Health-related claims in food supplements endorsements: a content analysis from the perspective of EU regulation

OBJECTIVES

Based on the legal framework regulating the advertisement of food supplements in the EU, the aim of this article is to analyse the relationship between the presence of endorsers, the different types of health-related claims (H-RCs) and product content information.

STUDY DESIGN

We applied a quantitative approach based on the content analysis of all radio spots broadcast throughout 2017 on full-service radio stations in Spain.

METHODS

A corpus of 10,556 radio spots was obtained of the three radio stations with the highest audience levels (165 without repetitions). We incorporated data on the accumulated broadcast frequencies to supplement the content analysis specific to each radio spot with its weight in relation to the overall advertising discourse. We developed a coding scheme to assess the type of endorser, the types of H-RCs, and the product content information.

RESULTS

Results show that European directives are breached in different ways. Healthcare experts prevail in disease claims, although they are prohibited. Celebrities are the most widely used endorsers (25%) in the function and reduction of disease risk claims. In addition, although these types of claims require substantiation by authorised ingredient, 73% of H-RCs lack this information.

CONCLUSIONS

The high presence of illicit H-RCs and endorsers, such as physicians, and the omission of compulsory product information suggest that public administrations must apply stricter monitoring and sanctioning mechanisms to dissuade advertisers from further breaches of the law and to protect consumers. Implications for public health policy are made.