Mr. Speaker, melatonin burst on the alternative medical scene with a flourish. Produced naturally in the brain of humans it has claimed to have benefits for jet lag-something MPs know about-and aging, which no politician needs worry about.
The health protection branch in Ottawa says this natural product has not been studied enough to guarantee that it is safe. No evidence of direct harm, mind you, after millions of doses.
Its solution is to ban the sale of melatonin in Canada. However, it allows the purchase of three month's personal supply from the U.S. Recently health food stores in B.C. have been charged for this infraction.
If melatonin is really unsafe, ban it. If it is okay to buy melatonin from the U.S., let it be sold by Canadians. We thought jobs, jobs, jobs meant jobs here at home.