Health on the Hill | Health Canada Moves to Outlaw Compounding

Many practitioners still compound remedies for individual patients. Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioners, herbalists, homeopaths, and naturopaths have long mixed natural ingredients to meet a patient’s specific needs. The Natural Health Product Regulations were written to protect this practice. Parliament was clear: Health Canada does not regulate compounding by health care practitioners. Yet Health Canada has now published a new policy designed to shut most compounding down. The policy invents conditions that do not exist in the law. Practitioners would be blocked if a similar licensed product is already on the market. Strict labelling, testing, and “palatable flavoured” requirements would be forced on them. Single-herb remedies would no longer qualify. Health Canada inspectors, who are not trained in medicine, would gain the power to second-guess clinical decisions and review patient files. None of these restrictions appears in the regulations. As a result, the policy is illegal. It also risks making compounded care uneconomic and unavailable for the Canadians who depend on it. ​NHPPA has already submitted formal comments opposing the policy​. Shawn’s full analysis lays out exactly how Health Canada is overreaching and what is at stake for practitioners and patients.