"Let your food be your medicine, and your medicine be your food!"

This Hippocrate’s saying dating back to around 460 B.C. has remained topical until present: indeed, proper nutrition creates the foundation for good well-being. Since then, the knowledge about the effects of nutrition on health status has increased considerably. According to research data, inappropriate nutrition accounts for more than half of deaths in Germany.

Many scientists and members of medical associations think that the available food products contain sufficient amounts of vitamins and mineral substances, and, therefore, food additives are, in principle, not necessary. Also, they argue that naturally occurring vitamins in their whole nutrient matrix are better absorbed and processed by the body than the synthetic products. The questions that remain are whether or not the ingredients contained in the available food products are still “natural”, and whether or not the available food products contain, apart from vitamins and mineral substances, the “alive” ingredients, including bacteria, so necessary for intestinal functioning and metabolism. Only several decades ago, most people used as food the immediate products of gardens and fields. These products were subjected to no (or nearly no) processing. At present, we import vegetables and fruit from the other side of the ocean. Often, they are picked immature and, therefore, contain greatly diminished amounts of nutrients. Agricultural intensification has resulted in soil leaching. However, any plant is able to produce sufficient amounts of nutrients only if it has been cultivated on fertile soil. With all the abovementioned taken into account, moderate and accurately selected addition to food can be reasonably considered as expedient.

Also, the following can be said about the effective legal norms:
according to legal definition, food additive is a kind of food whose designed purpose it to serve as an addition to general food. Any advertising implying a disease or a treating effect is forbidden for use with respect to food additives or any other food products. Phrases relating to curing or disease amelioration or prevention, as well as references to physician’s recommendations, expert opinions or positive statements of food additive efficacy, are forbidden. The products whose advertising mentions their healing effects shall be regarded as drugs and supplied with the appropriate certificate permitting their use. On July 25, 2007, in Leipzig, the Federal Administrative Court issued a decision establishing that the products launched as food additives shall be categorized by authorities and agencies as drugs only if substantial research studies have provided evidences that these products cause significant effects on human body functioning. Nevertheless, the situation remains quite equivocal, and everybody who claims effects when advertising a food product or a food additive is balancing on the edge of a legal conflict. Thus, there arises the question of the reasons for such a great attention attracted by food products, which shall not, according to law, cause any effects on the body. Otherwise, indeed, food products would have to be regarded as drugs, wouldn’t they? It has been known for six thousand years already that nutrition forms the basis of health. Each piece of food consumed by us causes biological and medical effects on the body. This fact, unfortunately, is completely ignored by legislators.