Loretta Marron

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Loretta Marron
Loretta Marron -Australian Skeptics National Convention 2015.jpg
Speaking at the Australian Skeptics National Convention 2015
Born (1951-10-16) 16 October 1951 (age 71)
Hanover, West Germany
Other namesThe Jelly Bean Lady
Employer Friends of Science in Medicine
Known forEvidence-based medicine
TitleChief Executive Officer

Loretta Josephine Marron, OAM (born 16 October 1951) is the Chief Executive Officer of the Australian Friends of Science in Medicine organization. Popularly known as the "Jelly Bean Lady", she has promoted an evidence-based approach to medicine since being diagnosed with cancer herself in 2003. In the media, she has presented exposés of unproven treatments, some of which have resulted in successful legal prosecutions. She was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia for her service to health, and she has been "Skeptic of the Year" three times.

Contents

Background

Marron was born in Hanover, West Germany in 1951. Her family moved to the United Kingdom in 1954, and then to South Australia in 1959. She graduated with a Bachelor of Science from the University of Adelaide in 1972, with majors in Physics and Mathematics. She spent her career working as an information technology specialist. [1]

In 2003, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. At her cancer support group, she was exposed to promotions for a range of alternative treatments, many of which urged her to reject conventional medicine and not to have surgery or chemotherapy. However, her research revealed that there was a lack of evidence to support the effectiveness of those alternative treatments. Marron said she became horrified to see how charlatans were attempting to take advantage of her and fellow sufferers, offering treatments with no verifiable benefits, often while charging large fees, and this drove her to expose the worst practices of people who promote unproven, "alternative" approaches. [2]

"It's understandable that people reach out for alternatives when they are ill. But they don't work...People are hanging on for a panacea that, regrettably, does not exist", she says. [3]

Support for evidence-based medicine

Marron began campaigning against the "outrageous claims" made by some alternative therapists, instead promoting that people should have access to reliable, evidence-based information. "They need protecting; they are victims twice — first of the disease, and then of the behaviour of alternative therapists." [4]

She studied a series of short courses at Bond University in the Faculty of Health Science and Medicine to improve her understanding of the issues, but she emphasizes that she is not a medical professional. Instead, she has worked with medical specialists, researchers, and practitioners to ensure her information is backed by evidence. Initially she worked with her GP and the Adverse Medicines Advice service to create a brochure on how to get good advice, and then a website called Health Information, aimed at helping other patients to get trustworthy medical information that is based on reliable evidence. [1] [5] :7:00

Marron approached the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) for assistance, but their policy was that if a product could claim "traditional use" then they would list it without needing any assessment of whether that product was safe or effective. She told The Australian newspaper that the lax oversight means "the internet is now flooded with incorrect information on therapeutic goods, many of which are TGA-approved." [6] Some of the claims for these products included promising to "nourish the fei", "tonify the qi", transform "turbid dampness", "nourish the blood", harmonise the "middle jiao", or to stimulate "energy meridians to aid stress relief". [6] Listing a product with the TGA simply entailed entering some details on the TGA's website and paying their fee. Even where there is testing, "sponsor 'evidence' could be a trial with two rats and a guinea pig – it does not have to be peer-reviewed". [7] Marron told The Australian newspaper that "it's really easy to make money with the current rules – just find any garden weed that has a traditional use, put it in a box with flowers or a has-been athlete, list it with the TGA and go on a marketing blitz – and rake in the money." [8] She pointed out that the enormous amount of money involved in supplementary, complementary and alternative medical treatments, estimated by The Sydney Morning Herald as $1.8 billion per annum in Australia, is an incentive to continue these practices regardless of the public welfare. "Desperate people will do anything when they are sick", she says. [9]

Her investigations into unsupported claims started with fundamental (vitalistic) chiropractic practitioners who claimed to cure a range of unrelated conditions and to be an alternative to vaccination. In the state of New South Wales, she identified 50 chiropractic practitioners whose treatment plans explicitly covered pregnant women, babies, and children. [10] She published her findings in a report to the Australian Health Minister, which was also supported by the British Medical Journal, calling for a ban on chiropractic treatment of babies and children, and for an end to teaching these "inappropriate and potentially dangerous techniques that target pregnant women, babies, infants, and children". [11] [12] [13] :6:00 In particular, she called for the chiropractic pediatric clinic run by the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT) University, which recorded 113 patients aged 13 and under, to be closed down, and to stop using government funds to pay for these practices. [10]

Speaking to the New Zealand Skeptics 2016 Loretta Marron NZ Skeptics Conference 2016.jpg
Speaking to the New Zealand Skeptics 2016

Jelly bean lady

Marron developed a character loosely based on advertisements for a "natural therapist" and substituting "jelly bean" instead to highlight some of the more ridiculous claims. She started to refer to this role as a "Jelly bean therapist", complete with a range of mock jelly bean "therapies". [5]

Marron became known as "the Jelly Bean Lady" after she used jelly beans to test magnetised mattress underlays, which the makers claimed could cure a range of health ailments. [14] She substituted jelly beans for the magnets in one of the underlays, and had participants test them using a meter that measures magnetism. They were not able to tell which one had the magnets and which one had the jelly beans through the mattress – the results were the same. This trial was telecast on Channel Nine, and their journalist suggested the name "Jelly Bean Lady" which Marron stayed with. Her conclusion that the magnets were just as effective as jelly beans, was an effective way to communicate the results accurately to a non-technical audience, without using jargon about topics such as controls and blinding. [15]

She further developed this persona of "the Jellybean Lady", including colourful clothing to play well on television, as a fun way to engage people's attention while being easily identifiable. Later in New Idea magazine it was changed slightly to become the "Candy Crusader". It also helped to keep a clear distinction that she was not a medical professional. [5] :10:00

Over this period, she became a frequent contributor to the media, including investigative journalism pieces to expose alternative therapists making false and misleading claims. A high-profile investigation on A Current Affair involved a beauty therapist who claimed that she could cure cancer by injecting sufferers with a mixture of citric acid and sodium chlorite. Marron's under-cover investigation was covered on national television, including showing the practitioner mixing up and injecting the mixture into Maria Worth, who was dying of breast cancer and paid $2000 for the "treatment". Four days later, Worth was in the emergency ward at Toowoomba Hospital with life-threatening blood clots. Marron's evidence contributed to the Supreme Court's determination that the practitioner was unqualified and unregistered, ordering her to discontinue the treatment in 2009. [15] [16] [17]

Her investigations into fraudulent practices led to cancellations of the approvals for nine alternative "medical" devices from the Australian Register of Therapeutic Goods in 2010, and another 31 in 2011. [15]

Friends of Science in Medicine

In 2011, Marron joined with a group of 34 prominent Australian doctors, medical researchers and scientists, to form the organization Friends of Science in Medicine (FSM). [3] Marron was the inaugural Chief Executive Officer. FSM was formed "to emphasise the importance of having health care in Australia based upon evidence, scientifically sound research and established scientific knowledge." [18] [19]

The organization has grown to gain the support of over 1000 doctors, researchers and supporters, including Nobel laureates and three winners of Australian of the Year. [5] :15:00

Marron's role as the public face of this organization has included submissions to the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) and presentations to professional conferences including the Australian Institute of Medical Scientists conference (AIMS) and the Australian and New Zealand College of Anaesthetists (ANZCA). [20]

Training and regulation of unproven methods

National registration has led to many alternative practitioners being registered by the Australian Health Practitioners Registration Authority (AHPRA), which is the same federal body that covers doctors and nurses. However, the alternative practitioners are not required to provide evidence of their methods' efficacy because they are deemed low-risk. [21] At the same time, a number of colleges and even universities run courses in supplementary, complementary and alternative methodologies. Marron is concerned that instead of providing improved accountability, these changes may simply confer an appearance of respectability and professionalism which is not warranted: "Once they are regulated, that legitimises them, but it comes with a responsibility to consumers; they can't have it both ways," she says. [2] [22]

Marron is particularly critical of universities which teach courses in unproven treatments, some of which have lecturers who promote their own practices and products in the process. In 2011, she wrote to the Federal Health Minister outlining the seriousness of the problem, which she said "is a form of child abuse", calling for universities to stop teaching health-related courses which could not produce adequate evidence to support their claims. The submission incorporated 20 pages of supporting letters from leading academics and clinicians. It focussed especially on the RMIT University chiropractic paediatric clinic, which dismissed the claims it was teaching techniques that could be harmful, although it acknowledged there was an "overall lack of high-level clinical evidence in chiropractic". [22]

Speaking with the journal Australian Doctor, she said: "It never occurred to me before that they would teach this type of nonsense in a university." [4] She was more forthright in an interview with The Australian newspaper, saying she felt "ashamed that our universities, once deemed to be pillars of excellence and enlightenment, are letting the bean-counters who run them sell off their reputations for considerable profit by actively embracing subjects no better than witchcraft and voodoo". [7]

Marron supports giving students the knowledge to critically appraise all therapies. She is concerned that the lack of consistent standards currently does not support this: "The two victims of the self-regulatory system are consumer health and truth." [6] Universities had to keep a close eye on what was actually being said in courses and included in the teaching material, she said. [23]

Awards and recognition

Marron was awarded the Order of Australia Medal (OAM) in the General Division of the 2014 Australia Day honours, in recognition of her "service to community health". [24] [25]

Marron was named "Skeptic of the Year" by the Australian Skeptics twice (in 2006–2007, and 2011) individually in recognition of her "great contributions to public health and the exposure of dangerous and discredited treatments that profit through offering spurious cures to the vulnerable and ill", and again in 2012 as the representative of Friends of Science in Medicine. [26] [27] In 2016, she was awarded life membership of the Australian Skeptics. [28]

Criticisms

Kerryn Phelps, former president of the Australian Medical Association and of the Australian Integrative Medicine Association, opposed Marron's call to stop universities from teaching unproven methods. She argued that these treatments are already part of mainstream society. "There is a consumer-led movement ... people are looking for different ways to manage their illnesses", she said. She called Friends of Science in Medicine an "ultra-conservative" force with "an alarming and far-reaching agenda". [2] However, she conceded that "if natural therapies are found to be ineffective or dangerous, they should also be eliminated from the market". [29]

Selected publications

Related Research Articles

Alternative medicine is any practice that aims to achieve the healing effects of medicine despite lacking biological plausibility, testability, repeatability or evidence of effectiveness. Unlike modern medicine, which employs the scientific method to test plausible therapies by way of responsible and ethical clinical trials, producing repeatable evidence of either effect or of no effect, alternative therapies reside outside of medical science and do not originate from using the scientific method, but instead rely on testimonials, anecdotes, religion, tradition, superstition, belief in supernatural "energies", pseudoscience, errors in reasoning, propaganda, fraud, or other unscientific sources. Frequently used terms for relevant practices are New Age medicine, pseudo-medicine, unorthodox medicine, holistic medicine, fringe medicine, and unconventional medicine, with little distinction from quackery.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chiropractic</span> Form of pseudoscientific alternative medicine

Chiropractic is a form of alternative medicine concerned with the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of mechanical disorders of the musculoskeletal system, especially of the spine. It has esoteric origins and is based on several pseudoscientific ideas.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Naturopathy</span> Form of alternative medicine

Naturopathy, or naturopathic medicine, is a form of alternative medicine. A wide array of pseudoscientific practices branded as "natural", "non-invasive", or promoting "self-healing" are employed by its practitioners, who are known as naturopaths. Difficult to generalize, these treatments range from outright quackery, like homeopathy, to widely accepted practices like certain forms of psychotherapy. The ideology and methods of naturopathy are based on vitalism and folk medicine rather than evidence-based medicine, although practitioners may use techniques supported by evidence.

Reiki is a Japanese form of energy healing, a type of alternative medicine. Reiki practitioners use a technique called palm healing or hands-on healing through which a "universal energy" is said to be transferred through the palms of the practitioner to the patient in order to encourage emotional or physical healing.

Rolfing is a form of alternative medicine originally developed by Ida Rolf (1896–1979) as Structural Integration. Rolfing is marketed with unproven claims of various health benefits. It is based on Rolf's ideas about how the human body's "energy field" can benefit when aligned with the Earth's gravitational field.

The National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH) is a United States government agency which explores complementary and alternative medicine (CAM). It was initially created in 1991 as the Office of Alternative Medicine (OAM), and renamed the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) before receiving its current name in 2014. NCCIH is one of the 27 institutes and centers that make up the National Institutes of Health (NIH) within the United States Department of Health and Human Services.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Craniosacral therapy</span> Pseudoscientific alternative medicine technique

Craniosacral therapy (CST) or cranial osteopathy is a form of alternative medicine that uses gentle touch to feel non-existent rhythmic movements of the skull's bones and supposedly adjust the immovable joints of the skull to achieve a therapeutic result. CST is a pseudoscience and its practice has been characterized as quackery. It is based on fundamental misconceptions about the anatomy and physiology of the human skull and is promoted as a cure-all for a variety of health conditions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of alternative medicine</span>

The history of alternative medicine refers to the history of a group of diverse medical practices that were collectively promoted as "alternative medicine" beginning in the 1970s, to the collection of individual histories of members of that group, or to the history of western medical practices that were labeled "irregular practices" by the western medical establishment. It includes the histories of complementary medicine and of integrative medicine. "Alternative medicine" is a loosely defined and very diverse set of products, practices, and theories that are perceived by its users to have the healing effects of medicine, but do not originate from evidence gathered using the scientific method, are not part of biomedicine, or are contradicted by scientific evidence or established science. "Biomedicine" is that part of medical science that applies principles of anatomy, physics, chemistry, biology, physiology, and other natural sciences to clinical practice, using scientific methods to establish the effectiveness of that practice.

Anthroposophic medicine is a form of alternative medicine based on pseudoscientific and occult notions. Devised in the 1920s by Rudolf Steiner (1861–1925) in conjunction with Ita Wegman (1876–1943), anthroposophical medicine draws on Steiner's spiritual philosophy, which he called anthroposophy. Practitioners employ a variety of treatment techniques based upon anthroposophic precepts, including massage, exercise, counselling, and substances.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Applied kinesiology</span> Alternative medicine technique

Applied kinesiology (AK) is a pseudoscience-based technique in alternative medicine claimed to be able to diagnose illness or choose treatment by testing muscles for strength and weakness.

Energy medicine is a branch of alternative medicine based on a pseudo-scientific belief that healers can channel "healing energy" into a patient and effect positive results. The field is defined by shared beliefs and practices relating to mysticism and esotericism in the wider alternative medicine sphere rather than any sort of unified terminology, leading to terms such as energy healing or vibrational medicine being used as synonymous or alternative names. In most cases there is no empirically measurable energy involved: the term refers instead to so-called subtle energy. Practitioners may classify the practice as hands-on, hands-off, and distant where the patient and healer are in different locations. Many schools of energy healing exist using many names: for example, biofield energy healing, spiritual healing, contact healing, distant healing, therapeutic touch, Reiki or Qigong.

Throughout its history, chiropractic has been the subject of internal and external controversy and criticism. According to magnetic healer Daniel D. Palmer, the founder of chiropractic, "vertebral subluxation" was the sole cause of all diseases and manipulation was the cure for all disease. A 2003 profession-wide survey found "most chiropractors still hold views of Innate Intelligence and of the cause and cure of disease consistent with those of the Palmers". A critical evaluation stated "Chiropractic is rooted in mystical concepts. This led to an internal conflict within the chiropractic profession, which continues today." Chiropractors, including D.D. Palmer, were jailed for practicing medicine without a license. D.D. Palmer considered establishing chiropractic as a religion to resolve this problem. For most of its existence, chiropractic has battled with mainstream medicine, sustained by antiscientific and pseudoscientific ideas such as vertebral subluxation.

Osteomyology is a multi-disciplined form of alternative medicine found almost exclusively in the United Kingdom and is loosely based on aggregated ideas from other manipulation therapies, principally chiropractic and osteopathy. It is a results-based physical therapy tailored specifically to the needs of the individual patient. Osteomyologists have been trained in osteopathy and chiropractic, but do not require to be regulated by the General Osteopathic Council (GOsC) or the General Chiropractic Council (GCC).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Black salve</span> Pseudoscientific cancer treatment

Black salve, also known by the brand name Cansema, is a pseudoscientific alternative cancer treatment. The product is commonly classified as an escharotic—a topical paste which destroys skin tissue and leaves behind a scar called an eschar. Escharotics were widely used to treat skin lesions in the early 1900s, but have since been replaced by safer and more effective treatments. Escharotics, such as black salves, are currently advertised by some alternative medicine marketers as treatments for skin cancer, often with unsubstantiated testimonials and unsupported claims of effectiveness.

Because of the uncertain nature of various alternative therapies and the wide variety of claims different practitioners make, alternative medicine has been a source of vigorous debate, even over the definition of "alternative medicine". Dietary supplements, their ingredients, safety, and claims, are a continual source of controversy. In some cases, political issues, mainstream medicine and alternative medicine all collide, such as in cases where synthetic drugs are legal but the herbal sources of the same active chemical are banned.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Friends of Science in Medicine</span> Australian association which supports science-based medicine

The Friends of Science In Medicine (FSM) is an Australian association which supports evidence-based medicine and strongly opposes the promotion and practice of unsubstantiated therapies that lack a scientifically plausible rationale. They accomplish this by publicly raising their concerns either through direct correspondence or through media outlets. FSM was established in December 2011 by Loretta Marron, John Dwyer, Alastair MacLennan, Rob Morrison and Marcello Costa, a group of Australian biomedical scientists and clinical academics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ken Harvey (professor)</span> Australian public health doctor

Kenneth John Harvey AM is an Australian public health doctor, currently Honorary Adjunct Associate Professor at the Institute for Evidence-Based Healthcare in Bond University. Described by The Age as an "anti-quackery crusader", Harvey is an advocate of evidence-based medicine and a critic of pharmaceutical marketing and unproven diet products. He is the president of Friends of Science in Medicine. In 2017, Harvey was awarded a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for his "significant service to community health and the pharmaceutical industry”.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Britt Marie Hermes</span> American former naturopathic doctor and blogger (born 1984)

Britt Marie Hermes is an American former naturopathic doctor who became a critic of naturopathy and alternative medicine. She is the author of a blog, Naturopathic Diaries, where she writes about being trained and having practiced as a licensed naturopath and about the problems with naturopaths as medical practitioners.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Dwyer (medicine)</span> Australian doctor, professor of medicine, and public health advocate (born 1939).

John Michael Dwyer, is an Australian doctor, professor of medicine, and public health advocate. He was originally a Professor of Medicine and Paediatrics, then Head of the Department of Clinical Immunology at Yale University. Returning to Australia, he became Head of the Department of Medicine and the Clinical Dean at the University of New South Wales and Director of Medicine at Sydney's Prince of Wales Hospital, the University's major teaching hospital, for over twenty years. In retirement he is an Emeritus Professor of Medicine of the University. He founded the Australian Health Care Reform Alliance, and was the founding president of the Friends of Science in Medicine until 2019. He was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia for his service to public health.

Alternative medicine describes any practice which aims to achieve the healing effects of medicine, but which lacks biological plausibility and is untested or untestable. Complementary medicine (CM), complementary and alternative medicine (CAM), integrated medicine or integrative medicine (IM), and holistic medicine are among many rebrandings of the same phenomenon.

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