Featured Image Credit: Netflix
Topics: Health, Cancer, Netflix, Film and TV
Ellie Kemp
A woman who became Australia's most-hated influencer after faking cancer to flog her healthy-eating empire is the focus of a new Netflix drama.
Belle Gibson duped thousands into believing she'd cured her own 'inoperable brain cancer' through a healthy diet and natural remedies.
Her lies were soon unraveled, and now a fictionalized version of her rise and fall is coming to Netflix in the form of Apple Cider Vinegar.
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The six-part series stars The Last of Us actress Kaitlyn Dever and Fear the Walking Dead's Alycia Debnam-Carey as a pair of social media influencers concealing a huge secret.
The series launches later this week.
Belle chronicled her cancer journey online, claiming she only had months to live after being diagnosed with a brain tumor.
Her dishonesty stretched even further, falsely claiming, as per Forbes, her cancer spread to her 'spleen, liver, uterus, and blood' and that a negative reaction to a vaccine was the root cause.
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In 2013, Belle fed her 300,000 Instagram followers the ultimate lie; she'd cured her cancer thanks to 'fruits, vegetables, and natural remedies.'
Off the back of this, she launched The Whole Pantry app, featuring her 'miracle' recipes and advice, as well as an accompanying cookbook.
Some 200,000 fans bought the $4 app within months of its launch and by early 2015, both launches had made more than $1 million in sales.
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It was claims of a grand charitable donation that saw Belle's career come crashing down.
The Australian vowed to donate $300,000 to charity, but doubts begin to grow when no evidence of this gesture surfaced.
Journalists caught wind of this and begin probing further.
In 2015, Gibson told 60 Minutes she had been diagnosed by a doctor who had purposefully lied and told her she had a brain tumor.
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But it all came out in an interview with The Australian Women’s Weekly that same year.
When asked straight-up if she had cancer, she admitted 'none of it's true.'
"I don’t want forgiveness,” she said. “I just think [speaking out] was the responsible thing to do. Above anything, I would like people to say, ‘Okay, she’s human. She’s obviously had a big life. She’s respectfully come to the table and said what she’s needed to say, and now it’s time for her to grow and heal.'”
Belle was consequently fined $410,000 by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission for lying about her donations to charity.
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The Whole Pantry app and book were also pulled.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the former influencer has kept an incredibly low profile ever since.
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Although in 2020, ABC Australia reported that Gibson was 'attending an event for Ethiopia’s Oromo community in Melbourne while wearing a headscarf and using a different name.'
A YouTube video of her speaking at the event later appeared.
The head of Melbourne’s Ethiopian community then spoke out and, after learning Belle's true identity, claimed she was ‘exploiting the good hearts of people,' reports Women's Weekly.
All six episodes of Apple Cider Vinegar drop on Netflix on Thursday, February 6.