Bioidentical Hormones - U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging

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Our staff identified 34 Web sites with claims that alternative
natural progesterone creams and sprays were safe or would prevent,
treat or cure serious cancer, heart disease or osteoporosis. We
sent a warning e-mail to each of those site operators; the e-mails
putting them on notice that they must have substantiation for any
health claims that they make about their products and urging
them to review their product claims to make sure they complied
with the law.
Our staff recently conducted a follow-up review of those Web
sites and has continued working with companies to clean up their
claims. Fifteen of the 34 Web sites have either removed the claims
or no longer sell the products.
As I said, we are continuing to follow up directly with the remaining
sites, and our staff will be making appropriate enforcement
recommendations about those that do not comply with the
law.
The FTC's efforts to halt deceptive health-related claims online
are part of its larger program to combat Internet fraud. Since 1994,
the FTC has launched 538 law enforcement actions, garnering
nearly $1 billion in judgments against those who have used the
Internet to prey upon American consumers.
Online deception generally falls into two categories: old-fashioned
schemes that have simply migrated online and new high-tech
schemes that are unique to the computer age.
Spam presents a hybrid of the two. Spammers use low-cost new
technology e-mails to carpet consumers with old-fashioned deceptive
claims about everything from miracle cures to bogus investment
opportunities.
The FTC has pounded the pavement on the spam beat for over
a decade. Since 1994, we have litigated 89 actions against 241 defendants
in which spam was an integral element of the scheme,
and 26 of those cases use the relatively new Can Spam Act.
As technology and scams change over time, the FTC continues to
shift its resources and adjust its priorities, targeting those frauds
that cause the most harm to consumers.
False and misleading claims that affect consumers' health and
safety are prime targets, and they will remain prime targets, of the
FTC's enforcement efforts. We will continue our efforts to ensure
the truthfulness and accuracy of advertising for health-related
products, regardless of the medium in which those ads appear.
Thank you, again, for inviting us. I am happy to answer your
questions.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Harrington follows:]