Should EFSA Apply the Same Requirements for Scientific Substantiation to all Health Claims Covered by the EURegulation on Nutrition and Health Claims?

摘要

The European Food Standards Authority (EFSA) is currently applying similar scientific criteria for the evaluation of Article 13.1, 13.5 and 14 health claims, basing its approach on the Terms of Reference it received from the European Commission, and contending that its approach is similar to FDA (2009) and the Codex Alimentarius (2009). Although the approach selected by EFSA seems to have now been commonly admitted as the way to go for evaluating all health claims, irrespective of the category to which they belong, we contend that this does not result from a correct interpretation of Regulation (EC) No. 1924/2006 on nutrition and health claims made on foods (hereafter referred to as the "NHCR"). We will advocate in this article that, pursuant to theNHCR as interpreted in the light of the methods of interpretation employed by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), the scope of the mission of EES A in relation to the so-called Article 13.1 claims was clearly intended to be different fromthat in relation to the so-called Article 14 and Article 13.5 claims.