It’s a bugger being a Big Pharma Shill, they never actually send the cheque. Funny how the homeopaths fail to notice that Big Pharma also makes homeopathy, and that hypothesising secret payments to skeptics rather draws attention to the fact that they themselves actually do have a direct and obvious conflict of interest.

That is a very legal BS statement – if you were on the take as a “scientist ” which is not totally unheard of then the last people you would tell are people on the Journal staff so using them as a reference is tantamount to being either stupid or guilty as charged. Give an answer like that to a cop and you are in trouble sunshine. In my other life I have had to research people who bash alternative ( non pharma) groups. Amazing what one comes across when one pulls the right strings. A favorite tactic is offering free articles to magazines and journals.
If you value the truth so much then go for specific cases of “malpractice “- It should not be difficult for you.
Before you start on about fraudulent medical claims – have a look at Medical Practitioners fiddling the insurance.
Now in Netherlands some medical insurance companies have started sending patients lists of their treatments periodically as a way of stopping doctors claiming for work not done.
I have lost 3 good friends at a young age due to undiagnosed cancer and seen one just scrape through because she decided to query the doctors advice. So open your mind and you might learn something …..a true scientist keeps an open mind because he realizes science is a work in progress and he realizes that as well as giving good things science also gave us Thalidomide /Softenon. And also check the Merck court case in Ballydine – Science – fundi’s are just as bad as the rest of the fundis.

Thanks, Donnacha, for acknowledging that scientifically speaking a placebo is literally better than nothing, a rare admission on this page. I’d go further on the possible benefits of homeopathy: since everyone admits that, e.g., the overprescription of antibiotics is a real and deadly problem for a variety of reasons, surely it’s a good thing that some people take harmless sugar pills rather than seeking scripts for minor ailments that will resolve themselves anyway?
As for ‘the wider philosophical question’, I find as I get older I’m less exercised about many people’s credulity on interesting but basically insignificant matters (the efficacy of homeopathy, the existence of god) than about the smugness of those who strain at gnats but swallow camels, all the time sighing at the stupidity of those less smart than themselves. (Paul here with his ‘*groan* and capital letters is doing a pretty good imitation of such a person.) I like Ben Goldacre’s work, but I fear he fosters such smug readers, and for what it’s worth I reckon he does some good stuff on medical research but doesn’t sufficiently emphasise the systemic corruption in much of it. Check out the Marcia Angell stuff linked above, and also Dan Hind’s excellent book, The Threat to Reason, which argues that excited polemics about the likes of alternative medicine actually help to obscure far more serious threats to science and knowledge, threats that can only be challenged if we take a critical look at structures of power in society. You suggest, Donnacha, that skepticism transfers ‘up’ to hard targets; I must say I doubt it. That’s why I came on here, not to engage in whataboutery, but to ask if Dr Grimes and the scores of others who have filled this thread to mock the rubes who trust homeopathy are willing to be as critical about what is happening to conventional medicine, which does both far more good and far more harm.

I think you’ll see if you look back over this thread that placebo was alluded to, if not mentioned specifically, a number of times, mainly as being at least in part an explanation for the anecdotal accounts of the efficacy of homeopathic remedies.

I don’t know if you are including me among those who ‘mock the rubes’, but if I have seemed uncritical of conventional medicine it is simply because that isn’t what this article is about. I’ve plenty to say about that, but it belongs in another conversation. Doctors (though it isn’t always obvious that they’d agree) are the same as any other people – some highly competent at their work, some mediocre, some diligent, some lazy, some plain evil. There are loads of examples of where medicine, or the practice of it, has gone badly wrong but they are irrelevant here. The one being less than perfect does not make the other a better option or mean that it doesn’t need to stand on its own feet in proving its effectiveness.

Nor is it simply a philosophical question. In the UK the tax payer is already footing the bill for alternative therapies. There are those who’d like to see the same happen here. That makes it a political issue, and an important one.

Katherine, one of your excellent earlier posts is literally the only one in this thread that treats beneficial placebo effects seriously. In fact you gave such a good explanation as to why a conventional doctor would prescribe homeopathic placebos that I wonder why you now appear to be concerned that public funds might help her/him do so, especially since homeopathic ‘remedies’ are generally less expensive. (Of course not all alternative meds are useless/harmless/placebo/cheap, but that really is a separate discussion.)
My point here is that attacking homeopathy makes people feel and appear smart, but the “real medicine is SCI-EN-TI-FIC” gloating also quite literally diverts attention from much more serious problems. You admit that doctors, like everyone else, come in all shapes, sizes and ethical systems, but that is neither here nor there. It’s not about individual morality or even competence, but about a disastrously misguided system. Read the following two sentences (from the Jan 2009 NY Review of Books article in the link above), then tell me why we’re wasting our time debating homeopathy:
“It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of The New England Journal of Medicine.”
It’s easy to mock the homeopathy-induced myth ‘water has memory’. But I’ll bet lots of people reading this still believe the pharma-induced myth ‘depression is caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain’. The deaths and damage already caused by the latter myth far outweigh the casualties from three centuries of homeopathy.

Oh, that’s priceless. In an article entitled “Homeopathy isn’t just useless – in the wrong hands it’s dangerous”, you jump in, demand the author write about a different subject, then say “Of course not all alternative meds are useless/harmless/placebo/cheap, but that really is a separate discussion”. Er, it’s not a “separate discussion” – it’s the title of the article! Ask my friend of a friend who ended up in hospital in India due to relying on “homeopathic” vaccine about its dangers.

[Part of this comment was removed by moderators] My point, simply, is that homeopathy-bashing, as embodied in this article and most of the comments, is itself a problem, because it almost invariably blithely mischaracterises the actual state of medical science (‘self-correcting’, ‘disinterested’, ‘double-blind’ etc etc).
On your specific ‘gotcha’, I was referring to non-homeopathic alt-meds that may be useful/harmful/ etc. They are not what this article was about. Properly made homeopathic stuff can’t directly harm people: your friendofafriend was hospitalised because of ‘relying on’ a homeopathic substance, not by the substance itself. Such indirect harm is obviously real but I’d venture to say it is rare and of little relevance to the vast majority of homeopathic practice.

The public deserves a better choice than the choice between over-prescribing doctors and homeopaths who peddle remedies that have no active ingredients to do what they claim to do. If telling lies to patients is the least of all evils, things have gotten pretty evil.

The partial efficacy of placebos does not excuse the dishonesty and disrespect involved in saying they’re genuine cures for specific ailments. (Although, I fear some homeopaths don’t believe they’re being dishonest or disrespectful, and are actually convinced that what they sell works. Maybe better science education in our religious-run schools would be a good start in addressing that problem.) Trust is essential in a doctor-patient relationship. Prescribing placebos diminishes trust.

To the idea that by focusing our attention on smaller lies we miss the bigger ones; I say we should challenge each and every lie we encounter. It seems only logical that the person who misses the smaller lie is more likely to miss the bigger one. Journalists especially, have an obligation to do pursue untruths, and for that reason, I applaud the article.

Whatever your views of the relative size of the problem that is homeopathy compared to other problems, I think you understate its actual size. Misrepresenting the products you ask people to pay significant sums of money for in shops and clinics across the country, to me at least, is a serious wrongdoing. As Katherine rightly pointed out, this issue becomes political when the state starts funding unproven treatments in the name of patient choice. I’m something of a fundamentalist about the obligation of health practitioners (and everyone else for that matter) to tell the truth with as much rigour as possible.

I agree that abusive posting is unlikely to win people over to the cause of scepticism. I must admit, my use of the word quack was over-emotive and ill-judged. It’s certainly more grown up and mannerly to explain illogic than to sneer at the people who believe in it. Levels of civility on internet forums are generally low; in the case of health debates, incivility can be explained (if not fully excused) by anger at the effects of illogic. I concede there can also be an element of egotism involved – best illustrated in the following cartoon: http://xkcd.com/386/

Let’s move on to the question of medical malpractice. The over-prescription of antibiotics, especially when it continues now that we know how harmful it is, is medical malpractice. I guess incompetence, laziness, demanding patients, and- the biggie – systemic greed all contribute to this problem.

All medical malpractice needs to be fought. Government must give independent professional authorities the mandate to root out malpractice in the board-room, in the lab, and in the surgery. This involves challenging the often-too cosy relationship between pharmaceutical firms and doctors, reorganizing the entire service so patients are put before profit, punishing pharmaceutical companies who sell harmful products, investigating doctors involved in malpractice, exposing deliberately misleading research, and educating the public. Doctors must stop overprescribing, resist subtle and unsubtle commercial pressures, and use their training to read studies with a critical eye. Patients must stop going to doctors who prescribe a pill for every ill.

It’s difficult and potentially unwise for a punter like me without medical training to challenge their doctor’s advice, but, I’m not a fan of blind and complete deference to any authority, even if that authority has spent many years learning medicine in university. If in doubt, I’d get second opinions from other medics, and to do some cautious googling (This involves avoiding the sites peppered with anecdotes and spurious claims and being wary of sites with drug company sponsors. It also involves acknowledging I’m not a doctor).

It is indeed very disturbing to hear the editor of a renowned journal claim that most research is so insufficiently scientific as not to be trustworthy. Nonetheless, this untrustworthy medical community has increased life expectancy and kept people close to me alive. In fairness, you acknowledge the medical profession’s greater capacity to do good. Unfortunately, we’re getting into the territory of degrees of untrustworthiness, but that’s the imperfect world we live in. Those of us who get sick and are not medical experts are obliged to place partial (not complete) trust in the least untrustworthy practitioners, and homeopaths still remain at the bottom of the pecking order. It’s important, to me at least, that people know that.

I think it would be useful if more medics used the media to challenge malpractice in their own profession because, they’re the best qualified to do so, and such information would be useful to people seeking medical help. In particular, questions about the efficacy and side-effects of anti-depressants need more airing. We can discuss forever the point that one article would be more useful than another, the point is, this article on it’s own does the public a service, and makes no claims about the infallibility of conventional medicine.

When I think about it, the whataboutery that I consider to be unfair as a criticism of the article, has at least opened up an interesting discussion on a vitally important topic. I will take the time to read up on the articles you have recommended.

Fair play to you, Donnacha. The rash of red thumbs made me wonder if there was any point in engaging here. I’m glad to say you’ve convinced me that there was, with your thoughtful and thought-provoking response.

You’re full of it Mark. I keep running into things like this on your links …
“There have been hundreds of research studies on homeopathy with positive results. Rather than make you slog through a list of them…” … then nothing.

No really, I want to slog through a list of them. In this instance “hundreds” boils down to 10 anecdotes. That ain’t peer reviewed science my friend. That’s fraud. You can’t actually explain how H2O can have “memory”. There is physically no possible way to rearrange those three atoms to resemble complex molecular structures or even simple ones like Nitric Acid:
http://youtu.be/JsJq8RKcXts

And as for your links to proof… WTF? For instance, the link which sends me to a Lancet paper which claims to be “favourable” to homeopathy actually says…
“we found insufficient evidence from these studies that homeopathy is clearly efficacious for any single clinical condition”.

Here’s another Lancet conclusion which claims to be “favourable”:
“There is some evidence that homeopathic treatments are more effective than placebo; however, the strength of this evidence is low because of the low methodological quality of the trials”

Not to mention that these papers are 10-20 years old! There’s even some “proof” from the early 19th century in there – probably some phrenology too…

Another place talks about a homeopathic cure for diarrhea in the “third world” – that would be risible if it weren’t so dangerously misguided! What’s wrong with the current treatment of oral rehydration with salt, sugar and water? And really, don’t you think you’re going to get SOME positive results treating patients who are dehydrated with a “homeopathic cure” that only uses water? Duh?

What do you think you’re trying to pass off here? Snake oil buddy. You’re either deluded about homeopathy or you’re a charlatan. I hope it’s the former, as there may yet be hope for you if so.

“However implausible something seems, however, implausibility itself is a belief and not a fact. Many things which originally seemed to be implausible are now seen as good science – Gaia Theory and Plate tectonics being two examples. There is plenty of evidence from materials science and other fields about the unique properties of water and how to detect the differences between remedies and ordinary water. Here’s a good summary:”

Your judgement of the epistemological status of the implausibility of homeopathy is deeply flawed. The extreme implausibility of homeopathy arises from its contradictions of firmly established physics, chemistry and biology, not from e.g. some subjectively motivated deviation from the Laplacian principle of indifference. For that reason and others the comparison with e.g. plate tectonics is grossly inappropriate. The supposedly plausibility-raising evidence you cite is utterly worthless too: a mixture of bad science and speculation and irrelevant science.

n 1920, Ernest Rutherford conceptualised the possible existence of the neutron. But since scientific measurement was at that time limited to detecting particles based on their electrical charge (and a neutron has no electrical charge) scientists could neither prove or disprove his proposition. Science is unable to work out why Homoeopathy works, that is an unfortunate situation. When is finally does, and I firmly believe they will, they will have to answer for their scepticism and eat humble pie.

Errata – “Science is unable to work out why Homoeopathy works” should read “Science has worked out that Homeopathy DOES NOT work”.

Errata Paul, your belief is that Science can explain everything, that is your blindspot.

And your misunderstanding / mischaracterisation of science is your blind spot.
Find me the literature that makes a claim on behalf of science to say science will explain everything…

Instead what we have found is that where things are explicable, it’s science that has the capacity and tools to explain and discover. Not blind faith.

Science just gives us the facts. When those facts don’t add up with your world view you want to attack science. That sounds like a blind spot to me.

You have already biased you own conclusions by asserting that homeopathy works no matter what facts are there to state otherwise. Science on the other hand will accept any crazy barmy idea as long as there is corroborated evidence to back up the theory that has been scrutinised and peer reviewed.

I reject Homeopathy not because it’s a far out alternative theory that somehow threatens big pharma, or whatever, but because the physics of the universe doesn’t allow it. Some of the wildest, most counter-intuitive ideas I’ve come across are from physics – General relativity, Special relativity and Quantum Mechanics to name a few. But they are well established as scientific axioms because they are provable and verifiable.

So unless you show me the physics by which homeopathy can occur then you will not convince me nor others.

Implausibility is not a “belief”, it’s an incontrovertible fact. The idea that something which has no provable connection to the underlying cause of a disease, can cure it when diluted past the point that nothing remains, and cure more powerfully the further past vanishing point it goes, is not even remotely plausible. You can arm-wave all you like about hypothetical ways this might still happen, but it remains utterly implausible.

we can count how much matter there is in the universe. In order to find one molecule of the many possible molecules that might be isolated form duck liver in 200C Oscillococcinum, you would have to consume hundreds of billions of times the entire quantity of matter in the observable universe.

Things like molecules and the size of the universe are not parts of some obscure belief system, they are objectively observable facts. And these facts stand in stark contrast to the asserted but entirely unproven ideas of “similars”, “infinitesimals”, “potentisation” and so on. Everything we have discovered about the nature of matter in the two centuries since Hahnemann invented homeopathy has increasongly shown it to be wrong, in concept and in detail.

One sure sign of a belief system is lack of self-criticism. When Einstein showed that Newtonian mechanics was wrong in detail, science was astounded but accepted it. Please cite one well-documented example of homeopathy discarding an idea in the same way. For example, is there a movement to remove oscillococcinum from the repertory now we know that there is no such bacterium as oscillococcus, that flu is caused by a virus not a bacterium, and that this is not normally found in the liver of a duck?

Every single observation in homeopathy can be accounted for by placebo effect and observer bias. This is the null hypothesis. I have yet to see a credible peer-reviewed paper that refutes this null hypothesis, still less any research that comes close to demonstrating the so-called “laws” of homeopathy.

“unless you show me the physics by which homeopathy can occur,,,,” All so called Laws in Physics are are actually generalisations. The Law of Gravity is no more than an observation that has yet to be contradicted. If it is ever contradicted someday it will no longer be a Law. Please try starting from the awkward assumption that if Homoeopathy works (and it does, although I dont know how) then whatever “Laws” in Physics which say it cannot work might just be in need of revision. Open your mind to possibilities and explore them….

@Peter Butler: You fundamentally misunderstand the way science works and the reason the laws of physics are called laws. You do not start from the assumption that X is so; the law of gravitation was arrived at because some of the greatest scientists of their age, men like Newton, Hooke and Kepler, carefully observed the natural world and hypothesised rules to describe it. These rules have been refined over time.

The fact that our knowledge is incomplete does not in any way support ideas that have consistently failed any attempt at empirical verification. And it is not up to scientists to do the work of the homeopathy industry – if the industry wants to be taken seriously then it has to move beyond proof-by-assertion and provide genuine testable theories and predictions. I am not holding my breath.

Please direct me to the peer reviewed results of these (presumably well hidden cos I can’t find them) “excellent” trials.

Sue you’re probably wasting your time. Cynics and skeptics love being able to say “that’s not accepted by Scientists” and “that’s not approved by the Medical Profession”. Gives them some warped sense of power or something. It works, you know it, I know it, so do those who use Homoeopathy. How and why is for others to work out, which someday they will.

Pesky facts keep getting in the way do they Peter? Ho hum. Never mind. Stupid skeptic will be gone soon and you can get back to alternative healing.

So to summarise your position by analogy: I have a stone in my pocket. As long as I keep the stone in my pocket I feel well. Therefore stone makes me well. **

Is there a flaw in your argument?

**(c)Lisa Simpson.

For the sake of balance of this argument it should be pointed out that “actual medicine” is not an infallible science either. Medicine is often proved wrong, unfortunately only after an appreciable number of people have suffered dangerous side effects from conventional medication. People have a choice in how they treat their own illnesses, and complementary therapists have a responsibility, in the same way that GPs have, to ensure that they treat their patients with the highest standard of care possible.

My rule of thumb is – if they start ” slagging – off ” regular medicine get out fast. But hey! a regular doctor said I had hayfever when it was actually acute chemical poisoning so keep a healthy distrust in the lot of them.

Did you read the article at all? When irresponsible and deluded parents allow their child to die from eczema just because they believe in magical water healing then of course homeopathy is dangerous. And the sad fact is that it’s almost guaranteed to happen again.

Emily, I tried to point out in the article that it can be dangerous. If you want to see people who had died following the advice of homeopaths (and there are a LOT) have a look at

http://www.whatstheharm.net/homeopathy.html

Oddly, first death listed is an Irish woman, Jacqueline Alderslade. Also, homeopaths degrade the public understanding of medicine and make promises they simply cannot keep – the net result is that people follow their advice and die.

And you argue doctors make mistakes? Yes they do, and people die. But they’re accountable to someone and lose their jobs if they have violated medical guidelines. The homeopath that killed Jacqueline Alderslade will never stand trail, or lose her license. No; she received a whooping €6.35 for failing to show up at a dail hearing and that’s the extent of it.

On that reflection, yes, homeopathy (as a discipline) is both useless – it doesnt work, and dangerous -it convinces people to ignore professional medical advice or tells them they dont need medicine etc..

Dangerous because if wastes time if you have a serious disease.

Daniel, homeopaths NEVER use dangerous undiluted poisons!

Advising someone to take a sugar pill rather than get properly vaccinated against typhoid is a good example of something that is both useless and dangerous at the same time.

Earlier this year an Australian homeopathic medicine company was forced to recall a particular remedy after it was found that the belladonna which formed the main ingredient was not as diluted as it should have been.

Another homeopathic website advised people who lived near Fukushima to seek homeopathic preparations of x-rays as a cure for any radiation sickness they might be experiencing.

No it isn’t. Prevention to mental health issues relate to counselling, talking out issues. Prevention to physical health problems is a healthy lifestyle, and importantly (and uncontrollably) your genes but also uncontrollable environmental factors. The only thing homeopathy prevents is quick efficient science based medicine at best, at worst it wastes the precious little time required to treat a serious disease.
It’s dangerous nonsense and I don’t think society can progress efficiently when people aren’t discouraged from believing proven lunacy.

Actually, I’m inclined to think that the idea that “modern medicine works on the symptoms, not the source” to be vaguely insulting. What it’s implying is that emotional, spiritual or physical states are responsible for all ailments, which means that kids who get cancer or who are born with a major defect are somehow responsible for the problems that they have – and if it isn’t them, maybe it’s their parents’ fault.

To think this way is in direct contradiction of the evidence and can actually be a source of major, unnecessary distress on people who already have enough problems. Modern medicine spends a lot of research trying to find the source of problems, and many of them turn out to be genetic, random or highly complex – in other words, not easy to fix. It’s done a much better job of establishing probable sources and treatments than the alternative community have ever done. Alternative medicine starts with the conclusion “it’s emotional!”,”It’s a blockage in the force!” and works backwards. Amazing, illogical and utterly useless.

Some of the most prescribed “medicines” are so called painkillers. But what they are designed to do it to shut off the symptoms. They dont eliminate the pain. When the medically prescribed painkillers wear off the pain returns. Nice gravy train that for medical doctors. The medical profession have a clear agenda, to eliminate competition. I presume you were well paid to write this article David…..

Given I accuse big pharma of the same exploits with their homeopathic wings, one would be forgiven for wondering if they might ask for their money back if that was the case….

It’s water.

IT’S WATER.

P.

Really? So when doctors prescribe antibiotics to kill bacteria responsible for an infection they are treating the symptoms and not the source? Poppycock and balderdash! When Edward Jenner discovered that exposure to the non-lethal cowpox virus made a person’s immune system much better at dealing with the decidedly lethal smallpox virus he was treating the symptoms of the disease only?

Susan, show me the scientific trials. Links and/or references please. I can’t find what you’re talking about ANYWHERE!!!

No Susan, it’s not ‘proven’ anywhere.

@Rie – what on earth are you on about? Vaccines have been PROVED, homeopathy is to date still UNPROVEN. Simples.

Montagnier in January told the Canadian television program marketplace that the results of his experiment were not applicable to homeopathic dilutions.

This article “French Nobelist Escapes “Intellectual Terror” to Pursue Radical Ideas in China”
http://bit.ly/pkDTY2

Which is behind a paywall. But here are some quotes from Montagnier.

“I can’t say that homeopathy is right in everything. What I can say now is that the high dilutions are right. High dilutions of something are not nothing. They are water structures which mimic the original molecules.”

Further, Montagnier refers to Dr. Jacques Benveniste, a French physician/scientist who conducted research on homeopathic doses, as a “modern Galileo.”

Sounds to me like that’s support for the “Memory of Water” hypothesis from the Nobel Laureate. Homeopaths use remedies derived from bacteria (or “nosodes”) which are prepared in the same manner of serial dilution and succussion – where else would Montagnier have got this technique?

Again your are spouting total nonsense Mark. Liquid water doesn’t have structure – that’s why it’s liquid. If it had structure it would be ice.

http://www.chem1.com/acad/sci/aboutwater.html

Let me quote from above link:

“The following facts are well established:

H2O molecules attract each other through the special type of dipole-dipole interaction known as hydrogen bonding
a hydrogen-bonded cluster in which four H2Os are located at the corners of an imaginary tetrahedron is an especially favorable (low-potential energy) configuration, but…
the molecules undergo rapid thermal motions on a time scale of picoseconds (10–12 second), so the lifetime of any specific clustered configuration will be fleetingly brief.”

“The consensus among chemists is that any temporary disruption of the water structure by a dissolved agent would disappear within a fraction of a second after its removal by dilution, owing to the vigorous thermal motions of the water molecules. Benveniste’s results have never been convincingly replicated by other scientists.

In 2010, a UK parliamentry committee report urged the government to withdraw funding and licensing of homeopathy.”

Water cannot contain or have “memory” of structure without the ability to retain that structure. You cannot get past this one fact which is the central tenet of homeopathy.

Madeline Ennis’s results have never been replicated successfully, including attempts by James Randi for a $1 million prize fund. Remember cold fusion?

PS – why is everything you quote over 10 years old and unverified?

@Mark: You have been shown the evidence that Montaigner himself stated that his research could not be extended to cover the substances used in homeopathy. You have been shown the original research where it is made clear that the duration of this (as yet unverified and unreplicated) effect is in nanoseconds. You have been pointed to the section where he notes that at higher dilutions nothing beyond background was observed.

http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk/blahg/2010/09/montaigner/

You know this, and yet you continue to reference this research, which is irrelevant in these critical ways. This makes you look like a charlatan, which I am sure is not your intent.

no my relative did not go to a homeopathic person at that time becasue she was so ill! my family trust in both but the mistake that the gp made was unbelievable yet we trusted him at the time. we dont NOT trust modern medicine, it has fantastic advancements etc, what im pointing out is that it is NOT to be soley trusted. would you say the same if YOUR close relative almost died because of such a doctor? and what about all those ladies who had their wombs removed unknowlingly? i for one keep an open mind to any healing practise, be it modern science or not.

Indeed I have had a very close friend go through the mill with medical doctors. She lost a year of her life as a result of bad decisions and things going from bad to worse. But what she has not done is to run to the arms of quack doctors, as if they know any more than regular doctors do.

In anything like this, you have to be sceptical – do your research, know the risks, ask the tough questions. Science does not claim to be perfect – only to represent the best knowledge we have at this time. That’s often far from perfect, but at least it has a better chance of success over time than do the claims of alternative practitioners.

But Tony, there’s nothing in homeopathy that science can’t explain. Science has explained it: it’s just water and it doesn’t cure anything. Trials have been done. Homeopathic remedies cause a placebo affect at best.

As for tobacco companies manipulating scientific studies, yes they did and it’s something to be wary of, but these things tend to be noticed with time (that’s how you know about it now, after all) and homeopathy has had a lot of time and a lot of chances. Homeopathy has been around for hundreds of years and when the scientific method was being used to discover so much of modern medicine in the early twentieth century and beyond homeopathy was found ineffective. It belongs with bloodletting and the four humours. Superstitous nonsense that’s been demonstrated not to work.