Health claims in Brazil: helping the public or giving misleading information?
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5902/1983465925180Abstract
The first phase of this study consisted of reviewing the literature related to food labels and its national and international legislations. After that, selected pre-packaged food labels were analyzed in a supermarket situated in the city of Porto Alegre, south of Brazil, considering their nutrition and health-related claims (NHC). From that, the main objective of this study was to identify and analyze these claims. From the products comprised in 9 different food categories, 87 had at least one NHC and, therefore, composed the group of analysis. Most of the claims consisted of nutrition claims (66,53%), followed by health-related ingredient claims (20,34%) and health claims (13,14%). The most common nutrition claims consisted of vitamins (44,2%), with vitamin C representing almost a quarter of the vitamin claims. Regarding health-related ingredient claims, more than a half of them comprised of the lack of conservatives in the food. Health claims consisted mostly of subjective sentences implying that the consumption of the food in question was a "healthy choice" or "source of health". Consumers should know how to evaluate these claims when choosing a food product, avoiding possible misunderstanding.
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