The UK Society of Homeopaths, a hub of anti-vaccination activists?

The Society of Homeopaths (SoH) is the UK’s professional organisation of lay-homeopaths, therapists who treat patients without having studies medicine. This is what they say about themselves:

Everyone needs a healthcare professional they can trust – one who’s trained to rigorous standards, bound by a strict code of ethics, and subject to independent regulation. That’s what the Society of Homeopaths stands for. We’re the UK’s largest group of professional homeopaths, and the only dedicated register accredited by the Professional Standards Authority, an independent body set up by the government to protect the public.

We work to uphold standards of homeopathic care, support our members in their practices, and help their patients back to good health. We ensure that the letters RSHom are your guarantee of a well-trained, registered and insured professional homeopath.

This sounds fine, but is any of this true? Because of their dubious activities endangering public health, the SoH has attracted my attention many times before (for instance here, here and here). Today, they made national headlines.

It has been reported that Linda Wicks, chair of the Society of Homeopaths (S0H), has shared a series of bizarre petitions claiming that childhood immunisations are unsafe, and calling for The Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRH) to be disbanded. Mrs Wicks also posted a petition supporting Andrew Wakefield, the disgraced former doctor who falsely linked the MMR vaccine to autism. It claimed that the scientific establishment’s rejection of his flawed research was ‘the greatest lie ever told’.

Mrs Wicks, a Cornwall-based lay-homeopath and owner of the Linda Wicks Homeopathy Clinic in Truro, has been an adviser to the society for 16 years. She was appointed to the SoH chair in April. She has used her Facebook account to spread ‘anti-vaxx’ propaganda for years. Mrs Wicks must now consider whether such to resign.

Two other members of the board of directors of the SoH are also under pressure to quit. One of them, Francis Treuherz, used his Facebook feed to share a petition describing Mr Wakefield as a ‘hero’ who ought to be ‘honoured’ with the Nobel Peace Prize. In 2016 Treuherz endorsed a campaign urging the then education secretary Justine Greening to ‘STOP vaccination’ of schoolchildren against flu.

The flu petition was shared on Facebook by a third member of the SoH’s board, Maggie Dixon, who owns a homeopathic clinic in Bath. Mrs Dixon works as a member of the ‘team of practitioners’ at Ainsworths, the homeopathic pharmacy boasting of royal warrants from the Queen as well as Prince Charles.

It seems clear to me that the behaviour of Wicks, Treuherz and Dixon endangers public health and is deeply unethical. Considering what the SoH say about themselves (see above), it looks like a bad joke. In my view, it is incompatible with holding an office in a professional organisation of healthcare professionals.

Homeopathy does not have a good name when it comes to advising the public responsibly. Such behaviour is hardly going to improve this situation. The recent call of NHS leaders to stop the accreditation of homeopaths in the UK seems therefore well-justified.

Mrs Wicks meekly apologised yesterday, saying: ‘I regret my association with these petitions and any confusion this may have caused, and I have removed the page which allegedly showed this historic material.’ Confusion? At this stage, I must conclude that she is joking!

The SoH said it was working to improve communication standards ‘with clearer guidelines’. Improve communication standards. Yes, definitely, they are taking the Mikey!

Mr Treuherz and Mrs Dixon did not comment.

So, should they resign?

Would that save the reputation of the SoH?

Is there any reputation to save?

WHAT DO YOU THINK?