The Future of Health Regulation and Why You Should Care

Wednesday, December 13th 2006

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If you are involved in the natural or complementary health fields in any way you should by now have heard about the ANZTPA proposal.

Just in case you haven't, ANZTPA, also known as the TTTGA, is the body the NZ and Australian Governments are hoping to set up which would hand control of all New Zealand's medicines, natural products and medical devices to the much hated Australian TGA which would re create itself as an international agency. From Australia and around the world there is a sense of disbelief that New Zealand would let itself get hijacked by a system like the TGA and yet that is just what our current Government has made clear it is hell-bent on doing, at any cost.

The Government has one major problem however - the opposition to this proposal from industry and consumers, on both sides of the Tasman, has grown so strong that Labour simply can't get the support it needs to make ANZTPA a reality.

The opposition politicians have all seen what the Labour Government refuses to see; that ANZTPA would devastate New Zealand's health industries and ultimately work against the New Zealand consumer.

For five years the New Zealand Health Trust, the Charter of Health practitioners and others have worked tirelessly on this and are tantalizingly close to what will be an incredible victory. I say 'will' because we know that the final nail is just about ready to be hammered into the coffin of ANZTPA. Despite frenetic last minute spin and attempted back room deals, the fact remains that the National Party, New Zealand First, the Greens, and ACT have all pledged their unconditional opposition to the joint agency the Governments has outlined. Between them these parties represent a majority in Parliament and the only way ANZTPA could happen now would be for one of them to be prepared to trade off the welfare of New Zealand businesses and consumers for some political gain. Given how public an issue this has become and how wide spread the opposition to it, we remain confident that none of these parties would be so foolish.

We do hear though that the Government intends to introduce the ANZTPA legislation soon, almost definitely before Christmas. If they don't then we will know that to all intents and purposes we have won. If they do then they will meet a public wave of opposition the likes of which New Zealand politics may never have been before.

When the NZ Health Trust received indications that the Government intended to introduce the legislation earlier this month we urged our supporters to let their MP's know what they thought of this. In just few hours the response had been so massive that the email facility had to be directed away from Parliament to prevent their server crashing and our own server did crash. As NZHT website space was over quota, many people were unable to use the facility for one night.
But now that defeating ANZTPA is so close, what next? Well during our time working in opposition to ANZTPA, several things have become clear:

1) The health industry generally, but particularly the natural health industry, is facing serious threats from a number of directions. ANZTPA is just one such threat. If these threats are not countered then the ability of individual consumers to take responsibility for their own health and make their own decisions from a range of effective and safe treatments will be seriously diminished, if not destroyed.

2) Change has to occur at the regulatory level to ensure all businesses are able to operate in a fair and reasonable way without double standards or pharmaceutical bias. There needs to be controls on bureaucracy to ensure that large companies do not achieve monopolies by regulation. There also needs to be a system that encourages innovation and demands accountability.

3) To act as an effective lobbying force the natural health industry needs a single umbrella entity that has as its only focus to act as a regulatory watch-dog without hidden agendas. While the industry continues to act through many separate bodies it is difficult to create and coordinate an effective plan, meaning nothing worthwhile can be achieved and the industry leave itself open to attack from the better-organised pharmaceutical sector and bureaucracy.

4) We believe that the NZ Health Trust, along with the Charter and others, have been very successful to date in preventing ANZTPA coming into effect. However, for the Health Trusts part it recognises the limits of what it is able to do. The major limit is that as a charitable trust there is no ability for supporters to 'join' the Trust. So, whilst the Trust has acted with wide ranging support it can never be the truly representative body that the industry so desperately needs.

While the fight against ANZTPA will continue, it has become apparent to us that the future lies in confronting the above realities by creating an umbrella group that represents the entire health sector including businesses and consumers alike that can act in a watchdog manner without any self-interest.

To this end, the NZ Health Trust has spent considerable time and money over recent months creating NEW HEALTH NEW ZEALAND.

New Health is an incorporated society, which all interested people and groups are encouraged to join. It aims to ensure regulations are effective to protect the consumer while still encouraging innovation and accountability. Because it is only interested at the regulatory level, competing businesses and groups with different focuses can all be a part of it without in anyway affecting their day-to-day operations.

New Health has been created with a series of entrenched principles, which guide the work of the organisation so that all members can be confident that the group will not be 'hijacked' or work for anything that is inconsistent with the basis on which they joined. In this way it is unique. New Health will be run by a national committee, it will set annual work plans and provide regular reports to members. It is envisaged that the committee will be made up of representatives from various industry areas to ensure full NZ wide representation.

New Health is in an unrivalled position. It's up and running and is spear headed by a fully functioning website (www.newhealth.co.nz) which provides the main public interface. New Health is able to utilise all the skills and expertise of the New Zealand Health Trust and most importantly the initial funding of the group is already in place. The creation and funding of this organisation is the gift of the New Zealand Health Trust to the people of New Zealand to meet the very real need the Trust has identified as set out above. We are delighted that the Charter of Health Practitioners became one of New Health's earliest member groups proving its commitment to its own members and to the future of health in New Zealand. New Health already has well over 22,000 members and is only just beginning.

So for the future the answer is both simple and complex. The simple answer is that before anything else can work, health regulations must be right. To protect the consumer and enable practitioners and businesses to carry out their proper function without monopoly control, good regulations are vital. Bad regulations though can do just the opposite. If health regulations don't se the proper framework then all of the other good work within the health industry is stifled while only the big few prosper.

The complex part of the answer is understanding how you make sure regulations work for us and not against us and how you safeguard those regulations against future manipulation. That is the challenge for New Health and it is a challenge it is ready for. New Health is already working with many other groups both in New Zealand and around the world to address just these issues.

Now we know as well as anyone that regulations just aren't that exciting, we'd be the first to admit that it's pretty hard to get revved up about the wording of one law over another, but in fact that's why things have got to where they are. Perhaps for too long ordinary people haven't paid too much attention to health regulations assuming that that is what the Government is there for, to look after all that for us. Well that should be their job only it doesn't appear to be working like that.

The ANZTPA fiasco may turn out to be a great thing for New Zealand because it has been the catalyst for so many ordinary New Zealanders to understand not only the importance of health regulations in determining our future, but that we can't simply sit back and assume Governments will always act in the best interest of the consumer. If they did so, ANZTPA should never have come up for serious consideration.

Now that the public consciousness has been raised we need New Health as a genuinely independent body to act as the voice of the consumer. So if you have ever asked yourself "what can I do, I'm only one person?" here is the answer. Be becoming a member of NEW HEALTH you are playing your part in securing the health freedoms of New Zealand. You will be kept informed on a regular basis and given the opportunity to participate in national and local events. All you need to do in return is keep your details up to date. Best of all it costs nothing to join.

Have faith, the future of health in New Zealand is NOT FOR SALE. There are too many good people just like you who care about protecting our freedoms for future generations for that to ever be allowed to happen. When all those people come together under New Health defeating ANZTPA will be just the beginning. New Zealand led the world when it became the first country to give women the right to vote, then it led the world again in declaring itself to be nuclear free. Now it will lead the world once more by developing a health system based on what genuinely provides the best outcomes for the consumer and not what commercially or politically influenced regulators may decide between themselves that you can or must have. Without doubt, the application of this principle will see the Natural Health sector flourish and regain its rightful place in all health matters.

It is called Consumer Empowerment and it includes an understanding that being responsible for looking after our own health is the most fundamental of human rights and includes being aware of the life we live, the food we eat and world that we live in.

Source, The New Zealand Charter Journal, Volumne 2 No.2, Spring 2006

Footnote from Ideal Health

Related articles can be found here:

Allison Roe Speech , June 16th 2006

Bitter pill: Govt surrenders $200m industry to Australian control

Complementary Health Response Disappoints Sue Kedgley

Govt Suffers Setback on Trans-Tasman Plans

NZ Health Trust Newsletter

Pharmac Warns Huge Fees Will Price Medicines Off the Shelf

Rules Body 'Will Limit New Drugs'

Speech by Green Health spokesperson Sue Kedgley to the Natural Healthcare Policy Debate

The latest on the ANZTPA proposal and the Therapeutic Products and Medicines Bill

 

If you need help or advice, you are welcome to email our naturopathic team with your health question.

Disclaimer: The health information presented here has been written for the New Zealand health consumer. It is of a general nature and is only intended to provide a summary of the subjects covered. The information is not intended to be comprehensive or to provide medical advice to you. While all care has been taken to ensure the accuracy of the information, no responsibility or liability is accepted, and no person should act in reliance on any statement contained in the information provided. All health ailments should be treated by a qualified health professional.

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