Commission Implementing Decision of 24 January 2013 adopting guidelines for the implementation of specific conditions for health claims laid down in Article 10 of Regulation (EC) No 1924/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council (Text with EEA relevance) (2013/63/EU)

3. Reference to general, non-specific health benefits – Article 10(3)

Article 10(3) allows the use of easy, attractive statements which make reference to general, non-specific benefits of a food for overall good health or health-related well-being, without prior authorisation, subject to specific conditions. The use of such statements could be helpful to consumers as they would convey more consumer-friendly messages. However, they could be easily misunderstood and/or misinterpreted by consumers, possibly leading to imagine other/better health benefits of a food than those that actually exist. For this reason, when referring to general, non-specific health benefits, it is required to accompany such references by a specific health claim from the lists of permitted health claims in the Union Register. For the purposes of the Regulation, the specific authorised health claim accompanying the statement making reference to general non-specific health benefits, should be made ‘next to’ or ‘following’ such statement.

The specific claims from the lists of permitted health claims should bear some relevance to the general reference. As this reference becomes broader, e.g. ‘for good health’, more health claims from the permitted lists could be eligible to accompany it. Still, attention should be paid to the fact that Article 10 sets rules as regards the context in which health claims are used and given that Article 10 specifically refers to the rules of Chapters II and IV, those rules should also be taken into account if operators wish to comply with the requirement laid down in Article 10(3). Therefore, to avoid misleading consumers, food business operators have the responsibility to demonstrate the link between the reference to general, non-specific benefits of the food and the specific, accompanying, permitted health claim.

Some claims submitted for authorisation during their scientific assessment were judged to be too general or non-specific for evaluation. These claims could not be authorised and can therefore be found in the list of the non-authorised claims of the Union Register of nutrition and health claims. This does not exclude that those claims could benefit from the provisions laid down in Article 10(3) and can therefore be lawfully used when they are accompanied by a specific claim from the list of permitted health claims in accordance with that Article.