It was never illegal. I used to manage a GNC in the early 90's and from what we were told, there was one bad batch of the amino acid (sometime in the 80's) which came from Japan. This one bad batch is what made the news due to some illness/sickness reported from using it. Of course, the mainstream media blew it out of proportion and made it sound like tryptophan was dangerous. I remember taking amino acids back in the 80's (because I didn't know any better) and my mother freaked out that I was going to die....LOL!
I could be mistaken on my facts about the bad batch from Japan, but for some reason I recall this very clearly. If I have my facts screwed up, someone please correct me.
Gumbo
You are correct. The contaminated batch from Japan was widely distributed in many different products, and caused some 1,500 cases of eosinophilla-myalgia syndrome (EMS), which is gobbledegook for high eosinophilla (a type of cell in the immune system), with muscle pain. No joke: it was implicated in more than a dozen deaths.
The contaminated tryptophan was traced to a Japanese company, and the contaminant identified by Dr. Kasunori Sakimoto. Amino acids are made by bacterial fermentation. Use of a new strain of bacteria the fermentation, produced along with the tryptophan, the compound 1-methyl-1,2,3,4-tetrhydro-beta-caroline-3-carboxylic acid. It is toxic to evryone, but in sensitive individuals causes the serious disease EMS.
Hope this helps
Nice to see it making a comeback.
