Pete Evans #

Introduction #

Pete Evans, the Australian celebrity chef best known as a judge on the television cooking competition My Kitchen Rules, was permanently removed from Instagram on February 17, 2021, after Facebook found he had repeatedly shared coronavirus and vaccine misinformation. The deletion removed an account with hundreds of thousands of followers, weeks after his Facebook page had already been taken down. The ban was the final step in a year-long unravelling that had already cost him his Channel Seven contract, his book publisher, and the shelves of Australia’s biggest retailers.

Background Information #

Peter Daryl Evans was born on August 29, 1973, in Melbourne. Raised on the Gold Coast, he began a cooking apprenticeship at 17 and in 1996 moved to Sydney with his brother and David Corsi, opening Hugos Bondi, Hugos Lounge, Hugos Bar Pizza and Hugos Manly; in 2005 Hugos won ‘Best pizza in the world’ at the American Pizza Challenge.

In 2010 Evans became a judge on Channel Seven’s My Kitchen Rules alongside Manu Feildel, a role he held for ten seasons; by 2015 the show was Australia’s highest-rated reality television competition, with two million weekly viewers. He hosted the PBS series A Moveable Feast with Fine Cooking, a 2014 Daytime Emmy nominee, and in 2017 produced and narrated the Netflix documentary The Magic Pill, which promoted the ketogenic diet and claimed it could help manage autism, asthma and cancer.

Long before the pandemic, Evans paired mainstream success with alternative-health controversies. Nicknamed “Paleo Pete,” he championed the paleo diet and “activated almonds,” describing himself as a “health coach” rather than a dietitian. His 2015 baby cookbook Bubba Yum Yum was called “extremely deadly for all babies” by health experts, and his opposition to fluoridation, promotion of sun-gazing and advice to an osteoporosis sufferer to stop eating dairy drew condemnation from medical professionals. He was the first person to win the Australian Skeptics’ Bent Spoon Award twice, in 2015 and 2020.

The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation #

Evans’ mainstream standing crumbled over his pandemic-era promotion of COVID misinformation. In April 2020 he promoted the BioCharger NG, a “subtle energy platform” device priced at A$15,000, which he claimed had “a recipe … there for Wuhan coronavirus.” The Australian Medical Association dismissed it as a “fancy light machine,” dietitian Mandy-Lee Noble called it “a glorified plasma lamp,” and Australia’s Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) issued his company infringement notices totalling A$25,200 over COVID-19 advertising breaches. In May 2020 Channel Seven terminated his contract after poor ratings and the TGA fine, and MP Josh Burns criticised him for promoting a David Icke video claiming the virus was caused by 5G.

The consequences mounted through late 2020. After Evans posted an image incorporating the “Black Sun” — a symbol widely used by neo-Nazis and white supremacists, in the design used by the Christchurch mosque shooter in his propaganda — Pan Macmillan dropped him, retailers including Coles, Woolworths, Target, Kmart, Big W and Dymocks ceased stocking his products, brand ties with Baccarat and House ended, and Network 10 removed him as an intended contestant on I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here!. In December 2020 Facebook deleted his public page for “repeated breaches of its misinformation and harm policies,” but Evans kept sharing the material on Instagram, which Facebook also owns.

On February 17, 2021, Facebook permanently deleted Evans’ Instagram account, which had hundreds of thousands of followers. “We removed Pete Evans’ account for repeatedly sharing debunked claims about the coronavirus or vaccines,” the company said, adding: “We don’t allow anyone to share misinformation about Covid-19 that could lead to imminent physical harm or about Covid-19 vaccines that have been debunked by public health experts.” The removal came days after Facebook expanded its list of false claims it would remove — including that the virus is man-made or safer than the vaccine, and that vaccines are toxic, dangerous, or cause autism.

Public Reaction and Consequences #

The Guardian described Evans as a “controversial celebrity chef and conspiracy theorist,” while the BBC reported the “Instagram ban for Australian chef over conspiracy theories” and called him a “former celebrity chef.” The news landed against years of warnings from Australian medical bodies: the AMA had accused him of endangering lives, RACGP president Harry Nespolon told him to “stick to talking about ‘activated almonds’ and leave vaccinations alone,” and GP Brad McKay said “Pete Evans has peddled nonsense for years.”

Facebook said it had earlier removed several of his Instagram posts before deleting the account outright, leaving him without his largest platform. In May 2021 the TGA handed down an A$80,000 fine for repeated breaches, on top of the A$25,200 issued the previous year.

Current Status #

As of August 2026, Evans remains firmly outside the Australian mainstream. Wikipedia describes him as “an Australian chef and former television presenter” who currently lives in Round Mountain, New South Wales, and he continues to run peteevanschef.com, the “alternative lifestyle business” he said he would focus on after leaving Channel Seven. In early 2021 he reportedly aligned with the Great Australian Party and announced a Senate run, a bid an expert slammed as a “dangerous publicity stunt” in an SBS report cited on his Wikipedia entry. Wikipedia’s short description now identifies him as an “Australian conspiracy theorist,” and it categorises him among Australian anti-vaccination activists.

Impact on Their Career/Life #

The February 2021 Instagram deletion capped a collapse that destroyed Evans’ mainstream career in nine months. Between May 2020 and February 2021 he lost his My Kitchen Rules judging role when Channel Seven terminated his contract, was dropped by Pan Macmillan, saw his books pulled from major retailers, lost partnerships with Baccarat and House, was removed from I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here!, and lost his Facebook page and Instagram account, with its hundreds of thousands of followers. The BBC’s coverage already introduced him as a “former celebrity chef,” a description that has stuck.

The reputational shift has been equally stark. Once known for My Kitchen Rules and the Hugos group, Evans is now a two-time Bent Spoon Award winner, his companies have been fined A$25,200 and then A$80,000 by the TGA, and medical experts including AMA president Michael Gannon and obstetrician Brad Robinson have publicly warned of the grave dangers of following his advice. As of mid-2026 he continues to court controversy in anti-vaccine and alternative-health circles online, but the mainstream food-media career that made him famous shows no sign of returning: the breakups with networks, publishers and retailers permanently severed him from the industry that built him.