Today is Charles’ 70th birthday! On previous occasions, I have published a detailed review of Charles’ outstanding achievements in the realm of alternative medicine. For his 70th, I feel that something else is required. How about a personal birthday card?
HAPPY BIRTHDAY YOUR ROYAL HIGHNESS!
I know, it is not easy to become 70, but you must look on the bright side: you are reasonably healthy, you are not exactly a poor man, and you even managed to change the rules and marry the woman you have always loved. What else could you wish for?
Yes, I know, your big idea of ‘Integrated Medicine’ is not doing all that brilliantly. Your book ‘Harmony‘ was viciously ridiculed, and the ‘best of both worlds’ turns out to be a bit of a strange idea. The thing is that, in healthcare, there is only one real world: the world of reality, facts and evidence. The other is the unreal world of fantasy, wishful thinking and mysticism.
We all know you love homeopathy. After listening to Laurence van der Post in your younger days, it would have been lovely for you, had the notion of a remedy based on a mystical vital force been true. It would have avoided all the complexities of reality. But now, at the age of 70, you must have realised that make belief is a poor substitute for fact.
It has become all but impossible to ignore the truth about homeopathy. Only last year, the European Academies Science Advisory Council concluded that “the claims for homeopathy are implausible and inconsistent with established scientific concepts” and that “there are no known diseases for which there is robust, reproducible evidence that homeopathy is effective beyond the placebo effect”. Such brutal realism must be painful. And now the NHS decided to ditch homeopathy completely. All your homeopathic spider memos for nothing!
Yes, it is tough to grow old. But perhaps it is not too late. You could try to forget about van der Post and all your other ill-advised ‘advisers’. Instead, you could gather a few young, energetic, bright scientists and let them inspire you with the beauty and excitement of reality and science. You could still become a force for real progress in healthcare.
Think about it and keep looking on the bright side.
Many happy returns
Edzard Ernst
5 Responses to A birthday-card for Prince Charles on his 70th birthday
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I recently watched HRH on TV asking someone why they didn’t accept the scientific consensus on global warming. Irony of ironies! Why doesn’t he accept the scientific consensus on complementary/alternative/holistic medicine (aka quackery)?
I saw the same thing and my first thought after reading this article was to post here, you beat me too it! Critical thinking and consistency are obviously not his strong suit. I almost thought he sounded reasonable in the interview on climate change but knowing his history and specifically his views on homeopathy I found it hard to take him seriously. It is a credibility issue.
Haha, what a brilliant open letter to HRH, on this day when all else we hear about the man from the media is simpering obsequious nonsense.
THANKS
yes, you can call me lots of things, but sycophant is not amongst them.
Perhaps if you are still in the mood to send a birthday wish next year to another narcissistic, highly educated no-nothing, conniving-fraud, undeserving billionaire figure-head of a powerful western democracy…Trump was born on June 14th.