Some good news from Germany: A court in the town of Darmstadt had to decide on a homeopathy product made at a nearby pharmacy (https://www.xn--homopathie-shop-btb.net/). The claim was brought in the context of ‘commercial competition legislation’.
The claimants asked that a specific homeopathic preparation, HCG C30 (a hormone in potency) should be banned from sale. Grounds: consumers might believe there is actual HCG in the product even though there is no measurable amount of the hormone in the product = ‘misleading claim’.
The judge threw out the case:
“The fact that, due to the extreme dilution, the material cannot be identified using current methodologies, does not mean that one can assume that the material is not, in fact, contained in the homeopathic drug. As consumers who buy homeopathics are open to its tenets, they are not being misled by this product. Critics of homeopathy may see this differently; however, this group of people are unlikely to use such products. Therefore, there is no case to answer.”
The judge also mentioned that, if the ruling had come out in favour of the defendant, it would have affected further homeopathic products. And this, the court argued, would not be in the interest of the consumer.
The case hinged on whether or not the label HCG C30 was misleading under consumer protection legislation. The judge asserted that it is not.