Have you seen Apple Cider Vinegar on Netflix? Since its release on 6 February, the Aussie series has been streamed nearly four million times and made it into the top five of Netflix’s global charts. The six-parter follows the story of Australian wellness blogger Belle Gibson, who claimed she was treating malignant brain cancer with a strict health routine of organic foods, coffee enemas and juices.

In 2013, she began documenting her treatment journey online and amassed hundreds of thousands of Instagram followers. Gibson secured a book deal and landed a gig with tech giant Apple. But… she never actually had cancer. Today, I’ll take you through the true story behind Apple Cider Vinegar and the rise and fall of Belle Gibson.

Born in 1991, Annabelle Natalie Gibson was raised in suburban Brisbane by her mum. In interviews, Gibson described a difficult childhood burdened by responsibilities beyond her years, like caring for her autistic brother. An exemplary student and a high achiever, Gibson’s school friends claim she was teased for lying compulsively. They allege Gibson made things up about her life, like being in witness protection or surviving major health issues.

Gibson relocated to Perth in 2009, where the 18-year-old began posting stories in an online chatroom. She claimed she was writing from a Perth hospital, where she’d undergone major heart surgery for a tumour. Eventually, she said she’d been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer and had only had a few months to live.

At the time, Gibson blamed her brain tumour on the HPV vaccine, which protects against most cervical cancers. She said the immunisation had caused her to have a stroke, which then led to brain cancer. However, there is no evidence linking the HPV vaccine to brain cancer or stroke.

Gibson used this anti-vaccine narrative to explain why she’d chosen to shun traditional treatments like chemotherapy and radiotherapy for her supposed brain cancer. In 2010, Gibson moved to Melbourne to undergo treatment with a neurologist and immunologist named Dr Mark Johns. However, it’s now believed Belle made up the existence of Mark Johns.

Meanwhile, another young woman was leading a new online movement. Jessica Ainscough was known as the ‘original wellness warrior’. At the age of 23, she was diagnosed with a rare and aggressive cancer in her left arm and hand.

Ainscough rejected doctors’ recommendation to amputate and adopted an alternative treatment known as Gerson Therapy — a food-based protocol that claims to cure illness, including cancer, with an all-vegetarian diet and a strict routine of fruit and veggie juices, as well as coffee enemas.

According to the Cancer Council, “Gerson therapy is not a valid or effective treatment for cancer. It should never be taken in lieu of genuine treatments like surgery, radiation therapy or chemotherapy.”

Believing this treatment was her medicine, Ainscough built up an online profile promoting this belief. Belle Gibson saw how audiences resonated with Ainscough’s story and began sharing her own treatment journey for her supposed brain cancer.

Tragically, Jess Ainscough died in 2015.

By 2013, Gibson was posting about living with brain cancer on Instagram. Her account, @healing_belle, rapidly amassed 200,000 followers — an impressive audience size for the time. For context, around 100 million people actively used Instagram in 2013. Today, the meta-owned platform has two billion active monthly users.

Gibson’s recipes and wellness tips were turned into a lifestyle app called The Whole Pantry. The app’s success earned Gibson a contract with Apple, who wanted to incorporate it into the launch of the first Apple Watch.

Gibson signed a publishing deal with Penguin Random House and released The Whole Pantry as a recipe book in 2014. By 2015, it was a best-seller.

Amidst the rapid success of her book and app, Belle also ran fundraisers and claimed she was donating regularly to charities. With the backing of a tech giant and a major book publisher, it seemed no one had reason to doubt Belle Gibson.

An anonymous email first sounded the alarm on Belle’s fake diagnosis. It was sent to journalists and publications around the country, including The Age reporters Beau Donelly and Nick Toscano. They began investigating Gibson’s alleged donations. When she couldn’t provide proof that money from her fundraisers or book/app earnings had been donated, they investigated further.

Some of the charities Gibson claimed to be supporting said they’d never received any money from her. Others said they had received small donations, but only in the days after Toscano and Donelly first contacted Gibson.

It then came to light that neither Belle Gibson nor her companies were lawfully registered as fundraisers. According to Consumer Affairs Victoria in 2015, organisations found to misrepresent fundraising events could be in breach of criminal and consumer law. Gibson and her company, The Whole Pantry, risked significant fines.

But Toscano and Donelly had only begun to scratch the surface. They put a list of extensive questions to Gibson. After she failed to provide satisfactory answers, The Age ran a story on 8 March 2015 with the headline: Charity money promised by 'inspirational' health app developer Belle Gibson not handed over.

“Melbourne businesswoman Belle Gibson, founder of food and health app The Whole Pantry, solicited donations from a loyal following of 200,000 people in the name of at least five charities that have no record of receiving money from her,” it said.

Hours after the story went live, The Whole Pantry released a statement blaming a bookkeeping error for the unpaid donations. As backlash mounted, so too did questions over whether Gibson was even sick in the first place.

The Australian Women’s Weekly published an interview with Belle Gibson in May 2015, where she conceded she did not have brain cancer. “None of it’s true,” Gibson said. However, she maintained that she’d been tricked into believing she had cancer by two men.

“One of the most troubling aspects of Belle’s response is that she appears to have little empathy. When Belle cries, her tears seem to be mostly for herself,” reporter Clair Weaver wrote.

When the interview stirred more confusion and outrage amongst Gibson’s former fans, she agreed to sit down with 60 Minutes journalist Tara Brown. One million Australians tuned in to the Nine Network that June 2015 night. The interview has since been viewed nearly eight million times on YouTube.

“Are you prepared to sign a statutory declaration to say that everything you tell me today is the truth… You don’t have a good record on telling the truth, do you?” Brown grilled Gibson.

“Absolutely. There's nothing left to lose. And if that requires a stat deck, then I'm comfortable with that,” she replied.

The 60 Minutes interview may have captivated audiences, but it was far from conclusive. On reflection, Tara Brown said she was not surprised that Gibson came on 60 Minutes, but said she was “surprised that she continued the lies… She accepted that she didn't have [brain cancer], but she maintained that she had been told that she did… She'd take you down a rabbit hole for every answer.”

Gibson lost the support of Apple and her publisher, Penguin Random House.

Then, there was the question of criminal ramifications, and whether her actions broke the law.

Consumer Affairs Victoria promised to take civil action in the Federal Court against Gibson and her now-defunct company. In March 2017, the court upheld “most but not all” of the allegations against Gibson and her company, finding that she’d engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct. She was fined more than $400,000 for several breaches.

When those fines were left unpaid in 2018, additional legal action was filed. Then in 2019, Gibson appeared in court and claimed she couldn’t afford to pay the fine. Multiple raids were conducted on her Melbourne home to recoup some of that debt, which has since increased to more than $500,000. All these years later, authorities are still chasing her for the money.

When asked about Gibson’s outstanding debt this week, Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan said Consumer Affairs Victoria “is pursuing this constantly and consistently and won’t let up.”

Breaching consumer law isn’t the same as being convicted of a crime. To this day, Gibson hasn’t been prosecuted or found guilty in a criminal court.

Gibson appeared to have reinvented herself by 2020 when a video circulated on social media showing she’d converted to Islam and immersed herself in a Victorian Ethiopian migrant community. In the video, she claimed her heart is “deeply embedded” with the community. “I feel blessed to be adopted by you,” she said.

Photographs from the time also show Gibson volunteering at an Ethiopian food truck and wearing a traditional beaded headdress. However, community leaders distanced themselves from Gibson in 2021.

As for Belle Gibson in 2025, there’s a lot we still don’t know.

A decade since her elaborate scam unravelled, Apple Cider Vinegar has brought Gibson’s lies to new audiences, including international viewers. Given the popularity of the Netflix show and the relentlessness of so-called online ‘armchair detectives’ — I doubt we’ve read the final chapter of the Belle Gibson story just yet.

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On today's good news wrap up, we discuss the Aussie athletes reaching new heights this week, an out-of-this-world discovery, and a “magnificent” giant schnauzer.

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