A WIDE range of natural food and vitamin supplements used by millions are set to be banned from high street shops.

Ministers are introducing regulations that will outlaw the sale of 270 minerals and vitamins used by people suffering ailments from arthritis to PMT. They want to bring Britain in line with new European Union rules based on tougher standards in other EU countries where many of the substances are already banned.

The move has, however, provoked a furious political backlash by opposition peers who will try to block the regulations in the House of Lords tomorrow. They claim it is an unjustified curb on consumer choice and are backed by a host of celebrities including Sir Paul McCartney and Sir Elton John.

Earl Howe, the shadow health minister, said: “This is a civil liberties issue. If consumers can’t go out and buy things that do them good just because of the nanny state then that is a very sorry state of affairs.”

The substances on the new proscribed list are used in hundreds of multivitamin and food supplements. Holland & Barrett, the health chain, said it would wipe out sales of at least 1.5m bottles a year worth £6m.

Among the minerals affectted are boron, mainly used to maintain healthy teeth and bones, sulphur, used for skincare and arthritis, and vanadian for reducing cholesterol and fighting diabetes. Other products such as vitamin B6, for countering stress and PMT, and vitamin C, used to tackle infections and colds, as well as zinc, to protect the immune system, will only be allowed to be sold in far lower doses than now.

Under the law, manufacturers of banned products would have to prove they were safe, which would require tests that they claim would make them “prohibitively expensive”.

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