The most asked question, and the one we cannot answer

It is the first thing almost everyone wants to know, and it is the one thing a seller may not tell you. Not because the answer is secret, but because the framework governing what may be said about a food product is explicit, and nothing is authorised.

That produces an odd situation: a category where the most common question is met with silence by compliant sellers and with confident answers by non-compliant ones. The confidence is not evidence.

This page explains what the rule is, why it exists, what it covers, what a seller can legitimately tell you instead, and where the question actually belongs.

⚠️ Scope. This page describes a process and what can be verified from documents. It does not describe what a product does to a person, gives no amounts, and does not replace a healthcare professional.

🔴 The rule

The register

The Union maintains a public register of authorised nutrition and health claims for foods. It is searchable and anyone can consult it.

How it works

A claim must be assessed and authorised before it may be used. Authorisation follows a scientific opinion on whether the evidence supports it.

What is listed for this substance

Nothing. No health claim has been authorised, which means every such claim made on a food product containing it is non-compliant.

What that is not

Evidence that the substance does nothing. It is a statement about which claims have completed an assessment process, and no more than that.

Why the framework exists

The problem it addresses

Sellers asserting benefits without evidence, which is a documented and recurrent problem across the whole food supplement sector.

The solution adopted

Requiring assessment before assertion. A claim must be shown to be supported before it may be communicated to a buyer.

Who assesses

The scientific opinion comes from the European Food Safety Authority; authorisation is a decision of the Commission and member states.

What it protects

The ability to trust a claim that is made. If any claim could be made freely, none would carry information.

What counts as a claim

Explicit statements

Anything asserting a benefit, in words, anywhere on the product or in its marketing.

Implied statements

Imagery, product names, condition references, and testimonials. The framework covers implication as well as assertion.

Why the wider scope

Because an impression can be built without a sentence. A page carrying particular imagery and language communicates a claim without stating one.

What that means practically

A compliant seller has a narrower vocabulary than sellers in most categories. It reads as unhelpful and it is the lawful position.

🔴 What a seller can tell you

The composition

What is in the product, in what quantity, from the certificate and the ingredient list. Fully verifiable.

The documentation

Which panels the certificate covers, which laboratory ran it, and whether the batch code matches.

The provenance

Where the material came from, which variety, and how it was processed, to the extent they know.

The practicalities

How to store it, what the format is, what the price per milligram works out at. All factual, all useful.

Where the question belongs

With a pharmacist

Readily accessible, qualified, and able to consider what else you take. For most people this is the right first conversation.

With a doctor

Particularly for anyone with a medical condition or taking prescribed medication.

Why not with a seller

Because a seller has a commercial interest, no clinical training, and no knowledge of your circumstances. Three reasons, any one of which would be sufficient.

What to expect

A professional answer may be that the evidence is limited or that it is not appropriate for you. That is a real answer and it is worth more than an enthusiastic one.

Reading a seller who answers anyway

What it tells you

That they are operating outside the framework. Whether or not the claim is true, the operation is not compliant.

Why that matters beyond the claim

Because compliance is a habit rather than a policy. An operation disregarding one framework is frequently casual about others, including the ones covering testing.

The correlation worth noting

Sellers who publish full certificates and say nothing about effects tend to be the same sellers. So do the opposite pair.

What to do with it

Use it as a signal about the operation, which is what it reliably is.

The techniques used to imply

Naming

Products named for a state or a condition, communicating a purpose the label never states.

Adjacency

Editorial content about conditions placed next to product listings, so the association is made by proximity rather than by assertion.

Third-party voices

Testimonials and reviews carrying claims the seller does not make directly. The framework counts communications by the operator as the operator’s own.

Study references

Citations to research, presented so that the reader infers a conclusion the seller has not stated.

The novel food question, separately

What it is

An additional framework: foods without significant consumption history in the Union before the reference date require authorisation before being placed on the market.

How it applies

Extracts and isolates fall within it, and the authorisation process has been under way for a substantial period.

What that means for availability

Enforcement varies between member states, and the market operates in a state that varies accordingly.

Why it belongs on this page

Because it is a second reason a seller’s vocabulary is constrained, and it is frequently confused with the claims question.

What research exists

That it exists

There is a substantial and growing scientific literature, and none of this page suggests otherwise.

Why it does not license a claim

Because a claim requires an authorised assessment of whether the evidence supports a specific statement for a specific purpose. Published research is an input to that process, not a substitute for it.

Where to read it

Public databases of scientific literature are freely accessible, and reading primary sources is always better than reading a summary written by someone selling something.

What to notice when you do

The population studied, the doses used, the design, and whether the finding was replicated. These determine what a study actually supports.

Why we hold this line

The obvious reason

It is the law, and it applies to us as it does to everyone selling in this category.

The better reason

Because the alternative — a market where anyone may assert anything — is one where a buyer cannot distinguish a careful operation from a careless one.

What we do instead

Publish what is checkable: registers, contents, certificates, arithmetic. It is less satisfying and it is the part that is actually reliable.

What that costs us

Sales, presumably, to people who wanted a different answer. It is the correct trade.

How to consult the register yourself

Where it is

A public database maintained by the Commission, searchable by substance and by claim type. It requires no account and no expertise.

What a search returns

Authorised claims, rejected claims, and the reasoning behind each decision. The rejections are frequently more informative than the authorisations.

Why the rejections are useful

Because they set out what was proposed, what evidence was submitted, and why the opinion concluded the evidence did not support the claim. It is the clearest available account of the state of the science.

What it takes

A few minutes. It is the single most direct way to check any claim you encounter, from any seller, in any category.

What an authorised claim looks like

The structure

A specific wording, tied to a specific substance, at a specific quantity, with conditions of use. It is far narrower than the marketing language it replaces.

Examples from other substances

Several vitamins and minerals carry authorised claims of this kind, phrased tightly and hedged carefully. They read nothing like ordinary supplement advertising.

Why they read that way

Because the wording is what the assessment supported, and no more. The precision is the point rather than a legal formality.

The contrast worth noticing

Compare an authorised claim’s phrasing against a typical product page. The gap between them is a good measure of how far the page has travelled from the evidence.

The enforcement reality

Who enforces

National authorities, with resources that vary considerably between member states and priorities that compete with everything else they oversee.

What that produces

Non-compliant claims persisting in the market, particularly online, for long periods. Absence of enforcement is not evidence of compliance.

Why that matters to a buyer

Because you cannot infer that a claim is lawful from the fact that it is being made. The register is the check, not the market.

What has changed recently

Increasing attention to online marketing across the supplement sector generally. The direction is toward more enforcement rather than less.

The question behind the question

What people usually mean

Not a pharmacological question but a practical one: is this worth my money, and will I notice anything.

Why that is also unanswerable by us

The second half is individual and clinical. The first half, though, is entirely answerable.

What we can answer

Whether a product contains what it says, at what price per milligram, with what documentation, from a seller whose paperwork is coherent.

Why that is worth having

Because a product that fails those checks is not worth buying regardless of what anyone believes about the substance.

What a good conversation with a pharmacist looks like

What to bring

A list of everything you currently take, including anything bought without a prescription, and the certificate or label of the product you are considering.

What to ask

Whether there is anything in your current medication that would make this a poor idea. That is the question they are best placed to answer.

Why the certificate helps

Because it states composition. A pharmacist can work with a number; they cannot work with a product name and a marketing description.

What you may hear

That the evidence is thin, that it is unlikely to matter either way, or that something in your medication makes it inadvisable. All three are useful answers.

The asymmetry that shapes this whole category

Claims are free and evidence is expensive

An assertion costs a sentence. An authorisation costs years and a dossier. That asymmetry is why the framework exists at all.

What it produces in an unpoliced market

Sellers competing on the confidence of their claims rather than on the quality of their products, because confidence is cheaper to produce.

Why the register interrupts that

By making the assertion the expensive part. A claim that has been authorised carries information precisely because getting one is hard.

What follows for a buyer

The absence of claims from a seller is closer to a quality signal than their presence. That is counter-intuitive and it is the right way round.

A short glossary

Health claim

Any statement, express or implied, that a relationship exists between a food and health. It requires authorisation before use.

The register

The Union list of authorised nutrition and health claims for foods, publicly searchable, containing nothing for this substance.

Implied claim

A claim communicated by imagery, naming, adjacency or third-party voices rather than by direct statement. It falls within the framework.

Novel food

A food without significant consumption history in the Union before the reference date, requiring authorisation before being placed on the market.

Scientific opinion

The assessment underlying an authorisation decision, examining whether the evidence supports the specific claim proposed.

The five checks that apply to any product

The batch certificate

Request it with the number printed on the packaging. A general document for the product line does not cover this batch, and those differences are exactly what it should record.

Total THC

Delta-9-THC plus THCA multiplied by 0.877, because THCA becomes THC under heat and the limit applies to the sum, not to either value alone.

Price per milligram

A division, not an opinion. The only figure that makes two products comparable, whatever the format, process and pack size.

The claims

Without an authorisation number in the EU Register these are assertions, not data — and for cannabidiol that register contains no authorised entry to this day.

The seller’s details

Company name, address and contact. Without them there is also no counterparty to turn to if something turns out to be wrong.

How this connects to the rest

With the medicines boundary

A claim can reclassify a food product as a medicine. The two frameworks meet at exactly this point.

With reading a seller

The presence or absence of claims is one of the more reliable signals about how an operation runs.

With the certificate

It is what a compliant seller has instead of claims, and it is checkable in a way claims are not.

With price per milligram

The arithmetic is the other thing that is fully knowable, and it is where a comparison can actually be made.

What this is for in practice

When a seller answers this question

They are outside the framework. Read it as information about the operation.

When you want an answer

A pharmacist or a doctor. Both are qualified, neither is selling you anything.

When you read a study reference

Read the study. Population, dose, design and replication determine what it supports.

When comparing products

Composition, documentation and price per milligram. Those are the three things that can be compared.

Frequently asked questions

Why will a compliant seller not answer this? Because only claims authorised in the Union register may be made about foods, and none is authorised for this substance.

Does that mean it does nothing? No. It means no claim has completed the authorisation process. It is a statement about the process, not about the substance.

Who decides what may be claimed? Authorisation is a decision of the Commission and member states, following a scientific opinion from the European Food Safety Authority.

Does the rule cover implied claims? Yes. Imagery, product naming, adjacency and testimonials all fall within it. An impression is a claim.

What can a seller tell me? Composition, documentation, provenance and practicalities. All of it verifiable, none of it about effects.

What is the novel food framework? A separate authorisation requirement for foods without significant consumption history in the Union before the reference date.

Is there research? A substantial and growing literature. Published research is an input to an authorisation, not a substitute for one.

Where should I take the question? A pharmacist or a doctor. Both are qualified and neither has a commercial interest in the answer.

What if a seller answers confidently? Confidence is not evidence. It indicates an operation working outside the framework, which is worth knowing.

Why does any of this matter to me? Because a market where anything may be asserted is one where you cannot tell a careful seller from a careless one.

What we check and what we do not

We check what can be checked from documents: official registers, declared contents, certificates of analysis, arithmetic. We test no products, rank nothing, and assert no effects.

This is the most frustrating page on the site, and deliberately so. The question is entirely reasonable, the silence is not evasion, and the register that produces it is public and takes a minute to consult.

What we can offer instead is everything that is actually checkable: what is in a product, what the laboratory measured, whether the arithmetic holds, and whether a seller’s documentation is coherent. It is a smaller offer than an answer to your question, and it has the advantage of being true.