Matthias Rath

Background

Rath studied at the Hamburg University Medical School in Germany After graduating from Hamburg, Rath began researching arteriosclerosis at the University Clinic of Hamburg. Later, during 1989 and 1990, he was a researcher at the Berlin Heart Centre. He subsequently joined two-time Nobel Prize laureate Linus Pauling at his research institute in California. Ultimately, Rath had a falling-out with the Linus Pauling Institute; after a series of lawsuits and countersuits, Rath was ordered in 1994 to pay the Institute $75,000 and was assigned several patents. Rath subsequently developed his own branded nutrient products, set up the Dr. Rath Health Foundation and Dr. Rath Research Institute, and funds nutrition research with patent development in what he calls "Cellular Medicine".

Rath has offices in California, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and South Africa (Cape Town). His foundation also advertises its products in Spain, France, and Russia. According to Eversheds, Rath's solicitor, the Dr. Rath Health Foundation is "a not-for-profit body which conducts research into science-based natural therapies," but the foundation is estimated to have earned "millions" through nutritional supplement sales.

International politics

According to Rath, events of the last century in the international arena have been driven by pharmaceutical and oil companies. Rath claims that World War II was started and exploited by these interests. In court filings, Rath and his lawyers write that the pharmaceutical industry then started apartheid in South Africa as part of a global conspiracy to "conquer and control the entire African continent." Former Nazi officials and the German chemical company IG Farben are specifically mentioned as playing a central role in the alleged conspiracy. In these documents, Rath also compares his adversaries in court to Hitler's storm troopers.

Rath suggests that the pharmaceutical industry continues to control international politics today, allowing 9/11 to occur and starting the Iraq War to divert attention from what Rath considers the failures of drug companies. On his website, Rath states that United States President George W. Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney, at the behest of what Rath calls the "pharmaceutical cartel", were planning a nuclear war in advance of 4 November 2008 elections in the United States. Similar claims are made by Rath in the New York Times and other major newspapers around the world in the form of large advertisements reportedly designed to resemble newspaper editorials.

Awards

In 2001, Rath was presented the Bulwark of Liberty Award by the health freedom advocacy groups the American Preventive Medical Association and the National Foundation for Alternative Medicine.

Controversies

Rath's theories, claims, and research, particularly his efforts to persuade South Africans to use his vitamin supplements to treat HIV/AIDS, have been controversial.

Illegal AIDS trials in South Africa

In 2005, according to Reuters, Rath's foundation distributed tens of thousands of pamphlets in poor black South African townships, such as Khayelitsha, claiming that HIV medication was "poison" and urging HIV-positive people instead to use vitamins such as those Rath sells to treat HIV/AIDS. People with "advanced AIDS" were then recruited by the Rath Foundation and its surrogates for what the Rath Foundation called "a clinical pilot study in HIVpositive [sic] patients" Personnel of the South Africa National Civic Organisation (Sanco) administered the programme in Khayelitsha as "agents for the Rath foundation."

Patients were recruited for the study with offers of money or food, and were instructed to stop taking conventional HIV/AIDS medications. Luthando Nogcinisa, a local Communist Party official, said that Rath agents recruited known HIV-positive individuals, "often with a pack of groceries, and they encourage the person not to take the antiretrovirals, but to rather take the vitamins". Mike Waters, Democratic Alliance health spokesperson, states that Rath gave patients "food parcels to convince them to give up their antiretrovirals and take his vitamin C supplements instead."

Rath Foundation employees reportedly infiltrated HIV/AIDS clinics in Khayelitsha and paid clinic staff to provide them with names of patients. The Guardian described a case in which a pregnant woman newly diagnosed with HIV was visited at home by Rath Health Foundation employees and convinced to stop taking her antiretroviral medication in favour of Rath's vitamins; she died 3 months later. The Rath Foundation disputed that patients were asked to stop taking effective antiviral medication. Rath's lawyers also claimed that the trial was actually a "community nutrition programme" to which Rath contributed vitamins.

Five trial participants stated in affidavits that they were stripped to their underwear, photographed, and had blood drawn without their permission. They were told to take pills containing what were said to be high doses of vitamins, including Rath's VitaCell. Demetre Labadarios, who leads the Human Nutrition programme at Stellenbosch University, questioned the safety of administering high doses of supplements to already-sick patients.

During and immediately following the vitamin trials, "many people died," deaths attributed by Rath's adversaries to a lack of effective medication. Sanco-Rath clinic workers reportedly instructed patients to return to the clinic in the event of medical emergency, rather than going to hospital.

The Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) and the South African Medical Association (SAMA) took the Rath Foundation to court to prevent further unauthorised trials and to stop the foundation's claims that vitamins could treat or cure HIV/AIDS. Rath's lawyer however said that he had never claimed his vitamin products were a cure for HIV/AIDS, adding that Rath's only involvement in the affair was the donation of vitamins to the South African National Civics Organisation. TAC and SAMA prevailed in court over Rath and the Medicines Control Council on unauthorised trials and advertising of Rath's nutrients as a replacement therapy for HIV.

In September 2008, Rath was ordered to pay court costs in an unsuccessful libel action against The Guardian (UK) after the paper reported on his foundation's unauthorised drug trials in South Africa.

SKAK

In 2004, the Swiss Study Group for Complementary and Alternative Methods in Cancer (SKAK), an independent group which evaluates alternative medical treatments, examined Rath's vitamin preparations and the marketing claims made by Rath. The Study Group reported that they "found no proof that the vitamin preparations of Dr. Matthias Rath have any effect on human cancer" and "advise against their use in cancer prevention and treatment while recommending a diet rich in fruit and vegetables." Specifically, the Swiss Study Group report criticised Rath for:

The conclusion of the Swiss Study Group regarding Rath's vitamin formulations was:

A cancer-curing effect has not been documented for any of these substances. Nor is there any proof that the preparations sold by Matthias Rath, some with high dosages, are useful in cancer prevention – leave alone curing cancer. Rath still owes proof regarding the correctness of his claims. Proof of effect cannot be provided by analogy with in vitro, animal or cell experiments. Because there is no proof for effect nor for the harmlessness of the preparations, SKAK advises against their use.

Harvard multivitamin study

To support the use of multivitamins in HIV/AIDS, Rath has cited a study conducted by the Harvard School of Public Health, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, suggesting that multivitamin supplementation slows the progression of HIV to AIDS.

In May 2005, the study authors released a statement condemning Rath's "irresponsible and misleading statements, as in our view they deliberately misinterpret findings from our studies to advocate against the scale-up of antiretroviral therapy." The study authors felt that Rath had misused their study results to argue that multivitamins should be used in place of antiretroviral medication. In their statement, the study authors affirmed the central role of antiretroviral medication in the treatment of AIDS, and indicated that multivitamins should be, at most, a supplementary treatment.

Use of published medical literature

A 1998 article in the British Medical Journal examined some of the claims made by Rath and Health Now in support of Rath's multivitamin supplement blend. The authors found that Rath listed 40 citations to support his product; however, on examination, only 8 of these citations were of actual clinical trials. After examining these clinical trials, the authors concluded that despite Rath's claims to the contrary, "no general clinical benefit of vitamins C and E and carotene can be proved from the works cited by Health Now."

Claims of WHO and UN support

Rath's advertising material has suggested that his nutritional supplements are superior to antiretroviral therapy in the treatment of HIV/AIDS and implied that his claims were endorsed by the World Health Organization, UNICEF, and UNAIDS. However, these agencies issued a joint statement condemning Rath's advertisements as "wrong and misleading".

Credentials

The Democratic Alliance (DA), official opposition party in South Africa, said Rath was representing himself as a medical doctor in his literature distributed in South Africa, and claimed that this was against the law since he was not registered as a doctor in South Africa. The DA filed complaints with the Health Professions Council of South Africa and the police. The Health Professions Council said it could not discipline Rath since its jurisdiction is restricted to registered doctors.

A lawyer representing Rath responded to the complaints by stating that the title 'Dr.' referred in Rath's case to "a PHD doctorate he had obtained and his position as a researcher, not a medical doctor."

Other sources, however, describe Rath as a "qualified doctor" and state that he "became a researcher first at the University Clinic in Hamburg and then, during 1989 and 1990, at the Berlin Heart Centre."

South African Council of Churches

To address the "confusion" created by Rath's advertising campaign, the South African Council of Churches issued a statement that Rath's activities in South Africa "can only be interpreted as misguided strategies to promote Rath's own brand of nutritional supplements." The Council affirmed the importance of both antiretroviral medication and good nutrition for people with HIV, and pointed out that multivitamins are distributed by public health services and need not be obtained from Rath's organisation.

Legal cases

Rath has been involved in a number of legal cases.