The Straight Dope about Homoeopathy

This week, the Georgia Straight published an article by the daughter of the publisher of the paper espousing the benefits of homoeopathic remedies for the H1N1 influenza virus due to hit North America in full force this fall. After a round of pillory by the Canadian skeptics calling the author out on her assertions, the publishers included an article detailing a new study about the rate of medical errors in Canada in hospitals. While the 23000 deaths in 2000 attributed to medical errors is very disturbing, this defence of homoeopathy is one big red herring. Here is the comment I left on the article - which may or may not be published..we will see

"The chance of making a medical error looms over every health professional's head. Especially when you are applying treatments that have large inherent risks, like surgery or anaesthesia. What this article does not address is the much larger number of Canadians who are helped by or cured by modern medicine - which surely numbers in the millions every year; let alone those whose lives are extended by drugs treating their chronic conditions.

The way the medical and skeptical community raises its voice is by doing SCIENCE. To uncover problems in our therapies and interventions, publishing them so the public and our peers can see the problem, and then trying to abate it. When was the last study done by homoeopaths of this kind? I see you did not cite any study like this.

The reason homoeopathy has no side effects is because it has no effects, outside the placebo effect. The danger in using homoeopathy to prevent the flu is that you are avoiding real treatment - and this will surely do some harm. We have already seen outbreaks of measles (a serious disease that can kill your child) in the US and the UK because of the lessoning of vaccination. The regular flu kills 36000 people in the US every year - and this is less virulent than the H1N1 strain.

We have to lower the death-from-error rate, no doubt, but it surely sits below 1 percent now. Digging up this red herring of medical errors does not lesson the argument against homoeopathic flu medicine - it just muddies the waters some more and confuses the issue. The flu vaccine is safe and effective at preventing flu. Homoeopathic medicine is safe but not effective at preventing the flu. I know which one I will choose.

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The debate over the flu vaccine seems to be one of competing fears. The two major arguments are as follows:

Medical Community:

The H1N1 influenza virus is a novel virus for which we have no immunity. It is more virulent than the normal seasonal flu, if not more deadly. To prevent serious complications in target populations (young people, pregnant people, health care workers) you should get vaccinated.

Vaccine-denial Community:

The H1N1 influenza virus is not nearly as bad as the medical community says it is. It is just a ploy by big pharma to sell more vaccines. These vaccines have not been proven safe and will cause more harm than good.

We have evidence for the former position:
http://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/vaccination/acip.htm
http://www.cdc.gov/h1n1flu/pubs/
http://www.who.int/wer/2009/wer8436.pdf
http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=2691743&tool=pmcentrez

Evidence for the Latter Position:
http://swinefluswindle.com/
http://www.rense.com/general86/dngers.htm (please check out the home page - it is one big ad for conspiracy and health products - dubious ones)

The latter is just s sample of the conspiracies out on the web. Most use news articles as their source, or other like-minded blog posts. The former uses science.

Here is an article by Dr. Harriet Hall talking about all of the myths surrounding the Swine Flu. If you read nothing else, this will be a great guide through the jungle of swine flu fears.