The Truth About Homeopathy

Written by Rolf

We are well into the 21st century but homeopathy is as popular as ever. And that is only because commercial corporations have us believe that homeopathy is actual working medicine. The government takes no steps to ban this outdated practise and the corporations invest millions in spreading the lie.

In the Netherlands, we have rules that prohibit misleading commercials, like anti-aging creams and effective exotic ingredients in shampoo, but in reality you'd have to go to court to actually take steps against these commercials and the fact is that no one can be bothered to go through such lengths. We are usually down to earth and blame people's own gullibility if they want to believe in it. The same is true for homeopathic medicine.

And 'misleading' is a loose term. A lottery can mislead people by saying there is a 1 in 7 chance the jackpot will be won. This is misleading for the mathematically challenged, who think *they* have a 1 in 7 chance to win it. I have no problem with the wording, I even think it's amusing how optimistic they make it sound.

However, homeopathy is a bit more serious than shampoo. While I couldn't care less about women who wash their hair with broccoli extract, I can get very worked up about corporations that collect billions worth of cash by claiming to cure actual health issues. Issues that you really need to see a doctor about.

What I do mind, is bluntly lying for profit at the expense of ignorance. And ignorance in the case of homeopathy can hardly be blamed on people's gullibility. Corporations tell us their medicine fixes some random health issue and no one tells us otherwise. The corporations have made a name for themselves over the past decades of "making medicine" and they spend millions advertising brands like Oscillococcinum, so why would we doubt their claim? If it was fake, they would not be able to market it the way they do, right?

What makes it even worse, is that some insurance companies cover homeopathy as if it was real medicine. This means that you and I pay for it! We support thousands of quacks who have made it their sole job to scam people with their homeopathic practises day in day out.

Basic principles of homeopathy

So what is homeopathy? Homeopathy is a placebo effect. In short, this means that it doesn't work. Homeopathy is an old practise. It was developed by german physician Samuel Hahnemann in the age when bloodletting was the default wonder cure for whichever illness.

Homeopathy is based on the following two theories:

• What makes you sick, also cures you


• The more diluted a preparation, the higher the effectiveness

Homeopathy was invented in a time when they had no idea diluting had a negative effect on the fluid. Instead they thought the solvent would pick up the characteristics of the preparation, it would remember what it had been in touch with. So much for recycled sewage water.

Even if you still believed, you could conclude homeopathy is overpriced, since dilution makes the preparation stronger. Creating medicine is like a pyramid scheme to the point where you should only be paying for the packaging. All the medicine is, is water or sugar (lactose), depending on whether the remedy is fluid or pills.

Fun facts about Oscillococcinum

Oscillococcinum for instance, is a top selling 'cure' for the flu and the common cold. The 'active' ingredient is an extract of a duck's liver and heart (anas barbariae hepatis et cordis extractum, look it up if you are skeptic toward my skepticism). The inactive ingredient is lactose, to bind it together into a globule.

The reason for the active ingredient (although irrelevant, since there is not a molecule of it in the final product), is that in 1917, physician Joseph Roy claimed to have found a bacterium in spanish flu victims that he later claimed to have found on the liver of a particular type of duck.

The extract of the heart and liver is diluted to a ratio of 1:10⁴⁰⁰. In comparison, the official allowable concentration of arsenic in drinking water is 1:10⁸. This means 1 molecule of arsenic in 100,000,000 molecules of water is perfectly harmless.

They claim your cold will be cured in a week with Oscillococcinum! Of course, you have to realize that, without any special treatment, a common cold only lasts about 7 days.

For some reason, these sugar globules that are sold as medicine have been in production for over 65 years and are sold in 50 countries. They sell for a total of $15 million per year in the US alone. Sugar!

When I first saw their commercial, I had no idea it was a homeopathic product. They didn't say so. But now I know and I wonder which other commercial medicines are also water or sugar. They have me questioning real medicine. But my cynicism aside, there are millions of people who have no idea what homeopathy really is: an expensive placebo.

Share this with everyone you know. Educate people about homeopathy and help put an end to these medieval practises.