Not food, not medicine: Understanding dietary supplements

Type “asthma cures” into your favorite search engine and you'll discover thousands of high-tech hucksters claiming their “all natural” cures for asthma ranging from ginger water to exotic tree bark from the Philippines. The proliferation of Web sites touting “miracle cures” for asthma and allergies that work in as little as one week dovetails with a growing interest in legitimate complementary and alternative medicine (CAM). In its 2005 report titled, Complementary and Alternative Medicine in the United States, the Federal Institutes of Medicine reports more than one-third of adults state that they have pursued some form of CAM treatment, such as herbal remedies and acupuncture.