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Karl Schembri
The Malta Chamber of Pharmacists welcomed the Department of Public Health’s decision to ban Blue Pain Relief adverts making unauthorised health claims after a year and a half complaining with the authorities.
“After months of continuous representations by the Malta Chamber of Pharmacists, we have the pleasure in announcing that FINALLY the Department of Public Health has taken action on these unauthorized health claims,” the Chamber said on its website in reaction to a MaltaToday story announcing the ban last month.
The department decided to ban the adverts last March in view of the unauthorised health claims made by the importer, Nidal Binni, during the commercials. Adverts promoting three other creams which allegedly cure psoriasis, eczema and haemorrhoids – also imported by Binni’s company called Made in America – were similarly banned by the department. None of the products imported by the company are certified as medicinals by the health authorities.
“Everyone has been complaining against those adverts since they started being broadcast 18 months ago,” the Chamber’s Secretary, Max Borg Millo, told MaltaToday. “We urged the authorities to stop this charade on ethical grounds. Those adverts were being marketed as a cure-all when they are not certified as medicinals.”
Borg Millo said the Chamber was joined by the GRTU section of pharmacy owners as well as by employed pharmacists in its protests with the Department of Public Health, the Health Department and the Medicines Regulatory Unit.
“To be fair, when we first complained the health authorities did not have the legal power to stop him,” he said. “The European Union’s legislation in this regard was still being drafted. Now it is illegal to make unauthorised health claims and we welcome the authorities’ decision.”
The products remain on the market and can also be found in pharmacies, but they cannot be advertised as medicinal products unless they are certified as such by the Medicines Authority and given marketing authorisation.
“We have no objections to the products themselves,” Borg Millo said. “What we object to is the unauthorised health claims.”
karl@newsworksltd.com
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