to think homeopaths really just make money out of the gullible?

[WidowWadman]

A remedy made from diluted bits of the Berlin Wall - seriously, that's surely just a test to find out how far they can push it, isn't?

placebo still works even when pts are aware it placebo

"Claig I'm actual quite keen on herbal remedies...but what does that have to do with homeopathy?"

You said
"The application of a smear of amber gris, or a tincture of hoi polloi, or a tablet of twit twoo has no effect, whatsoever on the outcome."

Tinctures are herbalism

scottishmummy, do placebos work by email too?

Tinctures are herbalism

Not in hoi polloi flavour they aren't.

Very true. That is just pure quackery

do placebos work by email too?

They must do to some extent. Because this machine has been going for good while now, he is still speaking at conferences, still flogging them, and there are people offering long standing services using it.

However, if email attachments worked as well as sugar pills, I think given the time frame, what with the Alt Med practitioners interest and excitement in the concept of e-healing of all types when the internet was newish ....compared to what to my eye looks like a sharp decline of interest, despite the greater penetration of internet in people's lives....

Not as well as sugar pills.

Which does rather fit in with what we know about the placebo effect, that there is a hierarchy of effectiveness.

from best to worst

saline injection
red squishy pill with an X in it's name
white pill

and I think we can safely hypothesise ....

"email attachment remedy"

....trailing at the bottom of the league table.

E homeopathy? Hahahahahahahah etc, etc.

Racism, misogyny and paedophilia have been around for ages too. Longevity doesn't equate wih super niceness.

I imagine homeopathy will be around for as long as people are lonely, frightened or a bit thick. I.e for ever.

Hey be fair - that electronic system is 'electronic kinesiology'. You're slagging off the wrong alternative therapy. That chap is most definitely NOT a homeopath.

saintly I first came accross it when I was lurking on homeopathy practisioner forums and lists, and there was a right buzz of excitment about this back in the day. I can go see if I can find the original text of the "science" behind e-homeopathy if you like. It had nothing in it that appeared to challenenge the homeopathic communities understanding of the claimed sicentific basis of their field, pleanty of them were pouring over it with interest and approval.

Just read about homeopathy on wikipedia.

Not convinced by it at all. Strikes me as somewhat close to mumbo jumbo, which is why I don't think that it should be on the NHS.

But it is a free country and if people believe it helps them then they should be allowed to use it. Hopefully someone regulates it to make sure that no one charges exorbitant amounts and rips people off.

Hopefully someone regulates it to make sure that no one charges exorbitant amounts and rips people off

It is "regulated" by bodies that charge for membership, I think, but am not sure, that homeopath is a protected title.

They just don't do anything excpet wring hands at best or defend and distract at worst when somebody does something wrong. I'm not sure if any homeopath, not even the one that helped kill Penelope Dingle, ever gets struck off.

It can't be regulated proper. Anymore than you can regulate Witch Doctos, or Spagetti Monster Healers, as though they were professions.

Regulation infers credibility. Which encourages people to see it as evidence based health care. Which it is not.

It was Penelope Dingle I was thinking of re link I discussed earlier

The coroner said

Giving his recommendations, the coroner said homeopathic treatments should not be outlawed but nor should they be legitimised.

But he recommended federal and state health authorities review their legislation regarding complementary and alternative treatments.

Interestingly, it seemed she was also failed by two 'conventional' doctors. But on my understanding, if she hadn't listened to the homeopath, she could have lived.

Carpe - all the homeopaths I know see the consultation as a very important part of the process. That machine seems to turn the consultation into putting a hand onto some pad thing and reading off a list of body organs. It's completely at odds with anything I've ever heard homeopaths talk about (admittedly I have only talked to classical homeopaths).

In terms of Penelope Dingle - she certainly made some hard to understand decisions (although her cancer was already advanced), but she herself was already anti medicine and was married to someone (not a homeopath - a toxicologist going by the title of Dr - I assume he has a PhD) who was very anti chemo. Prior to her diagnosis her husband had often talked publically -e.g. on the radio- about his objections to chemo. It seems a little unfair to lay the blame for her refusal for treatment solely at the door of the homeopath in her case as it appears that Penelope Dingle herself was anti chemo before she even developed cancer.

The blame for this baby's death was clearly at the door of her father 'a lecturer in homeopathy'

www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/sep/28/homeopathy-baby-death-couple-jailed

Interestingly, both Australian cases.

And this makes for a depressingly long list

whatstheharm.net/homeopathy.html

all the homeopaths I know see the consultation as a very important part of the process

Of course they do. They don't make any money if you pop to Boots and buy it OTC.

The vast majority of those on the list were not treated by homeopaths. Several of the links go to the same story about a GP for example. Others, Paul Meton's wife for example appear to have made their own decision not to have chemo or conventional treatment - people are allowed to make that decision. And in the case of cancer depending on the stage at which it is discovered may be presented as an option by their own medical team.

The only one on that list (apart from the homeopathic GP) which appears to have maybe been a homeopath in the sense recognised in the UK is the first one (although the report isn't clear as it mentions another case involving pendulum swinging which sounds far more like kinesiology that homeopathy). I mean one of the UK cases on that list links to a dentist, not a homeopath, another a GP not a homeopath. It's a bit unfair to link t a GP and dentist and then blame homeopaths! And then other cases are a bit odd ('mother refusing antibiotics for ear infections' - the last people to refuse my child antibiotics for an ear infection was a paediatrician in hospital).

It would be very worrying indeed if homeopaths were causing so much death and destruction, but it appears that it's pushing it a bit to blame homeopaths for any of those deaths. Except maybe the first one, although that's hard to tell from the report (if it involved pendulum swinging it wasn't homeopathy).

although her cancer was already advanced

She had a chance, I think it might have been stage 3, like Sharon Osbourne had. Do not a huge chance, but she had no chance with homeopathy. And no effective pain avoidence stratagies either. She must have been in agony.

She was enamoured with alt med..and that palyed a major role in her death. but in her own words to her homeopath, she does appear to think the practisioner let her down

I haven't found any statement from an homeopathic association or entity condeming the clear strides over homeopaths own code of ethics seen in this case yet. Anybody else trawled something up ?

Conventional medicine never fails though does it?

My BIL was given the all clear on his 6 monthly checkup (non-hogdkins lymphoma 6 years and 12 years earlier) but 2 weeks later he became poorly, with cancer in all his organs.

He died two weeks after that.

The pain relief failed too - the battery was flat in the morphine driver.

Oh I agree that she had a chance. And her doctor said she had a chance. But I think laying all the blame on the homeopath when she was married to someone who was outspoken in his distrust of chemo is a bit simplistic. I think blaming the husband when she had her own alternative beliefs that she had lived by for years would also be a bit simplistic. This transcript is interesting (can't find the second episode although I haven't looked far - that may go more into the homeopath's role - from this first part though it's hard to see her as someone who wasn't already anti-chemo) www.abc.net.au/austory/content/2011/s3260786.htm

TBH the main alternative to chemo cancer treatment I see suggested (and used) is juicing. I think that does tell you specifically not to use chemo. That doesn't seem to come under much criticism though, although that may be because it isn't part of an established therapy practice iyswim

whoops sorry www.abc.net.au/austory/content/2011/s3260786.htm

Paul Meton's wife for example appear to have made their own decision not to have chemo or conventional treatment

If "alternative medicine" didn't exist how many would have choosen no treatment over conventional treatment ?

These people do not make these choices in a vaccum. The homeopaths and all the other varieties kind of contribute to the choice, just by existing, and contribute significantly by the anti "allopathic" tone many of them use when discussing medical treatments for minor and serious ailments.

I'm not sure she even used homeopathy. Of course people can make up their own minds. Some people do choose nothing as an alternative as well (no alternative stuff to fill the gap - they just go for pain relief).

Michael Gearin-Tosh seemed to make up his own therapy www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1495451/Michael-Gearin-Tosh.html (and made quite a few people angry by surviving 11 years rather than 6 months).