AN AMERICAN MAGICIAN and well-known sceptic has launched a campaign against homeopathy by offering $1 million to anyone who can prove that the alternative medicine actually works.

James Randi has attacked the use of homeopathic remedies in the past – once taking an entire bottle of sleeping pills (32 pills) before an audience to prove that they had no affect. He pointed out that the bottle included label that warned consumers to “call your local poison control centre in case of an overdose” – describing this advice as “a joke”.

Calling homeopathy a “pseudoscience”, Randi said that people were “paying real money for fake medicine that leaves innocent people sick and suffering”.

He challenged manufacturers to conduct a double-blind test in order to establish whether their medicines worked – and offered $1 million (€732,33,00) if they proved him wrong, Wired reports.

Randi was a magician and escape artist who became a prestigious MacArthur Foundation fellow. He established the James Randi Educational Foundation in 1996, with a view to promoting “critical thinking” and demonstrating to the public and the media the “consequences of accepting paranormal and supernatural claims without questioning”.