Bill to Limit Diet Pill Sales Moves Ahead : Assembly: Legislators approve a measure to ban over-the-counter purchases of weight-loss drugs by minors.

By JERRY GILLAM

May 3, 1991 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

SACRAMENTO — Over objections that the measure is unnecessary and “paternalistic,” the Assembly on Thursday approved a bill to prohibit the sale of over-the-counter diet pills to minors without a prescription.

The bill, by Assemblyman Bruce Bronzan (D-Fresno), was sent to the Senate on a vote of 50 to 16.

Bronzan said the diet pill restriction would prevent injury and in some cases the death of young people who overdose on the pills in their efforts to lose weight.

“Diet pills can kill,” the Assemblyman said. “I don’t think it is ethical to promote weight loss by the use of potentially dangerous chemicals,” Bronzan said. “We should be educating children to practice dietary self-control, maintain a healthy lifestyle and exercise regularly.”

He noted that most of the opposition came from the diet pill manufacturers whose businesses would suffer from a sales ban in California.

One opponent in the Legislature, Assembly Republican leader Ross Johnson of La Habra, called the bill “paternalistic nonsense” because it implies that people under the age of 18 are incapable of making up their minds about diet pills, but can vote for President and serve on life-or-death juries when they turn 18.

“In the name of common sense, vote no,” Johnson counseled.

Another foe, Assemblyman Richard Mountjoy (R-Monrovia), said it is absurd to tell teen-age girls they may not buy diet pills on their own but allow them to obtain an abortion without parental consent.

But Bronzan said there were special inducements for teen-agers to use the pills despite the dangers. He cited youth magazine advertisements that carry the message “you gotta be thin to be somebody.”

“Allowing body-conscious adolescents to buy diet drugs is tantamount to telling them that a healthy lifestyle can be found in a pill,” he said.

The bill imposes civil penalties ranging from $200 to $1,000 for first through third offenses of selling or giving the diet pills to anyone under the age of 18 without a prescription.

Sellers would have to post conspicuous signs in their places of business advising consumers of the terms of the bill.