Yahoo – AFP,
December 14, 2015
Sydney (AFP) - Nurofen feels pain in Australia over misleading claimsdrug giant Reckitt Benckiser was Monday ordered to pull some of its popular Nurofen painkiller brands off shelves in Australia after a court ruled they made misleading claims.
Sydney (AFP) - Nurofen feels pain in Australia over misleading claimsdrug giant Reckitt Benckiser was Monday ordered to pull some of its popular Nurofen painkiller brands off shelves in Australia after a court ruled they made misleading claims.
Australia's
consumer watchdog took court action in March, disputing Nurofen packaging that
products in its Nurofen Specific Pain range were formulated to treat different
types of pain, when the active ingredient was identical.
The Federal
Court ruled the British-based multinational engaged in misleading conduct with
the main ingredient, 342 milligrams of ibuprofen lysine, the same in all the
products with none any better at treating one type of pain than others.
It ordered
that Nurofen Back Pain, Nurofen Period Pain, Nurofen Migraine Pain and Nurofen
Tension Headache be removed from retail shelves within three months and packets
amended.
The court
also ordered it to pay the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission's
(ACCC) costs and publish online and newspaper corrections.
Nurofen
denied it deliberately deceived consumers but consented to the court orders.
"Nurofen
did not set out to mislead consumers," spokeswoman Montse Pena said in a
statement.
"Nurofen
has cooperated with the ACCC in relation to these proceedings and will fully
comply with the court order made today."
The ACCC
said the company took advantage of people's medical ignorance for profit.
"The
ACCC took these proceedings because it was concerned that consumers may have
purchased these products in the belief that they specifically treated a certain
type of pain, based on the representations on the packaging, when this was not
the case," chairman Rod Sims said.
"Truth
in advertising and consumer issues in the health and medical sectors are
priority areas for the ACCC, to ensure that consumers are given accurate
information when making their purchasing decisions."
In
Australia, Reckitt Benckiser markets and supplies a range of consumer health
and household brands, including Nurofen, Mortein, Clearasil, Finish, Airwick
and Gaviscon.
A hearing
will be held at a later undisclosed date to decide what fine the company faces.
No comments:
Post a Comment