Health-claim regulations ‘too severe:’ think-tank

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This article was published 21/07/2009 (6199 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

CANADIAN regulations regarding health claims on food products are “too severe,” putting Canadian consumers and companies at a disadvantage to their American counterparts, according to Brett Skinner from the Fraser Institute.

Skinner, director of bio-pharma and health policy, said Health Canada should reform its policy, and look to the U.S. as a model. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has 27 permissible health claims. In Canada, however, standards only allow five advertising claims concerning reduced risks of disease, according to the report from the right-wing think-tank.

“Canadian consumers here are being denied,” said Skinner. “They don’t know about the potential health benefits of many food products because information can’t be printed on labels.”

Bruce Cran, president of the Consumers’ Association of Canada, said Canadians are “much better off” with the current, cautious approach. The liberal process in the U.S. allows room for claims to be made that are not necessarily justified, he said.

The U.S. employs a tiered “qualified health claims” system, where scientific evidence is used to rank a product. The assigned rank determines the wording that appears on a label or in an advertisement. Labels in the U.S. can say “very limited scientific research suggests” and “although there is scientific evidence supporting the claim, the evidence is not conclusive.”

The CAC has been involved in making recommendations to Health Canada’s Natural Health Products Directorate on which products should be allowed to make health claims. “There’s no reason we should follow American standards,” Cran said. “Some American consumer groups aren’t even happy with the amount of claims made on labels for foods.”

The author of the Fraser Institute’s report, Mark Brosens, conducted an analysis to determine whether Canadian and American advertising regulations were in line with scientific research found in a sample of 416 academic papers. He found 78 per cent of the scientific conclusions in the sample were in line with the five permissible Canadian health claims. Comparatively, 64 per cent of conclusions agreed with the 27 permissible American health claims. “Our restrictions are too severe,” said Skinner. “Americans have better and easier access to information about the relationship between diet and health.”

— Canwest News Service