Herbal Supplements?

The Associated Press has reported that four out of five bottles of the herbal supplements we buy do not contain a trace of the herb on their labels. Instead they contain cheap fillers like dirt and chopped-up weeds. But is this really a good thing?

My economic analysis shows that the sale of herbal supplements moves money from educated and thoughtful suckers to more canny types of capitalists. In the long run, that must work for everyone's benefit. It puts billions of dollars in the right hands.

Genuine herbs can be dangerous. Almost no one is harmed by swallowing small amounts of dirt and weeds. Some of our greatest athletes, football players, do this daily. Many of them live deep into their fifties.

In general herbal supplements attract and reinforce the optimists among us, people who plan to live forever, people who hope that Asian grandmothers know more about health than Western science.  I might not be among those people, but no one has rubbed more Tiger Balm on tummies than my family.