Should homeopathy be criminalised?

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fabrutus	The selling of products that are at best a con - they do not do what is claimed, and at worst can actually do harm because proper treatment is not sought should indeed be criminalised, in MHO! Natasha, why do homoeopathic 'medicines' need regulating - it's WATER!!!! Every properly conducted double-blind test of homoeopathy has shown it to be utterly ineffective. It does not work, full stop, and saying it does won't change that! The plural of anecdote is not evidence! Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

Elise C	You might be interested in the article I'll cite below. Here is the abstract: Outdated Fraudulent Healing? Homeopathy on Trial : The Homeopathic “Pill Scandal” in the 1950s and Modernisation of Health Care in Sweden During the first half of the 20th century, homeopathy became the most widespread alternative to conventional medicine in Sweden, although it was practised almost exclusively by laymen. In July 1951, news spread that certain manufacturers of homeopathic remedies had skipped part of the potentization process and had sold pure sugar pills under the false claim that they were homeopathic remedies. Directors and other company employees were sentenced for fraud and tax evasion. According to Swedish medical authorities, homeopathy had finally been revealed as the quackery they had always declared it to be. Homeopathy’s social and cultural associations at this time – belief and religious faith as well as criminal activities – facilitated the pronouncement of the end of this kind of healing. Homeopathy vanished from both Swedish pharmaceutical legislation and the discursive level in society. The homeopathic “pill scandal” can be seen as an important symbolic turning point in the process of modernisation of health care in Sweden. Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

Tom B	Homeopathy, as with any therapy should play by the rules that so called 'conventional medicine' plays by. First produce a body of evidence that your treatment performs better than placebo (or the current treatment). Then sell the treatment on a market that is regulated by people who know what they are doing. If homeopathy was forced to play by the same rules it would essentially become illegal. Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

drjtdinh	NOT AT ALL but dangerous unethical medical practices like these should be criminal. http://www.click2houston.com/investigates/15137142/detail.html Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

tacomadc	I've seen this "homeopathy is water" claim many times on this board, but never any proof or even any evidence offered. A molecule is a pretty damned small thing, I'm sure if you could have a sensitive enough test the substance still would be there, however dilluted. Look at the one per millions of particles that a dog can smell - no reason your body shouldn't be able to detect that. Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

killbasabill	Hey Morty, did your girl friend run off with a HOMEOPATH? It must have been hard on you since it appears that you have an axe to grind with one of the oldest professions in the world. In answer to your question, NO!. Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

Alison B	Where is the crime? If it something that does not work and it is a load of sugar pills then what are you scared of? I have used Homeopathy for 30 years for myself and children and we are all very fit and very healthy! Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

Raven Eyes JPA	"Decent" people don't keep making nasty posts like this day in, day out Morten. They discuss and debate politely. In answer to your question, no it should not. Now why not quit with the one man hate campaign? Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

Angel	what do you mean "homeopathy has never saved one life" ??? why do you go asking a question if you have an answer in your head already and just want to yell at everyone who disagrees with you. go do some real research with an open mind go get a life Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

Astro	Definitely not, homeopathy works. Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

natasha the sleuth	I think it would be a good idea for products that homeopaths use to be regulated to ensure consistant and quality assured manufacturing. However, I think people should be able to decide for themselves how they want to pursue their medical treatment. You obviously prefer western medicine, but many complimentary and alternative routes, such as homeopathy, have helped many people. If there is going to be any prohibitive legistation to improve public health, cigarettes should be made totally illegal. Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

grayure	I seriously hope you aren't confusing it with herbalism. In any case, let's assume that it is completely useless. Most illnesses get better on their own, though of course some don't. Drug companies are multinationals. It doesn't matter what their ethical record is or anything else. They are part of what makes this world a terrible place to live in, purely and simply, and if anything, even if it is ineffective, reduces their profits, it is worthwhile. Finally, the point is to prevent illness wherever possible, not to treat it, because by then something bad has already happened. What might work, but will never happen, is this. Nationalise the drug companies, derive all medicines from biological sources or non-covalent inorganic compounds, remove all harmful adulterants such as Azo dyes and racemic mixtures from drugs, concentrate on prevention and test medicines properly over two generations before releasing them to the public. Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

fretochose	No but closed minded trolls should be! Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

Ad G	Maybe your question should actually be should Modern Medicine and the FDA be criminalised? I believe the FDA is even becoming a political election point since it is a non sanctioned unconstitutional cash cow. Investing in the health of our children is a bargain To cover the nutrition basics only costs a few dollars a month, and that investment would pay off so much in our society. It would be returned many times over very quickly because every kid that we can save from the prison system and give a new opportunity, in terms of being able to learn and take on a skill and have real job opportunities out there, produces a windfall of returns for society. That child is going to grow up and be a productive member of society. He or she is going to pay taxes, possible raise a family and be part of a community. Instead, we put them in prison, dose them up on drugs and blame them for their actions when I believe they've actually been instigated by the prescription drugs and toxic chemicals in their foods. The don't need to be punished as mush as they simply need to be nourished. I know this stands at odds with the current "incarcerate everybody" mentality that dominates the culture here in the United States, the land of prisons -- but it's the truth. Why are we the country with the greatest prison population in the world? It might be the same reason we are the nation with the worst health problems in the world. They are connected, you know. People who are unhealthy are unhappy, moody and can display aggressive, violent behavior. Change their diets and you can turn many criminals into normal people. Not all of them, of course, but a large number. Modern society is addicted to drugs Someday historians will look back on this era and wonder with great bewilderment how we could poison our children with such toxic chemicals, how we could poison an entire generation with prescription drugs and how we could keep all our senior citizens in a zombie state, dosed up on mind-altering drugs. They will wonder, "How could we do this as a society? Were we insane? Were we completely out of our minds? What was wrong with this society?" At that time, society will have moved way beyond chemical-based medicine. We will be focused on disease prevention, and we'll have electro-medicine. We'll be using non-local medicine, for example, to help people stay healthy. We'll have outstanding nutrition available at a very reasonable cost in formats people can enjoy taking. Someday, nutrition will be recognized as the number one way to prevent disease and keep people healthy. Belief in chemicals as a cure-all is just one more sign that we are living in the dark ages of medicine Today, however, we're living in the Dark Ages of medicine. We're still living in the chemical-based medical society where everybody says that chemicals are the solutions to health problems. "Does your head hurt? You need a chemical. Blood pressure too high? We have a chemical for that, too. Do you feel nervous speaking in front of groups? We have a chemical for that one. Having trouble with your relationships? Chemical. Got a little bit of joint pain? Yup, there's a chemical for that." Then they'll tell you, just in case, "We have chemicals for stuff that you haven't even experienced yet. We have chemicals that you can take to make sure that you never have pain or heart disease. You should take all these chemicals right now, just in case, and keep taking them for as long as you live." How's that for a con? The con of pharmaceutical-based medicine is the biggest con ever perpetrated on the American people. That con has effects in our schools, and unfortunately, some of those side effects are fatal. The silent holocaust of pharmaceutical deaths Let's look at this in perspective: We're talking about 10 children being killed in this particular incident, and there are a lot of headlines about these 10 children being killed. Certainly, it is a tragedy. None of those children deserved to die, and it didn't have to happen if only we were able to actually take care of our children and feed them right in the first place. But let's compare those 10 deaths to how many Americans have been killed by prescription drugs this year alone. Even the Journal of the American Medical Association says in a peer-reviewed study that prescription drugs cause 100,000 deaths a year in this country. Ten children die in this school shooting, and it gets a lot of attention. Why? It's violent; people pay attention to violence. Meanwhile, we have 100,000 Americans (and that's a conservative number) dying every year just from prescription drugs side effects, and it gets no attention. Why? It's not violent. These 100,000 people die separately, and they die quietly. They die in homes or in hospitals. There's no fiery crash, there's no late-night footage for the news, there's no big explosion and there's nothing to report to the tabloid papers. It's just 100,000 people dying silently. Also, more than 16,500 deaths a year are caused by over-the-counter pain medications. Non-steroidal, anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) kill more than 16,500 people a year by gastrointestinal bleeding. Then the COX-2 inhibitors, which were supposed to be safer than the NSAIDs, came along, and according to studies by chief drug researcher Dr. David Graham at the FDA, they've caused more than 144,000 heart attacks, more than 40 percent of which have been fatal. So what are we talking about here? We're talking about drugs killing more Americans than the entire Vietnam War. We're talking about it happening every year -- twice a year, in fact. You want to talk about a war; this is war on the people, and it's being waged by the pharmaceutical industry. They're willing to trade your life for their profits, in my view. They can get away with it because, again, there's no big event. People are dying separately and quietly, and many of the people who are dying were in their old age anyway, right? They figure no one will blame the drug. We have a disturbingly drug-addicted society here, folks. We've got to get back to health and basic nutrition by raising children with healthy, functioning nervous systems. If we don't do that, no amount of chemistry is going to save us. In fact, these chemicals are already responsible for untold pain, suffering and death in our society. The solution is not more chemicals. The solution is to change the paradigm and get back to nutrition, healthy foods and disease prevention while getting the poisonous ingredients out of our food supply. If we don't do that, we're going to continue to be a society of violent criminals and degenerates -- a society of people who don't have good cognitive function and who are chemically dependant on a system of medicine that is actually killing them at a rate that makes the Vietnam War look like a Boy Scout skirmish in the woods. That's the truth about modern medicine today. It's a crime against our own children, and if we are to have any real hope of surviving as a nation for another generation, this practice must be stopped. Since you and others have already made your opinion about homeopathy plainly clear and obvious and believe it is nothing more than a sugar pill. Shouldn't you spend your time posting about real dangers and not percieved ones? How about taking on big pharmica and make an issue out of the thousands they have killed with their untested drugs and then end up saying oh well, just sue us. Every time they put a poorly tested drug on the market it's all a numbers game, how much can we make before we get caught and sued? How many people have to die before it's not cost effective anymore? You spend your obviously worthless time to prove things that people choose as choices for themselves. Take on the FDA with your rants for their false approvals for things that they approve and then hurt and kill people in the name of safety. Get real and get a life and stop taking the side of the drug companies, you make it sound like you're employed by them or something. Are you? Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

Toffy	http://www.holisticonline.com/Homeopathy/homeo_problems.htm NOPE....should not be criminal at all.......Homeopathy does work.....and has for hundreds of years.....before chemicals were mixed together for us to shove down our throats and add to our already chemical processed foods....Now we do have more and better choices....and that is just what Homeopathy Medicine is a choice.........and since more HONEST people are desiring to do the right thing...it has greatly improved since the SUGAR PILLs of the 1950's Research is the key......... Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

Bob H	The drug cos. and insurance cos. are running wild with advertising and outrageous prices. Alternative medicine is the only chance a lot of people have. To throw them to the wolves, would be a real crime. Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

James	OMG, you obviously have never tried or looked at or read anything about homeopathy. What is so wrong with using natures bounty to cure problems that conventional medicine fails to do or covers up the symptoms or exasperates the problem. St johns wort is a great natural anti-depressant Lavender will cure headaches Tea Tree Oil is one of the best antiseptics - far better than germolene or almost anything else. Seems ridiculous to me to criminalize something that has been in use far longer than doctors have been in existence, just because a few people are so blinkered as to not research the topic. Take a look at Cuba - its one of the worlds leading homeopathic countries due to the embargo on imported goods such as Paracetamol, and the plants and remedies they prescribe have a far better affect with no side affects (Except the taste) that conventional medicine Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

goin.back.2bed¦-}	No, absolutely not....I was under hospital treatment for nine months for a skin condition, they had to stop treatment due to the side effects. It was a six month course, but it was ineffective. So I tried alternative, the homoeopath prescribed Agnus Castus. After three months the condition became less severe, and now I have no symptoms at all. Traditional medicine could not help me....homoeopathy did AND with no side effects!! X Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No

Opus	Obviously, "James" does not realise the difference between herbals and homeopathy. Homeopaths have been scamming people for 200 years. It's about time they stopped. Was this answer helpful to you? Yes / No