Sonavel Tinnitus/Hearing Supplement Is a SCAM — Debunkable Claims

Hello Tinnitus Talk. We have another scam supplement claiming to cure tinnitus and hearing loss, named Sonavel. Sonavel is doing the same dirty tricks as the other health scams that have been exposed by others and myself. I wrote up a PDF report of them, and part of it (the important stuff) will be directly linked in this thread. I have avoided posting any link's to Sonavel's official website as there is no free advertising on my part. They did many horrible things like fake testimonials, using the information of a deceased doctor like a previous scam I exposed did.

Sonavel Scam Report - by @Contrast

Sonavel's official website (archival):
https://archive.ph/blqW2

Sonavel scam advertisement video (archival):


Main Story Corresponding to the Health Scam Video

We are introduced to Allan Sanger. A middle age man who suffers from severe tinnitus and hearing loss. He is let down by the medical system because they do not have a cure; or any, treatment options for tinnitus. In his desperation he digs deep into research and explores the world of alternative medicine. He meets a neurologist named Bob Stuart who claims to know of the research of doctor Joseph Barnes (now deceased) who claims to have found a natural cure for tinnitus. Neuroscientist and researcher Bob Stuart decides to conduct research on all natural ingredients he believes can cure tinnitus. 60 people were rounded up for a clinical trial by Dr. Barnes. 98% reported significant improvement in tinnitus and hearing loss. They had to keep going for six more weeks. After six weeks 100% of the participants were cured.

After the success, Sonavel tinnitus supplements became publicly available and booms with even more success. Leading to a scenario where allegedly 56,000 people were cured of tinnitus and hearing loss. And now they are receiving threatening law suits from Big Pharma to take down the supplements. They refuse to obey big pharma, and urge the viewer to buy Sonavel tinnitus supplements to cure their tinnitus and hearing loss before they are forced to take down everything. They insist the viewer buy Sonavel ASAP.

--end of summary--

This story is entirely fake. The clinical trial never happened. Allan and Bob don’t exist (even under pseudonyms) Joseph Barnes was a real (now deceased) doctor who was being slanderized by the scammers. As far as I researched, The real doctor Joseph Barnes founded a organization in Africa to fight against starvation, malaria and AIDS but I could not find any info about him doing research on tinnitus.

Main Ingredients of Sonavel & What They Do

Most of this information is coming from the British Tinnitus Association’s official website.

Green Tea — Helps with Anxiety, but it is NOT a cure, even though it may help a small minority of sufferers. It is much wiser to purchase green tea manually then it is to get it from scam vendors.

Juniper Berries — Juniper berries have anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, anti-fungal, antiseptic, diuretic, and antioxidant properties. And for a small niche of people anti-inflammatory foods could help reduce tinnitus. But this is not established by clinical research and it would be much cheaper for one to purchase Junipers manually than to buy a supplement from scammers.

Vitamin C — Great for skin, muscles, and bones. There is no evidence that says it will help tinnitus or hearing disorders.

Hibiscus — There have been no papers published on hibiscus as a tinnitus or hearing treatment. There is no evidence about Hibiscus being a tinnitus treatment.

Hawthorn Berry — There is no evidence available regarding this treatment for tinnitus.

Debunking Pseudoscience

The Sonavel Scammers; like a previous scam (Synapse XT, plagiarized the life’s work of a deceased doctor (Dr. Joseph Barnes) that spent most of his life working in Africa practicing tropical medicine and never wrote about tinnitus. Search for Dr. Barnes in Part 3.

The Sonavel scammers are claiming that tinnitus is exclusively linked to synaptic damage in the brain. Very similar to a previous scam named Synapse XT. However, This is not true as tinnitus is primarily (but not exclusively) caused by hearing loss. Furthermore, there is a certain form of hearing loss called cochlear synaptopathy (death of synapses) in the inner ear that damages connections from the ear to the brain.

More info about the science is here:
What’s hidden in hidden hearing loss?

Basically in a nutshell, synapses are like bridges between nerve fibers. If they get damaged from loud noise, then nerves in the inner ear will stop working. The brain will notice less auditory input is coming to the ear and will compensate with its own internal phantom noise; similar to phantom limb syndrome.

It looks like the scammers at Sonavel got confused when reading about synaptic damage in the ear and the brain. They decided to twist the story as if it were synapse damage in the brain (as opposed to real research implying it is in the ear) as the root cause of tinnitus. These scammers did a poor job at researching cochlear nerve damage problems. This is probably because their only goal was to make a quick buck scamming tinnitus sufferers.

Evidence: Clips from Scam Videos, and Raw Data

Here you can find most of the exact clips I am quoting and raw documents that I used when working on the case. Basically you (the person reading) can see all the evidence I have access too.

• Claims of curing 56,000 people and a fake clinical trial
• Julie’s fake testimonial
• Mary’s fake testimonial
• Karolyn’s fake testimonial
• Scott’s fake testimonial
• Charlie’s fake testimonial
• Contrast’s investigational folder (raw data) - this could be actively updated.

Now here is the fun part when I make image content to redirect online image search results:

 

There is a very simple test of the value of Sonavel..

98% of 60 people in the trial were reported to have noticed significant improvement.

Maths! 98% of 60 = 58.8! Who was the .8 of a person!

 

Thank you for the Scam information. I almost wasted my money to purchase, but instead I just joined Tinnitus Talk and discovered a wealth of information.

I have had tinnitus since 1950, age 10. From birth I have had allergies, hay fever, sinus problems and back then in the 40's, 50's and 60's, Penicillin was the cure for everything! Sometimes it is really bad, and then it calms down. I have learned to live with it.

Again, thank you/Galkowskib