Public health specialist Associate Professor Ken Harvey has quit the TGA’s advertising committee, saying the watchdog had failed to act effectively over complaints regarding complementary medicines.

He also called for an “urgent review” of the TGA’s revamped advertising compliance scheme, introduced in 2018, saying the new mechanism lacked transparency and rarely applied its beefed-up powers.

In 2018 Professor Harvey, of Melbourne’s Monash University, was appointed the Choice magazine representative on the Therapeutic Goods Advertising Consultative Committee, made up of industry, media and consumer representatives who work with the watchdog on advertising compliance.

Professor Harvey has now resigned from the committee, saying he had come to the conclusion the experience had been a waste of his and Choice’s time.