Background
This Ruling forms part of a wider piece of work on ads relating to low testosterone, identified for investigation following complaints and intelligence gathered by our Active Ad Monitoring system, which uses AI to proactively search for online ads that might break the rules. See also related ruling published on 26 August 2026.
Summary of Council decision:
Two issues were investigated, both of which were Upheld.
Ad description
Two paid-for Facebook ads for BioID Health, hormone therapy, seen in January 2026:
a. The first ad had a caption that stated “Your GP said your testosterone is ‘fine’. But you still feel exhausted, foggy, and flat. We test deeper than your doctor did”.
The video featured a man who said, “Here’s the problem with going to your normal doctor [...]. They ask basic questions, run some standard blood work and they might miss something and tell you you’re at normal levels when actually you’re not. […] We ask a different set of questions. We run different tests. And we look for different markers, and it produces completely different results. […] Now that is the difference a specialist consultation can make. […] Of course, low testosterone might not be the problem but that’s what the consultation is for […]. Get the proper assessment you need […]”.
b. The second ad featured an image of a man in a white medical coat with a stethoscope around his neck. Text stated, “Still Exhausted after 8 hours Sleep? Your GP Says You’re Normal – We Say You Deserve Better”; “‘Your levels are within range’ – but you still feel terrible”; and “Here’s why: NHS ranges include men aged 18–80. At 300 ng/dl, you’re normal but exhausted”. The heading, “The symptoms they dismiss”, was followed by four bullet points: “Waking tired despite adequate sleep”; “Constant brain fog and forgetfulness”; “Zero motivation or drive”; and “Unexplained weight gain around the middle”. Further text stated, “At BioID Health, we don’t accept normal. Our doctors optimise YOUR hormones for YOUR body using bioidentical therapy tailored to your specific needs”.
Issue
The ASA challenged whether:
- the claims in the ads to provide more effective tests and services than GPs were misleading and could be substantiated; and
- the ads were irresponsible because they implied that GPs were insufficiently thorough.
Response
1. & 2. BioIdentical Hormone Therapy Ltd t/a BioID Health said that their intention with the ads was to communicate that their service specialised in hormone health with clinical assessment that combined symptom evaluation and biochemical testing not only of testosterone levels but also other parameters. They considered that approaches to assessment could vary across different clinical settings, and that NHS and GP-led care appropriately followed established national guidelines and resource frameworks. They said that it was not their intention to suggest that GPs provided inadequate care, that NHS testosterone reference ranges were incorrect, that other healthcare providers were inadequate or that their own approach was superior.
BioID Health accepted, however, that the ads included wording that could be interpreted as suggesting that their services were superior to those provided by GPs, and that wording such as “we test deeper than your doctor did”, “they might miss something”, and “symptoms they dismiss” could be interpreted as objective claims of superiority. They said that they did not hold comparative clinical evidence to substantiate a claim to be objectively more effective than GP-led care. While their approach had been informed by published literature, clinical guidelines, and practitioner experience, they acknowledged that this did not constitute sufficient evidence to substantiate the claims made in the ads.
BioID Health said they had therefore withdrawn the ads and were in the process of amending any other ads containing comparative claims about GPs. They said they would avoid direct or implied comparisons with NHS or GP services in future, limit future claims to those that could be substantiated and carefully phrase claims to avoid implying unproven superiority.
BioID Health said further that it was not their intention to undermine public confidence in primary care. However, they accepted that the tone and wording of the ads could be interpreted as doing so. In addition to withdrawing or amending relevant ads, they had therefore implemented a process to review all future marketing to ensure compliance with CAP guidance on socially responsible healthcare advertising.
Assessment
1. & 2. Upheld
The CAP Code stated that before distributing or submitting a marketing communication for publication, marketers must hold documentary evidence to prove claims that consumers were likely to regard as objective and that were capable of objective substantiation. Objective claims must be backed by evidence, if relevant, consisting of trials conducted on people. The Code also stated that marketing communications must be prepared with a sense of responsibility to consumers and to society.
We considered consumers were likely to understand claims in the ads to suggest that BioID Health provided more effective tests and services than GPs; for example, in ad (a), “Your GP said your testosterone is ‘fine’. […] We test deeper than your doctor did” and “Here’s the problem with going to your normal doctor [...]. They ask basic questions, run some standard blood work and they might miss something and tell you you’re at normal levels when actually you’re not. […] Now that is the difference a specialist consultation can make. […] Get the proper assessment you need […]” and in ad (b) “Your GP Says You’re Normal – We Say You Deserve Better”, “‘Your levels are within range’ – but you still feel terrible”, “Here’s why: NHS ranges include men aged 18–80. At 300 ng/dl, you’re normal but exhausted” and “The symptoms they dismiss […]”.
We therefore expected to see robust evidence to substantiate the claims but noted that BioID Health had acknowledged that they did not have the evidence to support the claims.
Further, while we understood it was not BioID Health’s intention to undermine public confidence in primary care, we considered that claims such as “We test deeper than your doctor did”, “Here’s the problem with going to your normal doctor [...] they might miss something […]” and “Get the proper assessment you need […]” in ad (a) and “Your GP Says You’re Normal – We Say You Deserve Better” and “The symptoms they dismiss […]” in ad (b) implied that GPs were insufficiently thorough.
Because we had not seen adequate substantiation that BioID Health conducted more effective tests and services than NHS GPs, we considered the ads were misleading and because the ads implied that GPs were insufficiently thorough, we considered the ads irresponsible.
The ad breached CAP Code (Edition 12) rules 1.3 (Responsible advertising), 3.1 (Misleadingness), 3.7 (Substantiation) and 12.1 (Medicines, medical devices, health related products and beauty products).
Action
The ads must not appear again in the form investigated. We reminded BioIdentical Hormone Therapy Ltd t/a BioID Health not to make claims regarding the effectiveness of their tests and services unless they held robust evidence to substantiate them, and not to imply that GPs were insufficiently thorough.
