Public consultation on the draft opinion on the relationship between intake of alpha-lipoic acid (thioctic acid) and the risk of insulin autoimmune syndrome

EFSA has launched an open consultation on its draft opinion on alpha-lipoic acid (ALA). Following a request from the European Commission, this document of the EFSA Panel on Nutrition, Novel Foods and Food Allergens (NDA) discusses data on the relationship between intake of alpha-lipoic acid (or thioctic acid) and the risk of insulin autoimmune syndrome (IAS) and investigates whether a dose may be set below which ALA added to foods is not expected to cause IAS in the general population or in vulnerable subgroups. This request refers to the procedure under Article 8 (2) of Regulation (EC) No 1925/2006 on the addition of vitamins and minerals and of certain other substances to foods.

Interested parties are invited to submit written comments by 25 February 2021. Please use the electronic template provided to submit comments and refer to the line and page numbers. To submit additional data to support your comments or files, there is an upload feature available in the tool (for a maximum size of 1Mb file). Otherwise you can also contact the Nutrition Unit’s functional mailbox nda_admin [at] efsa.europa.eu (nda_admin[at]efsa[dot]europa[dot]eu).

Please note that comments will not be considered if they:

• are submitted after the closing date of the consultation
• are presented in any form other than what is provided for in the instructions and template
• are not related to the contents of the document
• contain complaints against institutions, personal accusations, irrelevant or offensive statements or material
• are related to policy or risk management aspects, which are out of the scope of EFSA's activity.

EFSA will assess all comments which are submitted in line with the criteria above. The comments will be further considered by the relevant EFSA Panel and taken into consideration if found to be relevant.

Copyright-cleared contributions

Persons or organizations participating in a Public Consultation of EFSA are responsible for ensuring that they hold all the rights necessary for their submissions and consequent publication by EFSA. Comments should inter alia be copyright cleared taking into account EFSA’s transparency policy and practice to publish all submissions. In case the submission reproduces third-party content in the form of charts, graphs or images, the required prior permissions of the right holder(s) should have been obtained by the PC respondent.

Publication of contributions

Contributions will be published and may be re-used by EFSA in a different context. It should be noted that contributions submitted by individuals in a personal capacity will be published as such, indicating the author’s first and family name, unless a substantial justification for protection is provided by the respondent. Contributions submitted on behalf of an organisation are also made publicly available and attributed to the organization in question.