Date: Mon, 24 Nov 2003 21:40:52 +0000 (GMT)
Dear Newsletter Readers,
1. I was contacted today by a leading attorney whose job it is to warn those who give advice related to health conditions on the internet. This is now illegal, unless you are a medical doctor. My website at
www.fms-help.com
is not in compliance with FTC regulations.
2. Beginning Jan. 1, 2004, the FTC will begin a "sting operation" where someone will email or call to ask for help with a health problem. Should the kind-hearted soul reply with some advice, they can be fined $250,000 - yep, that's a quarter of a million dollars(!) if they are not a medical doctor. I asked the attorney if the FTC would sue companies or individuals and was told that the FTC
isn't putting up with it anymore and that individuals will be sued.
3. Because of this, I can no longer trust that people who write to me are actually FMS/CFIDS sufferers. I will still be accepting email at [email protected] but may not reply.
4. The attorney was most sympathetic with the use of nutritional supplements, because of a family member with serious health problems that drugs couldn't help.
The person suffered serious side effects and is now using ONLY nutritional supplements and doing much better. The attorney even enthusiastically endorsed a popular
nutritional supplement in the course of our conversation.
5. The attorney said that Sen. Richard Durbin of Illinois is trying to get rid of dietary supplements and described him as "the meanest man on the planet." My husband looked up Sen. Durbin's website and found an email address to
write to him: [email protected]
My husband also found a good letter on the net at
http://joeclarke.net/vitamins.htm
(It's called, "Hey Government, Don't Take Away My Vitamins.") There are many more
letters out there too, I've found.
6. Well, I have been in tears and grieving the loss of the website and newsletter most of the day. I need to do something VERY QUICKLY about my website, but I
have no idea what! Please PRAY for me to know what to do! Many of you have been with me for years and we have had the most wonderful relationship of support and caring. I will always treasure that!!!
7. What happened to my freedom of speech?....Or is that only reserved for pornographers now?! How can I get information out to people with FMS/CFIDS, if I can't say
anything because I am not a doctor?!!?? I am stumped!
8. My monthly newsletter is really YOUR newsletter, because much of the information comes from you and I pass it on via the newsletter to others who suffer with FMS/CFIDS. This is now against FTC regulations and they will be enforced and I could be sued.
9. The information on my website at www.fms-help.com
has helped many people around the world and even prevented suicides. For the past 7 years, I have had calls and emails from thousands of people who desperately needed information and help in dealing with their fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue syndrome.
Their doctors have failed them and no one really understands what it's like unless you have these conditions yourself. When you consider that Dr. Kervorkian has "helped" 4 women with FMS/CFIDS to end their lives, you realize the desperation and hopelessness in the hearts of many with chronic "invisible" illness.
10. My FMS/CFIDS website has been on the net since 1996, but it appears to now be coming to an end. At the very LEAST, I will have to severely curtail the information I offer on my site in the next few weeks to avoid being fined. If there's anything you want on my site at
www.fms-help.com, you may want to print it out now
before it is taken down.
11. The attorney said that NO health condition can be mentioned along with a nutritional supplement or advice of some kind. For example, when I say in my tips site that magnesium helps the muscle stiffness of fibromyalgia, that
is a NO NO! All words have to be in "secret code" almost. Here are some examples:
You can't say A.D.H.D. - You CAN say "trouble concentrating". You can't say pain - You CAN say "discomfort". You can't say insomnia - You CAN say "difficulty sleeping". You can't say menopause - You CAN say "change of life". You can't say fibromyalgia - Now I'm really stuck! Maybe I should say--"severe discomfort in my body, count sheep all night, feel like an old lady, can't stand up for more than 15 minutes, think negative thoughts, have to lie down to rest frequently, can't stop my mind from thinking, have to go the bathroom a lot, etc."
12. See "Stop Senator Durbin's Ban of Health Foods" at
http://philadelphia.craigslist.org/pol/18242201.html
There are many more sites on the net about Senate Bill 722. Simply type in these words at
www.google.com
-- Sen. Durbin's ban on nutritional supplements bill--and you will get a lot of websites about this. I have already written a letter to Sen. Durbin and ask you to do the same if this crisis in American health is of importance to you.
13. I may be pulling my site down at
www.fms-help.comsoon so I can work on it to try to make it compliant.
That will be a mammoth job and I'm not sure that I have the time or skills to
do it. I am also concerned that if and when I relaunch it, it will say next to
nothing, like many other sites that have been targeted by the FTC. They have
been watered down to where there's almost no point in reading them.
14. I am especially saddened because helping fibromyalgia patients has been my life's work for the past 7 years and I believe was a calling from God. I was glad that my 14 years of suffering hadn't been in vain--that what I learned from dealing with FMS/CFIDS since 1982 could actually help other people to not have to go through all the torments of this illness that I did. But this
can no longer be.....and I don't know what to do with all the love and caring I feel in my heart toward those who are still suffering? I am in tears! How can I help if I can't say what helps??!! It is so confusing!
15. I will be giving much thought and prayer about what to do next.
Thank you for all your contributions in the past years to the newsletter. We sure have been a caring and supportive group of people and I have learned as much
from you as you have learned from me. The attorney told me that the newsletter had great information in it, but is illegal. Frankly, I don't know how to write a newsletter that uses only the "approved" language and never mentions advice or a nutritional product in relation to a disease condition. What about all those companies on the radio and TV who are marketing their brand of calcium for people's "osteoporosis"?? I presume they will also be targeted?
16. I feel that I am being muzzled. I hate it. I am hurting and confused. Thank you for your prayers for me to know what to do. If my website disappears for awhile and you don't get any more newsletters, it's because I am
either working on trying to make it compliant and still saying something of value, or I have given up on it. I had the December 2003 newsletter almost ready to go and
it's a great one! Was just putting some finishing touches on it, but will not be able to send it now, since the whole concept of the fibromyalgia newsletter violates the FTC regulations (of giving people advice for a disease condition when you are not a doctor).
I am open to any thoughts or suggestions you may have. I may not write back, but will be reading everything you write!
Faithfully yours,
Dominie Bush
904-291-4168
