Ensure Nutrition Drinks Healthy Claims and Added Sugar Class Action

Abbott Laboratories makes Ensure Nutrition Drinks, which come in different varieties, flavors, and forms, but which all bear the claim, “#1 Doctor Recommended Brand.” Abbott makes other claims for the drinks as well, such as “Complete, Balanced Nutrition for everyday health,” but the complaint for this class action alleges that the company makes the drinks sound healthy, even though they contain significant amounts of sugar.

The class for this action is all persons in the US who bought, for personal or household use and not for resale or distribution, any of the Ensure Nutrition Drinks, between October 6, 2018 and the date a class notice is sent out in this case. California and New York Subclasses have also been defined for those in the above class who are in California or New York, respectively.

The Ensure Nutrition Drinks include the following varieties, in various flavors:

• Ensure Original Nutrition Shake
• Ensure Complete Nutrition Shake
• Ensure Enlive Advanced Nutrition Shake
• Ensure Compact Therapeutic Nutrition Shake
• Ensure Clear Nutrition Drink
• Ensure Original Nutrition Powder

Various pages in the complaint show images of the containers for these drinks, bearing claims such as that the drinks are “advanced nutrition shake[s],” that they are “Complete, Balanced Nutrition,” or that Abbott “Recommend[s] 2 bottles per day as part of a healthy diet.” Besides its more general health and wellness claims, the complaint alleges, “Abbott markets certain Ensure Nutrition Drinks as providing specific benefits, like supporting immune, heart, and digestive health.”

But the complaint points to the amount of sugar in the drinks—anywhere from 9 to 22 grams per serving, with anywhere from 16.4 to 40% of their calories from sugar.

But the complaint makes a number of allegations against sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs):

• That they are not healthy.
• That they are associated with higher risks of cardiovascular heart disease and mortality.
• That they impair the immune system.
• That they harm digestive health, including harm from added sugar to the gut biota and gut barrier.
• That they are associated with higher risks of obesity.

According to the complaint, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has proposed “a limit on the amount of added sugars in foods bearing the nutrient content claim ‘healthy’…” This limit, the complaint claims, would “limit[] added sugar to just 5% of calories, or 2.5 grams, in individual foods marketed as healthy due to their nutrient content.”

Other organizations, such as the World Health Organization, the American Heart Association, the Heart and Stroke Foundation, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, also recommend limiting added sugar and/or avoiding SSBs.

The complaint therefore calls Abbott’s representations about the drinks “false and misleading.” For example, the complaint alleges that following Abbott’s recommendation to drink two bottles of the beverages per day “would cause consumers to exceed the daily sugar intake levels recommended by authoritative health bodies to prevent harm to health.”

Article Type: Lawsuit
Topic: Consumer
Tags: Breach of warranty, Deceptive Advertising, Deceptive Labels, False Health Claims, Hiding Sugar, Negligent Misrepresentation