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Attention: MARKETERS, MANUFACTURERS & IMPORTERS OF THERAPEUTIC PRODUCTS & ALTERNATIVE MEDICINES

Would you knowingly allow Drug Companies to control your marketing campaigns and your access to the public? A proposed new Advertising Code will drastically affect your business! This unfair legislation can wipe out your company!

Bionic Products Pty. Ltd., manufacturers and sellers of ELANRA negative ionisers, is taking a stand the proposed new code which may become a part of the Therapeutic Goods Act. This new code will suppress your right to complete fairly in an open market and can even result in the complete destruction of your business. Its vitally important you understand the implications and offer your support.

• Bionic succeeded in altering the previous proposed advertising code for therapeutic goods in 1988 by appealing to the Trade Practices Tribunal.
• Their successor, the Australian Competition Tribunal, is now considering new advertising legislation which will put control in the hands of bureaucracy and your competitors to effectively stifle competition throughout Australia.
• Under the Codes definition advertising includes: pamphlets, brochures, magazine articles and paid advertising in any media. It does NOT include material circulated to medical practitioners, pharmacists, dentists, veterinarians, nurses, physiotherapists, accredited medical scientists, hospital purchasing officers etc. (Apparently, these are the only people intelligent enough to decipher promotional material without help.)
• The new code has been drafted - and will be administered - by various stakeholders including the Proprietary Medicines Association of Australia (PMAA) and the Nutritional Foods Association (NFAA). The PMAA claims to represent pharmaceutical companies. None of the Competition Tribunals material satisfactorily explains who is represented by NFAA.
• Bionic is deeply concerned that drug companies will exert major control over the Code and will administer it by means of a Code Council on which they have half the votes. Thus competitors to natural therapies will have the opportunity to oppress those businesses if they choose.
• The new Therapeutic Goods Advertising Code is not one by which industry self-regulates. In reality, it is controlled by the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA). Bionic is seriously concerned about the composition of the proposed new council and whether it will in fact be representative of the industries covered by the new Code.
• The Code is riddled with anomalies and restrictions. It effectively prevents advertisers from making any claim in regard to the benefits of their products, unless permission is given in writing by the Department of Human Service and Health.
• Many products with good scientific credentials cannot gain this approval and will not be permitted to advertise.
• Section 7 of the Code prohibits many statements, including claims that a product is safe to use, or that it is more effective because it occurs naturally. Why should this be against the law - because it could imply superiority to synthetic products?
• Testimonial statements from users cannot be published unless they can be proven, and where accepted medical evidence is not in conflict with the testimonial. Bionic points out that, in its own case, there is a great quantity of respectable scientific information to support the use of negative ionisers but because this is not accepted by the designated medical body (National Health and Medical Research Council) statements from consumers testifying to these benefits cannot be published.
• Manufacturers of other alternative remedies will find there is similar entrenched opposition to products that compete with traditional medicines - i.e. that reduce the publics dependence on doctors and pharmacists - yet the TGA expects this very group to provide objective evidence to support alternative products.
• The Code places an absolute embargo on reference to an exhaustive lists of ailments. ANY reference to many common conditions and illnesses is forbidden.
• These matters give a ready opportunity to competitors to complain to the TGA, who will then act to prevent further advertising. This has already happened to Bionic.
• There is a Register of Therapeutic Goods divided into two parts. One relates to registered goods (basically drugs) and one to listed goods (e.g. personal massagers). ELANRA is a listed device. No-one who is in any way associated with the manufacture or marketing of a listed device may advertise that device for an ailment other than those accepted in relation to the register. Yet the new code prohibits any advertising that mentions ailments!
• The consequences of breaching the advertising code are the threat of having a listed product removed from the Register, making it a non-listed product. Non-listed goods cannot be advertised as having any therapeutic benefit. For Bionic, and for similar products, this would mean the annihilation of the company.
• Members of 27 associations including Chinese Medicine Practitioners, Homoeopaths, Trichologists, Naturopaths etc. may well be exempted from the restrictive provisions of the new advertising code, giving these people a competitive advantage. This shows the Code is not a strict regimen applying equally to everyone. However:
• The Complimentary Medicines Association has applied for additional substances to be included in the list of products covered by proposed restrictions. Many of these are traditional medicines used by members of the above groups e.g. herbal substances, homoeopathic preparations, non-human animal tissue, bee products etc. People who retail or wholesale such products will then be affected by advertising restrictions.
• Anyone breaching the new Code can be ordered to cease advertising, to publish a retraction and apology, castigated in the trade press and fined. The committee deciding such matters will deliberate behind closed doors.
• An offender may appeal against the committees decision, but if the appeal is dismissed he/she has no recourse, not even through the courts.
• Should the TGA decide that your advertising claims breach their laws, whether or not you are aware of these laws, you can be prevented from promoting your product(s) to your specialist market and/or the public.
• Members of the public should be aware that this legislation, if it proceeds, will limit access to vital information on alternative goods and therapies. Free choice will be severely restricted.

A Hearing at the Australian Competition Tribunal will take place in Sydney on 19th November 1997. Any person affected by this legislation can seek leave to intervene and to state their case in a court action scheduled for February 1998.

WE NEED YOUR SUPPORT TO FIGHT THIS LEGISLATION!

For the full document detailing the implications and offering legal analysis, contact Bionic Products Pty. Ltd. Phone (07) 5593 1122 P.O. Box 555, Robina QLD 4226

STOP PRESS 12 November 1997:

At a meeting instigated by the Proprietary Medicines Association at 10.30 today, Mr John Cable, a senior TGA executive, stated to our solicitor that the TGA's intention was now to bypass authorisation by the Australian Competition Tribunal and have the new code passed by Parliament without further discussion.

This is contrary to the stated policy of the former Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Health, Mr Bob Woods, who, in a media release in December 1996 stated that:

Health Professionals and consumers would have to be closely involved in the establishment of a code of conduct, which would also have to be endorsed by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.

At the Directions Hearing on the 19th November 1997 the Commonwealth Solicitor will be requesting an adjournment of the hearing to enable this legislation to be passed in Parliament before Christmas. At that time of the year, our ability to alert the media to the implications of this legislation will be almost impossible. If this legislation is passed, individuals and groups within the natural health care industry will be at the mercy of draconian legislation, and will have no avenue of appeal.

By the 1st December, politicians will be leaving for their Christmas break.

You must act now!!

Phone, write or fax your Federal Member today to register your protest against this dangerous legislation!

Visit Bionic Products Webpage. http://xenios.qldnet.com.au/~bionic

Joshua Shaw
Bionic Products Pty. Ltd.
P.O. Box 555
Robina, Queensland 4226
(07) 5593 1122
bionic@qldnet.com.au