vote: Should NHS fund SCAM?

Seems as though the voting has ended.
To start with, respondents were about 55% against the idea of NHS-funded CAM. Once the woos got their act into gear after a delay of a couple of days, the vote swung round to end up 56% for. I think you could vote multiple times as well, which is never a good idea for these polls.
 
Yes
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56.50%
No
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43.50%
14560 Votes Cast


I just voted. The results are above.
 
From the article:
Dr Peter Fisher, of the Royal London Homoeopathic Hospital, described the letter as an attempt to introduce a form of "medical apartheid" into the NHS.
Click to expand...
("the letter" being the one from a group of Doctors arguing that the NHS should not be funding unproven medicines or treatments).

This really winds me up - it is NOW that their is unfairness in the system, as "alternative" treatments are exempt from the rigorous testing for clinical effectiveness and cost effectiveness that "conventional" medicines are (quite rightly) subject to.

How is treating all medicines and (alternative or not) in the same way "medical apartheid"? It's surely the complete opposite!!
 
End apartheid now!!!

Perhaps sCAM should be boycotted until it has been appraised by NICE like real medicine. ;)
 
I voted no on principle, it was a stupid question. Define SCAM. I'd vote yes for some and no for others. it depends how widely you define SCAM.
 
Until things can pass the same tests that are required for conventional medicines, then they should not be funded.
 
The problem is that conventional medicine includes loads of perfectly sensible things for which evidence would be sparse, especially double-blind evidence. Physiotherapy. Counselling. Nutritionists.

The problem is that 'perfectly sensible' does not equate to 'efficacious', but is it cheaper to run a physio service based on plausible ideas or to run double blind trials on a phsyio service.

I'd say that SCAM is defined by its inherent implausibility rather than its quality of evidence. Very few implausible things would ever prove useful. So, if they were rejected on the basis of common sense we would not be missing out on much.

What is the source of plausibility? The rest of science, I suppose. Homeopathy and chiropractic fail this test. Reflexology and iridology do. Acupuncture is a mixed example. It's these things on the boundaries of plausibility where research money should be invested to resolve the issue- maybe acupuncture works for acute pain but not to stop smoking. Money spent offering homeopathy or researching homeopathy is just being p8ss8d away.
 
From the URL in the OP:
Dr Peter Fisher, of the Royal London Homoeopathic Hospital, described the letter as an attempt to introduce a form of "medical apartheid" into the NHS.
Click to expand...
What a disgusting attempt to gain sympathy [edit: and curry outrage] by identifying with victims of a truly oppressive system. Nonsense. IMO homeopaths get treated far better than they have any right to expect.
 
A friend is an NHS Hospital Rehab Dept. Manager.
She has just been told to cut 140,000 pounds from this year's budget.
She has patients demanding accupuncture and aromatherapy treatment.

Something has to give.
 
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