If you read the Ernst and Young article you start to see how the claim unravels. For instance it mentions that he has been “honing his business acumen since grade school”, which seems like glowing praise, but it ignores the audio of the illegal medical claims he made in his fireside chats when with Royal Tongan Limu juice (sound familiar to MonaVie – it should). This lead to Royal Tongan Limu’s closure by the FTC and DOJ. How Ernst and Young missed this clear evidence is testament that Ernst and Young dropped on the ball on this one.

The explanation is simple, every company makes mistakes. Microsoft had Microsoft Bob. Ernst and Young has it’s Dallin Larsen as an Entrepreneur of the Year. It happens…

… or does it? Let’s dig a little deeper and see what else we can find…

Methodology for Choosing Entrepreneur of the Year

If you look at the FAQ for how an Entrepreneur of the Year is chosen we get a lot of information:

“Who are the judges?
The regional and national panels of judges include entrepreneurs and prominent leaders from academia, business, and the media…. Each independent panel of judges is allowed complete discretion in determining categories and award recipients.”

So, in short, we know that Ernst and Young only appointed judges, they did not endorse and do not endorse Dallin Larsen. It is very possible that Ernst and Young could completely disapprove of the winner, but have to award it anyway, since the panel of the judges made the decision. Furthermore, by setting it up the judging by regions, MonaVie gets the advantage of votes from other multi-level marketing companies that are traditionally focused in Utah.

By not knowing who the panel of judges are, we really can’t tell if there was bias involved in the judging or not. We don’t even know what criteria they used to make their decision.

Was Dallin Larsen really awarded Entrepreneur of the Year?

No, he was voted Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year. It was Tom Adams, President & CEO, Rosetta Stone Inc. who was Entrepreneur of the Year (see article above). If a MonaVie distributor tries to tell you Dallin Larsen was Entrepreneur of the Year, the distributor is trying to mislead you.

Should Dallin Larsen have been awarded Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year?

Perhaps he should have been awarded Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year. Let’s look at what he has accomplished:

• He has conned people into paying a $45 retail price for a juice that lacks the nutrition of a $4 juice.
• He has conned the 99.64% of the ENTIRE MonaVie sales to work hard at selling the product when while they LOSE money.
• This sales force is so brainwashed, that they even threaten to kill people like me who point out the above two facts.

I could probably add a few more bullet points, but I think that gets the message across. Let’s give a little credit to the guy where credit is due. Dallin Larsen rakes in millions while consumers of the juice and salesman of the juice lose. Shame on the consumers and salesmen of MonaVie.

This is why people are looking into creating their own MonaVie Scam.

Important Update

I don’t know how I missed this before. Anyway, Anonymous Aussie in the comments points out that there are a couple of other proven scammers who have won the Ernst and Young award:

“Let’s consider Stein Bagger, former CEO of IT Factory – awarded Danish Entrepreneur of the Year in 2008 by Ernst and Young.

Following his award, this young “entrepreneur” subsequently declared bankruptcy, was found to have falsified his credentials, was charged with forgery and was also convicted of fraud! He was sentenced to 7 years imprisonment on June 11, 2009 after it was found that his company was operating like a ponzi scheme – he had been forging large sales orders thus creating fictional revenue.

The scam which defrauded banks and private investors to the tune of US $225 billion is considered the biggest most recent scam in Denmark’s history!

This isn’t a once off “mistake” either – take Byrraju Ramalinga Raju who was awarded Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Services Award 1999 AND Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year 2007.

This scammer founded Satyam Computers but was subsequently forced to resign from the board in 2009 after admitting to corporate fraud whereby he’d cheated 6 million shareholders out of US $1.5 billion, many of which have lost their entire life savings.”

Let’s not credit Ernst and Young’s awards as a guarantee of good character or business acumen.

Originally posted 2010-09-08 10:00:46. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

I get the negativity comment on this site quite often. It’s quite illogical because I am simply trying to put the best information out there so that people can make an informed decision. I want to clear up the lies and misconceptions that MonaVie Distributors are spreading around the web about MonaVie. People should have the information on this site before making a decision to join MonaVie or continue being a part of the organization. There are too many people showing videos of Lou Niles and his Illegal Medicinal Claims as well as Lou Niles lying about being a cancer doctor in those videos. There are too many distributors lying that drinking MonaVie is equal to eating 13 fruits.

These lies are negative and they are being told to consumers. They hurt people like your mothers and your daughters. MonaVie distributors don’t want you to think about how spending $35-$45 for a bottle of juice (that lacks nutrition) hurts your chance for financial freedom. In a tough economy, such as this one, that $5000 a year (cost for a family of four) goes a long way.

If you were to get a bunch of criminals in a room, they’d call the police negative. After all, the police hamper the criminals ability to profit off of committing crimes.

Consider me like Consumer Reports magazine, looking out the people’s best interests. I don’t make MonaVie and its distributors scam people or make illegal medical claims, I’m simply blowing the whistle on them when they do. If you think that’s being negative, then chances are, you are with the criminals in the room upset at this police officer.

Originally posted 2010-08-22 11:03:43. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

Like the previous article, Mitch Biggs has posted a story on MonaVie on Associated Content. As of June 6th, 2010, you can see the Google Cache of this story here and here. Since Google may refresh their cache, you can just click the images below for a preserved copy.

Page 1

Mitch Biggs - MonaVie Organic Lies

Page 2

Mitch Biggs - MonaVie Organic Lies

Here are some of the quotes from both pages that I found worth focusing on:

“The value proposition is a tasteful, convenient and economical way to get all your fruit in a day.”

This is a clear lie and one we’ve heard MonaVie distributors tell again and again. It’s say that Mitch Biggs is simply making a mistake, but at his level in MonaVie organization such an obvious mistake is ridiculously impossible. For those unfamiliar with this lie, I give you this article on MonaVie and comparison to fruit. It’s worth noting that even a glance at MonaVie’s label shows that has very few vitamins and minerals and almost no fiber – all things that you should get by eating fruit. If you read this article, even MonaVie Product Specialist Sarah Brown agrees with this, proving Mitch Biggs’ statement to be wrong.

“MonaVie’s product is all natural and organic.”

We know that MonaVie is NOT organic. MonaVie admits this in their literature. Frequent commenter on this site, Vogel, has pointed out that there isn’t even one USDA-certified organic ingredient in Monavie. He also correctly points out that the false claim is punishable by a fine of up to $11,000 according to the USDA: “A civil penalty of up to $11,000 can be levied on any person who knowingly sells or labels as organic a product that is not produced and handled in accordance with the National Organic Program’s regulations.”

“The company recommends consuming 2 ounces twice a day for a total of 4 ounces. That will give you the antioxidant equivalent of 13 servings of fruits and vegetables. Do the math and it breaks down to 39 cents for an organic serving of fruit each day or about $5.”

I’d like to point out that this also a lie. It’s based on the above false assumption that antioxidant equivalent (measured by ORAC score) is equal to a real serving of fruits and vegetables. If Mitch Biggs wants to play that game, a $1.99 amount of cinnamon has 32 days worth of antioxidant capacity or about 6 cents a day (as opposed to MonaVie’s $5 a day).

Math and logic is clearly not Mitch Biggs strong point. Or maybe he’s trying to scam people so that he can line his pockets with money. It’s impossible to tell, but it’s one of the two.

“Research has also shown that it is effective against Swine Flu.”

We covered this previously here: Mitch Biggs Claims MonaVie Prevents Swine Flu. MonaVie is not shown to be effective against Swine Flu.

“Rather than choose one or two celebrities, they chose to use the average everyday worker that wanted something better for their family’s health and wealth.”

This is completely untrue. MonaVie has chosen celebrities. You’ll see Red Sox pitcher Jonathan Papelbon as one example. In fact there are whole photoshoots with Red Sox players You’ll also see MonaVie’s sponsored NASCAR cars. In fact here’s a picture proving the point:

MonaVie and the Red Sox

The choose the everyday worker not for altruistic purposes, but for other purposes. Mitch Biggs is an example of MonaVie’s true purpose. Distributors are given incentive to exaggerate the truth, outright lie (in Mitch Biggs’ case), or just claim ignorance of the very product they are paid to sell. With MonaVie’s distribution system, MonaVie itself retains plausible deniability and can get away with paying most of it’s sales force under minimum wage (see MonaVie’s Income Disclosure Statement.)

“As more team members are taught how to host tasting parties, the size of the team grows rapidly. Distributors are compensated on how much product is consumed by their team and not how many people sign up.”

Actually the compensation has nothing to do with actual consumption… there’s no one watching to see if the product is consumed. It’s about the product being purchased. What Mitch Biggs isn’t telling you in the above quote is that “how much product is consumed [or purchased] by their team” is directly related to “how many people sign up” as MonaVie requires that people who sign up also purchase the product. The way for distributors to get more money is to get more people to sign up.

Again, if you want want read more on Mitch Biggs’ claims, I suggest: Mitch Biggs Claims MonaVie Prevents Swine Flu.

(By the way, Mitch if you are reading this, this article isn’t meant to be personal. It’s meant to be more of a reflection of MonaVie’s educational process and how their method of distribution should be abolished. Clearly even top people in the organization like yourself are either not getting educated about the product or are purposely trying to scam your way to an early retirement. It has to be one of the two.)

Originally posted 2010-06-06 08:33:26. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

You can find his MonaVie page at the poorly spelled https://mymonavie.com/retireerly. That page name right there tells you their motivation for spreading the word about MonaVie. (Hint: It’s not about the value of the juice.)

Mitch Biggs wrote a couple of articles on Associate Content for the whole world to see. He even linked to his MonaVie page so people could read the content and sign up under him. That’s all fine, unless the articles are making illegal medicinal claims about MonaVie.

Page 1 of the article has no mention of MonaVie. You’ll want to click the image to see full details:

Mitch Biggs - MonaVie

Here’s Page 2 of the article with the mention of MonaVie (again click for full size):

Mitch Biggs - MonaVie Scam

I am showing you images of these pages because I have informed MonaVie and they have taken them down (more on that later). As of now you can still the Google Cache of page 1 and page 2.

Here’s a quote from that second page that I find particularly alarming:

The MonaVie Pulse blend has the Resveratrol equivalent of 30 glasses of red wine.

Our family put MonaVie to the test. We refused the vaccine offered by the school system and added MonaVie Pulse to our daily regimen. While there was as much as 60% absenteeism with documented cases of Swine Flu in each of our 3 children’s classes, none of us were affected. My wife and I added a little red wine to be on the safe side.

There’s obvious logic flaws going on here. If resveratrol stops Swine Flu (it doesn’t, but that’s Mitch Biggs’ claim on page 1), and MonaVie contains the resveratrol equivalent of 30 glasses of red wine… why would he and his wife, “add a little red wine to be on the safe side”? Is he thinking that extra 3 percent of resveratrol coming from wine is really staying on the safe side. And if you are going to “stay on the safe side”, it’s an all around bad idea refuse a vaccine and make your children test subjects with something potentially life threatening. Isn’t this the kind of thing that you report to the Department of Social Services? I don’t know, but just in case someone wants to investigate that further, here’s a link to Virginia’s DSS.

In MonaVie’s Distributor Guidelines, MonaVie makes clear that claims have to be “subject to typical results.” Mitch Biggs’ “putting his family to the test” does not qualify as typical results. Lastly, and one of the most important things to take away from this is that MonaVie is not approved to prevent or treat Swine Flu in anyway… and Mitch Biggs is clearly claiming prevention.

(By the way, Mitch if you are reading this, this article isn’t meant to be personal. It’s meant to be more of a reflection of MonaVie’s educational process and how their method of distribution should be abolished. Clearly even top people in the organization like yourself are either not getting educated about the product or are purposely trying to scam your way to an early retirement. It has to be one of the two.)

[Note: I'd like to thank frequent commenter here, Vogel for information leading to this story. Got a tip? Contact Us]

Originally posted 2010-06-06 07:09:39. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

However, one of the comments amazed me. It was this video clearly describing open-mindedness:

In order to have an intelligent debate on the value of MonaVie, one must recognize the concepts in the above video. Many (myself included) are open-minded about MonaVie. However, people should not accept all concepts from others on their face value. There should be scientific evidence from both sides of the debate supporting the claim.

Dozens of times in the aforementioned comments of the blog post, there have been claims of people witnessing medical situation X and attributing it to MonaVie, when there are a number of other valid explanations, such as the placebo effect. These are not scientific studies and carry no more weight for their argument than if they had said ghosts were moving the lamp shade.

Originally posted 2009-05-14 06:12:54. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

From everything I’ve read acai used in MonaVie is freeze-dried and shipped from the Amazon to the United States (specifically Utah) for bottling. This requires a lot of energy – energy in the form of oil or coal. Creating the energy to ship the fruit, leaves pollutants behind, and can’t be considered a good way for the US to reduce their dependence on foreign oil.

Many health organizations are suggesting that it is better if we eat locally grown food rather than importing it.

Originally posted 2009-03-07 10:16:13. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

Let’s investigate how MonaVie is marketing this release. On December 9th, 2011, it had this article Diamond Executive Marcy N. Shares MonaVie Perks Experience with Downline.

Before we dig into the details it is worth focusing on why MonaVie has highlights “Diamond Executive Marcy N.” when a simple search shows that the only Diamond Executive “Marci N.” is Marcy Negri. I understand anonymity and I’m anonymous myself.

However, if you want to be anonymous don’t try to pull rank as a Diamond Executive. In my view, you need to own the title if you are going to use your Diamond Executive title. Before he died (RIP), you never heard testimony from Steve J. about Apple, right?

So let’s look at what MonaVie is advocating that their top distributors spread through their downline. Here’s a quote from the article:

“The following is an email that Marcy N., Diamond Executive with MonaVie, sent to her organization. With permission, we are sharing this stellar example of downline communication, which effectively communicates the benefits of the MonaVie Perks program through personal experience.”

The email is this:

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Dec 9, 2011
Diamond Executive Marcy N. Shares MonaVie Perks Experience with Downline
Archive

Thank you for the feedback many of you have provided us during the rollout phase of our MonaVie Perks Retail Rewards program. We’ve sincerely appreciated hearing your accolades and experiences in saving.

The following is an email that Marcy N., Diamond Executive with MonaVie, sent to her organization. With permission, we are sharing this stellar example of downline communication, which effectively communicates the benefits of the MonaVie Perks program through personal experience.

I am so excited about the new MonaVie Perks program. One of the reasons people quit MonaVie is because once they start to feel better or lose weight, they forget how they used to look and feel. Then their credit card bill comes, and they think that looking good and feeling good cost too much. Well, now, MonaVie has provided a perk that can save them significant money. In fact, it will actually cost them money to drop out!

We just enrolled in the new Perks program, and during the first week we saved $93.00!

How, you ask?

We have a $40 co-pay on our prescription plan for some prescriptions. They have some crazy formula—some prescriptions are $10, some are $20, and some are $40, go figure…I went to Walgreens and paid $40 for a prescription and then as I was walking out of the store, I looked at the fine print on the receipt and it said, “Your prescription plan saved you $2.49.” In other words, if I didn’t have insurance the script would have been $42.49, big deal! So I asked the pharmacist if he would try to run the prescription on my MonaVie Health & Happiness Card. He wasn’t too thrilled and thought that it wouldn’t save any money. But when he went to his computer, his eyes lit up and he said, “I will re-run your prescription on this card, and your co-pay will only be $15!”
I just saved $25
Later in the week, I had another prescription filled; this one saved $3.
I just saved $3
I went online before we went out to dinner on Tuesday night and looked at the MonaVie Perks site. I found a new Japanese restaurant that we had never gone to before and printed a coupon. We had a great meal with our friends and when the check came we saved $15 plus 10% off the check.
I just saved another $25
Yesterday I went to the Gap; prior to going, I printed a $15 coupon.
I just saved another $15
Last night we went to Bensi, an Italian restaurant that we frequently visit. Prior to going, I looked online, found a $10 coupon, and guess what…?
I just saved another $10
Today I received the actual Retail Rewards discount card and welcome kit booklet from MonaVie. There was another Gap coupon…
I went shopping, and today I saved another $15

Total savings on stuff I would have bought in one week: $93. If I do this every week, I will save $4,836 per year! That is more than my AutoShip costs me. MonaVie just found another way to reward me for being a customer. What a great company! I am making money 8 ways on the standard compensation plan, PLUS I am saving more money on everyday purchases than I am spending on the product. There are so many places to save money! Just log into your Virtual Office and click “MV Perks” to register and look at all of the great merchants in your area that are participating—you won’t believe your eyes!

It really does cost you money NOT to be with MonaVie.

Marcy N.
Diamond Executive

The downline receiving this think that it is a fantastic opportunity to save money, right?

However, let’s examine the claims made.

Regarding the prescription part of the MonaVie Perks:

• Points #1 and #2 of Nancy Negri’s article relates to discounts for prescriptions being filled. Hey, I thought that people drinking MonaVie didn’t get sick. Oh wait, that was exposed as a scam here, MonaVie M(Mun), Dr. Paul Clayton, and Wellmune.
• Also there are similar health cards available for discounts on prescriptions here: http://www.medicationcard.net/

In short, the card has zero value. Also, MonaVie shouldn’t be representing it as a perk, especially when it flies in the face of what they’ve told consumers in the past.

The more egregious part of the MonaVie Perks program comes to the “deals.”

As “Marcy N.” says,

“Well, now, MonaVie has provided a perk that can save them significant money. In fact, it will actually cost them money to drop out!”<.blockquote>

Is that truthful? Let’s look at what MonaVie has to say regarding their Perk program. Their “official representative”, Jake Larsen, who is likely related to Dallin Larsen: said the following:

“The Retail Rewards program is a specially designed program for MonaVie distributors that is powered by Entertainment®. The special offers for MonaVie have been chosen from Entertainment’s database of hundred’s of thousands of offers focused on delivering relevant savings for MonaVie distributors. Entertainment also manages offerings for student and charity fundraisers. One of those offerings includes the Entertainment Book, which you may have seen used as a fundraiser for schools or other organizations.

The offerings for MonaVie have been put together especially for our distributors and may be different offers than those found in Entertainment Books used for fundraising.”

It turns out that MonaVie’s Official blog is pushing the fact that joining MonaVie is a cost savings. However further inspection reveals that MonaVie’s autoship requirements costs close to $1700 a year and anyone has been able to get the FULL DEALS (not limited as MonaVie’s representative says) for around $35 a year… and it get cheaper depending on the season.

This is deceptive marketing at its finest. I’m in appalled that MonaVie would post the following:

“Total savings on stuff I would have bought in one week: $93. If I do this every week, I will save $4,836 per year! That is more than my AutoShip costs me. MonaVie just found another way to reward me for being a customer. What a great company! I am making money 8 ways on the standard compensation plan, PLUS I am saving more money on everyday purchases than I am spending on the product. There are so many places to save money!”

It’s hard to know where to begin with topics like this. Marcy Negri extrapolates one week to an entire year. Does she get two prescriptions filled per week? If so… Wow, you why are you paying $40 a bottle for MonaVie?!?!

After that why is she pitching savings of a MonaVie program as an exclusive benefit when a non-member could get similar fantastic deals for $1700 less a year?

Poor form MonaVie.

Originally posted 2012-02-24 17:06:39. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

]]> http://www.juicescam.com/monavie-perks-scam-involving-diamond-executive-marcy-negri/feed/ 2 http://www.juicescam.com/monavie-contains-cancer-causing-ingredients/ http://www.juicescam.com/monavie-contains-cancer-causing-ingredients/#comments Sun, 22 Apr 2012 23:42:42 +0000 MonaVie Scam http://www.juicescam.com/?p=917 Many MonaVie distributors may claim that it is a healthy drink. As we’ve seen, MonaVie lacks nutrition. However, upon further investigation of the ingredients it seems that MonaVie contains a known carcinogen – a cancer causing ingredient.

That ingredient is benzene. Now you might be thinking, “I have a bottle of MonaVie and I don’t see benzene on the label.” Sodium Benzoate + Vitamin C = Benzene:

“Sodium benzoate has already been the subject of concern about cancer because when mixed with the additive vitamin C in soft drinks, it causes benzene, a carcinogenic substance.”

Here’s the list of ingredients from a bottle of MonaVie :

You might have blow that up a bit to read it. However, you’ll see that sodium benzoate and vitamin C are clearly there.

The FDA has created a question and answer for such products. It has tested quite a few products, but it has not tested MonaVie.

In any case, a wise consumer should avoid any “health” drink that has unknown dangers like proven cancer causing ingredients. MonaVie would fit into that category.

Originally posted 2011-09-20 12:54:59. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

]]> http://www.juicescam.com/monavie-contains-cancer-causing-ingredients/feed/ 42 http://www.juicescam.com/monavies-pain-reduction-and-improvement-in-range-of-motion-study/ http://www.juicescam.com/monavies-pain-reduction-and-improvement-in-range-of-motion-study/#comments Sun, 22 Apr 2012 23:42:42 +0000 MonaVie Scam http://www.juicescam.com/?p=896 [The following is research from frequent commenter Vogel... I have cleaned up some of the formatting.]

I had a look at MonaVie’s latest publication that just came out this week. This is MonaVie’s worst study yet. My critical analysis follows; it is by no means all-encompassing of the many flaws.

Publication

Jensen GS, Ager DM, Redman KA, Mitzner MA, Benson KF, Schauss AG. Pain reduction and improvement in range of motion after daily consumption of an açai (Euterpe oleracea mart.) pulp-fortified polyphenolic-rich fruit and berry juice blend. J Med Food. 2011 Apr 6.

The Authors

The article features the usual cast of MonaVie’s pseudo-scientific hacks; namely Alexander Schauss and Gitte Jensen. Their shenanigans have already been discussed in great depth on Lazyman and JuiceScam already. In a nutshell, both are skeezy lackeys of the supplement industry.

Schauss, holder of a mail-order PhD, has been in tight with MonaVie since the company’s inception. He conducted all of their bogus tainted research, heads the company’s “scientific advisory board”, is a frequent speaker at MonaVie distributor meetings, sells his books and CDs to Monavie distributors, and holds the patent to the freeze-dried acai that was allegedly used in Monavie (and which served as a fundamental part of Monavie’s advertising claims about the product’s uniqueness and “efficacy”). Schauss is also known for having previously peddled his own line of BS supplements (Feed My Brain) to treat autistic children.

Jensen is best known for her association with the Klamath Lake blue-green algae scam (shut down by the FDA), and for a previous MonaVie publication she coauthored with Schauss. She operates a tiny little insignificant research-for-hire organization (HolgerNIS) in Klamath Falls. You can find the information on StemTech here and here.

One of the other authors is David Marshall Ager, an obscure Klamath Falls chiropractor who operates out of a clinic (Cascade Chiropractic and Rehabilitation) so insignificant that it doesn’t even have its own website. This is his first scientific publication.

The remaining authors, who don’t have a PhD or MD degree among them, are underlings of Gitte Jensen and affiliated with HolgerNIS.

The Journal

The Journal of Medicinal Food, a rag for the nutraceutical industry, is produced by the Korean Society of Food Science and Nutrition. It has an ISI impact factor of 1.39. For perspective, this compares to top-tier scientific journals in roughly the same way that a Suzuki Sidekick would compare to a shiny new Ferrari (e.g., top-tier journals have an IF of about 30, going as high as 50). Read more about Impact Factor on Wikipedia.

If it dawns on you to you ask why MonaVie would publish a study in an insignificant Asian nutraceutical journal, then you are asking the right question. There is no legitimate reason other than that they couldn’t get their crap study published anywhere that actually matters.

The Study Design and Methodology

This was an open-label study, meaning that it did not include any placebo group or blinding, and it was conducted in a mere 14 subjects who were not enrolled in a randomized fashion. On that basis, this would be considered by any expert as an extremely poorly designed study; so poor in fact that it would be completely incapable of generating any remotely reliable data. The results would be susceptible to bias and the study cohort was too small for definitive conclusions to be drawn. In contrast, a randomized placebo-controlled double-blinded clinical trial would have been an appropriate experimental design.

The authors state explicitly that they included 2 subjects that did not meet the study’s inclusion criteria. This is unheard of — simply unfathomable. Inclusion criteria exist for a reason and subjects should never be included who do not meet a study’s preset criteria. My mind boggles at the ineptitude of the investigators for violating their own rules of the study.

“The original plan was to involve 12 participants; however, during the initial recruitment and interview process 14 interested participants were identified. Because this study was performed with the intent of broadly exploring what pain conditions may benefit from consumption of MonaVie Active, we decided to enroll all 14 even though some did not meet the original inclusion criteria.” [Page 3]

Several of the endpoints used to measure outcomes (pain, range of motion, activities of daily living) were subjective (based on patient questionnaires) and, thus, easily influenced by the study’s poor design (i.e. lack of blinding and placebo control) and susceptible to the placebo effect and subject/researcher bias. One of the few non-subjective measures used (to assess antioxidant effects) was the CAP-e assay, which we have discussed here previously. It is an anomalous assay developed by one of Jensen’s underlings (Dana Honzel, while she was an undergraduate student at Santa Clara University) and has never been used or validated by any other researcher.

It would not be considered as an even remotely acceptable method of measurement by any bona fide researcher.

The investigators also implemented an inappropriate method for analyzing statistical significance. They used a t-test instead of a repeated measures analysis, such as one-way ANOVA, to measure the effect of multiple measurements over time.

Ethical Issues

The study does not contain the required Declaration of Helsinki statement indicating that it was conducted in accordance with internationally recognized standards for human medical experimentation, nor does it state that the study was approved by any independent review board or ethics committee. These are grave oversights.

The study involved blood draws, yet it does not appear that any of the authors are qualified to perform such procedures. Lastly, the article does not include any statement indicating that the subjects provided informed consent prior to participation in the study; this too is a grave oversight and it adds to the overall picture that this study was not conducted in accordance with standards for ethical research.

Results

Because of the lack or blinding and placebo control, all results can be attributed solely to the placebo effect and investigator/subject bias.

The medical histories of the patients were not considered (probably attributable to the fact that no REAL doctor was involved in the study, and a chiropractor wouldn’t be qualified to assess their case histories). This oversight is ridiculous. No serious medical research study on joint pain would ever be undertaken without thorough medical exams and chart reviews to determine the diagnosis, etiology, and natural history of each patient’s condition. To make matters even worse, the subjects were not excluded from taking concurrent medications. Thus, all results could be attributable to such medication use rather than to Monavie.

The key results reported were improvements in activities of daily living (ADL), range-of-motion, and pain questionnaire scores; increased serum antioxidant status (measured by the unreliable CAP-e assay); and decreased lipid peroxidation (TBARs).

The only potentially reliable and semi-objective indicator of efficacy, the C-reactive protein assay (a surrogate marker of inflammation) was not significantly affected, and to make matters worse, the data were not shown at all (a ridiculous oversight). Equally ridiculous, is the fact that the lipid peroxidation data were not presented, despite the authors’ clam that there was a significant reduction in serum following consumption of Monavie for 12 weeks.

Averaged data for range of motion scores at each timepoint were not presented, making it impossible to verify the authors’ claims of a significant effect. Data for pain and CAP-e results were presented as percent change rather than raw values, again making verification impossible (this method is a common way of fudging and disguising bad data and small, clinically meaningless effects).

Pain scores were reduced from baseline by less than 10% at weeks 2 to 8, and by about 17% at week 12. The data throughout were highly variable (as evidenced by the very large error bars in Figure 4) and the differences from baseline could be just random noise (not to mention attributable to biasing factors, the placebo effect, concurrent medications, regression to the mean, or intentional data fudging).

The correlation graphs for TBARS and CRP in Figure 5 are basically meaningless. They are used to disguise the fact that the actual data TBAR and CRP data were not presented (a fundamental and inexcusable omission).

Interpretive Errors

The study attempts to single out acai as the causative factor responsible for the alleged benefits seen in the study subjects, e.g.:

“Given the combined antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and potentially antinociceptive properties of acai juice and pulp seen in vitro and in vivo, we sought to conduct a pilot study in humans with chronic pain and underlying inflammatory issues.” [Page 2]

“The test product for this study was MonaVie Active (MonaVie LLC, South Jordan, UT, USA), a fruit- and berry-based juice blend with a high level of polyphenolic compounds that exhibit strong antioxidant properties. These properties stem from the predominance of acai pulp in the formulation; pulp of this fruit has been shown to have high superoxide and peroxyl radical scavenging capacities in vitro.” [Page 2]

“Acai contains a range of polyphenols that protect cellular oxidative damage in vitro and provide anti-inflammatory signaling leading to reduced production of free radicals by inflammatory cells.” [Page 8]

However, the article’s discussion (page 8) states that grapes have been shown to have analgesic effects; and even though grape juice is a primary ingredient in Monavie, the authors fail to even remotely entertain the possibility that the alleged effects in this study would have been attributable to the grape juice rather than the acai in Monavie. Furthermore, the authors do not disclose that Monavie is made with significant vitamin and antioxidant fortification, nor do they consider the possibility that the juice’s alleged antioxidant effects could be attributable solely to the vitamin C that the juice is spiked with. Lastly, the do not discuss the possibility that the glucosamine added to Monavie Active could have been responsible for the improvements in patient-reported outcomes independently of any antioxidant effects (i.e. the purported benefits of glucosamine do not involve an oxidative/antioxidant mechanism).

Financial Disclosures

The disclosure statement reveals that the study was funded by Monavie. Schauss declares that he is an unfunded member of the Monavie scientific advisory board. He fails to disclose that he has other relationships with the company, such as the licensing of his patent on Opti-Acai, speaking engagements, and profits from the sale of his CDs and book to Monavie distributors.

Originally posted 2011-05-04 10:42:33. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

]]> http://www.juicescam.com/monavies-pain-reduction-and-improvement-in-range-of-motion-study/feed/ 1 http://www.juicescam.com/more-proof-monavie-dying/ http://www.juicescam.com/more-proof-monavie-dying/#comments Sun, 22 Apr 2012 22:25:17 +0000 MonaVie Scam http://www.juicescam.com/?p=869 I received an interesting email recently. The person had an email from former MonaVie distributor Robert Wright. I asked him if I could publish it and he went back to Robert for permission. Robert granted the permission so here is his email:

I was in MonaVie for 2-1/2 years, and never heard of non-retail bonus that you speak of. I will look into my back office and see if I can decipher what it is that you refer to.

As far as their Income Disclosure Statement….what a crock of crap. I have to admit that I made good money with MonaVie for the first year that I was with them. I made it to Gold Executive rank, but NEVER made the kind of $$ that it showed on the IDS. My average income ran around 300-400 per week, a far cry from $52,000 per year.

My group grew to just under 700 as of July of 2010, but out of those people I now have only 17 people that are on auto-ship and drinking the product

I’m very good friends with my Black Diamond up-line Carrie Dickie….she is the one on the Momentum DVD who talks about them taking the berry out of Brazil and MonaVie giving back to that country…speaking of the MORE project. She has over 22,000 people in her group.

Carrie made $980,000 in 2009 with MonaVie, her income today is less than $500.00 per week. This is happening with many of the Black Diamonds in MonaVie… the problem is that people simply cannot afford to drink the juice.

Carrie and I, along with my Diamond up-line, found a company that has a product that is only $40.00 per month, has better results than MonaVie, is a publicly traded company so that there is no hidden BS about the company being a billion dollar company, yet no one can see the books to validate what is being said. Everything with this company is in the open to the distributors and share holders, we are seeing 307% growth, and experiencing the momentum that MonaVie was seeing between 2005-2008.

Don’t get me wrong, I love the MonaVie product, but tell your wife to run….it is a loosing proposition. My wife and I went around $20,000 in credit card debt “sharing the juice” with everyone who would listen, only to have them get on the product, and than stop after a couple of months when they couldn’t afford to drink it anymore.

That’s quite a drop, right? It seems to support interest in MonaVie is fading.

As for the company that Robert is talking about, but not naming by name. That’s another scam called Protandim. Out of the frying pan and into the fryer.

Originally posted 2011-03-16 13:11:57. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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