Homeopathy is based on two main principles. The ‘law’ of like cures like, and the ‘law’ of infinitesimals. Like cures like works as it sounds, if a patient is suffering from symptoms such as a fever and a headache a homeopath will diagnose the patient with a substance such as Belladonna which would in a healthy patient induce a fever and/or headache. This may seem a little weird I know but just go with it for the moment. Obviously if a homeopath was to give a patient a substantial amount of Belladonna then mortality would probably occur, which wouldn't be in their best interests. Thus to combat the normal poisonous effects of substances such as Belladonna, the substance is diluted. This brings us to the second law, the law of infinitesimals. When I say that homeopathic concentrations are diluted I mean really diluted, diluted to the point that there are no active ingredients left in the substance. However homeopaths believe that even when the original active ingredient has been diluted to the point where it no longer exists they believe that the water still holds some memory of the substance.
So how dilute are homeopathic concentrations? The sheer amount of water that homeopathic concentrations are diluted in makes it very hard to visualise or even be able to imagine any active ingredients in homeopathic concentrations still existing. Imagine one drop of substance A in all of the world’s oceans, then taking one drop of that mixture and putting it into a homeopathic sugar pill. You’d think that would be pretty dilute right? But that is strong in terms of homeopathic remedies. There are many homeopathic concentrations that operate at 30C, which is the equivalent of one drop of substance A in 100^30 parts of water, 100 multiplied by itself 30 times. This is the equivalent of one molecule of the original substance A in a container of water that is 30,000,000,000 larger than the Earth. Thought that was dilute? It goes further and gets more and more ludicrous as the dilutions gets weaker and weaker. How about Oscillococcinum? This is a homeopathic ‘remedy’ to treat symptoms of flu and the common cold. So what concentration are we talking about here then? Oscillococcinum has a concentration of 200C. This is equivalent to one part of substance A in 100^200 parts water. This is impossible to visualise. Imagine one molecule of the substance in a container as large as you can possibly imagine, times that by 82, add 62 billion, then square it, then you might be getting close.
When homeopathic concentrations go past a certain number the chance of that molecule actually existing in the concentration rapidly declines. This number is called Avogadro’s number, equal to 6.023*10^23. So when homeopathic concentrations go past the barrier of Avogadro’s number, between 23 and 24C the chance of even a single molecule being present becomes less and less likely.
Although so far I’ve been bashing the science behind homeopathy maybe there’s a chance that it still works to treat disease. The fact that the possibility of there being any active ingredients in these pills is next to none is irrelevant if these pills work. However, unfortunately they don’t. There is no scientific evidence that homeopathy works. Hundreds of scientific clinical trials over the years have all shown the same thing, that homeopathy is no more effective than placebo. However there are a few scientific trials which claim to show homeopathy having a positive effect. But if you track down these clinical trials then you will see that they are bogus. The large majority break the scientific norms which one should see in all scientific trials. Many of these trials are not sufficiently blinded or randomised. Some don’t contain a placebo, or when they do it is not controlled for. Some simply don’t have controls put in place so the positive effect that is supposedly being shown is the cause of a drug that the patient was taking at the same time as they were participating in this clinical trial. Others use subjective test results rather than objective ones, for example, in a test where a homeopathic remedy is claimed to cure insomnia, patients are asked to mark how well they slept out of ten after taking the remedy or a placebo. This makes all of the results extremely vulnerable to human error.
So I’ve established that I believe that homeopathy does not work. However why should I so vehemently reject homeopathy if it is up to the individual themselves? After all is it not the patients right to choose? Even if homeopathic remedies have no more effect than placebo then does that not matter if patients are thinking they are feeling better?
Firstly, patient choice. I believe this argument to be completely flawed. Yes of course patients have a right to choose but they should have the right to choose between a drug that is proven to work rather than a homeopathic sugar pill which has no evidence of efficacy. Imagine you decide to build a brand new house. You hire a builder who asks you a very weird question. ‘So Sir/Madam, would you like me to build your house out of bricks and cement or jelly and jam?’ Sounds absurd doesn’t it? Is it not the right for the client to choose? Again the same principle applies. Yes they do have a right to choose which materials their house is built out of. But surely they also have the right to choose between materials which actually work and those which are plain stupid. Homeopathy is simply that. Plain stupid. Did you know there are homeopathic hospitals around the country? 5 in fact. Homeopathy is also provided on the NHS. This absolutely stuns me. How can a medicine which has no proof of efficacy be being funded by the taxpayer?
I could continue to ridicule homeopathy further but I shall leave it there for the moment. So if you ever come across homeopathic ‘remedies’, or just homeopaths in general, challenge them. Remember that homeopathy has been scientifically proven to be no more effective than placebo.
No comments:
Post a Comment