Trade Groups Ask States To Keep Consumer Health Industry Lights On During Covid-19 Pandemic

“We have a responsibility to stay open and provide essential services, and that is exactly what we are going to do,” says NPA head Dan Fabricant. AHPA, CHPA, CRN and UNPA ask all US states to include VMS retailers and other nutritional supplement stores as part of “critical infrastructure” the Trump administration said must continue operating as the country responds to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Allowing vitamin, mineral and supplement producers and retailers to remain open as the Covid-19 pandemic heightens consumers health concerns is a hot button for industry trade groups, including one asserting rather than requesting that its members’ stores continue operating.

“We have a responsibility to stay open and provide essential services, and that is exactly what we are going to do,” said Natural Products Association president and CEO Dan Fabricant on 20 March.

On the same day, other trade groups submitted a letter to all US states asking the governors to include VMS retailers and other nutritional supplement stores as part of “critical infrastructure” the Trump administration that must continue operating as the country responds to the Covid-19 pandemic. The administration’s “Coronavirus Guidelines for America” released on 16 March include “healthcare services and pharmaceutical and food supply” as parts of critical infrastructure, stated the American Herbal Products Association, the Consumer Healthcare Products Association, the Council for Responsible Nutrition and the United Natural Products Alliance in the letter.

“We strongly agree that food and healthcare product manufacturers have a central role to play in the fight against this pandemic. Provided employers comply with [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] guidelines to protect workers, food and healthcare product manufacturers have the special responsibility to maintain their current work schedules,” the four trade groups said.

"It is vital for key industries like food and health care product manufacturing, including dietary supplement facilities, to be considered essential as these sectors produce products that promote better health and provide consumers with critical nutrients they need every day.” – CRN CEO Steve Mister

They asked each state’s Covid-19 response plan “mirror the White House/CDC guidelines” and “make special accommodation for critical infrastructure industries that specifically include not only conventional foods but all subcategories of food, including dietary supplements, infant formulas, medical foods and spices and flavors.”

The groups pointed out that shelter-in-place ordinances imposed on 16 March across six counties in the San Francisco Bay area with nearly 7m residents “include exceptions for essential activity broadly, and for grocery and other retail food outlets and healthcare operations specifically” as well as for “the companies that supply these consumer-facing operations.”

One of the four groups, CRN, also has signed onto a letter from groups representing a broader swath of food, beverage and consumer packaged good manufacturers making a similar request to states.

Additionally, CRN joined AHPA and CHPA in a letter from health care groups to states suggesting language for shelter-in-place ordinances that would allow medical service and product providers and distributors to continue operating and alleviate consumer confusion about using health care services, including shopping at VMS stores.

“To the extent shelter-in-place orders are issued, we believe they should include appropriate exemptions for employees of health care entities,” the health care groups stated.

The AHPA/CHPA/CRN/UNPA letter to governors points out CRN’s latest annual survey found that 77% of US consumers use VMS products for overall health and wellness benefits, provide energy, support immune health, fill nutrient gaps, support healthy aging and support heart health among other reasons.

“We believe it is vital for key industries like food and healthcare product manufacturing, including dietary supplement facilities, to be considered essential as these sectors produce products that promote better health and provide consumers with critical nutrients they need every day,” said CRN president and CEO Steve Mister in a release.

NPA Expands Covid-19 Work

Acting on its own, NPA on 18 March asked governors to deem health food stores selling nutritional supplements as essential businesses during the Covid-19 pandemic and to allow them to federal Economic Injury Disaster Loan assistance. (Also see "Supplement Sellers Are ‘Essential’ Businesses During Pandemic, NPA Appeals To States" - HBW Insight, 18 Mar, 2020.)

Two days later, Fabricant said NPA members won’t wait for state government approvals to stay open.

The trade group noted Department of Homeland Security guidance and President Trump’s declaration that workers in critical infrastructure have a “special responsibility” to continue working.

It said its members would remain open at the discretion of business operators during the Covid-19 public health crisis, “including thousands of health food stores in Pennsylvania, California, and Miami-Dade, FL whose elected officials have balked at” the administration’s declaration.

NPA’s letters to governors were part of its Covid-19 work that also includes educating lawmakers, briefing media and providing resources for industry, including a website that will become a “clearinghouse” of information on the outbreak.

Another part of NPA’s pandemic-related work is offering to assist producing and distributing medical supplies during the pandemic. In a 20 March letter to Vice President Mike Pence, the trade group said some members have appropriate federal, state and local inspection requirements to produce not only VMS products, but also drugs and other FDA-regulated commodities.

“We stand ready to assist with any uncertainty related to this capacity as the administration responds to this crisis,” said Fabricant in a release.

(All of HBW Insight's coverage tracking responses by the consumer health and beauty product industries to the Covid-19 pandemic caused by a novel coronavirus is compiled on this page of our website.)