South Africa: Advertising Authority Sanctions Vitamin Distributor Who Claims Anti-AIDS Drugs Toxic

On Monday, South Africa's Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) ordered the vitamin seller Matthias Rath to submit all future advertisements to an industry authority for the next year to ensure his ads are neither misleading nor defamatory. Earlier this year, ASA found that Rath's ads in South African newspapers calling AIDS drugs poisonous were misleading and defamed the advocacy group Treatment Action Campaign (TAC), which Rath accused of being a front for pharmaceutical firms.

Rath's California-based foundation said it would ignore the latest ruling, as it had the previous one. "We will not be censored by the ASA or the Treatment Action Campaign or any other interest group of the pharmaceutical industry under any circumstances," said Rath spokesperson Anthony Brink.

AIDS activists have asked South Africa's Medicines Control Council to intervene, arguing that Rath's ads made false claims about the safety of medicines and that he is conducting illegal human experiments in poor townships around Cape Town. So far, the MCC has so far taken no action, which activists blame on interference by Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang. The minister often emphasizes the risks of antiretroviral drugs, a point Rath's spokesperson noted.

"We will persist in educating the public, as our government is doing, in regard to the dangerous toxicity of antiretrovirals and the clinical benefits of natural micronutrient therapy in AIDS," said Brink.

TAC claims that Rath is terrorizing the poor and sick in order to sell his overpriced multivitamins. UNAIDS and the World Health Organization have also condemned his actions, as have leading U.S. academics and scientists, all of whom say the efficacy of antiretroviral drugs is proven.

If Rath refuses to obey ASA's ruling, authorities can order all newspapers and broadcasters to ban his ads, said ASA spokesperson Dineo Pooe.

Back to other news for August 30, 2005