Homeopathy could be blacklisted

[Cian]

Sigh. That's bollox. It's not even what it says in the very badly researched and written BBC article. However, I've no doubt you will continue to believe whatever you want to believe.

Go on, show the evidence to support your viewpoint.

One anecdote (and your total lack of knowledge of medical science shown within) is not evidence

 

[Seagull27]

Anecdotes do not make for medical evidence

No trial has ever shown homeopathy to be better than placebo. There have been so many of them at this stage none more need funding - the process hasn't changed, the results don't change.

Its water. It does nothing. People get better in other ways and assign that to the water, which did nothing. That's the scientific fact and calling it "twaddle" and claiming "prejudice" for stating that water is water and nothing more shows severe contempt for science. Rather funny to be doing it via a computer.

"It made me/person I know better" isn't proof something works.

edit: by the way, the placebo effect works on babies. And animals. Being 18 months old does not prevent either placebo effect or regression to mean being entirely valid explanations for a recovery. Magic water is never a valid explanation.

100% correct. Anecdotes unfortunately mean nothing with regards to real scientific proof, as much as they may be appealing to believe.

Incidentally, the placebo effect continues to be an amazing thing and works in weird and wonderful ways. Apparently it works even if you are told that you have been given a placebo. Fascinating.

 

[brightn'ove]

Go on, show the evidence to support your viewpoint.

One anecdote (and your total lack of knowledge of medical science shown within) is not evidence

My mum's best mate's sister's son was diagnosed with autism after having a vaccine. Vaccines = Autism PROVEN.

 

[Guinness Boy]

Sigh. That's bollox. It's not even what it says in the very badly researched and written BBC article. However, I've no doubt you will continue to believe whatever you want to believe.

I was once proscribed a homeopathic pill for a stomach upset when I was living in Sydney. The doctor gave it to me but ALSO told me to rest, not eat anything, take small sips of water and to start eating rice or rice porridge when I did feel better. I never took the pill but took his advice and, guess what, I got better.

The story you relate seems amazing but it is just a story. You have no evidence that the cortizone hadn't already started to remedy the problem, or that just coming off it shocked the body in to recovery, or that the recovery was due to a placebo. It is unprovable.

 

[bristolseagull]

Just because science can't currently explain it, it doesn't mean it doesn't work.

Before the 1960s, Higgs-Bosun particles weren't even dreamed of.
What is the next fundamental discovery beyond quantum physics ?

Let's not be all 'Flat Earth' about this.

My wife swears by it, as does her mum actually, it really helped her following an aggressive bout of cancer.

I love the arrogance on this thread.

Open your minds people

 

[beorhthelm]

The story you relate seems amazing but it is just a story. You have no evidence that the cortizone hadn't already started to remedy the problem, or that just coming off it shocked the body in to recovery, or that the recovery was due to a placebo. It is unprovable.

not only that, i note that the Royal Homeopathic offered "an excellent regime using the best of homoeopathy and conventional medicine". no mention of the many over treatments that may have been applied, it must be the water.

 

[GT49er]

Go on, show the evidence to support your viewpoint.

One anecdote (and your total lack of knowledge of medical science shown within) is not evidence

We already have more than one personal anecdote on this thread. There are plenty more out there - they probably have never heard of NSC though, so not surprisingly haven't added to the evidence on here. Perhaps they believe that since they've never seen it, NSC doesn't exist............

 

[GT49er]

Geez, what a lot of ignorant prejudice there is around today. Comparable to four centuries ago when similar braying crowds would have been screaming for some old woman to be burnt as a witch just because she lived alone and owned a frickin’ cat.
For a start, let’s debunk some of the ideas promulgated in that very biased BBC article (the write just seems to have swallowed hook, line and sinker everything that the ‘Good Thinking Society’ (Who? Precisely!) are saying.

“It’s just water”. No, it isn’t.
“It’s just a sugary placebo pill”. No, it isn’t.

Let’s look at the definition of homoeopathy:
“noun: homoeopathy
1.a system of complementary medicine in which ailments are treated by minute doses of natural substances that in larger amounts would produce symptoms of the ailment.”

Or simply, a little of what is bad for you to counter a lot of what is bad for you (or may kill you).

That’s the same principle as using snake venom to make a serum to cure snake bite, or injecting people with cow-pox to give them immunity from the greater peril, small-pox. Nobody argues about those.

Of course, homoeopathy doesn’t work for everyone, nor is it effective against all ailments. There again, neither does conventional medicine.

 

[Seagull27]

We already have more than one personal anecdote on this thread. There are plenty more out there - they probably have never heard of NSC though, so not surprisingly haven't added to the evidence on here. Perhaps they believe that since they've never seen it, NSC doesn't exist............

But the problem is, when you add up every single one of those people with anecdotal evidence, as a percentage of people who have taken homeopathic medicine, those who have said it has had benefits are no more numerous than those who were given a control.

No-one on here is saying that nobody ever gets better after taking homeopathic medicine. What we're saying is that they didn't get better because of the homeopathic medicine. Not directly anyway.

 

[Skaville]

I’m a natural sceptic. Always have been.

Ten years ago my wife had a wisdom tooth out. She bruises very easily and her face was black and blue. Two months later she had the other one out. Someone recommended taking arnica homoeopathically prior to the op. The contrast was stark. You would not have known she had had anything done.

Since then I have dabbled in alternative remedies.

We use arnica cream and in homeopathic form – I just had an op and used a homeopathic combination of arnica, calendula and something else for the healing process. You can’t apply cream under plaster! The surgeon was flabbergasted with how well I had healed when the plaster came off.

My young son was suffering from persistent tonsillitis. He must have had it ten times in two years and now has a permanent inflamed tonsil. Someone recommended Merc Sol in homeopathic form. He has taken it whenever he had the first signs of a sore throat for three years and has never contracted tonsillitis since.

I was suffering with something else a little while ago. I don’t want to go into detail on here but I did not want to go down a traditional medicine route as there were addictive prescribed products with horrible side effects. I saw a professional homeopath for the first and only time and never really believed it would have any effect – but I thought it was worth a go. My symptoms were eased within 15 hours and have not returned.

As I said, I’m a natural sceptic but I’ve seen the results. I can’t argue against the scientific evidence and its against my better judgement but I believe in homeopathy. Not for everything and maybe not on the NHS (everything I have tried has been off my own back). It goes against all my natural instincts but I can’t discount what I have seen and experienced first-hand.

 

[Cian]

We already have more than one personal anecdote on this thread. There are plenty more out there - they probably have never heard of NSC though, so not surprisingly haven't added to the evidence on here. Perhaps they believe that since they've never seen it, NSC doesn't exist............

Multiple anecdotes are still not medical evidence

Your ridiculous analogy in your other post fails horribly on the fact that homeopathic dilutions mean there is no active ingredient at all - not even a little - in the water.

Trying to compare it to immunology is another level of scientific ignorance.

You don't understand what you're talking about. Theres no prejudice here - just fact. Homeopathy doesn't work - that's a fact.

 

[GT49er]

But the problem is, when you add up every single one of those people with anecdotal evidence, as a percentage of people who have taken homeopathic medicine, those who have said it has had benefits are no more numerous than those who were given a control.

No-one on here is saying that nobody ever gets better after taking homeopathic medicine. What we're saying is that they didn't get better because of the homeopathic medicine. Not directly anyway.

......................................and no proof it wasn't the homoeopathic treatment that helped them either.

 

[Seagull27]

......................................and no proof it wasn't the homoeopathic treatment that helped them either.

Well, when it doesn't perform any better than giving them a placebo, it doesn't give it much support...

 

[GT49er]

Multiple anecdotes are still not medical evidence

Your ridiculous analogy in your other post fails horribly on the fact that homeopathic dilutions mean there is no active ingredient at all - not even a little - in the water.

Trying to compare it to immunology is another level of scientific ignorance.

You don't understand what you're talking about. Theres no prejudice here - just fact. Homeopathy doesn't work - that's a fact.

Sorry, I've really touched a nerve on your prejudices there, haven't I.

 

[Cian]

......................................and no proof it wasn't the homoeopathic treatment that helped them either.

Other than the overwhelming medical evidence that it doesn't work.

You have an anecdote and are fighting against facts with it. You can't give us anything stronger than that anecdote.

 

[GT49er]

Well, when it doesn't perform any better than giving them a placebo, it doesn't give it much support...

But the people who had the homoeopathic medicine didn't have the placebo, did they? The placebo might not have worked in their case.

 

[Cian]

Sorry, I've really touched a nerve on your prejudices there, haven't I.

I've no prejudice here, just a scientific background and an understanding of medical trials, placebos and pseudoscience

 

[Seagull27]

But the people who had the homoeopathic medicine didn't have the placebo, did they? The placebo might not have worked in their case.

Placeboes work in every case. For medicine that doesn't work, it gives the same result as a placebo. For medicine that does work, it performs as well as the medicine would be expected, plus the results of the placebo.

 

[BigGully]

......................................and no proof it wasn't the homoeopathic treatment that helped them either.

Well isnt that the point of the current scientific research, that actually it isnt the homoeopathic treatment that helped.

 

[Cian]

But the people who had the homoeopathic medicine didn't have the placebo, did they? The placebo might not have worked in their case.

You don't understand medical trials.