Lot's Wife Edition 1 2017

Healthy Skepticism
edition one
lot’s wife
Health advertising, like any other advertising, is meant to be compelling. Health
ads may promise to fix anything and everything, to entice you to hand over exorbitant
amounts of money. Adverts for health products and services, however, come with an extra
proviso: they not only have a financial influence over consumers but dangerously sway
community perceptions around healthcare.
Like me, you may remember this unfortunate billboard (pictured) or its more explicit
companions from when you were just old enough to vaguely understand what it meant.
Due to this insensitive advertising, provocatively preying on the fears of men, the
Advanced Medical Institute pocketed several millions selling their shonky products and
services. AMI was receiving 7,000 calls a week allowing for thousands of clients to be
locked into deceptive contracts for products that were not only ridiculously marked-up,
but scientifically ineffective compared to mainstream medications. Whilst the Advertising
Standards Bureau banned the billboards in 2008, only recently was the entire AMI charade
legally unmasked. In 2015, AMI was charged with unconscionable conduct in the Federal
Court against the ACCC (Australian Competition and Consumer Commission) and ordered
to halt advertising and providing services.
You would think that the problem was solved. Sadly, it wasn’t. Despite this official
ruling, a simple trip to the AMI website reveals the serious limitations in the regulatory
framework.
Misleading Advertising
As educated university students, why should we give a second thought to this little
anecdote about an obvious scam? Well, firstly because the conduct of AMI is merely
symbolic of the ridiculous behaviour which pervades the world of health advertising. Many
health-related businesses have little regard for consumer protection when promoting
their products, which results in a widespread culture of routinely deceiving consumers for
financial gain.
You may recall Reckitt Benckiser was recently fined $6 million for their blatantly
deceptive marketing of Nurofen as ‘targeted pain relief’ for period pain or back pain. Many
consumers opted for these ‘targeted’ products, unaware they had simply paid an outrageous
premium for the same active ingredient in a normal Nurofen tablet. It was an evil but easy
way for an already enormously wealthy company to make a profit anew.
The same goes for companies like Swisse, whose products are ‘based on scientific
research’ but their trials are generally self-funded and non-transparent. This is because it
is more economical to pay for Nicole Kidman’s star power in your ad campaigns and sign
million dollar partnerships with La Trobe, ABC and CSIRO, than scientifically prove your
products.
The list continues with modern health hacks and fads, such as giving your gut a charcoal
cleanse (yummo) or the IV vitamin clinics that have been in and out of the news, being
promoted as the cure for a hangover.
Plot twist: sticking liquid vitamins into your bloodstream is a dangerous placebo
with little or no scientific basis. And sure, charcoal cleansing ‘works’ – because they use
charcoal in hospitals for drug overdoses to ‘get rid of the toxins,’ it will certainly work for
your ‘toxins’ too. Unfortunately, it seems the human body is not quite that simple. This,
however, doesn’t prevent people from making their fair share of cash out of pseudoscience.
A Failing System