Nagpur: With the aim of finding out whether nutraceuticals act as a booster to sportspersons, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is trying to collect samples of various nutraceuticals available in the market and sending them for testing of their ingredients.
It raided certain godowns of Herbal Life in city and seized material costing Rs17 lakh. Samples from this material have been sent for testing in the laboratory.
MS Deshpande, joint commissioner FDA (Food), told TOI that the sampling is being done to check the presence of any 'boosters' or performance enhancers in the nutraceuticals. The Food Safety Authority of India (FSAI) along with FDA is conducting a nationwide survey to check whether there are any performance enhancing elements in the health supplements.
"The National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) has found that certain athletes and players are testing positive despite not consuming any drugs. There is thus an assumption that the nutraceuticals might contain certain elements which act as boosters," said Deshpande. This particular lot was seized from Herbal Life's godown at 105, Royal House, Gajanan Nagar.
Deshpande said that as per labels on the containers of nutraceuticals like health supplements (personalized protein powder), proprietary food products (nutritional shake mix and nutraceutical (Herbal Control) have certain caffeine contents.
"We don't know whether the caffeine content is beyond the permissible limit of 300 ppm but we have sent samples for testing. And only certain beverages are allowed to put caffeine in their energy drinks and not all health supplement foods," added Deshpande.
Besides players a lot of younger generation is also consuming the nutraceuticals in the gymnasiums. Hence the issue gains more importance because of very high consumption of these health supplements in large quantities by young people.
The raid was conducted at the godown by a team of FDA officials headed by Deshpande and comprised FSO or Food safety Officer (vigilance) Abhay Deshpande, FSOs Pravin Umap, Seema Surkar and Kiran Gedam.
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