14 The Hampton Roads Messenger Herbal Supplements


FROM PAGE 6


involving 78 samples were performed overall.


GNC: Six


herbal “Herbal Plus” brand


supplements per store were purchased and analyzed: Biloba,


Gingko St. John’s Wort, Ginseng,


Garlic, Echinacea, and Saw Palmetto. Purchased from four locations with representative stores in Binghamton, Harlem, Plattsburgh & Suffolk.


Only one supplement consistently tested for its labeled contents: Garlic. One bottle of Saw Palmetto tested positive for containing DNA from the saw palmetto plant, while three others did not. The remaining four supplement


types yielded mixed


results, but none revealed DNA from the labeled herb.


Of 120 DNA tests run on 24 bottles of the herbal products purchased,


DNA identification 22% of the time.


Contaminants identified included asparagus, rice, primrose, alfalfa/ clover, spruce, ranuncula, houseplant, allium,


legume, saw palmetto, and


Echinacea. Target:


Six “Up & Up” brand herbal supplements per store were purchased and


analyzed: Gingko Biloba, and St.


John’s Wort, Valerian Root, Garlic, Echinacea,


Three nearly supplements consistent showed presence of the


labeled contents: Echinacea (with one sample identifying rice), Garlic, and Saw Palmetto. The remaining three supplements did not revealed DNA from the labeled herb.


Of 90 DNA tests run on 18 bottles


of the herbal products purchased, DNA matched label identification 41% of the time.


Contaminants identified included


allium, French bean, asparagus, pea, wild carrot and saw palmetto.


Walgreens: Six “Finest


herbal Nutrition” brand


supplements per store were purchased and analyzed: Biloba,


Gingko St. John’s Wort, Ginseng, Saw Palmetto.


Purchased from three locations with representative stores in Nassau County, Poughkeepsie, and Syracuse.


matched label


Volume 9 Number 6


Garlic, Echinacea, and Saw Palmetto. Purchased from three locations with representative


stores in Brooklyn, Rochester and Watertown.


Only one supplement consistently tested for its labeled


contents:


Saw Palmetto. The remaining five supplements yielded mixed results, with one sample of garlic showing appropriate DNA. The other bottles yielded no DNA from the labeled herb.


bottles of herbal products purchased, DNA matched


allium, rice, wheat, palm, daisy, and dracaena (houseplant).


Walmart: Six “Spring herbal Valley” brand


supplements per store were purchased and analyzed: Biloba,


Gingko


Garlic, Echinacea, and Saw Palmetto. Purchased from three


locations with representative stores in Buffalo, Utica and Westchester.


None of the supplements tested consistently revealed DNA from the labeled herb. One bottle of garlic had a minimal showing of garlic DNA, as did one bottle of Saw Palmetto. All remaining bottles


failed to produce


DNA verifying the labeled herb. Of the 90 DNA test run on 18


bottles of herbal products purchased, DNA matched label representation 4% of the time.


allium,


Contaminants identified included pine, wheat/grass, rice


mustard, citrus, dracaena (houseplant), and cassava (tropical tree root).


investigation


The Attorney General’s follows an important


study conducted by the University of Guelph in 2013 that also found contamination


and substitution in


herbal products in most of the products tested. As was said at the time by a spokesperson for the University of Guelph, “The industry suffers from unethical


activities by some


manufacturers.” The market


dietary for herbal


supplements is significant. The Natural Products Foundation estimates that the


supplement


Research estimated there are about 65,000


Canadian dietary


supplements on the


market consumed by more than 150 million Americans.


That same study also found


that more than half of Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Class I drug recalls between 2004 and 2012 were dietary supplements. Class I recalls are reserved for drugs or supplements for which there is a “reasonable probability that [their use] will cause serious adverse health consequences or death.”


The Attorney General


thanks Dr. James A. Schulte II of Clarkson University in Potsdam, N.Y. for providing his expertise in DNA barcode testing for this investigation.


by Executive Deputy Attorney General


Mack


The case is being handled Marty


and


Assistant Attorney General Deanna Nelson with the assistance of NYAG’s thirteen regional offices.


Institutes industry


contributes $61 billion dollars to the national economy. A 2013 study from the


of Health


St. John’s Wort, Ginseng, geographic


Of the 90 DNA test run on 18 label


18% of the time. Contaminants identified included


representation


February 2015


Rabbi Helps Hispanics Connect with Secret Jewish Roots


BY ELVIN ALVES


EL PASO, Texas – Two days after Rabbi Stephen Leon moved to El Paso from New Jersey in 1986, he received an urgent phone call from a Roman Catholic man wanting to speak with him about a family mystery.


were


“He told me that his entire family religious


Catholics living in


Juarez, but he remembers ever since he was a little boy, 3 or 4 years old, his grandmother would take him into a room on Friday night,


light two


candles, and say a prayer in a language he didn’t understand.”


Years after


died, the man asked a priest what the tradition


actually


his grandmother meant.


The


priest suggested he contact a rabbi. The man told Rabbi Leon about his grandmother’s ritual and was surprised when Leon told him the tradition was of Hebrew origin.


Rabbi Leon asked him if he ever


traced his ancestry, to which the man responded that his grandmother’s family was originally from Spain.


Leon was familiar with Spain’s


history of persecuting Jews during the Spanish Inquisition in the 15th and 16th centuries. In 1492, the Jewish population of Spain was ordered by King Ferdinand and his wife Queen Isabella to convert to Catholicism or leave.


“During the Spanish Inquisition, there were many Jews that were forced to convert, and some of them converted openly but they kept their Judaism secretly and continued doing certain practices,” Leon said.


The expulsion came as a result of


growing fear that the remaining Jews that had not converted would influence those that had, to continue practicing Judaism.


Rabbi Leon said he was


approached two more times by people with similar stories concerning their ancestry in Judaism.


Curious about the number of Hispanics with Jewish ancestors in the Southwest, Leon attempted to find other rabbis who to see if they had experienced similar situations.


“I called all of the people that


I knew, and they got me in touch with one Rabbi, a Reform Rabbi in Phoenix, and I spoke to him and he told me that there were a few people in his congregation that had these roots as well, and that they had come back to Judaism. And so that was where it all started” Rabbi Leon said.


Since coming to El Paso, Leon


has continued to meet people in the community with similar stories, like Louie Saenz, news director for KTEP radio.


Saenz said he found out about his own Jewish heritage by accident.


“We were in San Antonio, at the


San Antonio zoo, and we saw a rabbi there. Apparently he recognized me from television or being on the radio and he asked me if I knew that I might be Jewish,” Saenz said.


“He told me about a website that had a list of Hispanic names, and if your name was on that list, then you had Jewish roots that you could track, and sure enough, I was there.”


had come from Spain and had been through


Saenz explained that his ancestors France, Cuba and Mexico


before settling in the U.S. But, there weren’t any family traditions he could think of that would have been a clue to their Jewish past.


“As far as Jewish customs, rituals, anything we’ve done in the past, I’m not aware of anything that my grandparents used to do.”


What began as a series of


coincidences became much more as Rabbi Leon began to do outreach to anyone wanting to know more about Jewish customs. For 11 years he has also hosted annual conferences for the Anusim.


“Anusim is the Hebrew word for


Crypto-Jew. Anusim in Hebrew means people that were raped or forced to do something against their will, and it is the belief that the Hebrews during the Spanish Inquisition were forced


realized his dream of opening an


Anusim Center in El Paso. It is at 401 Wallenberg, at the site of what used to be the El Paso Holocaust Museum before it was relocated downtown.


“It will be a place for people to


learn about this phenomenon, a museum, a place for people to trace their DNA, a place for programming on this subject,


and it will be


something that I think will, in this area between Juarez, El Paso, and New Mexico, probably bring about a new sparked interest in this subject called Crypto-Judaism.”


In June 2014, the Spanish government announced a bill that will give full citizenship to Hispanic people with Sephardic Jewish ancestry provided that their last name coincides with an official list of names. Leon thinks that this is an important step and that it’s also time that the Catholic church make some kind of recognition toward the atrocities inflicted on Jews during the Inquisition.


Leon estimates that he has


spoken with at least 60 families so far that have come back to Judaism and that the number continues to grow. He continues to offer services and information to those wishing to find out more about their Jewish ancestry, and even teaches a class on Judaism and the Holocaust at the University of Texas at El Paso.


“If there’s such a thing as a call by God, then to some extent, I feel this is my calling. Its become a very important part of my life,” Leon said.


Rabbi Leon can be contacted through his congregation’s website, congregationbnaizion.org. For more information on the Anusim Center you can visit anusimcenterrep.org or the Anusim Center facebook page, and cryptojews.com, for more general information


from the Crypto-Judaic Studies. Society of


to


give up their Judaism.” On August 10, 2014, Leon


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