A little more homeopathic stuff. I blogged on the Guardian’s science pages about homeopathy and the NHS yesterday. Go and read it, but basically, I suggested that homeopathy is most probably a placebo, and one that is potentially useful to physicians looking for an easy placebo treatment – which is not the same as doing nothing.
The entry provoked a lot of thoughtful comments. Here’s a taster from one, written by Le Canard Noir:
Homeopathic retailers sell their customers sugar pills to protect themselves against malaria and Fellows of the Society of Homeopaths try to conduct AIDS trials in Africa using magic water….If placebos are ever ethically justified then deluded people are not the best set of people to be dishing them out.
I completely agree, but I’m not talking about the way I would set the system up. I’m talking about what we’ve got to work with now. To quote 13 Things:
According to the World Health Organisation, it now forms an integral part of the national health care systems of a huge swathe of countries including Germany, the United Kingdom, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Mexico. London’s Royal Homeopathic Hospital, part of the UK’s national health service, employs a staggering 6,000 staff. Forty per cent of French physicians use homeopathy, as do 40 per cent of Dutch, 37 per cent of British and 20 per cent of German physicians. In 1999 a survey revealed that 6 million Americans had used homeopathic treatments in the previous 12 months.
I think it would be wrong to impose a ban on something that so many people have faith in. That carries the risk of pushing people further away from sensible healthcare.
Of course there are dangers from the extremes, but I’m not talking
about doctors referring HIV prevention, cancer treatment or malaria
prophylaxis to homeopaths. That would be ridiculous.
The people who already go straight to homeopaths for this kind of thing will continue to do so, no matter what the system does or doesn’t endorse. There’s nothing you can do about that, just as you can’t stop people believing in horoscopes, or the power of psychics. People make life-threatening decisions on the basis of these hokum ideas too. People are human. What are you going to do?
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