Comments on: Neal’s Yard Remedies Offers Lethal Homeopathic Malaria Advice

By: Le Canard Noir

Le Canard Noir — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 20:11:00 +0000

What complete tosh. Science is about evidence and reason. Faith is about belief in spite of evidence and reason. Complete opposites.

If you want to look at the appraisal of evidence for tea tree oil, perhaps you could start here…

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginfo/natural/patient-teatreeoil.html

My guess is though, that evidence does not matter to you. You believe what you wish to be true.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 19:55:00 +0000

Shops like Neals Yard have been sellng other products for years not endorsed by ’science’ like Tea Tree oil; advertised as being anti-fungal and anti-bacterial, then some scientists decided to test it, over 2000 years after its first (documented) use. Then the scientific community tried the usual ‘We have discovered…’ bullshit.
Do not be so completely cynical of anything that your precious ’scientists’ have not endorsed for you…..in less than 100 years they will all have been consigned to the scrapheap of outdated scientific belief – note my use of the word belief; History has proved that science is as much a matter of faith as it is fact.

By: Bacon

Bacon — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 11:30:00 +0000

This is horrible. I’ve been meaning to boycott Neal’s Yard ever since I saw a “MMR: the debate” leaflet in there (er, which debate would that be..?) but unfortunately they do really fantastic skincare/shampoo stuff. Still. After seeing this I think my principles are going to have to come first – I can’t honestly justify giving them my money any longer. Grr, why couldn’t they just stick to cosmetics?

By: Le Canard Noir

Le Canard Noir — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 22:40:00 +0000

To be frank, my hope is that this is quite a minor problem in the UK. Most UK travellers who get malaria do not die as they get proper treatment. The point of this fight is that companies like NYR are wanting to undergo huge expansion and this sort of thing is worth nipping in the bud.

Where, I guess, there is real harm is homeopaths in developing countries telling their porkies to local people. Malaria is utterly preventable, cheaply, but maybe not quite as cheap as a sugar pill. Homeopaths in africa and india look back to blighty as an example and confirmation of their murderous practice. Let’s not let that be too easy.

By: Derik

Derik — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 22:12:00 +0000

Sorry, I’m getting in your way again on the LMSO blog again. Will bow out, sock it too them I say.

Is there a way of finding out how many, if any, people die of malaria each year after travelling to malaria zones taking just homeopathic prophylaxis for malaria? If you have young gap year students, their whole life before them, dying of preventable disease, then you have a hell of a story. If actually most people who are using homeoprophylaxis are taking conventional medicine as well in a fanciful belts and braises approach then there is no story, but mercifully little harm done. I’d like to know which it is but I don’t know where to start.

By: Le Canard Noir

Le Canard Noir — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 17:11:00 +0000

Derek – you are ansolutely right about the problem with what they mean by ‘treating named diseases’. I have written about this humpty dumpty approach to language a few times.

Thye problem is that their customers (I do not call them patients) do believe in real diseases but homeopaths tend not to set forth their true beliefs on the matter, e.g. their belief in magic miasms and life-forces and their refusal to accept the science of simple things like ‘germ theory’. For them, the HIV virus in not the cause of AIDS but a result of a perturbed life force.

By: Derik

Derik — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 16:57:00 +0000

One quick way to find out if she is deluded or a fraudster would be to ask her to take her prophylaxis and then be bitten my malaria infected mozzies in the lab. If she declines she is a liar, if she accepts she is a fool.

By: Derik

Derik — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 16:18:00 +0000

Interesting post.

I think there’s more insanity behind the “named disease” issue than you realise. The homeopath actually thinks that named diseases are a nasty reductionist allopathic idea, whilst homeopathy treats the whole person, nudging the vital force so that the whole is healed. When they use terms like “treats malaria” they are using it as a convenient short hand for the above in the same way biologists use “evolved to” as short hand for “those with trait X tended to survive long enough to mate because of Y and so trait X increased in the population”. That’s why the SoH code of ethics is so insidious. It looks to any sane person like it is constraining the claims homeopaths are allowed to make, but in a homeopaths eyes it is simply stating the obvious: namely that they do not treat named diseases.

By: gimpyblog

gimpyblog — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 14:30:00 +0000

Acleron, they lie because they cannot face the truth that their potions do not work. They have bought in, heart and soul, to a system that they believes heals. Because they cannot renounce their belief they see conspiracy and suppression whenever they are challenged. They cannot imagine their critics act in good faith and honesty because they know they are right. They think they are being smart, outwitting their critics, because they can apparently appease some of the criticism with silken platitudes and the occasional bit of grandstanding.

By: Acleron

Acleron — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 10:28:00 +0000

Gimpy, are they all deluded? So many just simply lie I conclude that many are cynical fraudsters.