Today is the 1st of March which means that the Advertising Standards Authority will now investigate claims made on websites. Previously it has investigated only claims made in broadcast (TV / radio) or print (leaflets etc) adverts but now misleading claims on websites fall within their remit.
Naturally quite a few people have taken advantage of this, starting at 00.01hr this morning, and put some claims in. A number of us have signed up to the Nightingale Collaboration newsletter; it suggested that we might focus on a particular topic each month and to kick us off it's Homeopathy Awareness Month. The following people have found unlikely / unevidenced claims made about homeopathy on various websites and mentioned this to the ASA.
I'm not sure how many people are going to respond to my tweet so it might be a bit of a short list ;)
Turns out the ASA was overrun with complaints about homeopathy and we all received a letter saying they were going to handle it differently from the way they normally handle complaints. Not on a case-by-case basis but by working to develop guidelines for the homeopathy industry as a whole. Still ongoing...
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