As I was doing my typical rounds visiting blogs, I stumbled across this post: FDA and Wilderness Family Naturals. It links to articles claiming the FDA Hits Small Family Food Ministry for $100K for HyperLinking to Health Research and urges its readers to

Help fight for our rights and freedoms in the US of America and join a 912 Project, Tea Party Group, or other group of your choice to protest the present government takeover of all our freedoms and property.

So, I thought I should investigate a little bit further. It turns out that in on November 9, 2005, the Food and Drug Administration sent a warning letter to Kenneth H. and Annette C. Fisher, Owners of Wilderness Family Naturals, concerning labeling violations with regard to Title 21 of the Code of Federal Regulations.

That letter listed dozens of violations, not only on their website, but on the labels of their products, including claims, “Clinical studies have associated kefir with many beneficial effects including … anticancer properties” and “This is a salve with tremendous anti-fungal and antibacterial properties. It can be used with wonderful success on athlete's foot, ringworm, and to prevent infections where the skin is broken. Besides containing Goldenseal root, this salve also has Tea Tree Oil and Grapefruit seed extract which are very good at fighting infection”.

Over three and a half years later, a consent decree was signed:

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today announced that Wilderness Family Naturals LLC of Silver Bay, Minn., and its owners have signed a consent decree that prohibits them from manufacturing and distributing any products with unapproved claims that the products cure, treat, mitigate or prevent diseases.

I have not been able to find why it took three and a half years to reach this agreement, or why the Fisher’s felt they had to spend approximately $100,000 in legal fees to get to the point where they agreed to not manufacture or distribute any products with unapproved claims that the produces cure, treat, mitigate or prevent diseases.

Yet all of this raises several questions. How far should the government go to make sure that misleading information is not presented that might cause people to buy products with false hopes? What is the best way for companies to make sure that they can market their products as honestly, fairly and effectively as possible?

Most of the blog posts about this that I’ve read so far misleading information by making claims that it was only about hyperlinking or that it was the FDA that was solely responsible for the $100,000 in expenses that the company owners racked up in legal bills. It is also worth noting that all of this happened while the FDA was under the control of a Republican President.

I do believe we need to protect our freedoms. Yet I believe that a bigger threat to our freedoms is the misinformation that is too often accepted as fact online, on talk radio and around the water cooler.