Wine extracted from soursop fruit not a proven treatment for cancer: experts

An image showing bottles of "Doc Atoie's Finest Guyabano Wine" was shared on Facebook on February 8.

The post's Tagalog caption partly says: "Guyabano Wine 750ML. Helps dissolve or prevent tumours from growing. Helps treat or prevent cancer from worsening."

"Guyabano" is another name for soursop -- a green oval-shaped fruit grown in tropical regions.

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Screenshot of the false post taken on July 10, 2023

The same product was also promoted on Facebook and TikTok with a similar claim.

Posts that soursop fruit in general can treat cancer have also circulated in Bangladesh here and here.

Comments show some users expressed interest in purchasing the product.

"How much is it?" a user asked.

"I would like to order 25 bottles please," another commented.

'Marketing ploy'

Cancer experts, however, told AFP there is insufficient evidence soursop or products derived from the fruit can help treat cancer and dissolve tumours.

Dr Meredith Garcia-Trinidad, an oncologist at the Dagupan Doctors Villaflor Memorial Hospital in Pangasinan, a province north of the Philippines, said any soursop wine product touted as a cancer treatment is a "marketing ploy" (archived link).

Soursop "in any form is not medically approved for the treatment or prevention of cancer," she told AFP on July 6. "It doesn't really matter whatever the product formulation or brand. The efficacy and safety of such products are questionable."

Some laboratory studies have shown soursop fruit has properties that help fight cancer, said Jenna Sherman, program manager for Meedan's Digital Health Lab which conducts research on health misinformation (archived link).

"All this being said, we do not have enough data from studies on humans to fully support these claims," she told AFP on July 13. "The same is true for any type of extract, juices, or wines made from soursop."

Dr Warren Bacorro, an oncologist at the University of Santo Tomas Hospital in Manila, separately told AFP patients who wish to take supplements with purported "anticancer properties" should consult their doctors first as these may "interfere with the effectiveness of the treatment or enhance its side effects" (archived link).

"Curative cancer treatment adheres to well-defined paradigms and regimens, based on rigorous clinical trials. These differ according to tumour type and stage," he said on July 1.

He previously told AFP scientifically proven treatments for cancer and tumours include surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy, hormonotherapy, immunotherapy and targeted therapy.

FDA warning

The Philippine FDA had previously warned consumers against purchasing Doc Atoie's Finest Guyabano Wine on November 6, 2019 (archived link).

The product has not gone through the agency's evaluation process and its quality and safety cannot be assured, it said.

A representative for the FDA's Food Safety Unit told AFP the wine has been previously registered as a food product -- not a drug -- but its registration expired on June 15, 2022.

"No renewal of application as of today," the representative said on July 7.

They added consumers should make sure a food product or a food supplement has been registered with the FDA "to ensure legitimacy and safety".

Keyword searches on the agency's database of approved food products yielded no results for Doc Atoie's Finest Guyabano Wine as of July 13 (archived link).

AFP has repeatedly debunked misinformation about cancer treatments circulating online for example here, here and here.