The U.S. Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act of 1994 established a framework for labeling and providing information about nutrition-related products, herbs and other botanicals. The act permits labels to contain a statement describing how the product affects structure and function or general well-being in humans, but not to make specific health claims. Consistency can be a significant problem with natural product-based products. Companies may not have rigid quality control standards to ensure the purity and reliability of the product. Clients expect foods to have important healing properties for a variety of reasons.
Foods have indispensable life giving properties, and many well-recognized deficiency diseases exist.
In addition to their physiological role as containers of nutrients, foods have important effects on psychological well being. They provide comfort during stressful times, enhance the pleasure of social gatherings, holidays and meetings, and serve powerful religious and cultural functions. Alternative and complementary therapies also excite interest. Some interest is based on results of clinical trials, as well as the desire for novel or exotic-sounding interventions. Some interest also may result from the anxiety that results from feelings of helplessness in the presence of a complex disease problem, frustration with the many limits of medical knowledge, and occasionally from superstitions and belief in miracles.