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11/636
DECISION
Meeting 7 December 2011
Complaint 11/636
Complainant: M. Edmonds
Advertisement: Manaki Wellbeing
Complaint: The website advertisement for Manaki Wellbeing appeared on the
Living Social website (www.livingsocial). It had a picture of Auckland in the
background and a picture of a woman with her face to the sun. The accompanying
text stated, in part:
“Manaki Wellbeing
Hour-Long Body Detox and Oxygen Wellbeing
Treatment
$39
…
The Detox Biocleanse involves plunging your tired feet into a warm foot bath.
A special field enhancer unit ionizes the water, charging your cells as the
blood passes through your feet and stimulating the body’s natural cleansing
processes.”
Complainant, M. Edmonds, said:
This advertisement makes unproven and incorrect claims about its treatments.
Specifically the suggestion that "A special field enhancer unit ionises the water,
charging your cells as the blood passes through your feet and stimulating the body's
natural cleansing processes" is scientifically absurd. Ionised water cannot "charge
cells.”
The Chairman ruled that the following provisions were relevant:
Therapeutic Services Advertising Code
Principle 3 - Advertisements should not by implication, omission, ambiguity
or exaggerated claim mislead or deceive or be likely to mislead or deceive
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consumers, abuse the trust of or exploit the lack of knowledge of consumers,
exploit the superstitious or without justifiable reason play on fear.
Guideline 3(a) - Therapeutic claims should be factual and able to be proved.
The Advertiser, Manaki Wellbeing, said:
There has been a difference of opinion as to what ionisation can do. Like any
scientific matter, this poses problems for people to understand the process of
ionisation and how it can impart energy to the cell. People with chemistry degrees will
understand the process and know how the energy from ionisation can impart energy
to the cell therefore helping cellular function to improve. We do not believe we have
breached any therapeutic claim at this time.
Here is a conclusion of ionisation in a more exact form:
Electrolysis of water breaks the water molecule into H- and OH+. Some of those ions
can recombine, but they are being produced at a rate which allows many of the
negative ions to be absorbed through the skin by the process of osmosis. This is
proven because bodily fluids do register as more alkaline after people use these
units. These negative ions are, by definition, alkaline. Once in the body, they do
negate free radicals and positive ions, which are acidic, by donating the extra
electron that they carry. When they make it to the cellular level, they are used in the
mitochondria to produce ATP, which is required for energy to carry out cellular
activity. So, the ions help provide the energy for cells to perform their intended
functions. One of the cells' intended functions is to eliminate waste. Many people
who are sick are very acidic. Cancer requires an acidic environment to survive. By
negating much of the acidity and creating a more neutral pH, the ions help to create a
more healthy terrain within the body.
The companies in this industry do not have the money to spend for your double
blinded, peer reviewed studies that pharmaceutical companies can easily afford.
However, many studies were conducted on ionized air and its benefits, mainly by
Russian and Israeli scientists in the 60's and 70's. The Russian Olympic teams had
air ionizers in their Olympic quarters. Israeli scientists did studies using ionized air to
treat seasonal depression. Their studies showed that air ionization helped with the
depression tremendously. Seratonin levels were changed when patients were
exposed to the ionization. There have been studies on the external application of
ionized water on burns and other wounds. The studies showed that the ionized water
definately accelerated the healing, usually by at least 50%.
The footbath supplements negative ions in a more efficient way than air ionization or
bathing. By using the feet, we can ionize a small body of water and create a high
concentration of ions, which makes for easier transfer by osmosis. Also, most people
use the unit for 20-30 minutes, which is plenty of time for all of the blood in the body
to make a complete circuit and be exposed to the ionization.
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Deliberation
The Complaints Board carefully read all correspondence in relation to the complaint,
and viewed a copy of the website advertisement. It noted that, in the Complainant’s
view, the advertisement made incorrect and unsubstantiated claims about the effect
of ionised water on the body.
The Chairman directed the Complaints Board to consider the complaint with
reference to Principles 3 and Guideline 3(a) of the Therapeutic Services Advertising
Code. Accordingly, the task before the Complaints Board was to determine whether
the advertisement would be likely to mislead the consumers, thereby breaching
Principle 3, while Guideline 3(a) required the Complaints Board to assess whether
any therapeutic claims made in the advertisement were factual and able to be
proved.
The Complaints Board noted that the Advertiser had supplied an article from a
magazine about the efficacy of air ionisers and also some abstracts of various
studies. While the Complaints Board said that a magazine article did not constitute
an academic study, it also noted that none of the abstracts cited the authors of the
studies, the year they were published, where to find the full articles, or the journals
in which the articles were published and, as such, the Complaints Board said there
was no way to authenticate the studies provided.
In the absence of any adequate substantiation provided by the Advertiser coupled
with the level of claims being made, the Complaints Board considered that the
advertisement was misleading, and the claims in the advertisement had not been
proved to its satisfaction.
Therefore for these reasons, the Complaints Board was unanimous in the view that
the advertisement was in breach of Principle 3, and Guideline 3(a) of the
Therapeutic Services Advertising Code.
Accordingly, the Complaints Board ruled to uphold the complaint.
Finally, the Complaints Board noted that the Therapeutic Advertising Pre-Vetting
Service (TAPS) was a user-pays service available to all advertisers making
therapeutic claims to help minimise the risk of breaching the ASA Codes of Practice
as well as other industry codes and relevant legislation. Information about TAPS is
available at www.anza.co.nz. It was recommended that therapeutic advertisements
use the TAPS process to help with code compliance.
Decision: Complaint Upheld