An Italian doctor has resigned after he was caught half-naked in a hotel room offering to cure a woman’s illness by having sex with her.
Dr. Giovanni Miniello, 60, a gynaecologist in Bari, also known by the nickname ‘Dr. Magic Flute,’ was the target of an undercover TV investigation and told an actress who was posing as a patient that she had human papillomavirus (HPV), a sexually transmitted virus that can cause cancer, despite a negative test.
Miniello reportedly told the female ‘patient’ that he could give her immunity for the virus by having sex with her because he was vaccinated.
The Italian doctor was uncovered as a fraud by the investigative news programme ‘Le Lene’ after a 33-year-old woman complained that he was offering to cure his patients with s*x.
The woman, identified as Anna Maria, said she had consulted Miniello about being unable to get pregnant, and he told the woman she had signs of HPV, despite a negative Pap smear test.
‘I have saved many women from cancer. All those I have had contact with were negative afterwards,’ he reportedly told her.
But Anna Maria decided to contact the Italian newspaper La Repubblica, alleging that Miniello had touched her breasts inappropriately and told her he liked women with small breasts.
When she contacted him for the results of the test, she said she was shocked when he proposed having sex with her to cure her.
The woman then reached out to the investigative news program ‘Le lene,’ which hired an actress to portray a patient.
Minello told her that she had ‘white spots’ on her cervix, which indicated the presence of HPV. He then offered to have sex with him.
Minello also claimed that having sex with somebody like him who had been vaccinated would give her immunity, and he offered to see if he could immunize her by having sex with her.
The undercover actress then agreed to meet him in a hotel, where he again assured her as he undressed that afterward she would be free from the virus.
While there, when she asked about protection, he told her that it was pointless as she would not then get the benefit of the antibodies if he had a condom on.
But before he thought he was about to have sex with her, a journalist came into the room and surprised the half-naked doctor, who reportedly said: ‘I’m doing this for my studies and for the other people that I have saved.’
Through his lawyer, Miniello said: ‘I, who have successfully treated hundreds of women for over 40 years … only proposed an alternative treatment that has yielded results,’ adding that he never forced women to have sex with him.
As a result of the TV investigation, 15 other women have come forward and claimed they were also victims of the doctor and his miracle sex cure.
Marika Massara, the coordinator for the Anti-Violence Centre in Bari, said: ‘We have received several reports in the last few days, dozens. Women who have come together and gone through a similar situation.
‘Some consider reporting it, others are afraid, also because the level of secondary victimisation we are witnessing is very high.’
The public prosecutor in Bari has meanwhile opened an investigation, which is currently in a preliminary phase to establish the facts.
