Meet the influencers calling drinking bleach ‘health revolution'

Times

6 hours ago

When Christina Dominguez complained of a scratchy throat, a friend from the small community church she attended in Liberty Hill, Texas, told her to do something she had read about online: gargle with chlorine dioxide — also known as industrial bleach.
'I gargled three drops with a very sore throat and it was gone the next day,' Dominguez said. 'My friend said it cured her Covid. I am new to it and don't know much, but I'm a believer.'
Ignoring health authority warnings around the ingesting of chlorine dioxide, alternative health influencers are recommending people drink it with water, spray it on skin and even use it in enemas as a 'cure' for everything from measles to cancer, HIV and autism.
First touted as a 'miracle cure' in the United States in the mid-1990s, the German biophysical researcher Andreas Kalcker is one of the earliest and most prominent proponents, describing chlorine dioxide as 'possibly the greatest medical discovery of the last hundred years'.
But the so-called bleacher movement received relatively little attention until President Trump, at the height of the Covid-19 outbreak in 2020, suggested coronavirus sufferers 'inject' disinfectant. He later claimed he was being sarcastic.
Yet adherents kept pushing the theory, largely on the fringes until they were embraced by Trump's second-term health secretary, the vaccine sceptic Robert F Kennedy Jr.
Kennedy, who has built a huge following promoting anti-vaccine conspiracy theories, has not explicitly promoted chlorine dioxide as a treatment. But during his Senate confirmation hearing in January, he referred to the chemical substance and praised Trump for 'looking at all of the different remedies' for Covid, 'including even chlorine dioxide'.
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In recent months, interest has exploded among social media groups such as those called 'Chlorine Dioxide' and 'Secret Mineral', some of which have added thousands of new followers on Facebook from the US, UK and across the world.
In the groups, users discuss their growing mistrust of science and the medical community, particularly in the wake of the pandemic.
In May, the movement was given its first mainstream boost when Kalcker was invited to a 'Truth Seekers' conference at the Trump National Doral hotel in Miami, a two-day event featuring anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theorists.
Though the conference was a closed event, The Times found video and photographs posted on the social media accounts of attendees. A number of products appeared to be on sale to ticket-holders, including chlorine dioxide-based nasal sprays sold by Michelle Herman.
Kalcker, who claims to be the inventor of the most commonly used chlorine dioxide solution, marketed as Miracle Mineral Solution (MMS), talked up the health benefits to the thousand-strong audience, some of whom paid $2,000 to attend.
'It's very easy, you drink it all the day,' he told attendees in a speech that was recorded on video. 'The important thing is not to drink a lot in the morning. More is not better, more often is better. It works on cancer … it helps necrotic fingers grow back. It's simply amazing.'
Influencers and peddlers of chlorine dioxide make money by selling self-published books about the supposed treatment, by marketing MMS and by posting how-to videos on their online platforms.
Half a dozen members of the most popular chlorine dioxide Facebook group, which has 30,000 members, told The Times they used the solution for minor ailments such as a sore throat or psoriatic skin. However, some said they were using it as the sole treatment for diseases as serious as cancer and neurodevelopmental disorders such as autism — against all medical advice.
Dominguez, a 31-year-old mother of two, said she kept her use of chlorine dioxide on the 'down low' because 'if you look at regular search engines like Google they make it seem like something bad, so that no one uses it. Think of how big pharma would lose money when this is used for so many different things.'
In 2019, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) warned that 'ingesting these products is the same as drinking bleach', listing possible side-effects including abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, diarrhoea and acute liver failure.
The American Association of Poison Control Centers recorded more than 16,000 cases of chlorine dioxide poisoning, including 2,500 cases of children under 12, in 2020, the last year it published figures on the trend. Many of those individuals suffered serious side-effects, the group noted, including a six-year-old autistic girl who required hospital treatment for liver failure.
'The problem with chlorine dioxide is that these benefits people are claiming are really not proven,' said Dr Josh King, medical director at the Maryland Poison Center and an associate professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.
Fiona O'Leary, an anti-chlorine dioxide campaigner, said she told managers of Trump National Doral of her concerns about the Truth Seekers event in a failed bid to get it cancelled. Speaking to The Times, she said of the bleacher movement: 'It's always been crazy, but this is totally different to what we've seen before.'
Several of the listed speakers and special guests at the Truth Seekers conference have previously faced legal action or been investigated by the authorities. In 2021, Kalcker was charged in Argentina with falsely promoting a type of toxic bleach as a medical cure after the death of a five-year-old boy whose parents gave him Kalcker's chlorine dioxide solution in the belief it would ward off Covid-19.
In a response to The Times, Kalcker wrote: 'As a biophysics researcher focused on electromolecular medicine, I believe it's crucial that any discussion about chlorine dioxide solution is grounded in scientific understanding.'
Mark Grenon, who attended the event as a special guest, was the main distributor of MMS in the US before he was sentenced in 2023 to five years in federal prison for selling an 'unapproved and misbranded drug'. Grenon, the self-styled archbishop of the Genesis II Church of Health and Healing in Florida, was released this year on probation.
Also at the conference was Kerri Rivera, a former Chicago real estate agent turned pseudo medical expert who has more than 17,000 followers on Instagram. She encourages parents to give their autistic children doses of chlorine dioxide as part of a 'protocol' that rids the body of parasites she claims causes autism. Experts say autism is a neurological condition that is not caused by viruses, vaccines or parasites and for which there is no known cure.
The authorities in Germany, where Rivera was believed to be living at some point, investigated accusations that she had caused bodily harm to a child, though no charges were filed. Rivera, speaking in both Spanish and English, describes herself on Instagram as 'a woman whose life changed' when her son was diagnosed with autism and claims that for the past 19 years she has 'helped many children lose their autism diagnosis'. On Instagram and in private online support groups she recommends parents giving drops to children orally, through enemas, and in baths.
'Almost all of the people with autism have high levels of pathogens; virus, bacteria, parasites and heavy metals,' Rivera wrote in her book Healing the Symptoms Known as Autism, which was removed by Amazon in 2019. 'Chlorine dioxide kills pathogens and helps the body to detoxify itself,' she added.
When reached by The Times, Rivera declined to address the allegations, but has previously defended chlorine dioxide and her credentials, saying: 'This is a medical issue. I have a degree in homeopathy and work with MDs and PhD scientists.'
In April, a report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found that autism diagnoses are increasing but attributed the rise to better early detection and evaluation services. Immediately after, Kennedy contradicted the CDC, repeating the claim that 'environmental toxins' and the prevalence of food additives were behind the spike.
Emma Dalmayne, an autism campaigner who has several autistic children and was diagnosed herself, said giving any legitimacy to bleach cures was dangerous. 'It's one thing if a consenting adult decides to take this, but we are seeing children held down and given enemas,' she told The Times. 'Sometimes drops are put into their babies' bottles.'
Dalmayne said her advocacy has attracted hate mail, threats and even bullets through the post, believed to be sent by members of the bleacher community trying to 'silence' her.
She called the chlorine dioxide proponents 'very clever, preying on fears and insecurities', adding: 'Parents are jumping on these 'cures' because they don't want to face the fact that they gave birth to an autistic child. And the kids can't advocate for themselves. It's heartbreaking, actually.'
Dalmayne, a 49-year-old mother of five, joined one of Rivera's support groups and shared screenshots with The Times of messages that appeared to show parents reporting vomiting, rashes, seizures and chemical-smelling urine in their severely autistic children after administering chlorine dioxide.
One mother called 'Katrina' asked Rivera: 'Hello Kerri, when a child has pain during detox but can't tell me because they can't talk or can't understand, and are crying out what (sic) you recommend, what I might give for pain or calm?' They did not receive a response that could be seen on the site.
But in reply to another message of concern about the enema protocol, an administrator for Rivera's group wrote: 'If you move slowly and respect the child's tolerance, there is nothing to fear.'
Dalmayne considered it child abuse and has lodged a petition on change.org to have Instagram remove Rivera's account, which has attracted more than 35,000 signatories. Dalmayne said she was waiting for a response from Instagram.
Most of the campaigning against chlorine dioxide therapies has come from outside the US. Dalmayne is based in London and O'Leary in Ireland. O'Leary speculates it may be because non-conventional therapies are much more widely accepted in America, where the market is less tightly regulated.
'The problem is there isn't the legislation,' said O'Leary, who describes four of her five children as being on the autistic 'spectrum'. 'Years have gone by where we've been protesting and raising awareness and all of these things.'
Meanwhile, several Truth Seekers speakers and guests have praised Kennedy on their social media accounts. Others have posted pictures taken with him before he took up the role. Herman said she met Kennedy in 2023, when she spoke to him 'for 30 minutes' about chlorine dioxide. 'He listened intently, indicated he was not familiar with it but was nonetheless very intrigued and asked for more information,' she said. 'I've been connecting with many of the high-profile medical freedom players to educate them on the benefits of chlorine dioxide and to counteract the misinformation.'
After several chlorine dioxide proponents, including Herman, called on Kennedy to remove federal warnings about the use of chlorine dioxide, an FDA web page featuring a warning about chlorine dioxide's life-threatening effects was taken down in April and replaced with a 'page not found' notice. The page is still not functioning.
An FDA spokesman told The Times: 'There is not any new FDA action and the general public health position on [chlorine dioxide] being dangerous has not changed.'
At the same time, alternative health proponents like Herman are cheering on what they call a 'health revolution'. 'The wholesale reform of these agencies is long overdue and we are thrilled that RFK Jr is in charge,' Herman said. 'A real healthcare can finally ensue. We are excited to have played a part in this revolution.'