23 June 2025
While trawling alt-med websites for nonsense recently, I noticed a particularly egregious claim made by Ben Warren's BePure company for their multivitamin product, BePure One. The advertisement claimed that it was essential, and that people need to take it every day. Now it strikes me as surprising that any product would need to be taken by everyone, no matter their situation - especially as alternative medicines are not only unproven, but they're often also pretty expensive. BePure One, for example, is $69 for a month's supply - not nice, especially as most people who eat a balanced diet don't actually need a multivitamin, as they're getting everything they need from their food.
13 September 2021
This week NZ Skeptics submitted our view on the Conversion Practices Prohibition Legislation Bill. This bill proposes prohibiting so-called conversion therapies which aim to change a person's sexuality, gender identity or gender expression. Curiously, the direction of conversion seems to be exclusively in the direction of becoming “straight” or identifying with and expressing the gender which aligns with the genitals you were born with.
1 February 2021
Or at least that's what NewsHub would have us believe, with an article published on Tuesday about the benefits of Reiki, an energy healing technique that involves the practitioner manipulating your “energy field” by waving their hands around your body.
30 September 2018
In a frankly scary move, the WHO are legitimising unproven medical therapies by including them in the new edition of its "International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems" - ICD11.
22 July 2018
Sellers of alternative therapies usually say publicly that they always recommend their patients continue normal therapy while they also use acupuncture, herbal remedies, etc for their medical conditions. This is especially important in the case of people who have life threatening medical conditions that can be successfully treated with conventional medicine, such as cancer. However, there are many stories in the news of people who have enough faith in their choice of alternative medicine that they decide not to use conventional therapy, or turn down some proven conventional therapies on offer - and in the worst cases, the alternative therapy practitioners actively dissuade their patients from using modern medicine.
29 April 2018
An organised group of homeopaths offering bogus treatments for autism has been written about in the Guardian newspaper in the UK. The article talks about how more than 120 homeopaths in the UK are part of this group, called CEASE (Complete Elimination of Autistic Spectrum Expression), and the therapies they are offering are supposed to remove "toxins" that are apparently causing autism in children, and many of these toxins are meant to have come from vaccines.
11 March 2018
A Reiki meeting has been deemed newsworthy by the Taranaki Daily News.
25 February 2018
Liza Schneider has written an article for the BoP Times, printed online in the Herald, which promotes nonsense therapies for animals.
28 January 2018
"The results argue for more trials of the fish skins for burns", the vets said.
5 February 2017
Vicki Latele, who was jailed for mortgage fraud, has had a tough time. She has cancer, and has had her stomach removed. It appears that the standard treatments, such as chemotherapy, have not helped her, and she's been released from prison on compassionate grounds.
25 September 2016
The infamous Brio clinic in Thailand has sucked in unsuspecting kiwis, promising to treat them with unconventional therapies for cancer. One unfortunate victim, Holly Devine, died after raising $55,000 on Givealittle for treatment at the clinic, but before attending the clinic.
19 June 2016
Chris Hyde from the Timaru Herald received a response to an OIA request to CYF this week. There was a recent case where a man was convicted for child abuse of CYF kids in Timaru, and he was used by CYF as an EFT practitioner.
1 May 2013
In Issue 100 of the NZ Skeptic I commented on how issues of concern to this society never seem to go away. A classic example of the moment is the case of Neon Roberts, the seven-year-old English boy whose New Zealand-born mother took him into hiding rather than have him subjected to radiotherapy along with chemotherapy to treat his aggressive brain tumour, and fought in the courts for her right to use alternative therapies instead.
1 May 2005
The medical community in Britain is suffering a severe attack of lèse majesté, and it is feared some distinguished heads will roll on Tower Green.
1 November 1992
Not surprisingly, the awarding of the Bent Spoon to Consumer magazine saw a vigorous defence mounted by the Consumers' Institute.
1 November 1992
The Bent Spoon Award this year created more controversy than usual when it was awarded to Consumer magazine. Why did we feel it necessary to bite our consumer watchdog?
1 May 1991
Advocates of Britain's internationally known alternative cancer clinic, the Bristol Cancer Help Centre, have been surprised and shocked to find that their patients are dying faster than those under conventional care.
1 May 1989
A virus has inflicted NZCSICOP, analogous to computer viruses that print messages if mild, but self-destruct if severe. The carrier is the ortho-skeptic, acting as a mole in the secret service, programmed to turn Skeptics into pseudo-skeptics, or pskeptics for short.