Homeopathy as Quackery

[David Baxter PhD]

Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and Science Is Planning To Honor Quackery
Better Health Blog
January 31st, 2009

David Kroll, Ph.D., and I ... are pro-science bloggers who want to understand the evidence for (or against) health treatment options, both in the natural product world and beyond. At our recent meet up at The Palm we discussed homeopathy - a bizarre pseudoscientific approach to medicine often confused with herbalism.

Homeopaths believe that ?like cures like? (for example, since an onion causes your eyes to water and nose to run, then it?s a good cure for a cold) and that homeopathic remedies become more potent the more dilute they are. So if you want a really strong medicine, you need to mix it with so much water that not even a molecule of it is left in the treatment elixir. Of course, homeopathy may have a placebo effect among its believers - but there is no scientific mechanism whereby tinctures of water (with or without a molecule of onion or other choice ingredient like arsenic) can have an effect beyond placebo.

David graduated with his B.Sc. in toxicology from one of the most prestigious schools in the country, the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and Science (PCP&S). In the early 1900s, PCP&S graduates were critical players in combating snake oil hucksters and establishing chemical standards, safety, and efficacy guidelines for therapeutic agents. So it was with utter amazement that he received recent news that PCP&S was planning to award an Honorary Doctorate of Science to a major leader in homeopathy - on Founders? Day, no less.

?Our founders would be rolling in their graves,? David told me. And he wrote a letter of complaint to the University president which you can read here. This is a choice excerpt:

Awarding Mr. Borneman an Honorary Doctor of Science is an affront to every scientist who has ever earned a degree from the University and, I would suspect, all current faculty members who are engaged in scientific investigation. Homeopathy is a fraudulent representation of pharmacy and the pharmaceutical sciences that continues to exist in the United States due solely to political, not scientific, reasons. Indeed, homeopathic remedies are defined as drugs in the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act [21 U.S.C. 321] Section 201(g)(1) as a result of the 1938 actions of U.S. Senator Royal Copeland (D-NY), a noted homeopath of his time. But scientifically, homeopathic remedies are nothing more than highly-purified water misrepresented as medicine based upon an archaic practice that is diametrically opposed to all pharmacological principles.​

Honoring people who actively promote pseudoscience is wrong in many ways as David points out. I would also add that doing so confuses the public. If academic institutions committed to scientific integrity lend their names to cranks, then it makes it more difficult for the average person to distinguish quackery from science. I have the utmost sympathy for the patients out there who are trying to figure out fact from fiction in medicine. That is why I have a ?trusted sources? tab on my blog - please click on them for guidance regarding health information you can trust.

As for PCP&S, if they value their academic principles (as no doubt many within the organization do) the president should rescind his offer to honor Mr. Borneman?s ?entrepreneurial spirit? on founder?s day (February 19th, 2009). Finding a way to sell water to people as cures for their diseases is certainly entrepreneurial - but I see nothing honorable about it. I hope that President Gerbino sees the light before founder?s day.

 

[Halo]

Good article, David

And a pretty good resource here:

That is why I have a trusted sources tab on my blog - please click on them for guidance regarding health information you can trust.

 

[amastie]

I admit that I have tried homeopathy and found it of no help. I know people I respect that beleive in it. I do think that desparate people will try almost anything. And I will - to a point. I always think that it is important to be prepared to know what you stand to lose, and are willing to lose, before you invest in anything that you think might help.

On that premise, I changed my name years ago because a friend whom I loved dearly believed in numerology. Change your name to a 5, you'll worry less. Diddn't seem to work but neither did I lose anythng. I am a Spiritualist by belief so New Age proponents of all kinds might draw my interest but *not* my money unless I can see me being the one to bring about change and the advertized service provide a stimulus of some kind to help me get where I want to go. Much like music can assist me to calm down but not unless I hear it in a way that enables that. (That said, I expect that there are stuides on the scientific value of music to have that effect). What I am saying is different from expecting that the New Age product so advertized will get you there on its own steam. That requires faith and while I'm not against faith, again I come back to what one is prepared to lose in order to obtain the desired effect because you remain responsible for what you do.

The big problem with that however is that many people, perhaps more desparate, more willing to hand over money without counting the cost (which is more than just money) if it *doesn't* work, will leave themselves too open to manipulation whether by New Age gurus or untested treatments.

I cannot in all conscience claim that there are no alternative-style/New Age treatments that, not having been tested scientfically, may not have value - or which ones they are. For example, I would have thought that crystals would never have meaning to me until I found myself using them during my meditation and some other forms of healing. Now, whether it be that I imbued the look of them with meaning of my own, it doesn't matter because it helped me. But I cannot extrapolate from that that it iwll help someone else. I would be comfortable saying to someone else that I found them helpful but I would *never* advocate them as a proven method of healing anything.

I am Spiritiualist. That in itself is entirely a faith-based belief, and yet I am more strongly drawn to internet forums/newsgroups that are atheist. In fact,I have yet to find a Spiritualist forum that I admire as much as I do the atheists. Melbourne here in Australia, has an excellent Atheist Society which has excellent speakers. Sometimes science and faith cause conflict in me. Mostly, it doesn't. It just gives me more interesting conversations

The choice to use an untested, unconventional healing tool or "Light-imbued" drops or the tongue of lizard (yuk!) comes down to one's well considered choice, but I don't necessarily believe that that choice must only be decided upon on the basis of whether is has undergone scientifc scrutiny. There is a part of me that *wants* that to be so, but a stronger part of me who is open to more than that.

I own responsibility for such choices.

It is true that I worry for those people for whom such choices lack the forward looking that says "Can I afford for this *not* to work?" If you can't, they I don't advocate doing it.

As much as I am able to describe my position on these thngs, that is how I see it. (I remain, and hope to remain, open to being quesioned on both my beliefs and those things which I allow.)

 

[ladylore]

I am a Spiritualist by belief so New Age proponents of all kinds might draw my interest but *not* my money unless I can see me being the one to bring about change and the advertized service provide a stimulus of some kind to help me get where I want to go.

Smart gal.