Death by Homeopathy

[BillyJoe]

Rolfe,

Thaiboxerken's point was perfectly reasonable, just made a little more obscure by an injudicious choice of example.

Yes, that is the only point I was making.
But I see he has moved on as so have you so let's leave it there.

BTW, you must have enough material on homoeopathy (is that the spelling you prefer?) to write a book on it.

BillyJoe

 

[Rolfe]

BTW, you must have enough material on homoeopathy (is that the spelling you prefer?) to write a book on it.

I'll leave that to MRC_Hans, I think he'll do a very good job.

I don't have anything original, just a lot of familiarity with existing material. However, a colleague has just submitted a new article to a journal with some original thoughts, so I'll be interested to see if they accept it.

Hahnemann invented homoeopathy, and he was German, He spelled it "Homöopathie". In English, were we don't use the umlaut and typewriters don't have the character, it became usual to denote this by adding an "e" after the umlauted letter. Hence "Homoeopathy", or quite often "Homœopathy". More modern usage, especially American, drops the umlauted "o", but leaves the "e", which isn't logical but so what. The real, folding journal in which I'm currently involved in correspondence uses the "oe" spelling, and I kind of like to stick to it just to emphasise how old-fashioned homoeopathy is.

Rolfe.

Edited to remove stupid spelling mistake in the middle of spelling explanation.

 

[jimlintott]

However I don't think that people who choose these remedies are thinking along those lines.

I could care less for their intent.

Intent plays a significant role in law

They only think it is going to work. Yes they are ignorant and stupid. We cannot make ignorance and stupidity illegal.

Why not? There are plenty of laws out there that keep people from hurting themselves, seat-belt laws and such. Why not a law that requires anyone that gives "medical" advice be certified by a governing body that has the same standards as real medical treatments?

I wholly agree that the practitioners should be held to high standards and be held liable if there advice hurts a patient. I am talking about the patient being ignorant and stupid. You could make ignorance and stupidity illegal but that won't make it go away.

(snip)

I do feel that when these people refuse treatment for children they are committing child abuse.

Yes, it's called negligence.

It's abuse but it isn't negligence. Not seeking regular medical treatment for a child because you just don't care would be negligence. Seeking even a quack remedy shows concern.

I really do agree with you that something should be done. I do think that some of the laws that are suggested might not be constitutional and clash with personal rights and freedoms, particularly the freedom to be stupid and ignorant. Guns kill far more people than homeopathy and look at how people get upset if you suggest that something should be done, vis a vis no guns.

 

[Rolfe]

Guns kill far more people than homeopathy and look at how people get upset if you suggest that something should be done, vis a vis no guns.

That's a fair point. But the other side of it is that we should do nothing at all about a lesser evil while some greater evil remains in existence?

Not that I have much perspective on it, because guns are very strictly regulated here and although gun crime exists, guns don't feature in most ordinary people's lives. And I have no idea how many people are harmed by choosing quack medicine over real medicine, as I can't see any way to gather the statistics.

Rolfe.

 

[thaiboxerken]

Intent plays a significant role in law

In many cases, but it's my opinion that intent is not a factor that should be considered in these cases.


I wholly agree that the practitioners should be held to high standards and be held liable if there advice hurts a patient. I am talking about the patient being ignorant and stupid. You could make ignorance and stupidity illegal but that won't make it go away.

It would place more stupid people in the prisons though.


It's abuse but it isn't negligence. Not seeking regular medical treatment for a child because you just don't care would be negligence. Seeking even a quack remedy shows concern.

Negligence is not getting a child the medical treatment when it is available. In this case, the medical treatment was being administered. The lady was negligent by stopping that medical treatment by preferring BS treatment that doesn't work. This really doesn't matter though, does it? Why are you arguing semantics?


Guns kill far more people than homeopathy and look at how people get upset if you suggest that something should be done, vis a vis no guns.

Guns don't kill people, people kill people. I'm not going to debate that with you, as it has nothing to do with homeopathy and medical negligence.

 

[Eos of the Eons]

I just can't read these threads, I get so angry and upset. This is animal abuse.

I and my business partner regularly get involved as expert witnesses in animal cruelty cases - sometimes on the defence side, sometimes on the prosecution. Right now I'm doing one where the owner certainly fed the dog and sheltered her and "loved" her - but never took her to a vet even though she had one horrendously sore, weeping ear, was walking on three legs due to arthritis in a hip, and was dying on her feet of kidney failure. I expect a conviction. Part of the duty of care of an animal owner is to provide medical treatment when necessary.

However, we are aware of more than one case where the animal was in even worse shape, and suffering horribly, and received no more medical care than the first dog, but all concerned were "discharged without a stain on their character" because homoeopathy was plausibly presented to the Bench as legitimate veterinary medicine. I think this is scandalous.

The veterinary homoeopaths are extremely keen to have their methods accorded diplomatic immunity from the requirements of evidence-based medicine, and continually urge us to be "courteous" towards our professional colleagues by refraining from criticising their addiction to prescribing magic water. However, some of us are equally keen to out them as magical-thinking woo-woo charlatans.

They've had it their own way too long. We'll see who rusts first.

Rolfe.

Thanks a lot. I went there, and almost lost it.

Oh yes, vaccine is obvious most likely cause of ear polyp years later. Without vaccines there would be no diesease. Would be foolish to think otherwise. If only no vaccines were used we maybe all live forever.

Most funny thing I read today!
.

I don't know if the person thinks what is said about vaccines is fuuny, or if they think it is funny that vaccines really are to blame for everything. I do detect sarcasm at least though.
But some moron did write that about vaccines and polyps.
Frucking morons. I can't go to those places because it is not good for the blood pressure or stress level.

 

[Eos of the Eons]

Go ahead and try to edumacate people. You can have all the proof in the world, all the sound arguments, all the reason to back you up, and people will not believe you. They would prefer to go on their
"faith of the human body and its ability to heal"


There is a really big reason why that stupid mom will still blame 'mainstream' medicine rather than the lack of medical treatment for her kid's death.

She is sure that her kid was poisoned beyond help. That if her kid didn't have any chemo, then the homeopathy would have cured the kid.

Once people get wrapped up in the 'natural healing' philosophy, then you might as well be telling the pope that god isn't real.

The only thing that can be done is to stop letting the liars lie. Stop letting the the crap be sold. Stop legitimizing their philosophies by allowing the stuff to be unregulated.

Stop letting the books be sold. Stop letting the con artists delude their followers into selling their ◊◊◊◊.

Put the liars in jail. Ban the books they way you would ban hate material against jews and anyone else. "natural' healers spread hate about the mainstream. They point fingers and lie about the doctors poisoning people with chemo and other things like medication.

That mom is never going to recognize what really happened. You want to see a whole site of moms just liker her?

It's sad, really sad, but getting to be a bigger and bigger problem.

We hate doctors


They hate doctors and know nothing about microbes or the human body.

We would like to keep away from the Dr if possible. Thank You

how to raise a healthy child in spite of your doctor

Croup is a symptom not a disease

There are many reports of treating cancer sucessfully with essiac tea

I have heard and read of how cancer has shrunk in size - or hardened - coming to the surface of the skin only to break open to release its poison from the body. There are many stories such as this. The one effect I have seen and keep hearing about is how ESSIAC ® improves the vitality of the person using the tea. The herbs are helping to cleanse the toxins from the body creating a healthier immune system to possibly deal with cancer more effectively.

My mom cured her cancer with this...really!!! Yes, and I would take it if I had cancer...it will cure you! It willl!

 

[Rolfe]

I don't know if the person thinks what is said about vaccines is funny, or if they think it is funny that vaccines really are to blame for everything. I do detect sarcasm at least though.
But some moron did write that about vaccines and polyps.

I do know, because I happen to know that poster personally. He's extremely concerned by the whole affair, but has begun to despair of ever getting through to these people.

This was said towards the end of a fairly long battle (mainly on other threads) where the poster (the Fat Man) had tried repeatedly to drag the homoeopaths kicking and screaming to face the contradictions and illogicalities in their position. You can imagine about how far he was getting. In the main, every attempt to suggest that shaken-up water isn't medicine was met by a demand that he should accept personal responsibility for the thalidomide tragedy, and the assertion that this tragedy alone proved that those who try to heal disease by using real molecules are evil.

The sarcasm in the riposte about the vaccines was perhaps a little unfortunate if taken out of context, but I can sympathise. For the record, the preposterous assertion which prompted the riposte was

When all of these acute symptoms are passed, consider that all of this may still trace right back to "ailments from vaccination"...leading up to the polyp.

In fact the dog had been given a primary vaccine at eight months old by the rescue centre he came from, and had subsequently lived for seven years without vaccination, with his anti-vaccination homoeopath "rescuer".

Rolfe.

 

[jimlintott]

I know I'm probably sounding stupid but I have a reason for arguing semantics. The people we are trying to take on love to manipulate words for their own purpose. I think it is a bit of a knee jerk reaction to just say "throw them in jail". I would like to see more laws regarding homeopathic practitioners but laws regarding the choices of patients get tangled in a web of personal choice, religious freedoms and the right to raise children as we see fit.

We could try to indroduce laws regarding medical treatment for children and we''ll quickly end up in a religous or cultural freedom fight. Some ethnic groups might say 'we have been snorting powdered ocelot testicle for a thousand years. Who are you to take away our culture?' We then enter the arena of political correctness.

Then there is the slippery slope of what is child abuse. Is raising a child to be a racist bigot abuse? I might think so but then some might say that raising your child as atheist is abuse. Is making a bad choice of medical treatment abuse?

Eos makes an excellent point about some people's perception of regular medicine. I see only that they have been educated by someone to believe this. They need to be reeducated. Persuading the media to expose homeopathy for what it is may be very effective.

I wish it was as simple as making some laws. I don't think it is. My arguing semantics and playing devil's advocate is to try to make that point clear.

 

[thaiboxerken]

I think it is a bit of a knee jerk reaction to just say "throw them in jail". I would like to see more laws regarding homeopathic practitioners but laws regarding the choices of patients get tangled in a web of personal choice, religious freedoms and the right to raise children as we see fit.

I don't see it that way. I see it as totally reasonable to toss idiots like this in jail. I have always maintained that position. I could care less about their "personal choice, religious freedoms and parental freedoms" when it comes to this. Freedom is limited to less than anarchy, and homeopaths are spreading anarchy with their ignorance and schemes. The only people that should have freedom are those who will be responsible with it.

We could try to indroduce laws regarding medical treatment for children and we''ll quickly end up in a religous or cultural freedom fight.

Yea, so?

Some ethnic groups might say 'we have been snorting powdered ocelot testicle for a thousand years. Who are you to take away our culture?' We then enter the arena of political correctness.

Screw political correctness, I could care less. Make homeopaths have to provide evidence for their claimed cures, if they don't pan out.. make it illegal.

Is making a bad choice of medical treatment abuse?

Yes.

Eos makes an excellent point about some people's perception of regular medicine. I see only that they have been educated by someone to believe this. They need to be reeducated. Persuading the media to expose homeopathy for what it is may be very effective.

It's been done and people still believe in that nonsense. It's because of the advertisement that the homeopaths are allowed to use. Because it is not illegal, that is anough to legitimize it to the believers. They don't care about facts.

I wish it was as simple as making some laws. I don't think it is. My arguing semantics and playing devil's advocate is to try to make that point clear.

Making laws would be the beginning. If the laws said that all medical treatments had to be backed by evidence, then homeopathy would be illegal. Right now, the homeopaths think that their stuff does work and the believers think that because it's legal, it does.

 

[jimlintott]

The only people that should have freedom are those who will be responsible with it.

The right to pursue life liberty and happiness is guaranteed to all american citizens regardless of IQ. The supreme court is constitutionally bound to respect things like personal freedoms and religious choice whether either of us like it or not.

Make homeopaths have to provide evidence for their claimed cures, if they don't pan out.. make it illegal.

I absolutely, 100%, agree. Any product that claims to have medicinal or far reaching health benefits should have to be shown to work or not be allowed for sale as such. I think this type of law would be workable and is needed.

It's been done and people still believe in that nonsense.

Then it isn't done. Won't be done until no one believes. (Sorry for another semantic argument. )

 

[thaiboxerken]

The right to pursue life liberty and happiness is guaranteed to all american citizens regardless of IQ. The supreme court is constitutionally bound to respect things like personal freedoms and religious choice whether either of us like it or not.

You are true, but freedom is only granted to those who are responsible with it. That's why we have prisons. If people are going to abuse the system by ripping people off or spreading false "medical" treatments, they should have their freedoms restricted.

I think this type of law would be workable and is needed.

Yea, it's just too bad that naturopathy and quack medicines have so much money and power tied up in special interest groups that this will probably never happen.

Then it isn't done. Won't be done until no one believes. (Sorry for another semantic argument. )

You can lead a horse to water....

 

[Trebuchet]

It's bad enough that this stuff is allowed to go unchallenged by legal authorities. What's worse is that proponents of "alternative medicine" have actually conned state legislatures into requiring health insurance plans to cover them, thus requiring the rest of us to pay for their frauds. As if we didn't have enough of a health care problem in this country.
I saw an item a few years ago mentioning that chiropractors had surpassed lawyers as the most frequent profession in my state's legislature. Groan.

 

[Rolfe]

Happens just about everywhere. Look at this thread here - especially the fourth post! I can't help wondering if this poster is anyone we know.

Rolfe.

 

[Lost Boy]

Happens just about everywhere. Look at this thread here - especially the fourth post! I can't help wondering if this poster is anyone we know.

Rolfe.

't ain't me, but it raises an interesting question. The NHS does fund homeopathy doesn't it? I thought the big homeopathic hospitals weren't state-run. What does it need to make the NICE (National Institute for Clinical Excellence) pay attention?

By the way I'd rather the originator of that thread got some state-funded help for her illiteracy.

 

[Rolfe]

't ain't me, ....

Mmm, thought had crossed my mind I admit, but I'll strike you off the list of suspects. Spells too good for Geni. Wrong country for Hans and a good few others, and I don't think Hans would sock-puppet them anyway.

I gather that one of the London boroughs recently cancelled its contract with the London Homoeopathic Hospital on the basis they didn't think they were getting anything for their money. But then we hear the place has recently had a multi-million-pound refit.

See what I said in the "sample preliminary tests" thread. I don't think it's possible to refute homoeopathy to the homoepaths, and the very strength of their belief acts in their favour when interacting with rational but not too clued-up colleagues. Homoeopathy has to be demonstrated to be delusional not to the deluded but to the keepers of the purse-strings and medical ethics. I think Edzard Ernst is doing some good stuff here, but it's so in with the bricks it's slow work.

I did ask a member of the medical GMC (at a dinner) what they proposed to do in their re-validation about professionals who had embraced magic methodologies. He suggested that they tackle the easier bit first (revalidating the people who were doing it right) and gradually the macicians would be sidelined. However, I detect a bit of resentment there, and I wonder if the professional revalidators and NICE might have to take some interest at least in the medium term.

Rolfe

 

[geni]

Rolfe you have a PM.

I have to say that I have no idea who jsut people is either I wonder if they will carry on posting.