Good News In Nevada

AB289 (Dietitian Licensing Bill) was successfully amended

SB412 (Complementary Integrative Medicine Bill) did not move out of Committee.

Thank you to Nevada Assemblyman John C. Ellison for advocating for a last minute successful health freedom amendment that makes it clear that the Nevada Dietitian licensing bill AB289 will not apply to a person “who furnishes nutrition information, provides recommendations or advice concerning nutrition, or markets food, food materials or dietary supplements and provides nutrition information, recommendations or advice related to that marketing, if the person does not represent that he or she is a licensed dietitian or registered dietitian….”.

On May 30 th, AB289 passed both House and Senate and was enrolled. (Click Here to read the enrolled bill) The health freedom amendment was an important addition in the last committee. Assemblyman Ellison and his staff as well as Committee Chair Senator Schneider deserve congratulations on their work to listen to citizen concerns to the fast moving bill and find and accept a solution that would preserve and protect consumer access to so many nutrition practitioners who are currently practicing in the public domain and who do not intend to become Dietitians. Especially citizen Jim Jenks, herbalist and coordinator of Nevada Sunshine Health Freedom Foundation and Citizen Debbie Pawelek, owner of a local health food store, deserve our deepest thanks for their important lobbying and educational efforts on behalf of health freedom.

Nevada Sunshine Health Freedom Foundation and National Health Freedom Action’s Position on SB289: Nevada SHFF vigorously opposed what it deemed a monopolistic Dietitian bill as introduced because of its broad brush and regulation of the entire field of nutrition and healing and because it believes that the current title protection Dietitian Certification by the state of Nevada was the proper way to regulate a profession that shares information, unlike a profession that performs dangerous invasive procedures requiring licensure. However we are grateful for the amendment which provides protection for other consumer nutrition options.

Update on SB412: SB 412 passed the Senate but did not move out of Committee in the House. NHFA opposed SB412 because it required all persons practicing complementary integrative medicine, which was defined very broadly to include most all of natural health, to obtain a license. Nevada already has a restrictive homeopathic licensing requirement and SB 412 would have made a bad situation worse for natural health. We are grateful that it did not move forward and we invite the advocates for the bill to discuss language options with us before next legislative session.

Legislator Concerns about Process: The citizen push to stop AB289 and then to amend the bill had its ups and downs. Some legislators were upset and reported that they had received Robo calls and unwanted script calls on their cell phones and many calls with mis-information about the bill. NHFA did not participate in these types of activities and legislators appreciated our point position papers on the bill. Legislators firmly encouraged citizens to make sure they had read the bill before they call, join in the legislative process in positive ways, and respect legislators’ use of their own cell phones. NHFA is grateful to the entire citizen outpouring about these bills and hopes that citizens will remain involved in the legislative process in positive ways in their future successful efforts to protect health freedom.