According to the Los Angeles Times, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has warned producers of two popular brands of green tea drinks not to make unauthorized nutrient claims, continuing its clampdown on misleading food labeling.
September 10, 2010
According to the Los Angeles Times, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has warned producers of two popular brands of green tea drinks not to make unauthorized nutrient claims, continuing its clampdown on misleading food labeling.
In a warning letter to Dr Pepper Snapple Group, the FDA said the company’s Canada Dry Sparkling Green Tea Ginger Ale improperly claimed to be “enhanced” with antioxidants. Because it’s a carbonated drink and classified as a snack food, the beverage should not claim to be nutritionally fortified, the FDA said. In addition, ingredients purporting to contain antioxidants “are not nutrients with recognized antioxidant activity,” the letter said.
The FDA also asserted that a Web site for Unilever Inc.’s Lipton Green Tea 100% Naturally Decaffeinated made a health claim by linking consumption of green tea to reduced cholesterol for people at risk of heart disease. Making such a health claim makes the Lipton green tea a drug, subject to requirements for proving safety and effectiveness, the FDA told Unilever. The FDA also said the company’s description of the tea’s antioxidant content runs afoul of other federal wording rules.
Unilever is reviewing the letter and is “committed to full compliance with the law,” according to a statement from the Dutch company, which has U.S. headquarters in Englewood, N.J. spokesman for Plano, Texas-based Dr Pepper Snapple Group said the company was “looking forward to working with the FDA and addressing the issues raised.”
In an article in the Sept. issue of Scientific American—“Snake Oil in the Supermarket”—the editors stress that the FDA is too lenient regarding health claims and needs to follow EFSA’s lead and hold foods to the “same scientific standards as those for drugs.” The editors point to the numerous products on U.S. shelves that contain health claims that, while they may appear authoritative, in a lot of cases science doesn’t support the claims and the government doesn’t endorse them. What this inevitably does is give consumers a false sense of security.
According to the editors, holding health claims for food to the same scientific standards as those for drugs, and requiring manufacturers to convince the FDA of alleged benefits before releasing products for sale, would result in far fewer health claims on packaged foods. As they stated: “In 2006, Europe began holding food makers to rigorous scientific standards. Since then, the European Food Safety Authority has rejected, on the basis of insufficient evidence, a whopping 80% of the more than 900 claims they have assessed thus far.”
While some manufacturers have stated that it would cost too much money and take too much time to prove every claim, the Scientific American editors believe that with the current state of obesity in the nation, “unsubstantiated health claims on processed foods are a harmful abuse of science that we should not tolerate.”
Los Angeles Times article
Unilever warning letter
Dr Pepper Snapple Group warning letter
Scientific American article