Quackbuster: Singapore

The comment from The Angry Medic in this previous post sent angry doc on a search for Singapore's Quackbusters.

It seems like the Health Sciences Authority comes closest to playing this role here.

From their Annual Report 2004 - 2005:

"As part of our ongoing post-market surveillance programme, we rely on various sources of information, including information obtained from field and media surveillance, to detect defective health products and health fraud. We received a total of 542 complaints in the year. 62 product defect reports were received and 94 products assessed. We conducted 31 product recalls for western medicinal products and CPM [Chinese Proprietary Medicine] due to concerns over their safety and quality requirements, such as contents of active ingredients not within specification limits, toxic heavy metals above permissible limits and the presence of adulterants.

Legal actions were taken against errant and non-compliant dealers. During the year we completed 37 prosecution cases in court, resulting in $302,000 worth of fines being imposed by the courts and five cases with imprisonment terms. In addition we also issued 37 composition notices amounting to a total of $30,800 in fines for the year."


Not too shabby.

Here's an Advisory on Caution about Misleading or Exaggerated Claims in Health Supplement Advertisement from your friendly neighbourhood quackbuster.

The HSA also regulate medical devices. Not sure if ionic bracelets fall under that description though...