Government’s Health Star Rating Website Taken Down Hours After Release

If you were hoping to check out the government’s new website explaining its upcoming food and drink “Health Star” rating system, you had a chance to see it on Wednesday. However, the site is now no longer active after a decision was made to pull it down.

Image: Department of Health

If you try and hit up the site now, rather than a regular 404, you’ll just get a brief message declaring it as unavailable.

A story on the ABC by Amy Bainbridge mentions that the version of the site made public was a “draft” and the fact it was published at all was due to an “inadvertent error”, according to a Department of Health spokesperson.

Despite any problems the site may have had, Michael Moore, CEO of the Public Health Association, had the opportunity to poke around and didn’t have any concerns. From the ABC piece:

“The website came up and I checked through it and thought it was really going to be useful for industry who wants to use it and for consumers that can then understand about the healthiness of their food … And then of course I was disappointed about seven or eight hours later when it came down.

Moore goes on to mention he’s heard “a number of reasons” as to why the site disappeared, but nothing definitive.

Currently there isn’t a timeline as to when the site will reappear, but I imagine we’ll be able to make do for now.

Health star rating website for food and beverages disappears 24 hours after being published online [ABC]