National Healthy Bones Week (NHBW), a health promotion initiative linked to the dairy industry is calling on cafes around Australia to offer free milk-shakes and smoothies as part of the ‘Free Shake Days’ promotion.

Dairy Australia, which has been organizing NHBW since 1994, is inviting cafes around the country to join a “mass milkshake giveaway”.

Participating cafes will receive free promotion at the special website, Facebook page and Twitter account. New and returning patrons will be encouraged to stop at their local café and take advantage of the free milkshake giveaway.

Nutrition Claim or Health Claim?

Some have claimed that Dairy Australia’s promotion of National Healthy Bones Week goes beyond the promotion of calcium as a healthy nutrient.  Arguably, the National Healthy Bones Week campaign encourages more milk to be consumed. The question raised is whether the campaign is promoting a food-related nutrition claim or health claim by consumption of dairy products in order to achieve the therapeutic outcome (“healthy bones”).

The Food Standards Code regulatory restriction came into effect about eight years after National Healthy Bones Week was first launched in 1994.

The making of health claims is the subject of an upcoming FoodLegal Symposium entitled: Health Claim Hazards: Navigating the Regulatory Minefield.  Registration information is available here.

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