Reckitt Benckiser, the maker of Nurofen, has been fined $1.7 million dollars for breaching consumer laws.

Last year, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) launched proceedings against the makers of Nurofen in the Federal Court.

Sections 18 and 33 of Australian Consumer Law prohibit businesses from:

• engaging in misleading and deceptive conduct; and
• engaging in conduct that might mislead the public about the nature, characteristics of suitability for purpose of goods.

Nurofen’s pain-specific range products promised to target back pain, migraine, tension headache and period pain and were packaged and marketed on this basis. However, all products in this range (which cost almost twice the price of ordinary Nurofen products) contain exactly the same active ingredient: ibuprofen lysine 342mg.

Given that it is not possible to specifically target pain, and that all products contain the same active ingredient, the ACCC found that all products did the same thing and were no more effective at targeting specific areas of pain.

Lawyers for Recktt Benckiser told the court that “rational” consumers would not think a pain-specific product was any more effective than a regular one.

The ACCC argued that Nurofen had made substantial profits from its misleading marketing and that the company should be slapped with a large fine of $6 million dollars.

The court found that Nurofen’s ‘pain-specific’ product range misled consumers, since they all contain the same active ingredients and do the same thing.

The key issue here is that if you thought you were buying a special product, and that product does not actually have a special quality, then you have been misled.

h/t ABC news.