Research into homeopathy: data falsification, fabrication and manipulation

I regularly had arguments on homeopathy with some close family members. I stopped, because belief in homeopathy is the same kind of belief as belief in flat-earth, and you can't be cured off it.

People get seduced by a somewhat internal logic. They get a fuzzy feeling of superiority in their discovery that the mainstream ignores. If you point out the absolute lack of evidence of any of what they believe in, it's because pharma is silencing them. They are excited to be enlightened, because only they can see how crooked big pharma is: they need you to be sick so you can buy their "allopathic medicine" (derogatory calling of drugs that actually work), so they're trying to kill homeopathy who would really save you ; which to be fair is not helped by the fact that pharmaceutical companies are indeed crooked and want you to be sick.

I don't think there's any volume that can be said on homeopathy that will convince anyone who already believes in it that it's all a scam.

If it worked and had the scientific evidence behind it then would be called medicine.

I have dry eyes, and years ago my optometrist basically ordered me to buy a particular brand of homeopathic eye drops to use every day. All the drops have to do is wash off the surface of my eyes, and we don't want them to do anything but that. His point was that because they're homeopathic, they won't actually do anything, and because they're a reputable homeopathic brand, you can be pretty sure they don't contain anything that accidentally does something. Homeopathy as a way to ensure you're not getting medicine. Interesting way to look at it, I thought.

I wish more German doctors would acknowledge what utter quackery homeopathy is. Three separate doctors wanted to prescribe me homeopathy stuff last year, ended up not getting any help at all.

What I don't get about homeopathy is that there's not even a plausible mechanism for it to work. So research into its effectiveness is like studying how well rocks repel tigers[1]. It seems necessary to show that a homeopathic "medicine" is substantially different than plain old water first.

[1] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4GzMizVAl-0&pp=ygUTc2ltcHNvbnM...

Two years after Oncology said they'd take the whole thing Very Seriously and Do A Thorough Investigation, Frass's article is still up on Oncology's website - not a single disclosure, notice, etc when it should have been retracted:

https://theoncologist.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.10...

He even got caught modifying the procedures of his study part-way through: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9470608/

What infuriates me is that health insurers in my jurisdiction are required to pay for "naturopathy." yet if I ask for the non-generic version of a medicine because the generics only have to deliver between 80% and 120% of what the non-generic does, different non-active ingredients, and different delivery / time release mechanisms...I get denied!

Obligatory Mitchell and Webb: Homoeopathy Accident and Emergency Ward

https://youtu.be/HMGIbOGu8q0

How much of other modern research has the same amount of issues, but doesn't have any motivated critics to uncover it?

The joke about homeopathy is that the guy that invented it knew that it didn’t work. He invented an heal plan that included fresh air and forrest walks and good food and exercise… the obvious today. But his patients wanted also medicine too … because you know that’s how people are apparently… so he invented homeopathy and the nice story to it. But people should primary do the other things. It’s funny that only his fake medicine is so successful today.

> 128th ‘German Medical Assembly’ recently declared that: “the use of homeopathy … is not an option that is compatible with rational medicine, the requirement for the best possible treatment and an appropriate understanding of medical responsibility and medical ethics”.

I find this interesting because it was a German example a few years ago that demonstrated that homeopathy could be ethical in a specific case.

My mother in law (in Germany) had cancer, and eventually things reached the point where any further chemotherapy was pointless. So she went home. But they stocked her up with homeopathic "therapies" and she was quite diligent in taking them in the morning and thropugh the day. At first I was appalled, but then I realised that they gave her a sense of agency over her care. I think this had important psychological value over the beginning of the terminal phase of her life.

Now I can't believe this works for everyone -- I can't imagine I would waste my remaining time on such nonsense. But I don't think she had a good grasp of science (she always wanted one of her kids, or me, to go with her to the doctor and to explain things to her) and she never had any access to the Internet to look things up, so she was probably the ideal candidate to benefit from this nonsense. Drinking water out of tiny bottles isn't any different from praying at that stage of your life and that's considered acceptable and even unremarkable in certain circles.

PS: The Ukraine war made me think of her cancer -- it was a very unusual one and I have always believed it was due to some Chernobyl fallout.

Packaging on homeopathic products should have at least the same size warnings as tobacco products.

If homeopathy "theory" says that the water retains an "imprint" of other chemicals it encountered, clearly the tap water coming into your house is horribly contaminated with the fish pee, ozone (from UV purification treatment) and the pipes themselves.

I briefly considered selling a device that would "reverse" those consequences so the water from your tap would be homeopathically neutralized. But it just seemed unethical to take advantage of the poorly educated. It's bad enough there are people selling crystals, bibles, and magic charms -- selling a scam-device like this is just as unethical.

Homeopathy is BS, but understanding of edible foraging and plant chemistry is surprisingly helpful for better health and diet.

As an example onions and garlic do nothing to cure or address asthma. They do contain an active chemical that vaporized when they are cut which causes uncontrolled tear production. That same chemical agitates the throat in a way that arrests some amount of night coughing induced by asthma.

Another example is that wild lettuce is a drug like opium. Opium is a thistle, as are artichokes, and thistles are closely related to the lactuca genus that comprises lettuce. The drugs in both opium and lettuce are found in the plant latex containing two analgesics and a depressant. Lettuce drug, lactucarium, is not known to be habit forming and is minor though. It is just recommended as a topical treatment for minor skin injuries.

Another is that common fruits like pears, apples, and citrus contain drug like chemicals that alter the metabolism. This is super potent in grapefruit and has been known to cause fatal drug interactions in people on prescribed medicine. These chemicals are again magnified in commercial fruit juice since commercial fruit juice represents a high concentration of juice than found in actual fruit and without any fiber to slow digestion. If you find yourself mixing gold flakes with liquor and orange juice you might be inducing long term metal toxicity to your body even though gold is inert under normal dietary conditions.

I've now known two people quite well, who either had cancer or their spouses did. Both of them went all-in for the woo-woo. One went to Mexico for it. Both are dead now.

If you make it illegal in the US, they'll just get it from another country. Because some people are just susceptible to this stuff.

Homeopathy is total BS, but the placebo effect is real. Is there a way that medical science can allow people to benefit from the latter without rewarding quacks who push the former?

It’s comforting to think of medical professionals as competent and trustworthy, but it’s simply not universally true. Medical mistakes are the third leading cause of death in the U.S.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK499956/

Homeopathy is basically mistake proof compared to real medicine, including a doctor visit. For a sufficiently minor ailment, avoiding risk of a potentially lethal mistake is just safer.

I had horrible pollen allergies. My mother took me to a homeopath (in addition to regular doctors) She prescribed some tablets / pills to dissolve under the tunge, that had some pollen in them.

It worked pretty well for allergies but not the best for teeth. Just building up resistance I would think.

I know you can get similar treatment now from regular doctors.

So my one and only interaction was fairly successful.

I have never sought one out for anything else.

Weren't zinc lozenges a homeopathic remedy?

I'm a staunch supporter of homeopathic remedies. I drink more than 2 liters of homeopathic solution per day. /s

I still don't understand why these can be sold in American pharmacies.