Honey exporter caned for British ad's health claims

Friday, 8 January 2021

Britain is a lucrative market for New Zealand's mānuka honey.

Britain's advertising watchdog has ruled an ad promoting mānuka honey as a treatment for coughs breached its code.

A complaint upheld by the UK Advertising Standards Authority said a newspaper ad for New Zealand-based Mānuka Doctor should not have described the honey as a treatment for coughs and referred to its ''anti-microbial properties''.

Businesses are going to great lengths to keep fake honey off the market.

Britain's advertising code prohibits claims that state or imply a food can prevent, treat or cure human disease.

Karin Kos, chief executive of Apiculture New Zealand, said she did not think the ruling would be detrimental to New Zealand manuka sales in the UK, but it might mean exporters needed to be smarter about marketing.

Research has suggested that honey is not unhelpful when treating coughs.

* Manuka honey blog amended after claims of efficacy against Covid-19

* Mānuka honey producers support 'spiking' prosecution

''The food labelling rules are clear for honey that is produced as a food, but as medical-grade honey it has gained a global reputation for support for reducing infection, and it remains the most researched medical-grade honey in the world.''

Mānuka Doctor's ad stated that in the UK's ''current health conscious society'' there was ''a simple form of self-treatment'' for coughs that had the backing of government health watchdogs.

The ad told readers that “antibiotics alone will not prevent you getting a cough,’’ but ‘’honey can help with the symptoms,” and “a 10g spoonful of honey significantly reduced the frequency and severity of coughs within a day”.

Mānuka Doctor's British arm told the ASA that the ad had not claimed to ''prevent, treat or cure a disease'' because a cough was not a disease. It could be a symptom of some wider health conditions, but not all coughs were linked to diseases.

It also defended its description of mānuka honey as anti-bacterial or anti-microbial, saying it simply referenced peer-reviewed research.

However, the ASA ruled that the ad had broken its rules around food advertising. While Public Health England had recommended using honey as a first approach to relieving coughs, the code prohibited advertisers from stating or implying that a food prevented, treated or cured human disease in any circumstance.

Coughs were a symptom of a range of diseases, ''and in that context we considered the references to coughs would be understood as references to a symptom of Covid-19 in particular''.

The authority also believed the antibacterial/microbial claim would be interpreted by consumers as able to kill micro-organisms ''and therefore could both prevent those who consumed the products from contracting diseases caused by such microorganisms, and treat or cure diseases caused by such microorganisms''.

Marcus Rudkin, legal counsel for Mānuka Doctor, said the company was ‘’a little cross’’ with the ruling, as it had cleared it first with the UK trading standards authorities.

It would appeal the ruling, but there was no financial penalty.

Rudkin said the company would not be able to use the wording it used in New Zealand either, under current regulations around food and health claims.

It used them in Britain after a well-reported study by Oxford University about honey’s use for relieving the symptoms of upper respiratory tract symptoms, especially coughs.

The company tried to be very careful about its claims. ‘’The honey sells because it’s a product that people feel is good for them and that's all we generally need, but I guess we’d be pretty upset if we got singled out for this.’’

It also raised the issue of what exporters could generally say about mānuka honey. ‘’Certainly I think you’ll find most reputable companies, they're not making any claims on their mānuka honey, certainly in New Zealand. It depends on the different jurisdications and it can come down to words.

‘’We just go through the processes whichever country we’re going into and get sign-off, as in this case.’’

In its ruling, the ASA that because of the ban on food health claims, it had not assessed the evidence submitted to substantiate the ad's claims.

It instructed Mānuka Doctor to remove claims to prevent, treat or cure human disease from its advertising and Rudkin said it had not used the ad since.

Kos said that there had been some interesting international studies from reputable organisations on honey and colds recently.

Apart from the Oxford study, another had found that honey was better than nothing for childhood coughs but said there was no strong evidence for or against its use.

Kos said it was ‘’no less effective than some pharmaceuticals indicated for the same purpose’’.