DOHA: The Supreme Council of Health (SCH) has warned against import and use of Oxy Elite Pro Capsules, a weight loss food supplementary product for its potential health hazards.
The SCH move follows similar warnings issued by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) earlier this week that these products were linked to an outbreak of liver illnesses, including one death.
Enquiries in the local market yesterday revealed that the products are not being widely sold in Qatar.
“We are not selling these products. They might be available with pharmacies catering to sports clubs, health clubs and dietary clinics,” said a pharmacist.
Last month, the FDA warned USPlabs, the dietary supplement maker that it deemed OxyElite Pro and another of the company’s supplements, VERSA-1, to be adulterated because they include an ingredient called aegeline.
The FDA said it considers aegeline, a compound found in an Asian tree, to be a new dietary ingredient that lacks a history of use or other evidence of safety in the United States before 1994, a key regulatory date for grandfathering supplements.
USPlabs disagreed and on November 4 sent a response letter to FDA saying the compound has been used safely for centuries. Still, the company said it was discontinuing use of the ingredient in the United States because of negative publicity.
The company said it had destroyed its distribution center inventory of all supplements containing aegeline and would be reformulating the products.
The FDA in its November 6 letter to USPlabs told the company that a review of liver illnesses reported in Hawaii indicate a connection to the OxyElite Pro products now being recalled. The Peninsula
