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Belle Gibson 60 Minutes interview: 'I have lost everything'

Mary Ward

Updated ,first published

Disgraced author and entrepreneur Belle Gibson has given her first televised interview after it was revealed she had lied about a cancer diagnosis in order to promote her wellness philosophy.

The Australian entrepreneur has spoken to 60 Minutes' Tara Brown, in an interview to air on Sunday night.

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In a 30-second clip released by Channel Nine, Brown asks Gibson, "Belle, are you prepared to tell the truth today? The whole truth?".

Gibson says she is "absolutely" prepared to tell the truth, adding, "I'm not trying to get away with anything".

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Belle Gibson will be pursued by Consumer Affairs Victoria.Garry Barker

After asserting that she had been "really transparent", Gibson goes on to tell Brown, "I have lost everything".

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"No … None of it's true," she told the Weekly.

"I am still jumping between what I think I know and what is reality. I have lived it and I'm not really there yet."

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Gibson rose to fame as the author of The Whole Pantry, a wellness app containing recipes that she claimed had helped her manage to ward off cancer without undergoing medical treatment.

Her app was named runner-up for the Best iPhone App of 2013 by Apple, and she won Cosmopolitan's Fun and Fearless Female award for social media.

Gibson's story first started to unravel in March, after Fairfax Media revealed she had raised money for several charities that had no record of receiving a donation from her.

Friends of Ms Gibson's also questioned whether she had ever been diagnosed with a terminal illness.

"I asked her when she got her diagnosis, she said she didn't know," a friend told Fairfax Media.

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"I asked her who gave her the diagnosis, she said Dr Phil. I asked if Dr Phil had a last name, she didn't know, he disappeared. I asked her where she saw Dr Phil. She said he came and picked [her] up from [her] house."

The revelations resulted in a significant backlash against Gibson. The Whole Pantry was pulled from the App Store and she lost her cookbook contract with Penguin.

Various inconsistencies in Gibson's biography also started to emerge, with Gibson giving her age as 23, despite long-term friends insisting she was 26.

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