Doctor loses C4 libel case

Doctor loses C4 libel case

Channel 4 has won a pounds 2m libel battle with a Harley Street doctor who the channel claimed rigged tests and misdiagnosed a terminally-ill Aids patient. Dr Peter Nixon halted his case against the channel's 1994 programme, Preying On Hope, after five weeks at the Royal Courts of Justice in London.

Dr Nixon has gained a high profile for his theory that a list of diseases including Aids, Gulf War syndrome, ME and pre-menstrual tension are attributable to hyperventilation.

However Channel 4 found that Dr Nixon rigged his patients' breathing tests by asking them to "breathe as if they were angry". He told Ian Hughes, an Aids patient who died last summer, that his fatigue was caused by over- breathing. Dr Nixon, who had a turnover of over pounds 100,000 a year, recommends a course of Valium or diazepam and "two weeks of sleeping" as a cure for hyperventilation. Paul McCann