After my diagnosis with breast cancer in 2003, I saw firsthand my fellow cancer patients being targeted by alternative medicine practitioners. These poorly trained people claimed that they knew the secrets of preventing cancer, had a cure for it, and had a product that would prevent our cancers from returning. My local support group would invite these so-called “natural therapists” to our meetings. The patients, sometimes connected to drainage tubes, occasionally bald, and often with desperation on their faces, would sit on the edges of their seats listening to the slender and attractive naturopath—or the wizened and aged homeopath—who offered them hope without proof, at considerable cost, at a time when they felt abandoned by their faith or by medical science.

The underlying message was that we, ourselves, had caused our disease—eaten food cooked in a microwave oven, used margarine, eaten meat or genetically modified food, or didn’t eat organic food; the list was long. Week by week, the guilt in each of these women grew. One naturopath assured me that she would not get cancer—but if she did, she would cure herself.

In Australia, patients are well looked after. Women are encouraged to check themselves regularly for breast lumps. If we find one, we get free mammograms. If cancer is detected, there is a follow-up call during which our disease is explained in simple language. From then on, we receive support from our doctors, oncologists, radiotherapists, and the rest of the therapeutic team. Help is always available. We are also told the five-year survival rate for our type of breast cancer. Treatment is free, and survival rates are good. I was given hope that I would be one of the nineteen out of twenty who would survive. It helped me cope.

We were also given brochures for families and friends offering suggestions for our loved ones on how to help us cope with the looming months of treatment. We could even ask for a breast-care nurse to “hold our hand” for as long as we felt the need. We were encouraged to go to a free “Look Good, Feel Better” group where we had fun trying on wigs and practiced using free makeup. But for many, this is not enough.

I noticed once that my oncologist seemed extremely interested in what I had to say. I asked her if I had suddenly become “interesting.” She responded, smiling, that she was monitoring me for any signs of depression! She explained that it was common, and women are good at hiding it. This made their personal treatment journey more difficult. I have only praise for those who supported me through my own journey.

‘Saving Mankind’

Even before my diagnosis, I had taken exception to magnetic mattress underlays. Costing hundreds of dollars, these underlays are nothing more than a standard underlay with some magnets stitched into them. They were relentlessly advertised as treating not only pain but all sorts of other illnesses, and these advertisements target some of our most vulnerable citizens, including our seniors.

Having majored in physics, I found these advertisements so painfully annoying that I decided to challenge them. I bought a few magnetic underlays from my local flea market (at much reduced prices) and a meter to measure magnetism. About two centimeters above the magnets, the reading was zero. I set up two small underlays—one with four jelly beans and the second with four magnets taken from an underlay—covered them with a piece of fluffy sheep skin, and handed “the meter” to true believers. I never had to explain whether or not magnetic therapy worked: zero is zero. They were convinced.

It was several years after my treatment before I felt mentally strong enough to get back to my attempts at “saving mankind.” Being a cancer survivor with a science degree gave me credibility, so I invented the “Jelly Bean Lady.” The media loved it. My first television appearance dressed as the “Jelly Bean Lady” challenged magnetic therapy. I encouraged people to “pop on a fridge magnet” if they wanted to try magnetic therapy. It went well.

Radio, television, magazines, and conferences followed. I was even invited a few times to go undercover for the A Current Affair TV program to expose “cancer cure” charlatans. I contacted Australian Skeptics and asked for help. When I needed anything—from legal advice to an expert for my radio segment—Australian Skeptics would soon call me back. Being on radio and TV is a great way to reach a large audience. Interviewing medical professions—such as a professor of medicine, a pharmacologist, or someone running clinical trials—helped me stay on the radio for more than two years. Where I could get my foot in the door, I did. Good topics, great guests, and a few games kept my segment interesting. This was the case until the sports season—then it was suddenly gone.

The Australian Skeptics also published several of my articles, including “Sex, Drugs and Rock ’n’ Roll,” “My Magnetic Personality,” “Intelligent Design: Only a Man Would Think So!,” and “Naturopaths: We’re Dying to See Them.” I had never written before my cancer diagnosis, but with the confidence gained from these publications, I went on to write articles for Crikey, MJA Insight, and pharmacy journals. I even had several articles in the Royal Automobile Club of Queensland magazine. I have also been published by, and interviewed for, overseas journals, including the BMJ and HealthWatch-UK (now HealthSense). I was featured in national and state-wide magazines and newspapers and have spoken at conferences across Australia and New Zealand—and in Brazil. Thanks to Susan Gerbic and her amazing Guerilla Skepticism on Wikipedia team, I now have my own Wikipedia page!

I was invited to write a chapter in Professor Ian Olver’s book Perspectives on Complementary and Alternative Medicines. At that time, Olver was CEO of the Cancer Council Australia. I have received two Australian Skeptic of the Year Awards (2007 and 2011). I was awarded the Order of Australia Medal (OAM) in the General Division of the 2014 Australia Day honors in recognition of my service to community health.

Taking on Therapeutic Goods

The Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) is our regulator for all goods that make therapeutic claims. Since 2005, I have challenged homeopathy, herbal remedies, weight-loss and any other pills, pads, lotions, and potions that, although lacking credible evidence, were listed with the TGA. I also challenged “energy medicine” devices that were listed with them. Every removed advertisement and every canceled device gave me hope that I could make a difference.

In 2008, I worked with Dr. Ken Harvey on “Commercialism, Choice and Consumer Protection: Regulation of Complementary Medicines in Australia.” Using TGA-listed weight-loss goods as an example, we showed that the “controls on the supply and promotion of complementary medicines in Australia are weak” (Harvey et al. 2008). In 2009, I worked with a team to review of the quality of complementary medicine information resources (Mcguire et al. 2009). This provided databases that people researching complementary medicines could use with confidence.

In June 2010, I noticed the chain pharmacy at my local shopping center had a near life-size cardboard cut-out of cricket superstar Glen McGrath standing at the entry to their store. McGrath was promoting vitamins, the sales of which would go toward the McGrath Foundation.¹ Unfortunately, vitamins help cells grow and might also help cancer cells grow, so patients are encouraged not to take them (Cancer Council NSW n.d.). I immediately drove home for my camera. Later that week, I challenged the McGrath Foundation, sending a report to every board member and a journalist. That particular campaign soon disappeared.

Taking on Registered Practitioners

In July 2010, the Australian Health Practitioners Regulation Agency (AHPRA) was set up “to help protect the public by regulating Australia’s registered health practitioners.” From that time, chiropractors became registered health practitioners. For the next five months, AHPRA received a monthly report from me on chiropractors’ activities—each containing hundreds of images from chiropractic websites. Topics included anti-vaccination statements; inappropriate courses (which gained chiropractors the professional development points they are required to obtain to remain registered); techniques on how to target young families and images from magazines targeting young families; claims of cures for children with asthma, allergies, bedwetting, colic, ear infection, and autism; and so on. Primarily consisting of images from websites, names, addresses, and contact details, each report took me a week to prepare.

In November 2010, I was invited to speak at the international The Amazing Meeting conference that was being held in Sydney. There I met Simon Singh. I followed closely the court case in the U.K. when he was being sued by the British Chiropractic Association (BCA) for comments he made in the media. I spoke to him about my work on chiropractic. I also told him how his court case had affected my work in that the U.K. professors who usually helped me asked not to be quoted for fear of a libel action in a London court. When he returned to England, Singh interviewed me for his article “Nick Clegg’s Civil Liberties Speech Strikes a Welcome Blow against Libel Tourism” (Singh 2011). He won the case against the BCA, but it cost him £100,000 and two years of his career.

Following my reports, in February 2011, I received an email from AHPRA inviting me to meet their lawyer to talk about my work. She assured me that what I was doing was important, but I needed to be patient because AHPRA was new and court cases would not be able to proceed until they had built up a body of evidence. I agreed with her, but as I traveled down in the elevator from her office, I wondered why chiropractors were targeting children.

It was two days later that I realized that they must be teaching it in our universities. I wrote to the health minister, asking her to shut down the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) Paediatric Chiropractic Clinic. This gained international attention. The academic running the degree left the RMIT and became a member of the Board of the Chiropractors Association of Australia (CAA). This group represents the majority of chiropractors and supports the concept of the “disease-causing,” nonexistent “vertebral subluxation complex.”

FSM: The Beginnings

In mid-2011, the CAA advertised, on behalf of Central Queensland University (CQU), a position of project leader for their new chiropractic degree. I warned Professor John Dwyer that the disgraced RMIT academic would get the job. He did. Within a week of this CQU announcement, Professors John Dwyer, Rob Morrison, Alastair MacLennan, and Marcello Costa came together. A letter signed by more than thirty academics, mostly professors, asking them to rethink introducing that degree, was sent to CQU. They ignored it, but the letter received media attention.

Dwyer suggested that the five of us form an organization. If we could get thirty professors to support our cause, why not 1,000? We agreed; within two weeks, Friends in Science and Medicine (FSM) was born. Launched December 20, 2011, the aim of FSM is to foster good science in medicine. The Australian Skeptics had just written an article on pseudoscience-based courses in our universities. We wrote personalized letters to all the vice chancellors who were hosting these courses, asking them to remove them. We also challenged the Private Health Insurance Funds, which were including naturopathy and other pseudoscience-based interventions in their coverage.

Professor Alastair MacLennan coordinated the FSM Pathology Advisory Group, which includes distinguished pathologists from New Zealand. Results of pathology tests are often the basis for important decisions in health care. The report “Recommendation for Pathology Tests in Australia” (FSM Pathology Advisory Group 2013) is supported by the Royal College of Pathologists Australasia. We developed a modus operandi for dealing with AHPRA. We bombarded them and the Chiropractic Board with hundreds of practitioners websites’ false claims. All needed investigation, overburdening the few AHPRA staff. Over the next few years, we provided many hundreds of examples of fraudulent advertising by osteopaths, acupuncturists, TCM (traditional Chinese medicine) practitioners, and some medical doctors.

We achieved a major reform when the deluge led AHPRA to appoint a senior executive to oversee them. Complaints about advertising led to a requirement that registrants respond within six weeks and stating the remedial action taken. Although positive, it could not change what a practitioner might actually do.

FSM soon turned its attention to the acupuncture scam. Marcello Costa’s neuroscience expertise was invaluable. He wrote a review on acupuncture, “Is There Any Place for Acupuncture in 21st Century Medical Practice?” (Friends of Science in Medicine 2016), which was endorsed by the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.

Most acupuncture is offered by TCM practitioners, but some registered doctors and physiotherapists offer it as well. “Credibility” had been provided by WHO’s listing some 160 diseases/problems proven to respond to it. The underpinning theory is nonsense (i.e., not science). No well-performed studies prove that “the perfect theatrical placebo” can alter any pathology. FSM campaigned the WHO, and they eventually removed all the links from their website that claimed that acupuncture was proven to be effective.

In 2007, prior to the creation of FSM, I had challenged a range of energy medicine devices that were legitimized by TGA listing. It took three years, but they were removed. However, some remained, including the BICOM. As time went on, additional devices were also listed.

In 2019, following a campaign by FSM, the TGA commenced work on a sector-wide compliance activity relating to the advertising of “bioresonance” devices, which are sometimes mistakenly promoted as “biofeedback devices.” As a result of their internal investigation, more devices were delisted (Therapeutic Goods Administration 2019). In January 2022, FSM launched a second campaign against “energy medicine” devices, documenting claims made on hundreds of websites. In March 2022, we were notified that they were “working with an external provider to procure an intelligence product to progress its bioresonance compliance project.” We anticipate that more devices will be canceled from their register and more advertising will be removed.

In 2012, FSM was awarded the Australian Skeptic of the Year Award.

Importance of the Media

From the beginning, my aim was to get published in mainstream media, initially as myself and later as part of FSM. Every time I read a newspaper article that quotes a professor, pharmacist, or other medical expert, I track down the person’s email. These included Professors John Dwyer, Alastair MacLennan, and Edzard Ernst, who continue to be called upon to comment in the media, both here and overseas. They have always been willing to provide me with comments and offer support.

FSM, or its executive members, have been in the media nearly 200 times in the past five years. If they are not being interviewed as experts, they are writing articles. From my initial dealings with the media, I have learned that journalists need a good story, so collecting data or ideas for them and providing high-profile experts might encourage them to write one. There are several ways a journalist can get expert advice. FSM is often contacted to provide experts for topics relating to alternative medicine, but for all articles relating to science, there is also the Science Media Centre. It is a great shame more journalists do not take advantage of these free resources, but perhaps their newspaper’s advertising income takes precedence.

Change of Leadership

In 2019, the four professors, Friends for Science in Medicine’s original cofounders, stepped down and became consultants. I remain as the chief executive officer. Having worked with him since 2006, I was delighted that Associate Professor Ken Harvey agreed to take on the position of president. The new executive members are Professor Paul Rolan, Professor Hubertus Jersmann, Dr. Paulina Stehlik, Dr. Ian Musgrave, and Kurt van Ryswyk. With so much misinformation and big profits from alternative interventions, it is unlikely that FSM will become redundant for years to come. We have recently challenged intravenous vitamin infusions, laser vaginal rejuvenation devices, and the food/medicine interface. We have exposed several alternative medicine practitioners who have been publishing COVID-19 misinformation and anti-vaccination statements.

As to our future, to quote our new president:

The peddling of unproven and sometimes dangerous remedies has existed throughout human history. There will always be companies (and individuals) who put the pursuit of profit before ethical behaviour. There will always be advocates for de-regulation and regulators captured by industry. To protect consumers, there must be opposing forces. That is the role FSM is proud to play, along with colleagues from the sceptical community and consumer movement.

Note

1. After the death of McGrath’s first wife to breast cancer, the McGrath Foundation was set up to raise money to fund McGrath Breast Care Nurses.

 

References

Cancer Council NSW. N.d. Vitamin supplements and cancer risk. Online at https://www.cancercouncil.com.au/cancer-prevention/diet-exercise/nutrition-and-diet/vitamin-supplements-and-cancer/.

Friends of Science in Medicine. 2016. Is there any place for acupuncture in 21st century medical practice? Online at https://www.scienceinmedicine.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/Acupuncturereview.pdf.

FSM Pathology Advisory Group. 2013. Friends of Science in Medicine (FSM) recommendations for pathology tests in Australia. Online at https://www.labtestsonline.org.au/lto_au/media/images/FSM-pathologyrecommendations.pdf.

Harvey, Ken J., Viola S. Korczak, Loretta J. Marron, et al. 2008. Commercialism, choice and consumer protection: Regulation of complementary medicines in Australia. The Medical Journal of Australia 188(1): 21–25. Online at https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18205557/.

Mcguire, Treasure M., Julie Walters, Angela J. Dean, et al. 2009. Review of the quality of complementary medicines information resources. ResearchGate (January). Online at https://www.researchgate.net/publication/239821133_Review_of_the_quality_of_complementary_medicines_information_resources_Summary_report.

Singh, Simon. 2011. Nick Clegg’s civil liberties speech strikes a welcome blow against libel tourism. The Guardian (January 7). Online at https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/libertycentral/2011/jan/07/nick-clegg-civil-liberties-libel-reform.

Therapeutic Goods Administration. 2019. TGA cracking down on non-compliant advertising of bioresonance and similar devices (press release) (August 16). Online at https://www.tga.gov.au/bioresonance.

Appendix

Friends of Science in Medicine Activities and Outcomes (often in association with others), 2011–2021:

• Removal of extravagant claims for acupuncture from the World Health Organization website and instigation of a WHO evidence review.
• Involvement in the 2015 Review of the Australian Government Rebate on Private Health Insurance for Natural Therapies. This led to the removal of coverage for therapies that lacked evidence, such as homeopathy, iridology, reflexology, and naturopathy (which is currently being reviewed again to see if additional evidence exits).
• Removal of unproven/disproven courses or modules from Australian universities.
• Removal of continuing professional development (CPD) points required annually by all registered practitioners for several alternative medicine courses.
• Following complaints to the TGA, removal of some illegal medicines not on the Australian Register of Therapeutic Goods (ARTG).
• Following complaints to the TGA, delisting of some complementary “medicines” and “medical” devices (such as bioresonance machines) that lacked evidence for claims.
• Getting the TGA to declare that two products, self-declared “Foods for special medical purposes,” were illegal therapeutic goods and to remove them from the marketplace.
• Publishing academic articles in peer-reviewed journals documenting regulatory problems investigated and solutions suggested.
• Publishing articles on current problems in lay media, including The Conversation, MJA Insight, and Pearls and Irritations (around 200 over the past five years).
• Responding to consultation requests from the TGA, Medical Board (AHPRA), National Medicines Policy Review, and others.
• Registration suspension of anti-vax chiropractor Simon Floreani.
• Stimulating the Chiropractic Board to publish standards on pregnancy and pediatric care.
• Responsible for setting up AHPRA’s “Advertising Compliance” section, including their pilot auditing system (yet to report).
• Responding to requests from many journalists for information.
• Correction of misinformation from the Victorian government’s Better Health Channel.
• Providing an avenue for people who want to remain anonymous to complain.