Homeopathy Plus!


Homeopathy Plus! is an Australian company run by homeopath Fran Sheffield in Tuggerah, New South Wales. It is known for the claim that homeopathy is an effective, and safer, alternative to vaccination for conditions including whooping cough, along with claims that homeopathy is superior to chemotherapy for cancer. The claims for "homeoprophylaxis" were assessed as misleading by the Complaints Resolution Panel of the Therapeutic Goods Administration and a retraction demanded; this was ignored. The prophylaxis claims were referred to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, and although this was stated to have resulted in their removal, legal proceedings continued, culminating in a ruling by Justice Perry of the Federal Court of Australia in December 2014 that:
The Federal judge concluded that: "there is no reasonable basis, in the sense of an adequate foundation, in medical science to enable the First Respondent and the Second Respondent to state that Homeopathic
Treatments are safe and effective as an alternative to the Vaccine for the Prevention of Whooping Cough".
Sheffield was also the originator of a controversial change.org petition to the World Health Organization calling on the WHO to use homeopathy in the 2014 Ebola virus epidemic in West Africa; a New Zealand MP who signed the petition was demoted from his position as a result. The New Zealand Prime Minister John Key called the idea of homeopathy for Ebola "barking mad".
The sentence was announced on 14 October 2015: Fran Sheffield was fined $23,000 and banned from selling the products for five years, and Homeopathy Plus fined $115,000.