The drop in cases and deaths due to COVID-19 infections in India has been attributed to India’s national policy of using homeopathy. Early in the epidemic, the national “Ministry of AYUSH, recommended the use of Arsenic album 30 as preventive medicine against COVID-19. Its prophylactic use has been advised in states like Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, and Maharashtra. The ‘OFFICIAL HOMEOPATHY RESOURCE’ is now claiming that homeopathy is the cause of the observed outcome:
And now the results of that policy and use are clear, even though skeptics and other scientists in the conventional paradigm are mystified as to why the drop is so dramatic. They know nothing about homeopathy and its history of successfully treating epidemics.
India has a population of 1 billion, 300 million people. Relative to this massive population the number of cases per day and especially the number of deaths per day are now exceptionally low. According to the Daily Mail:
“Scientists are trying to work out why coronavirus cases in India are falling when at one point it looked like the country might overtake the US as the worst-hit nation.
In September the country was reporting some 100,00 new cases per day, but that went into decline in October and is now sitting at around 10,000 per day – leaving experts struggling to explain why.”
END OF QUOTE
According to my sources, the number of daily new cases in India rose steadily to reach its maximum of almost 100000 new cases per day in mid-September. Thereafter, the figure fell in almost the same fashion as they had previously risen.
Currently, they have reached a plateau of about 13000 cases per day, and around 100 patients per day are reported to dies of COVID-19 every day. There are several possible contributors to these relatively positive outcomes:
- India has administered the Covid-19 vaccine to about 10 million people in one month since launching the world’s largest vaccination program on Jan. 16. However, this timing cannot explain the fall of cases before mid-January.
- The Indian government has attributed the dip in cases partly to mask-wearing, which is mandatory in public in India and violations can draw hefty fines.
- Large areas of India have reached herd immunity.
- Some of the various non-homeopathic remedies that have been recommended by the Ministry of AYUSH might be effective.
- There might be a host of other factors that I don’t know about.
- The figures coming out of India may not be reliable.
- The homeopathic remedy Arsenic album 30 might indeed be an effective preventative.
Which of these explanations are valid?
Most likely, it is not one but several working together. However, the hypothesis that homeopathy has anything to do with the course of the pandemic in India seems most unlikely. Apart from the fact that highly diluted homeopathic remedies are implausible and have not been shown to be effective, the timing of events is clearly against this explanation: if I am correctly informed, the homeopathic remedies were dished out months before the decline in cases started. In fact, simply going by the timing, one would need to assume that homeopathy led to the enormous increase before the remarkable drop.
Of course, it would be interesting to see the results of the homeopathy trials that allegedly started in India about 8 months ago. They could bring us closer to the truth. But somehow, I am not holding my breath.
117 Responses to Has homeopathy caused the dramatic decline of COVID-19 cases in India?
Leave a Reply to Steve Tonkin Cancel reply
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
No, it’s a natural progression.
” In fact, simply going by the timing, one would need to assume that homeopathy led to the enormous increase before the remarkable drop”.
Initial aggravation!
Unfortunate if some get Aggravated to death….
Like everything else, including vaccine, it takes time to distribute and convince people. Kerala seemed quite successful.
As reported elsewhere in this Blog, Kerala had good success with adopting firm infection control measures early in the pandemic – handwashing stations, other hygene measures, teaching people to avoid contact. These are well-established methods for managing infections. Nothing to do with homeopathic pills.
@ Chiong
“Like everything else, including vaccine, it takes time to distribute and convince people. Kerala seemed quite successful.”
Perhaps you would like to offer some kind of evidence to back this up?
There is zero evidence that homeopathy works to treat ANYTHING period.
There is even less that it has had any effect on the prevention or treatment of Covid-19 in India – whatever magical thinking you or others seek to invoke.
This is simply delusional.
This article in the Times on Monday suggests that things are a bit more complicated than the self-appointed “Official” Homeopathy Resource pretends:
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/eb796c0a-6f9f-11eb-811f-f64a7b4cb430?shareToken=f0bb2616e86d5fa62880cc8ac9751cc2
THANKS
Correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t India always one of the countries with the lowest life expectancy, the worst public health record, and the scene of some of the worst epidemics the world has ever seen? And that WITH homeopathy AND ayurveda?
It appears that the Ministry of AYUSH plays one of the oldest tricks in the book, i.e. the ‘Three-Step Strategy to Success’ as I call it:
1. For of any medical problem (anything from one case of runny nose to a pandemic affecting millions), promote the use of alternative ‘medicine’.
2. Wait for the situation to resolve.
3. Claim success.
a priori homeopathy has no scientific basis or plausibility so there is no logical reason to suspect that it would have had anything to do with either the prevention or successful treatment of Covid-19.
there is no actual evidence being produced to demonstrate that homeopathy has in fact been successful in either case. Where are the RCTs demonstrating that the homeopathic arms of these studies did indeed fare better?
All of this is wishful thinking and propaganda as per usual. There are many other factors that are far more probable as out-lined in the Times article especially the demographics. There may well be other factors that have not been considered yet. When you hear hoofbeats think horses not zebras – only a fantasist or someone unhinged from reality would imagine that ultra-diluted substances that no longer contain active ingredients which themselves are chosen for fantastical reasons could have any real world effect in a pandemic.
Also correlation is not causation. Just because you are taking a homeopathic nostrum and you do not contract Covid-19 is not evidence that the former is the cause of the latter. I have been drinking black coffee brewed from Columbian coffee beans every morning throughout the pandemic and I have not caught Covid-19 either – do you think I could get this published as a paper somewhere? Should I be encouraging my obviously highly successful “preventative” to everyone?
The people promoting this nonsense are as dumb as a rock – and this is dangerous nonsense. It is harming the vaccination uptake and promotion in India as well as distancing and masking precautions putting more people in harm’s way. This is not a victimless crime.
”a priori’ you were wrong 🙂
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8VyUsVOic0
Chiong, do you think that YouTube video constitutes strong evidence for anything?
I think it does: strong evidence that Chiong is clueless.
@ Chiong
“a priori homeopathy has no scientific basis or plausibility so there is no logical reason to suspect that it would have had anything to do with either the prevention or successful treatment of Covid-19. there is no actual evidence being produced to demonstrate that homeopathy has in fact been successful in either case. Where areContinue reading “Has homeopathy caused the dramatic decline of COVID-19 cases in India?” – John travis
”a priori’ you were wrong �� – Chiong
My statement that “a priori homeopathy has no scientific basis or plausibility” is a fact. If you think you can disprove it then please produce some scientific evidence with which to do so – because so far no-one else has been able to do so!
If homeopathy were shown to work as stated then vast amounts of standard physics, chemistry and biology would have to be re-written and demonstrated to be wrong: that is a staggering claim for which there is not the remotest evidence.
Then produce some evidence to back up your delusional claim. You can’t change the facts simply by stating that “it is so!”
I am waiting………
@ Chiong
if this is what you rely upon as evidence then there are plenty of Flat Earth videos on here as well and you might like the Reptilian Overlord ones too.
Do you believe everything you see on the internet? Just asking for a friend?
chiong, you wrote:
Oh dear! Let’s examine what you pretend is evidence for your claim:
* It’s a YouTube video (already addressed by David B and Edzard)
* It refers to a so-called finding abut water that was published in a non-peer-reviewed paper in a journal owned by its author, that fails to detail the experimental steps, so that replication is as near as dammit impossible.
* Even if what Montagnier claimed had been true, as Harriet Hall wrote (https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/the-montagnier-homeopathy-study/), “…its findings are inconsistent with homeopathic theory.”
How can a comment posted in 2009 on a page of an unknown refute an exquisite documentary made by an international producer in 2014? Do you believe in time machines?
@ Sh
you are wrong on several fronts.
Harriet Hall in hardly an “unknown.” She is a well known skeptic and blogger for “Science Based Medicine” a skeptical and science based anti-pseudoscience site that has been running for many years.
She regularly debunks pseudoscience and other nonsense and I defy you to say where she is wrong in her post.
“an exquisite documentary made by an international producer” this is a logical fallacy if ever there were one. An appeal to “beauty” or “form” or “presentation” as if that were some substitute for scientific accuracy, facts, logic, rational reasoning or anything else.
It is the CONTENT that is important not the “exquisiteness” of the you-tube video.
So I think we have your measure already.
“made by an international producer.” this is an appeal to some kind of false authority although why you would think that an international producer has any kind of authority in the field of scientific plausibility, knowledge, authenticity or reliability is beyond me! What has this got to do with anything?
If Steven Spielberg had produced the thing it would not make it any more authoritative would it? What do these people know about science? They are just as capable of churning out crap pseudoscience in a
pleasing format as anybody else.
But there we have it . You were completely taken in by a nicely put-together you-tube video and not convinced by a well argued blog post. Which says that you have zero critical thinking skills and are easily fooled by clever marketing. Not very smart.
As for the inversion of the dates? It is irrelevant because the 2014 you-tube video is merely re-hashing all the same crap that Benveniste and Luc Montagnier had been spewing out for years – and it is all pure drivel. Since all of this nonsense predates 2009 the blogpost is as relevant as ever and still nicely refutes anything Montagnier has to say.
Neither Benveniste nor Montagnier has been able to demonstrate that their nonsensical claims were reproducible and other scientists have failed to find anything like the same results in replicating the same experiments. Both became involved in supporting the totally implausible and irrational notion of homeopathy which did further damage to their already trashed reputations.
The “memory of water” and the “radio signals” from nanoparticles of DNA or anything else are figments of the imaginations of these two men who were over-zealous in their attempts to make a name for themselves with non-existent “discoveries” and to support the most ridiculous of the SCAM pseudosciences.
Sorry – you lose. See here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benveniste_affair
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC534457/
https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Luc_Montagnier
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luc_Montagnier
I’ll answer you out of pity, John:
-Hall is widely unknown outside of his circle of charlans, his scientific publications are zero, the rest of his publications are articles in “skeptical journals”. She’s anything but a scientist.
-I said that the video is exquisite for the quality of its production, appreciating the quality of the film is not a fallacy. The documentary makes a live replication of the transduction experiment.
-But what the hell are you talking about, John? At no time do I say that the producer has scientific authority, I said that it is internationally recognized.
-Wow, Now you’re deducing that I don’t have “critical skills” just to say that the documentary is well done.
-I set out to read the sources you share. One is an obituary where they recognize that Benveniste was a great scientist, can you say the same about yourself, John Travis? What the hell did you plan to accomplish by quoting Wikipedia? is that your seriousness? You say that the experiments of Benveniste and Montagnier were not reproduced, and you use as sources two articles on Wikipedia that are nothing more than partial visions and biased and virulent attacks.
-Let’s see a little, in the article about Benveniste are mentioned curiously only the apparently failed attempts as the experiment of Hirst, that of Ovelgonne and disqualifies the experiment of Ennis with a documentary produced by the BBC, but did you not complain that the documentaries were not valid? or are they only valid if they speak ill of homeopathy? Tell me why Wikipedia doesn’t mention Paolo Bellative’s article?
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2759025/
-The objections cited in Wikipedia about the Montagnier’s paper are from people of no scientific relevance such as Hall or PZMayers.
-“other scientists have failed to find anything like the same results in replicating the same experiments.” Please remember: if you make a claim in a comment, support it with evidence!
“I’ll answer you out of pity”
Yes, that’s a truly pitiful reply!
@ SH
what a truly pathetic, pitiful, absurd response.
are there any logical fallacies you are capable of avoiding? do you even KNOW what a logical fallacy is? do you even know what critical thinking is? do you even know what thinking is?
You launch an ad hominem at me and Harreit HAll and PZ Myers – zero points.
Another appeal to authority – Benveniste may have done some good work in the distant past – but like so many he went well off the rails and produced absolute crap with his ultradilute nonsense and support of homeopathy which was widely mocked and ridiculed worldwide.
You totally fail to get the point don’t you – it doesn’t matter whether or not Benveniste has a “great reputation” or whether or not “I/ Harriet Hall or PZ Myers” are well known or not – what matters is WHETHER WE CAN PRODUCE LOGICAL SCIENTIFIC ARGUMENTS AND WHETHER OR NOT WE ARE RIGHT!
To buffoons like yourself you are happy to believe any old tosh as long as a famous name spews it out – argument ad celebrity. What a weird idea. Have you never heard of “Nobel Disease?” It affected Luc Mantagnier as well and Linus Pauling and dozens of others – all of whom went from being brilliant scientists to believing in their celebrity status to backing perfectly idiotic ideas that were a load of tosh – and people like you believed them because they were “famous.”
SO you believe in homeopathy – the most nonsensical of idiotoic theories on the planet. Dilute a substance out of existence, dilute it out of more molecules than there are atoms in the entire observable universe, dilute it in more water than exists in the entire imagination of the entire world’s population – adn you still believe it has some magical properties. There have been no reputable or valid replications of any of these fairy dust alleged scientists fairy dust highly implausible so-called experiments. They remain highly implausible, and contradict what we know about established science. There is no known mechanism for these reactions to occur and these phoney experiemental results are merely further attempts to endorse the irrational beliefs of homeopathy.
But you carry on believing in these delusional and irrational ultradilutional nonsense and the radio waves being emiitted from nanaoparticles of DNA – you must like a good fairy story!
Montagnier also made ludicrous claims about the origins of the Covid-19 virus saying it was created from the AIDS virus – he has completely lost the plot – but this is your HERO?
You pity me? Don’t waste your breath. You need your few remaining brain cells to negotiate what remains of your life.
Clue: The documentary was made in 2014 but, like any documentary, it dealt with things that happened before it was made. (I’d have thought that would have been obvious, but I guess I was wrong there.) In this case, the documentary covered Montagnier’s claims from 2009 before Harriet Hall refuted them.
I must thank you, though, for providing us with a usable exemplar of argumentum ad hominem and appeal to (false) authority in your “unknown” vs “international producer” comments.
I’m going to answer you again out of pity, John.
-Dr. Benveniste was always a meticulous scientist who took care of his works to the maximum detail, not for nothing was the co-discoverer of the PAF Acether that is still mentioned in the books of immunology and biochemistry. His work as the legendary scientific article published in Nature continues to date published in Nature and at the time was reproduced by 4 independent laboratories. The only objection to date is the fiasco and circus staged by James Randi, Walter Stewart and John Maddox. Maddox’s objections were refuted in 1991 when Benveniste in collaboration with an independent statesman, Alfred Spira, replicated the results. These results were replicated in several laboratories but surprisingly Maddox refused to publish them in Nature and only devoted himself to publishing ridiculous failed attempts like Metzger’s that used other types of cells.The most overwhelming case that marked Maddox’s ridicule was the 1993 article when Hirst tried to replicate Benveniste’s experiment and ended up confirming a strong variation in the results, but to save face Hirst discarded his results. This is so pathetic and similar to when The Lancet meta-analysis published in 2005 admitted to finding 8 high-quality articles that favored homeopathy and without explanation Egger did not include them in the funnel plot. It should not be by chance that after 1993 Maddox and Nature refused to publish independent replications of Benveniste’s work, because if they had done so, the smear campaign against Benveniste would have become visible.After 1993 it has been possible for me dozens of works that have replicated the works of Benveniste already with the same model or with variants such as the one used by Madeleine Ennis and Dr. Sainte Laudy which is a more objective test.
-Disqualifying Montagnier for his statements about the origin of the coronavirus is an ad hominem. What he thinks about the origin of this virus has nothing to do with his research on water memory, they are independent aspects. Anyway, the issue of the origin of the coronavirus is not only disputed by Montagnier, there are dozens of articles that question the official version of the origin of the coronavirus and its authors are not proponents of homeopathy. If you feel like an expert you will not have any problem in discrediting with arguments and empirical evidence the scientific article published by Montagnier and the matemathician Jean Claude Perez, which curiously is not mentioned in the press.
-Let’s see, if I said that Pzmeyers and Hall are quacks it’s because their comments on Montagnier’s work make no technical or scientific sense. All they do is complain about the time that passed between the publication of the article and the review, and because at that time Montagnier was part of the editorial committee of the journal. Hall’s comment admits that Montagnier’s article should be considered preliminary, but since 2011 Montagnier has published more articles and other authors have been able to reproduce the results using not only bacterial DNA, but also other types of DNA. What a coincidence that since 2011 Hall no longer made any comment about it. What a coincidence that neither Pzmyers nor Hall object to the theoretical foundations of Montagnier’s article, which obviously require technical knowledge of nuclear physics and quantum physics.
For Steve:
No, the documentary covered an independent live replication. This was done in 2013 in the presence of the film team. Hall couldn’t have refuted anything, she’s a quack who didn’t even understand the article. His article has no validity and anyone with a basic knowledge of electronics should laugh at her lack of scientific knowledge.
@ Sh
your continued attempts to denigrate Harriet Hall merely reveal your own ignorance, use of ad hominems, and you absence of any real arguments.
Harriet Hall is a well respected skeptic, a member of the well-respected Science Based Medicine blog group and a far better scientst than you will ever be. you are easily taken in by any pseudoscientist touting crazy claims to have turned lead into gold, magic water, homeopathy, water memory or the lunatic ravings of Luc Montagnier and others.
You would do well to look a lot closer to home!
Harriet Hall is a highly qualified air-force doctor with impeccable credentials – in what way is she a quack?
the fact that you “believe” that what you think you saw was a live replication of some fanciful fairy story merely demonstrates how gullible you are. “I saw it on TV or You-Tube so it must be true!” Are you really that credulous, that lacking in critical thinking skills? Are you really that incredibly stupid?
Do you believe everything you see on TV? I have seen a woman sawn in half on TV -so that must be true too!
What a pile of BS!
btw way I have the statue of liberty for sale in New York harbour going cheap – would you be interested in buying it? going real cheap? Real bargain – got to make your mind up real soon though!
@Sh
Come on, then. Enlighten us with exactly what you fancifully imagine to be Dr Halls scientific shortcomings. You’ve made an accusation. Back it up with evidence. And if all you’ve got is a couple of YouTube clips, prepare to be laughed at again.
I too would like to know why Sh calls Dr Harriet Hall a quack. Biographical details about Dr Hall are easily available online, and can be checked. To call her a quack sounds defamatory to me, for it suggests she is lying about being a doctor.
In view of previous comments mixing up Dr Hall’s gender, and calling her a “charlan”, I do wonder if this is simply another case of trolling.
I fear you are right
“anyone with a basic knowledge of electronics should laugh at her lack of scientific knowledge”
I have a basic knowledge of electronics. I don’t laugh at Dr Hall’s lack of scientific knowledge, as she doesn’t lack scientific knowledge.
What’s your knowledge of electronics, Sh?
Maybe India just turned down the number of cycles on the PCR test and magically the epidemic went away. The WHO advised the labs to be more careful to avoid false positives, ironically on the same day that Biden took office.
Anyone curious about homeopathy and Covid19 here is a discussion by Dr Andre Saine.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SqkTz04A0Uo
@ Roger
you never learn do you?
your ignorance on the subject of PCR testing has been exposed on this forum many times before – don’t you get tired of trotting out the same old tosh about “false positives” when it has endlessly been explained to you that they are nothing of the kind? You really do have serious comprehension issues don’t you?
And you have still learned nothing at all about getting your information from reliable sources. You will believe absolutely any old nonsense from any old source credulously with not a modicum of critical thinking anywhere to be seen.
YOUTUBE as a source of credible information – are you serious? Youtube is a hive of misinformation, conspiracy theories and credulous pap. Anyone can post anything they like on there. Even Flat-Earthers and Creationists!
But of course you Roger, credulous believer of everything you see and hear on the internet, are willing to take it all as the gospel truth just because…….
Why should anyone pay any attention to Andre Saine – who by the way is NOT a doctor of any stripe? He is misrepresenting himself.
He is instead a triple quack. He is a chiropractor, a naturopath and a homeopath. That means he is a hive of health misinformation in three different quackeries. He has three times the normal alt-med propensity to mislead and harm people.
I could not be bothered to listen to a homeopath/ND/DC blather on with his nonsense – the title of the video was disturbing enough. Anyone who is irresponsible enough to claim to treat pneumonia with homeopathy should not be allowed anywhere near a live patient and ought to be locked up. This is negligent homicide!
A patient with pneumonia needs to see a real doctor and receive proper medical treatment.
Having said that I would be surprised if this individual would recognize a case of pneumonia if he stumbled across one in the street – I very much doubt he could differentiate pneumonia from a hangnail.
You have the most remarkable quality Roger – you have the ability always to get absolutely everything completely wrong all of the time. I don’t believe I have ever seen you make a sensible or true statement on this forum once.
Instead you always manage to misunderstand and misinterpret absolutely everything and believe in the most rank and utter nonsense imaginable. You must be a Nigerian Prince’s delight and I can only imagine what a collection of inter-state bridges you must have accumulated by now. How often has Microsoft fixed your computer for you already? Isn’t it nice of them to take such an interest in you personally?
As for youtube videos there was a good one about a black hole at the centre of the earth you might like, or the one about Covid coming here on meteorites – and there’s an especially good one about how the earth is being run by reptiles from outer space disguised as politicians. You shouldn’t miss that one. My favourite is the one about humans and dinosaurs co-existing just like in the Flintstones – you see how prescient cartoons can be?
Perhaps in time evolution will sort this out. Natural selection will ultimately make it unsustainable for those relying solely on homeopathy for the treatment of serious diseases and this will also have a beneficial effect on the average level of rational thinking in the population at large as well.
Just think – no more loonies claiming that sugar cubes or pure water can cure dangerous diseases!
I cant trust what Kary Mullis, the Nobel laureate and inventor, said about the PCR test? So I should assume you and the So-called Skeptics have some deeper knowledge? I dont think so.
You might be able to rely on what Kary Mullis actually said, but you cannot rely on what the unintelligentsia and the sociopaths pretend that he said:
https://fullfact.org/online/pcr-test-mullis/
@Roger
It is interesting to note that proponents of quackery such as you have a high regard for scientific credentials and titles of those you think support your beliefs(*) – yet at the same time you dismiss out of hand whatever is said by the 99.99% of other scientists with equally impressive credentials and titles.
I am sorry to inform you that science and scientific knowledge is not a party buffet, where you can pick and choose only the titbits and morsels that you fancy, and leave all the rest for the trash can.
If you set store by scientific credentials and titles, you must also accept the principle of scientific consensus, which is constituted by the totality of insights and opinions of people with credentials in the applicable scientific areas. And the scientific consensus in this case is that PCR testing is highly specific and reliable indeed.
Interestingly, it is believers in quackery who implicitly claim to have some kind of deeper knowledge. Literally everyone who has openly criticised homeopathy has been told by aforementioned believers that “They know nothing about homeopathy”. And for some reason or other, those believers and practitioners consistently fail to explain where those critics go wrong, and what actual knowledge they are lacking in. So believers in homeopathy (or any other type of SCAM) must have special, deeper knowledge – knowledge that is only imparted upon those who truly start believing in the type of SCAM at hand …
*: In this case even erroneously so, see Steve Tonkin’s reply.
So what you think Kary Mullis said then, Roger? Please tell us. And explain what you think it means for PCR COVID testing. Then we’ll explain to you why you’re wrong and demonstrate once again that you’re a fool.
A fool, Roger, is someone who refuses to learn. Who displays wilful ignorance. And you’re doing that every time you post here. Wrong about absolutely everything. I’d say it was quite an impressive performance if it wasn’t for you being a homeopath when it just makes it par for the course.
@ Roger
It is well known that we can rely upon you to be completely wrong about absolutely everything Roger can’t we?
YOU SEE THE PROBLEM IS THAT KARY MULLIS NEVER IN FACT SAID THE QUOTE THAT YOU KEEP ATTRIBUTING TO HIM!
And the people who did say the things that likely inspired the quote did not mean what you think it means.
SO THE RELIABILITY OF PCR TESTING HAS IN NO WAY BEEN UNDERMINED BY YOUR IMAGINARY QUOTE.
Who would have thought it – Roger spouting absolute canine testicles once again!!!
Please see here:
https://fullfact.org/online/pcr-test-mullis/
https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-pcr-idUSKBN24420X
what is known is your extremely poor comprehension abilities, your appalling lack of rational thinking and your complete absence of critical thinking skills – along with your extreme gullibility and tendency to believe anything and everything that your read or hear from very unreliable sources such as Fox News and Youtube.
Don’t you EVER think to fact check anything before you spout absolute rubbish on the internet?
You have been promulgating this fake Kary Mullis quote for ages but it never once occurred to you to check if it was true – instead you credulously and gullibly believe any old cobblers that your hear that confirms your biased views.
And I imagine you likewise dismiss any information that would contradict your religiously held false beliefs – because you arrogantly just “KNOW” you are right!
You need to try to be more skeptical about what your see and hear. Question where this nonsense you acquire comes from. Stop looking at Fox News and Youtube and find a reliable neutral news source. And before you try spreading stuff all over the place try engaging your brain before touching keyboard – check to see if it is true!
People lie about all sorts of things for all sorts of reasons and there is a high percentage of misinformation on the internet – you seem to be more gullible than the average 2 year old.
But you will believe ANYTHING as long as it confirms your world view – that is called confirmation bias and it is a really dumb approach to things. Wise up man! Have you no shame?
As previously mentioned in this Forum (2016 and 2018) and as is apparent from his listed qualifications, André Saine is not a medical Doctor.
And, Roger, please may I make a plea (with reference to your last sentence above) for grammatical sentences?
@ Roger
PS the video mentions treatment with “Genuine Homeopathy” – but I have to ask does it really make any difference if the patient is treated with “Fake Homeopathy?”
How could anyone tell the difference?
I’ve been wondering about that too – and I sometimes have the suspicion that manufacturers of homeopathic products skip the messing around with mother tinctures, diluting and shaking altogether, and simply sell unprocessed sugar crumbs as ‘homeopathic medicine’.
And oh, some 10 years ago, a Dutch consumer TV program known for its investigative journalism wanted to trace oscillococcinum back to its origins – only to be stonewalled at the gates of Boiron’s factory. No, they could not enter the premises (let alone film inside), no, they could not speak to anyone except the press manager, and no, they could not make an appointment with anyone for anything. All because of ‘trade secrets’, ostensibly. Very suspicious, if you ask me …
Certainly no homeopath and no laboratory anywhere, would be able to tell bottles of Nat Mur 30C and Rhus Tox 30C pills apart, with the labels off. Nanoparticle theories notwithstanding.
Always fun to see another example of the sheer silliness of homeopathy and its deluded believers
The key to homeopathy is individualised therapy until it’s a bit inconvenient and/or can be monetised a different way. Quick everyone, take your Ars Alb!
“Large areas of India have reached herd immunity.” – is there good evidence for that?
From worldometers.info, India’s total case rate is 7886 cases/million. That’s only 0.8% of the population. Even if the true infection rate is ten times that, that still seems unlikely to be enough to provide herd immunity in “large areas of India”.
The Indian authorities should carry on with what they are doing. They should rely on their own expertise and not listen to western so called experts as whatever they are doing is working .
There was John Travis pontificating on here only a few weeks ago about how the Indian authorities were harming their people with their covid policy.
He won’t see any irony.
@ Dendra
“They should rely on their own expertise and not listen to western so called experts as whatever they are doing is working .
There was John Travis pontificating on here only a few weeks ago about how the Indian authorities were harming their people with their covid policy.
He won’t see any irony.”
Because there is no irony to see.
Only a deluded fool would believe that the thoroughly debunked worthless pseudoscience that is homeopathy is having the slightest effect at all upon the pandemic in India.
Instead, as per the Tines article quoted before, there are MANY other factors particular to India’s demographics that are responsible for the reduction in case numbers.
Homeopaths don’t have any “expertise” only a vastly over-inflated belief in their magical powers and a profound ignorance on all matters of health.
Correlation is not causation.
There is zero plausibility in the idea that homeopathy should have any effect on anything except the bank balance of the homeopath.
You have still failed to learn anything about the logical fallacies – motivated reasoning, prior beliefs, cherry picking data, confirmation bias, ignoring contradictory information, proof by assertion, post hoc fallacy, magical thinking and no doubt others. You will never break free of your false beliefs unless you learn to counter these harmful effects – but sadly I fear you are too full of your own importance to take any note.
That is the big difference between a “belief system” such as homeopathy and a science.
I know the title of this blog post is ‘Has homeopathy caused the dramatic decline of Covid 18 cases in India’. However, my comment didnt say that it did. All I said was that the Indian authorities should carry on with what they are doing. There are many different factors involved. This situation should be reviewed by scientists worldwide.
You just jump in without thinking.
@ Dendra
wrong again – as usual!
you said “They should rely on their own expertise and not listen to western so called experts as whatever they are doing is working .”
In fact the evidence would seem to indicate that India’s success is likely to be IN SPITE of what they are doing rather than BECAUSE of what they are doing.
Despite having the second worst infection rate in the world after the US, India has a shambolic record on testing but is already abandoning any efforts at containing the virus, with politicians holding super-spreader events and masks and other protective measures being abandoned.
Vaccine uptake and promotion is pathetically low. True levels of infection are suspected to be way higher than official figures and according to the Times – ” around 80 per cent of Indians die at home and several states have been accused of covering up Covid-19 death rates or refusing to test dead bodies to save face.”
A younger demographic and quite possible a less lethal strain of the virus in Asia are all thought to have contributed to India’s relatively lucky escape – so far.
So “what they have done” is to mount a shambolic, disorganized, incompetent, idiosyncratic, unscientific and haphazard failure of an attempt to deal with the pandemic and their dishonest and criminal promotion of pseudoscientific AYUSH treatments which have been clearly demonstrated to be worse than useless has just made a disastrous situation worse.
That Modi and his cronies have managed to escape without the deaths of many more Indian citizens on their hands is purely down to good fortune and has nothing whatsoever to do with anything that they have done right. But of course you will be unable to see this as your blind faith in magic water and confirmation bias will prevent you from ever seeing anything that could interfere with your “belief system.”
This comes over clearly in statements that you make such as “Fortunately for them they will not listen to ‘experts’ like you.” No, homeopaths and their ilk “never listen” to anyone else – because they already “just know” it all already and for them it is Holy Writ and immune to any and all evidence. Nothing can change their minds – ever.
@John Travis – Absolutely true. But there is no mention in India that Homeopathy/Ayurveda has helped in controlling the pandemic. It could be that our immunity is better bcoz our body is exposed to so much infection through food, pollution right from childhood. And, unlike western countries, we did not do much testing.
@ Pamela
I think you are absolutely right. There is indeed a good argument that the greater exposure that many in India will have had to other infections previously will have to a certain extent “primed” their immune systems and there could well be a certain amount of latent immunity or at least better response than in say Europeans who will have had far fewer such previous immune reactions.
And yes to the testing too. Some estimates put the possible rate of immunity in densely populated areas of cities such as Mumbai and Delhi at up to 50% but in rural areas it could be as low as 6% – but these are just educated estimates because of the low testing rates.
The other big thing is the relative youth of the population – making it far more likely that even those who do get infected will escape serious complications. But there is also some evidence that the Asian strains of Covid were less virulent, and that the earlier lockdown in India was relatively successful too.
But India looks to be making impressive inroads in the area of manufacturing vaccines, especially in terms of supply to poorer countries, an area where richer Western countries have not exactly displayed a great spirit of generosity thus far.
The sad thing is that the current lull may have affected their own vaccine uptake negatively.
@Dendra
If that ‘expertise’ leads to promoting toxic quackery (a.k.a. ayurveda) and shaken-water placebos (a.k.a. homeopathy) as official healthcare, then that is an unforgivable crime against their own people.
When you look at public health and life expectancy in different countries over the past hundred years, the pattern is quite clear: both metrics see a a huge surge wherever western medicine is introduced, but stay low in places where countries rely on traditional medicine.
Also please note that those who promote these long-disproven modalities are the same people who believe that the excrements of cows are not waste products or simply fertilizer, but are instead beneficial for people’s health. They literally promote bullshit as a medicine.
Maybe the Indian authorities should stop doing what they are doing and follow the UK approach to Covid then? You put them right on this.
I bet you dont. No such letter will be sent.
@Dendra
No, because the situation in India differs significantly from the UK situation. For starters, the population has a completely different age distribution, with far fewer elderly relative to young people. Also, Indian society has far more people in menial jobs that British society, with far less technological infrastructure to support work from within a lockdown situation etcetera.
However, in a more general sense, the Indian government should follow the western approach in terms of evidence-based or at least plausible treatments and medical policies – adapted to local resources and circumstances of course.
They should not waste precious resources on promoting and supporting treatments that are pure placebo at best, and often even actively harmful.
Fortunately for them they will not listen to ‘experts’ like you.
@Dendra
Nothing new there, alternative practitioners and their adherents never listen to experts. In my experience, they tend to stick to their fairy tale ‘medicine’, more often than not with a hefty dose of arrogance. Which is understandable, because they have invested so much in this belief system that it has become integral part of their identity, so they must be right.
However, the AYUSH people appear to realize that their ‘medicine’ would not survive rational scrutiny, so they try to prohibit non-believers from researching and criticising their beliefs: https://www.nationalheraldindia.com/national/ayush-ministry-upsets-scientists-with-new-advisory-barring-non-ayush-scientists-from-research-on-ayush-drugs
This alone clearly shows that ayurveda etcetera is not a system of medicine, but a state religion, a cultural phenomenon reeking of nationalism – much like TCM in China.
Yes India, China, Russia and Brazil will not listen to ‘experts’ like you.
What sort of testing they do is entirely up to them.
They all have very good historic reasons to trust their own people first and use what they can from both western medicine and from their own traditions.
Tough if people like you dont like it.
Ah yes, the “famous” indigenous medicinal traditions of Brazil and Russia.
Traditional Brazilian Medicine (TBM), collected and written by Jair Bolsonaro
And in Russia the state television shows the healing dances of the great shaman Vladimir every day. That’s why covid infections are so low.
@ Dendra
what a typically tone deaf an ignorant response.
So you are defending the totally chaotic and irresponsible crap-show that has been Bolsonaro’s non-response to the pandemic in Brazil?
The Response in Russia has not been much better,
“What sort of testing they do is entirely up to them.” – perhaps, but that doesn’t put it beyond criticism by any other intelligent or informed persons. That they are serving their citizens very badly and killing them by the tens of thousands happens to bothers some of us with a sense of humanity and concern for our fellow men.
We may not have any influence or any authority, but I believe that there is still free speech and right thinking people have over the years felt it their moral duty to criticize the moral outrages and culpability of incompetent, criminal and immoral regimes in other parts of the world where those in power look after themselves but badly fail their own people.
Unsurprisingly you evidently care not a jot for the plight of your fellow men, but rather defend the rights of the despots who govern them. The Bolsonaros, the Modis and the Putins. The first two are Trump wannabees.
“They all have very good historic reasons to trust their own people.”
Surely you are joking Mr Dendra?
What historical reasons do the Russians have to trust Putin or Stalin or any of the others of the Soviet era? Or of any era before that? Do you know ANY Russian/Soviet history?
What historical reasons do the Chinese have to trust the Chinese Communist party or Chairman Mao?
Do you actually know the least little thing about world history?
Have you not heard about the Uighurs and the current GENOCIDE of which China stands accused?
Surely even you must have heard of a place called Hong Kong or the way China treats Tibet?
China has an appalling record on human rights and the way it treats its own citizens.
But I guess all that’s just fine by Dendra”!
What historical reasons do the Brazilians have for trusting a long line of corrupt and incompetent politicians?
Do you ever actually THINK before you haphazardly thump your keyboard?
“use what they can from both western medicine and from their own traditions.”
What evidence do you have that “traditional medicine” actually has any actual validity? That it is anything beyond old wives’ tales? Yet you would have people go out and entrust their lives to it during a raging pandemic!
Well at last you have revealed your true colours.
Not only are you totally ignorant of world history, you are woefully ignorant of current affairs and what is happening in the world around you at this very moment.
You have no concern for the welfare of your fellow human beings, but instead are perfectly happy for them to suffer and die at the hands of self-serving despotic politicians who have badly mismanaged their countries’ responses to the pandemic because that is their right and no-one outside should dare to criticize it.
And instead of scientific medical treatment these regimes should be free to choose “traditional medicine” if they see fit because in the wisdom of the “all-seeing Dendra” these historically corrupt and badly mismanaged countries should put their faith in the “traditions” or in the ideologies (either communist or religious) that have repeatedly got them into bigger and bigger messes in the past?
Dendra – calling you a halfwit would be a compliment. A village somewhere must be missing its idiot.
Like it or not John Travis these countries are on the up. They could all say a few things about the west. We all have to live with each other though.
Thankfully delusional medical missionaries like youself can cause no harm in the 21st century.
@ Dendra
I note you didn’t address any of the points I made in my last comment -you never have anything substantive to say do you?
“These countries are on the up?” In what sense? Brazil – you have a strange sense of “up?” I doubt many Brazilians would agree that the current state of chaos and disarray represents any sense of “up.”
And Russia – being led by an an despotic oligarch where there is a gross disparity is standards of living between the ruling party and the workers? Appalling human rights record, poor freedom of speech, restricted press, gross environmental damage, incursions on neighbouring states – Crimea, Ukraine etc and even the Baltic countries are nervous. Health care in Russia is a lottery.
Meanwhile Modi is busily turning India into a religious state. There is severe poverty and gross disparity in healthcare. It is wracked with social, economic and environmental issues and endemic corruption. Its population will soon exceed that of China.
You seem to have a strange fondness for despotic, incompetent and self-serving leaders of foreign countries – what is it about these Stalin wannabees that you find so attractive?
Your comment about the West is irrelevant – nobody was suggesting the West is perfect. That is the typical attempt at misdirection used by alties. Imperfections in the West are no excuse for the gross derelictions of duty in the countries mentioned above, and they are no excuse for the Governments of India and Brazil pushing worthless treatments on their long-suffering populations.
Why do you feel so strongly about defending the indefensible?
Your last sentence is idiotic. I am not the one who is delusional – after all you are the one who believes in the healing properties of magic water and sugar cubes and who is insisting that folk remedies such as Ayurveda are effective when there is zero evidence for any of your irrational and unhinged beliefs. I think you need to look closer to home.
And I am not a medical missionary – you do talk a lot of absolute rot.
How would i cause harm – you are the one promoting fake treatments!
I am attempting to engage in a rational debate. But in your case it is what Edzard calls playing chess with a pigeon. You are incapable of either rational thought or of debate.
You make no effort at substantive statements or logical arguments. You just make stupid vague assertions with nothing to back them up. You seem to be totally unaware of what is happening in the world around you.
“We all have to live with each other though.”
Are you not aware of the incendiary situation on the China/India border which has been flaring up for quite some time? The two most populous nations on the planet, both with nuclear capabilities? And right next door, with all kinds of issues, not least from Afghanistan and Modi, you have Pakistan with the world’s 6th largest army and another bunch of nuclear arms.
You believe in make-believe medicines and I think you must inhabit some fantasy world where the Bolsonaros and the Modis all appear to you like some Fairy Godmothers and they will all live happily ever after in Putinland.
It’s time to go back on the meds.
Be true to yourself John Travis and boycott any goods from China. You might find that quite a challenge but considering your comments you must be doing this?Even my Colegate toothpaste is made in China so good luck.
Please ensure that no medicines you use are made in India and no garments either. Dont use any petroleum products without checking either as Russia supplies the UK with oil. Make sure those coffee shops you hopefully can visit soon dont use Brazilian Coffee.
Dont invest or hold any pension funds investing in these markets or UK companies doing business with any of these countries that you so oppose.
@ Dendra
why don’t you grow up?
Looks like the pigeon in the room left the chess table when it got to checkmate.
@ Dendra
like all narcissists you overestimate your abilities.
however it is pointless attempting to debate with you since you never even attempt to respond to any arguments that are put forward. you never quote any legitimate sources and you simply change the subject, make irrelevant assertions that are not backed by logic, reason or data and when these are refuted you fail to attempt to defend them.
You never add anything of any value to any comment you make – you just make silly pointless and untrue assertions. No topic is ever improved or enhanced by your contributions – that is quite a record.
You are simply a troll.
that is the allusion to playing chess with a pigeon.. it has a bird brain, it doesn’t know the rules of the game, it fails to play by the rules, it is bad mannered, it scatters the chess pieces all over the board, squawks loudly instead of making intelligent conversation, is very poor company, is very annoying because it keeps flapping its wings instead of behaving in a civilized fashion, and then ultimately it shits all over the board before flying off claiming it has won. But of course being a pigeon it is far too stupid to realize that all it has achieved is to have made a fool of itself.
And of course that is why nobody likes pigeons – because they serve no useful purpose and they shit all over the place.
You keep setting them up and I’ll keep knocking them down.
Look in the mirror John Travis and you may see a manifestation of the insults that you routinely serve up for others from your first post.
@ Dendra
you don’t even have the inventiveness to make up your own invective All you can do is manage is the school yard taunt of “so are you!”
you truly are an entirely empty vessel aren’t you Dendra? Completely devoid of any substance or depth – all sound and fury, signifying nothing. you are as fatuous and devoid of meaning and purpose as the shoddy, totally ineffective and adulterated fictitious “remedies” you are so fond of hawking as “cures” in spite of the overwhelming evidence of their utter worthlessness.
You have revealed your moral bankruptcy as a proud supporter of immoral foreign despots who are mismanaging their own countries’ response to the pandemic and displayed a total lack of any humanitarian concern for your fellow man.
Yet you want to add to these countries’ suffering by adding fake remedies in place of real medicine which would lead to even further incalculable sickness and death. All because of your simplistic “belief” in magic water.
Truly you are proposing genocide on a vast scale.
And you are the one suggesting that I should look in a mirror?
“You are simply a troll”.
Indeed. And that class of being thrives on eliciting responses. Why feed them what they thrive on?
I see a certain relatively reasonable tone in Edzard’s new book towards some CAM treatments. This tone seems incompatible with what i see as just blanket indiscriminate abuse of all CAM and its users from John Travis irrespective of evidence.
John,
I think you are being unfair to pigeons. I have never heard a pigeon squawk, they are actually fairly intelligent birds (though not as intelligent as crows) and they have their own following in the form of pigeon fanciers and racers. They were also a vital means of communication before modern telecomms systems were developed.
@ Dr Julian Money-Kyrle
perhaps, but there are many city dwellers and those in municipal and transportation and telecommunication maintenance who would violently disagree with you. They cost millions every year in cleaning away their droppings, and they damage installations as well as being blamed for being a public nuisance.
They are called “the flying rat”
Many installations are festooned with anti-pigeon “spikes” in attempts to dissuade their perching. Pedestrians complain about cleaning bills from their droppings as do motorists from damaged paintwork and many arguments (sometimes violent) break out between those who feed them and those who strenuously object.
“Nest droppings and feathers block gutters and rainwater pipes causing water damage to buildings. Their droppings can lead to hazards on pavements, especially for the elderly. Pigeons are capable of lifting loose roof coverings, tiles and battens to gain entry into the roof voids. This can significantly damage the structure by allowing water penetration, providing the ideal environmental conditions for the growth and proliferation of wood rotting fungi. Wood boring insects are attracted to this damp, rotting environment, leading to substantial further decay (Singh 1995).
“Pigeon nesting materials, feathers and faeces can block parapet gutters and hopper heads, allowing water penetration into the building fabric and providing the ideal environmental conditions for the growth and development of decay organisms (Singh 1994a, & Singh 1999).”
“Ladders and fire escapes coated in pigeon droppings become slippery and unsafe to use particularly in wet conditions. Startled pigeons may take flight suddenly and cause a hazard to road traffic.”
“……detritus and debris under a nest provides an ideal environment for disease. This encourages fungi and bacteria to grow and proliferate.” ibid.
“They are also a source of allergens, which can cause respiratory ailments like pigeon fancier’s lung, aspergillosis and allergic skin reaction. There is potential for these illnesses to be spread to people through contact with pigeon droppings, dandruff and feathers, pigeon parasites, or where dead infected pigeons get into food or water sources.”ibid
In addition they breed incredibly quickly and populations proliferate to very large numbers.
I rather think in the internet age the usefulness of carrier pigeons may have been superseded – but perhaps that is even more reason why the metaphor is apt for Dendra. In the age of CRISPR and mRNA vaccines he is flogging a 200 year old notion of magical thinking that hasn’t changed in all that time.
Pre-scientific, outdated, superseded, and useless – if the cap fits…………
Fine. Carry on with your rhetoric John Travis.
@Dendra
I don’t recall asking for your permission – I shall continue to comment according to my own taste.
It is extremely interesting to look at your past articles and the science that you refer to, to run down every other medical system in use around the world.
May be, using the same science (avoiding ifs and buts) you could explain the deaths due to Covid (per million of population) in UK (1767), Italy (1581), USA (1535) representing the best in scientific medicine by comparing similar figures from India (113) and Cuba (26) where, you are aware, the government, started distributing homeopathic medicines as preventive as also ayurvedic mixtures.
The data is clear. Are you?
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries
you might benefit from a crash course in critical thinking.
Didn’t bother to read this before commenting, did you?
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/eb796c0a-6f9f-11eb-811f-f64a7b4cb430?shareToken=f0bb2616e86d5fa62880cc8ac9751cc2
This is very superficial report.
I was foxed to see the down trend in all India numbers when I expected these to go up consequent to cold weather setting into North India.
I ran an analysis with data as of November 19, 2020 for Delhi and the next state: UP.
“As of November 19, 2020, Delhi reported infected cases and deaths: 16606 and 262 per 10L (m) respectively. The population of Delhi, is estimated at 30.29 m. ICU beds in hospitals, are in short supply considering the new spike in cases. 7546 new cases on date, in Delhi alone of the 46182 All India cases.
There is a lot of focus on the situation from the Central and the local government on Delhi situation. Delhi has fair number of good hospitals. Sufficient for its population; time will tell.
{To run comparison, assuming Delhi figures closer to reality, considering state and central government monitoring, I converted all data to per million (m) of population}.
Move on to Lucknow, the infected cases and deaths rise to 17151 and 258 per m respectively, matching Delhi numbers. Kanpur is worse off: Only 9411 infected cases and 244 deaths per m. One of the figure should be incorrect. Because deaths should not be wrong, the infections are not being reported correctly.
Prayagraj shows 8400 infected cases and 245 deaths per m. Very similar to Lucknow and Delhi.
Varanasi recorded 11493 and 217 cases of infection and dead per m respectively. This is almost similar data as for Kanpur.
Repeat for Meerut: 9786 cases of infection and 220 dead per m.
For UP as a state the numbers are: 2181 infections and 31 dead. Infections could be under reported: deaths?
The data pointed to a clear picture: the cities showed very similar numbers for infections and deaths. When it came to villages : rural areas, the difference in numbers was starkly different. When cross checked with people in touch with villagers, (Lucknow, Kanpur, Meerut, Varanasi and additional villages around Indore, Bhopal, Gwalior) the situation was found to be real. Few infections and deaths missing. The TV visuals of people traveling with no distancing, no masks were common. (In villages people live even closer compared to cities. Small houses with common walls.)
Population, generally not in touch with scientific medicine, seemed to be doing great. People with easy access to medical support were dying in statistically significant numbers.
Exactly similar sequence is playing out in UK/USA: more access to medical support= more fatalities.
Well of course it is; it’s a newspaper article, not a paper in a reputable refereed scientific journal. Despite that, you have presented neither:
* Evidence from any reputable refereed scientific journal that any assertions/suggestions it makes are false.
* Citations from any reputable refereed scientific journal to support the claims that you make.
In fact your entire screed has an aura of ignoring all plausible hypotheses (in this instance, systematic under-reporting of Covid deaths) and Maier’s law compliance (Facts that do not conform to the theory must be disposed of) about it
Steve Tonkin
“Well of course it is; it’s a newspaper article, not a paper in a reputable refereed scientific journal. Despite that, you have presented neither”
This newspaper report was good when you linked it. Now it is just a report?
“…in this instance, systematic under-reporting of Covid deaths) and Maier’s law compliance”
And where did this “under reporting” come from? Your imagination?
May be you can explain the figures of the Americans, Italians and the British dying at such rapid pace with billions of $ healthcare service not being able to do nothing about it.
This you should be able to scientifically prove?
I KRISHNA, you wrote:
You do like taking things out of context, don’t you? What I wrote was in response to your criticism of it being superficial. You have offered no evidence that it is not correct (and have tried to dodge that particular challenge).
Oh, please don’t be so disingenuous! The evidence is all around you; please stop pretending that it isn’t:
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)31857-2/fulltext
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7508490/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-54985981
https://science.thewire.in/health/india-mccd-comorbidities-covid-19-deaths-undercounting/
Please don’t keep disingenuously changing the subject. This thread is about homeopathy and Covid-19 in India. Nobody is denying that the US and UK in particular (I don’t know enough about Italy, and I bet you don’t either) have been pretty incompetent at preventing the rise of the epidemic for a number of reasons, but the notion that “The UK and USA have failed their citizens, therefore homeopathy works” is just plain idiotic.
As you have been told many times before, I KRISHNA, problems with medicine validate pseudomedicines like homeopathy in exactly the same way that aircraft accidents validate magic carpets.
I KRISHNA, in one of your red herrings you wrote:
Guess what: evidence for the reason for the high mortality in the UK and USA as compared to, say, India and Cuba, emerged from the WHO and the World Obesity Forum this week and, guess what: it has nothing to do with your favoured species of pseudomedicine.
https://www.worldobesity.org/news/obesity-and-covid-19-policy-statement
https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n623
I bet that won’t stop you touting for homeopathy, though, or stop you from continuing to pretend that it is a factor in the lower mortality rates in (say) India than in (say) the UK
” it has nothing to do with your favoured species of pseudomedicine.
https://www.worldobesity.org/news/obesity-and-covid-19-policy-statement
https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n623
Where did obesity originate?
“In 1990, about 12 percent of Americans were obese. By 2010, the national average was above 30 percent. Next time you go to an airport terminal, supermarket, or mall, look around and see for yourself. The obesity epidemic is not just a U.S. problem; it’s global. As of 2008, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), 1.5 billion adults were overweight; of these, over 200 million men and nearly 300 million women qualified as obese. Many of these people live in developing countries that we associate more with famine than with overeating.
These figures are alarming, but the really shocking fact is that this accumulation of global human body fat has been accelerating not over the course of a few centuries but in a mere two decades. Yet fat- and sugar-rich foods, so often blamed for all the extra pounds, have been ubiquitous for a good deal longer than that, at least in the developed world, and the new generations of overweight people in the third world have not suddenly adopted a Kentucky-fried American-style diet. Epidemiologic studies have shown that high caloric intake, while definitely not helpful, is not sufficient to explain the distribution or course of the worldwide obesity epidemic.”
https://www.sciencefriday.com/articles/beware-the-antibiotic-winter/
Dr Blaser in NOT a homeopath.
I KRISHNA, you wrote
You do like shifting the goalposts, don’t you? You asserted that homeopathy was the factor relevant to lower Covid mortality in India and Cuba than in the UK and USA. I provided evidence that one of the relevant factors is obesity.
I KRISHNA, your latest bout of homeopathic religious fervour goes like this:
Changes in human gut microbiota may be implicated in the largely western obesity crisis (not something that is much disputed, I believe – see, for example, https://www.nature.com/articles/s41367-019-0011-7), therefore homeopathy is effective for treating SARS-CoV-2 infection.
Ever considered doing a course in critical thinking? Or ethics?
or just thinking?
Steve Tonkin
“You do like shifting the goalposts, don’t you? You asserted that homeopathy was the factor relevant to lower Covid mortality in India and Cuba than in the UK and USA. I provided evidence that one of the relevant factors is obesity. ”
Shifting the goal post?
First the virus was killing people of old age based upon the deaths in old homes in Italy, UK, Sweden….
Then the virus was killing people with diabetes, people with BP, people with cardiac issues…
Now it is obesity!
You have the final picture? Do you understand the common thread running these different attributes that led to deaths?
All these people are on routine regular medication: requirement of the scientific system for the health conditions created by the medicines these people took in the past. The virus is just pushing these people off the precipice brought there by the “scientific medicine”.
This is exactly in line with the reason explained in homeopathy. Allopathic treatment comes with adverse effects that outweigh benefits every time. Provide immediate but temporary relief and converting the small issue into a larger problem. A badly treated skin eruption (ointments?) into asthma, for example. And in subsequent generations.
Homeopathy works with the body’s healing system. Every treatment makes the body stronger to fight next disease. Look at Prince Charles: at 72 years, he came back from infection with no problem. His past reliance on Homeopathy helped.
This is helping India. And Bangladesh. And Bhutan. And….
The people relying on allopathic medication: everyone can see the outcome.
@ I KRISHNA
“Homeopathy works with the body’s healing system. Every treatment makes the body stronger to fight next disease. Look at Prince Charles: at 72 years, he came back from infection with no problem. His past reliance on Homeopathy helped.”
Only in your totally deluded mind. HOMEOPATHY DOES NOT WORK! PERIOD.There is zero evidence that it does.
Any suggestion that it does defies know laws of physics, chemistry and biology – do you not understand that?
WATER DOES NOT HAVE A MEMORY! PERIOD! It has never been demonstrated that it does.
What evidence do you have that Prince Charles recovered from Covid “because” of your fantasy remedy? – this is rabid speculation at its worst. The fact that you are unable to separate fantasy from reality, speculation from fact and magic from medicine continues to demonstrate that you are totally clueless about the workings of the universe.
Your inability to identify reliable sources or differentiate fact from fiction leaves you wide open to being deceived by any internet meme or huckster. The fact that you “believe” in homeopathy is evidence in itself that you have no critical thinking skills and zero understanding of the basic sciences.
That you are quite unable to see this demonstrates a remarkable lack of introspection, insight and self-awareness – an very common attribute among believers in homeopathy who are generally immune to reason and rational argument of any kind.
But feel free to carry on with your make-believe world where water miraculously “remembers” irrelevant nonsensical “remedies” and somehow forgets contact with raw sewage and poisonous chemicals etc. After all it doesn’t “have to make sense” does it?
I’m sorry, this is nonsense. These people have been kept ALIVE by proper medicine. They went to a doctor because they were ILL, and they got medical treatment that has kept them alive. In times past, if you have type 1 diabetes, or cogestive heart failure due to a faulty heart valve, or whatver, you simply died.
My granny had Rheumatic Fever as a girl, and died age 42 of “congestive heart failure with pleural effusion” – probably due to heart valve damage caused by the Rheumatic Fever (which killed her younger sister at the time).
Nowadays medicine can fit a replacement heart valve, and give medicines that really do something to keep patients alive.
In centuries past, everyone died in agony aged 30 (this is hyperbole, but it helps to make the point).
This MD just happens to mention India in this video clip, very informative.
Give a listen
https://www.bitchute.com/video/siDonw0W4YZc/
I KRISHNA, I think, respectfully, perhaps you have misunderstood the nature of Professor Ernst’s work.
It is not, nor has it ever been, his purpose simply to “run down” any system of medicine. Professor Ernst’s appointment to a professorial Chair at Exeter University in 1993 (following a Professorship in Rehabilitative Medicine in Europe) was to INVESTIGATE various “alternative” and/or “complementary” modalities, in order to FIND OUT which of them, if any, works better than placebo.
He and his team, as good scientists, followed where the evidence led.
Other factors that come into play regarding Covid-19 infection rates in India have already been discussed in this Blog and I won’t re-visit them.
I would personally be interested to know, I KRISHNA, since you apparently believe that Arsen Alb 30C works better than placebo (am I correct in thinking you believe this?), any mechanism by which you think it may work? As you know, there is no Arsen Alb present in a bottle of 30C Arsen Alb pills.
@ I KRISHNA
“The data is clear. Are you?”
Only if you are blind and been living in an underground bunker with no communications for the past 12 months.
It is a massive assumption that homeopathy and Ayurveda are the cause of the difference in India and Cuba. What evidence do you have?
How do you account for the massively lower rates in Taiwan and New Zealand which failed to use these miraculous drugs?
Jumping to conclusions in this manner is evidence of very sloppy thinking and all manner of logical fallacies – I suggest you look up skepticism, critical thinking, jumping to conclusions, correlation is not causation, motivated reasoning, prior beliefs, confirmation bias, cherry picking, dismissing contradictory evidence, – well that will do for starters.
And your little fantasy ignores the important fact that there is no credible a priori reason for thinking that pre-scientific belief systems such as homeopathy or ayurveda, which are pseudoscience would have any clinical effect in the first place. Your belief is based on magical thinking.
That which is asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.
Lastly I do not know why people keep quoting worldometer as a reliable source when there are very good reasons for believing that its figures are unreliable. If one wishes to be taken seriously i would suggest using another source.
“you might benefit from a crash course in critical thinking.”
My teacher in critical thinking told me that the final result matters. The proof of the pudding is in eating!
If UK, USA.. have over 10 times the death rate compared to India, what has the scientific medical system achieved by investing billions of $ in research and medical infrastructure? A small push and the edifice crashed?
If you could scientifically justify such large difference in deaths, with your critical thinking, I would be keen to understand the science and the critical thinking from a new master!
Then your teacher is a fool.
Because it is not the ‘final result’ that matters, but knowing what CAUSED that ‘final result'(*).
If homeopathy did not contribute in any way to the result (and it most certainly didn’t), then it is a waste of money and resources to promote and administer homeopathic nonsense to people.
*: If you enjoyed a high school education, then your teachers in maths, physics etcetera must have told you the very same thing:
“A correct answer is still 100% wrong if you can’t show me how you got that answer.”
“Because it is not the ‘final result’ that matters, but knowing what CAUSED that ‘final result'(*).”
Repeatedly?
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20674839/
This study was carried out by researchers from Finlay Institute (a WHO accredited facility for vaccine research & development.)
https://www.bmj.com/content/345/bmj.e6184/rr/616928
@ I KRISHNA
you are still not learning anything are you? this is simply an “appeal to authority.” Yet another logical fallacy.
As long as you allow your thinking to be clouded by all this nonsense you are never going to be able to see the facts among all the dross.
And what has vaccine research got to do with the rabid mess that is represented by “homeopathic nosodes?” There is ZERO plausibility a priori behind the notion of these irrational and dangerous nostrums pushed by homeopaths and there is equally ZERO reliable evidence that they have any real biological effect.
AS per usual the only studies that allege to provide any “evidence” for these are poorly designed, badly conducted, implausible and inevitably do not demonstrate what they claim. But there are always willing and gullible believers such as yourself who will swallow the propaganda hook line and sinker because you WANT to believe in this fantasy belief system, and because you couldn’t tell a well conducted study from a hole in the ground.
Just a few quick criticisms of the study you quote.
– it was published in a low quality Homeopathy journal – not a high impact medical journal – I wonder why?
– one has to question the quality of peer review given the many failings of the “study.”
– there would appear to be many differences between the two populations being compared – this is hardly randomized and comparing like with like. They are even using two different time frames and using “projections for what might have happened in the other group.” What kind of science is this?
– as there is no proper randomization or control and because of the projections and different time frame there are many other factors that could have influenced the results.
– it also appears that many of the subjects in the homeopathy group also had shots of an approved and known to be effective medical vaccine. This would significantly skew the results in favour of the homeopathy group as it appears that none of the alleged “control” group received this vaccine.
As always homeopaths are willing to torture the evidence in any way possible to get the answers they want, and their fan base as ever will believe whatever tosh they serve up. Skepticism and critical thinking are never anywhere to be found.
Just take the inherent lunacy of Oscillococcinum a supposed remedy and preventative for flu. It is based upon the misidentification of an artefact found in a Muscovy duck that was mistakenly thought to be a bacterium that caused the flu. Since influenza is caused by a virus this comedy of errors could only go downhill from there.
This totally ineffective “remedy” is allegedly diluted to 200C potency – i.e. 10 to the power of 200. This is the number 1 followed by 400 zeroes! A googol is only 1 followed by 100 zeroes.
There are estimated to be only 10 to the power of 84 atoms in the entire observable universe.
Yet homeopathic lunacy is such that they claim to be able to dilute this imaginary duck “bacterium” to the level of 10 to the power of 200! How exactly?
Homeopaths inhabit a world that makes Alice’s Wonderland look positively sane, staid and boringly normal, and where all the normal rules apply. In their world unicorns are ten a penny, and counting angels on the head of a pin is a regular after dinner past-time.
Homeopathy is and always has been pure and utter fantasy.
I KRISHNA, you wrote:
Well that’s a double “Appeal to Authority” fallacy, isn’t it.
That leptospirosis tosh is a zombie argument (keeps getting slain, yet refuses to die). It was been comprehensively debunked long ago. You have been told this several times (eg in Quora), so it is disingenuous of you to pretend otherwise and to keep bringing up.
https://apgaylard.wordpress.com/2010/08/08/much-ado-about-nothing/
http://www.quackometer.net/blog/2009/01/hasta-el-absurdo-siempre.html
http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2010/11/30/homeopathy-in-cuba/
@ I KRISHNA
your thinking is totally simplistic!
“If UK, USA.. have over 10 times the death rate compared to India, what has the scientific medical system achieved by investing billions of $ in research and medical infrastructure? A small push and the edifice crashed?
If you could scientifically justify such large difference in deaths, with your critical thinking, I would be keen to understand the science and the critical thinking from a new master!”
I do not believe that you have the slightest understanding of critical thinking or of science at all from the way in which you make such simplistic comparisons and jump to immediately erroneous conclusions. There are far more variables than you are considering and you are using motivated reasoning to prove your point – not looking at data dispassionately to determine what it shows.
If your “teacher in critical thinking” really taught you only to look at the end result either he was a total idiot or you fell asleep in class.
Definition: “Critical thinking is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action. In its exemplary form, it is based on universal intellectual values that transcend subject matter divisions: clarity, accuracy, precision, consistency, relevance, sound evidence, good reasons, depth, breadth, and fairness.”
You didn’t get past the first line!
There have been many suggestions as to why India’s death rate is lower than might be expected in spite of India having the second highest level of Covid infections in the world after the US.
– most Indians still die at home and deaths are recorded incorrectly as something else (especially as testing is so poor)
– stigma – even where Covid might be suspected clinically the death would be reported as another cause
– levels of testing are abysmally low so the actual number of cases is undoubtedly much higher
– India has a predominantly young population relative to the ageing populations of the US and Europe – hence lower deaths
– In spite of the densely populated cities much of the population is still rural and contrary to what you say epidemiologists in fact believe that rural dwellers are in fact LESS likely to become infected than city dwellers especially those in city slums.
– There is good reason to believe that because of the many co-existent infections that the native population of India is exposed to that their immune systems may in fact already be primed for pandemics such as this in a way that Westerners are not and that this infers an inherent advantage.
– There is evidence that the initial lockdown in India was successful in damping down the initial phase on the pandemic
– it has been postulated that in some densely packed city areas that there may be clusters of people with up to 50% immunity which would slow down contagion appreciably. Of course so much is speculation because of the slow and chaotic roll out of testing.
– Western countries may well have had good scientific infrastructure – what they did not have was good disaster preparedness. That has got nothing to do with science. It has got to do with human nature, politicians being blind, stupid, lazy and preferring to spend public money on their pet projects, and other factors. In addition other mistakes were made – sending infectious patients from hospital to nursing homes, being too slow to lockdown, mixed messages about masks, members of the public failing to follow the rules, idiots denying the bleeding obvious and so on.
And of course the hopeless lack of enough PPE.
– I could go on and on. But you failed to consider any of these issues in your overly simplistic notion.
Oh and by the way – the usage of homeopathy and or ayurveda in India didn’t help anyone and may have caused harm if it was used in place of a real therapy that could have helped.
These “treatments” are pre-scientific nonsense that are ineffective and have no place in present day medicine.
So your premises are incorrect and your conclusions are wrong – and you have exhibited no critical thinking at all.
Nul points.
And AYUSH is make believe.
john travis
You have only used many assumptions to write your story.
Maybe you can explain the death rate of about 2.93% of infected cases. This is about the highest that there is!
@ I KRISHNA
what is the 2.93% supposed to refer to?
once again your mind is so simplistic. there is no doubt that most countries could have handled the pandemic better. Certainly the UK and the US could and should have avoided many of the deaths that have occurred.
We are still in the middle of this pandemic in case you hadn’t noticed and much of the evidence isn’t yet available.
But in your binary mind these differences come down to the use of AYUSH vs scientific medicine – which is simplistic beyond belief. This is a false equation. You are asking the wrong question – and you are most certainly getting the WRONG ANSWER!
I have explained to you before that all of these issues are multi-factorial and most are not related to the issue of science or medicine. The issues of imposition of lockdown, mask-wearing, adherence to protocols, adequacy of testing, crowded public transport etc were all political decisions and nothing to do with how good the medical services were.
In the US they had an anti-science President who made mask wearing a political and partisan issue, who held super-spreader rallies, who did nothing to stop the spread of the pandemic, left the states to fend for themselves and the supply of PPE in many nations was a major issue.
These are political and logistical issues – nothing to do with science or medicine.
ANd they don’t prove that your AYUSH works either!
There are also many reasons why the death rate is higher in certain Western countries. Older population – age is associated with much higher mortality. Higher rates of obesity which is also associated with Diabetes and high BP which also increase mortality.
In many places health services were overwhelmed by the sheer numbers of very ill patients swamping hospitals and ICUs and the level of care suffered.
This was a novel disease and it was not immediately appreciated that it could cause thrombotic events or that it affected other organs or that patients could become seriously hypoxic with little clinical evidence.
It took time to elucidate these facts and develop better means of care and develop treatments.
In many Western countries there were significant pockets of Covid deniers who called it a “hoax” and took to the streets in crowds protesting. Idiots held parties and raves – super-spreading events. That Western nations have morons who choose to believe conspiracy theories spread by social media and spread Covid through their ignorance is a failure of intelligence and social responsibility – not of science or medicine. I doubt that your AYUSH would have had much impact on them either – although acupuncture from a distance is a tempting thought: perhaps it does have a useful purpose after all!
There were shortages of ventilators and other equipment and many other logistical difficulties.
But rationally one has to ask the question. What is more likely? That a multitude of factors that we know apply to any such situation will have contributed to the statistics and will have accounted for the variations that we see between different populations – and not least the many different ways in which these figures have been counted, defined, quantified and translated. Or that a bunch of traditional remedies picked for no discernable reason other than random chance and with confirmation bias and applied in some unknown haphazard fashion instead miraculously made an enormous difference?
There is no existing evidence base for AYUSH. There is no evidence that it is useful in the treatment of any disease. There is no logical or scientific reason to suppose that it would have any utility is preventing spread or in the treatment of a pandemic. Your beliefs are delusional. All you are doing is manipulating the existing statistics to confirm your prior beliefs. This is irrational behaviour. Fooling oneself is not particularly clever.
You could just as easily argue that since cinemas have been closed since the early part of the pandemic that it is obviously deprivation of movies that is driving the pandemic and that the inevitable solution is compulsory mass attendance for all citizens at multiple showings of numerous double-features. Cure!
Science is all about teasing out al the many factors that may be involved in any situation and allowing for the effect of each. It is about considering the inaccuracies of definitions, measurements, inherent and explicit bias, one’s own prior beliefs, and making allowances for all these factor and many more.
But it is also about allowing for factors one may not even have considered, and that may creep unnoticed into the equation. It is about asking the questions and trying to eliminate and inaccuracies and biases. It is about arriving at the truth.
And science also requires plausibility and measures of probability. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
AYUSH is merely a combination of folk remedies (Ayurveda, Siddha and Unani) with yoga and Western alternative medicine (in the form of Naturopathy and Homeopathy – both thoroughly discredited.)
There is no reliable evidence that any of these modalities is useful in the treatment of any disease and they are all pseudoscientific as regards forms of medicine. Yoga may have some utility as a form of exercise or meditation.
Please show me any RCT in a premier peer reviewed journal of a well conducted trial that demonstrated that AYUSH is a reliable treatment for some disease or that it significantly outperforms placebo? The usual crap studies published in the Homeopathy rags do not count as they will publish anything.
The Indian people deserve better from their government that to be palmed off with this nonsense as treatment for anything, least of all during a pandemic, especially when they have access to the very best of conventional science and medicine in their very own country already. But that alone is not going to be enough to end the pandemic.
BTW just because you believe in something does not make it so. Facts require evidence and logic and rational thinking.
john travis on Friday 26 February 2021 at 18:45
“In the US they had an anti-science President who made mask wearing a political and partisan issue, who held super-spreader rallies, who did nothing to stop the spread of the pandemic, left the states to fend for themselves and the supply of PPE in many nations was a major issue.”
I thought so also. But when I come across hundreds of thousands of farmers, sitting together on Delhi borders, eating together, sleeping in confined spaces, no masks, no distancing, no vaccination….. I am positive this variable is irrelevant. Majority of the population in these protest are old. They left behind their young ones to look after the crops.
The “scientific medicine” is really getting tested in this pandemic and failing badly. Continued use of it seems to have interfered with the immune system so badly, that the nations where population had the highest exposure to “scientific medicine” are showing the highest death rates, in spite of the medical infrastructure.
Now everyone is in a queue to get vaccinated. The possible outcome:
https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/merck-ceo-ken-frazier-speaks-about-a-covid-cure-racism-and-why-leaders-need-to-walk-the-talk
“Well, first of all, it takes a lot of time. I think the record for the fastest vaccine ever brought to market was Merck in the mumps vaccine. It took about four years. Our most recent vaccine for Ebola took five and a half years. And why does it take so long? First of all, it requires a rigorous scientific assessment. And here we didn’t even understand the virus itself or how the virus affects the immune system. We’re starting there. We’re starting with a spike protein as the antigen. What we’re hoping to be able to do with these different approaches is to create a vaccine that we can study quickly that can be both safe and effective and can be durable. Those are three different issues. No one knows for sure whether or not any of these vaccine programs will produce a vaccine like that. What worries me the most is that the public is so hungry, so desperate to go back to normalcy, that they are pushing us to move things faster and faster. But ultimately, if you’re going to use a vaccine in billions of people, you better know what that vaccine does. ”
Interesting, that this is the science that you believe in! Remember Tamilflu from Roche?
@ I KRISHNA
more unfiltered nonsense.
“The “scientific medicine” is really getting tested in this pandemic and failing badly. Continued use of it seems to have interfered with the immune system so badly, that the nations where population had the highest exposure to “scientific medicine” are showing the highest death rates, in spite of the medical infrastructure.”
Please explain how exactly how you think this works? How has “science” interfered with the immune system? Where is the evidence for any of this? Please demonstrate why this is not pure BS?
You are using correlation = causation again. How many times do you have to have it explained to you that they are NOT the same? Just because A is followed by B it does NOT mean that A CAUSES B. Do you think you can finally get your head around that simple point? My dog barks at the postman every day and the postman goes away immediately after. Correlation. But it is NOT causation. The postman was going to go away anyway.
God this is hard work.
The differences between the effects of Covid-19 in India and Western countries have already been explained to you. Do you not read the explanations or is your brain too addled by homeopathy that you are unable to understand them?
The difference is demographics not scientific medicine. The populations are different in their make-up. The study of demographics is a different kind of science – can you understand that? I get the strong impression that you do not understand very much at all.
These Western countries have a predominantly ELDERLY population – the major determinant for dying if you catch Covid-19 is being old. The older you are the more likely you are to die.
But on top of that other determinants are OBESITY and associated factors like DIABETES and HEART DISEASE.
Western countries have a much greater weighting of people with these conditions also. Diet is also a factor.
India has a much younger population average and much lower figures for obesity and related conditions. Also much more of the population is rural in India where infection rates are lower.
NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS HOMEOPATHY NONSENSE.
Your link is as always totally irrelevant. I am quite ready to believe that there is racism is the pharmaceutical industry as elsewhere – what has that got to do with this discussion?
The Covid-19 vaccinations were an amazing feat of science and we should be celebrating that so many were able to be made available and that so many were as safe and effective as they are. That this was achieved in such an amazingly short time span was due to a number of factors – but not as you are implying some kind of malfeasance.
There was a very real urgency – a pandemic in case you hadn’t noticed with 2.5 million dead already.
There has never been an equivalent sense of urgency – so lots of labs and departments around the world stopped working on other things, pooled resources and put their minds to a single purpose.
Pharma companies devoted enormous resources to the same goal – and these were backed in many cases by government funds in the event of a vaccine not panning out.
There is much regulatory “red-tape” involving committees and various other things – normally getting all the appropriate people together for a meeting can take months, circulating documents etc all takes time, things go back and forth. When there is a sense of urgency and you have people ENSURING that these things all come together super fast a lot of that wasted time can be dispensed with.
These vaccines went through rigorous testing before they were accredited and released. But I don’t expect you to understand that – anyone who believes that homeopathy works obviously has certain intellectual challenges. But the science is sound.
You quote a guy who is a CEO but what does he know about viruses or about epidemiology? Is he even a doctor or a scientist? In which case all his speculations are those of the average joe in the street – uninformed and ignorant.
We know quite a lot about the virus already thank you – how much longer would he have us wait? Until 5 million are dead? 10 million? 20 million? I mean there is a certain sense of urgency……..
And it is known what effect the vaccines are having on the human body. Is this guy really as stupid as he sounds? Are you? There have been 20 million+ doses given in the UK alone. 90+ million in the US. Tens and tens of millions more all over the world. Where are all these “terrible” side-effects that you are all talking about? I think we might have heard about one or two of them by now. What would you rather do – wait until Covid kills us all?
What has Tamiflu got to do with anything? it is not a vaccine!
You seem to think you have discovered gold when you find some irrelevant quote from any old bod on the internet who has something negative to say about vaccines – but you have no idea what is a reliable source of information, what is authoritative, or whether the person you quote even knows anything about vaccines or not. Don’t you think that is a little foolish? Do you believe everything you see on the internet? Do you have no ability to discriminate?
You have an irrational anti-science prejudice and an equally illogical belief in homeopathy. May i suggest you look into classes on logic and critical thinking at an accredited institution? You are badly in need of some help in these matters.
Oh – and abandon this homeopathy nonsense, it will only lead to trouble.
Homeopathy doesn’t work. It is irrational and illogical.
It defies known laws of physics, chemistry and biology – which we see in action working every day.
It has never been shown to treat any illness or disease.
Continuing to believe in it is a sign of being irrational and illogical. It is a matter of faith – homeopathy is a religion.
Now do you understand?
Just ask yourself this:
– how exactly could these vaccines “harm” people in some sinister way? What mechanism are you proposing?
– how exactly could science be causing all this harm you are alleging? How exactly would that work?
– by what mechanism are you suggesting that homeopathy is saving all these Indian people from Covid-19. How exactly does THAT work?
I get the impression that these are all just “magic” ideas in your head and that you have not thought any of them through.
BTW I do not “believe” in science. Science is a matter of evidence, of testing, of having hypotheses and having them tested. Science is about being rational, logical and practical. It is about changing one’s mind when new evidence comes along that demonstrates new information overturning a former position. It is about methodology. Consistency. Being open to new ideas but also being skeptical and critical.
I don’t “believe” things. I need evidence and facts. Often we don’t have “proof” but a balance of probabilities, or a weight of evidence. Some things are much more likely than others.
But to hold on to a “belief” in the face of an extraordinary mass of contradictory evidence is a sign of being irrational.
And please don’t trot out the “but Galileo…..” canard. For one it is narcissistic – do you really fancy yourself a Galileo? And for another it is inaccurate. Galileo had the facts on his side – it was the Church that was being irrational and dogmatic.
If you really want to learn try reading the information that has already been given to you here on this forum – stop looking at random links on the internet – you do not have the skills to tell whether what you are looking at is reliable or a load of BS. Until you accept that fact you are not going to improve. The internet is full of misinformation – it takes knowledge and skill to tell the good from the bad.
You have neither.
“The “scientific medicine” is really getting tested in this pandemic and failing badly”.
No, scientific medicine is succeeding triumphantly. At the end of World War 1, “Spanish Flu” killed between fifty and a hundred million people in eighteen months flat – and that from a much smaller world population. Science then knew very little about viruses – mostly understood back then to be plant diseases.
Sience now enables us to tell one virus from another, to know what type it is, and to determine if it is a new type. Only in relatively recent times was the Spanish Flu virus of a century ago identified as an H1N1 virus. Science has enabled hospitals to find which treatments were most effective, in a period of months. Science has facilitated the production of several highly effective vaccines is ten months flat. Science has given me a little testing kit which I use twice a week for work, and which is stable and accurate.
Homeopathy has done NOTHING beyond placebo for Covid-19, or any other health condition. Nor could it, since at 30C or above there is no medicine in the pills.
john travis on Sunday 07 March 2021 at 19:13
“Please explain how exactly how you think this works? How has “science” interfered with the immune system? Where is the evidence for any of this? Please demonstrate why this is not pure BS?”
https://www.infectioncontroltoday.com/view/study-shows-antibiotics-destroy-immune-cells-and-worsen-oral-infection
https://www.cdc.gov/fungal/infections/immune-system.html
There are 100’s of articles and information available to read if you stop wasting time on conjuring up BS.
“These Western countries have a predominantly ELDERLY population – the major determinant for dying if you catch Covid-19 is being old. The older you are the more likely you are to die.”
This is invalid. Kerela state in India has people on average as old as UK. They did great with homeopathy. 124 deaths/million against UK of 1827/million.
“But on top of that other determinants are OBESITY and associated factors like DIABETES and HEART DISEASE.”
WHY are such conditions prevalent? For Diabetes check Dr Russ Altman.
“Using automated software tools to examine queries by six million Internet users taken from Web search logs in 2010, the researchers looked for searches relating to an antidepressant, paroxetine, and a cholesterol lowering drug, pravastatin. They were able to find evidence that the combination of the two drugs caused high blood sugar.”
Stop wasting time with BS arguments.
“Western countries have a much greater weighting of people with these conditions also. Diet is also a factor.”
Another BS argument. Read Dr. Blaser: How antibiotics and not diet, are responsible for obesity and modern plagues.
” but not as you are implying some kind of malfeasance.”
Not me. The CEO of the largest vaccine developer.
“Pharma companies devoted enormous resources to the same goal – and these were backed in many cases by government funds in the event of a vaccine not panning out.”
Another BS argument. By devoting enormous funds, you expect human pregnancy duration will drop to 3 months? Safety studies for vaccines take time. Lots of time.
“These vaccines went through rigorous testing before they were accredited and released. But I don’t expect you to understand that – anyone who believes that homeopathy works obviously has certain intellectual challenges. But the science is sound.”
Another BS argument. Check which company is taking responsibility for adverse reaction of vaccine, if any. Pharma companies never take responsibility nor do governments.
“You quote a guy who is a CEO but what does he know about viruses or about epidemiology? Is he even a doctor or a scientist? In which case all his speculations are those of the average joe in the street – uninformed and ignorant.”
To write an illogical argument you have no problem in running down the CEO of the world’s largest vaccine developer? Harvard should be talking to you! For this BS argument your name should be put up for the Nobel prize of the century: for medicine.
“What would you rather do – wait until Covid kills us all?
Off course not. Considering I have no possibility of getting the Nobel Prize money, in February 2020, I invested heavily into stocks of Pharma companies. The real adverse effects of vaccine would surface after few years. Can you imagine the number of new patients being created and who is expected to make money from the new complications? In the mean time I plan to use homeopathic medicines, as I have always done.
I believe I have wasted enough time on you and your BS. Good bye.
I am afraid this is strikingly similar to experiences I have with callers claiming to be from Visa, Amazon and British Telecom.
When I politely question their desire to have remote access to my computer, and politely question whether, instead of being in the UK as claimed, they are in fact in a scam call centre in Kolkata or New Delhi or Mumbai, they become verbally abusive, call me names and hang up.
The pattern is the same.
@ I KRISHNA
Throwing our toys out of the pram are we?
You have all the critical thinking and reasoning powers of a gnat. You are prepared to believe any nonsense you read on the internet whatever it’s source. This displays extreme gullibility and naivety and an extreme inability to distinguish between reliable and unreliable sources of information.
“In the mean time I plan to use homeopathic medicines, as I have always done.”
Says it all – a believer in magic water. You live in fantasy land totally unconnected with reality.
Good riddance!
I KRISHNA, may I please respectfully ask you to answer my question further up this thread? What is your own belief about how 30C homeopathic pills might work?
“What is your own belief about how 30C homeopathic pills might work?”
I have no clue. But this is not the first time. Should an opinion matter or an outcome?
https://www.ecampnd.com/homeopathy/A_Chorus_of_Fifty_in_Harmony.pdf
I KRISHNA, thank you for taking the time to respond to my question. I understand that you have no clue how a 30C homeopathic remedy can exert any effect beyond placebo.
With regard to the article you linked to, I don’t really think that something from a century ago is much help.
As has been said before, if you hear hoofbeats outside and look out the window, it is safer to assume you’ll see a horse, than a zebra. And certainly safer to assume you will see a horse than a unicorn.
When figures apparently suggest a powerful effect from a 30C homeopathic remedy, it is much safter to assume that there is something wrong with the figures, than to assume that the remedy produced the reported effects. To asume that homeopathy really produced the reported effects, is to assume the unicorn.
David B
“When figures apparently suggest a powerful effect from a 30C homeopathic remedy, it is much safter to assume that there is something wrong with the figures, than to assume that the remedy produced the reported effects. To asume that homeopathy really produced the reported effects, is to assume the unicorn.”
Why would YOU say so?
The researchers at the Finlay Institute- all involved in research and development of conventional vaccine- published a report with 200 c medication.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20674839/
This study was carried out by researchers from Finlay Institute (a WHO accredited facility for conventional vaccine research & development.)
https://www.bmj.com/content/345/bmj.e6184/rr/616928
Thank you for your response, I KRISHNA. The Cuba Leptospirosis trial has been referred to in this Blog in the past.
It seems clear from the PubMed Abstract, that there was no control or randomisation.
I KRISHNA, in view of your knowledge of the subject, what is your view of the incidence of Leptospirosis in Cuba now, a decade on?
There is some interesting discussion in this Blog: https://apgaylard.wordpress.com/2010/08/28/editing-reality/
It is better to conclude that the hoofbeats you hear are not those of a unicorn.
“David B
“When figures apparently suggest a powerful effect from a 30C homeopathic remedy, it is much safter to assume that there is something wrong with the figures, than to assume that the remedy produced the reported effects. To asume that homeopathy really produced the reported effects, is to assume the unicorn.”
Why would YOU say so?”
Here are the reasons why I say that if figures show a strong result for 30C pills, it is safe to assume the figures are wrong:
1) 30C pills contain none of the ‘remedy’ whether animal, vegetable, mineral or electromagnetic.
2) No laboratory in the world, nor any homeopath, can tell the difference between bottles of different 30C ‘remedy’ pills with the labels off.
3) There is no known mechanism by which 30C pills could exert effects on physiological organisms. Various theories have been suggested, but not demonstarted: Nanoparticles, Memory of Water, Spiritual Essence. None is plausible, and none has been demonstrated.
In view of the entire implausibility that 30C pills could exert any effects, when figures suggest that they do, it is safer to doubt the figures than to believe them.
If such figures were reliably replicated time after time in properly controlled experiements and trials, then much of science would have to be re-written. The mass of such evidence would have to be absolutely enormous, as the changes to scientific understanding would be cataclysmic. No such mass of evidence exists.
David B on Friday 26 February 2021 at 12:10
“Here are the reasons why I say that if figures show a strong result for 30C pills, it is safe to assume the figures are wrong:”
The researchers at Finlay Institute, (doctors, epidemiologists…) were trained in conventional scientific system. They were regular contributors to vaccine journals before the homeopathic trial. After the homeopathic trial, they continued with conventional vaccine research. Why did WHO not cancel the accreditation of Finlay institute this reckless, unscientific act?
What is your qualification and experience in vaccines? I would believe, the blog writer would be equally illiterate about vaccines.
If 30c cannot produce result, what was the logic of this group of researchers to use 200c and invest time and money, of the institute, in a trial that had no possible outcome? What is the irrelevant statement ” that there was no control or randomization”? A trial with shaken water requires controls? What controls would you have suggested?
Only 1 of the 2 arguments can have merit: either 200c can give results, or trial required controls. Which will you like to go with?
Your statement implies: researchers trained in conventional scientific medicines cannot be relied upon. Also with such low quality institutes being recognized by WHO, WHO cannot be relied upon for their vaccine recommendations.
Still Cuba is doing comparatively great in times of Covid, while their neighbor, Florida residents are dropping dead like flies all over.
@ I KRISHNA
as has been repeatedly explained to you it was a rubbish study – it doesn’t matter who did it it’s still rubbish.
homeopathy doesn’t work – it doesn’t matter whether it’s 30C or not. It simply does not work – for anything.
there is no evidence – period.
homeopathy is not science – it’s a religion. The Flying Spaghetti Monster makes more sense.
I KRISHNA, hyou observe:
“If 30c cannot produce result, what was the logic of this group of researchers to use 200c and invest time and money, of the institute, in a trial that had no possible outcome? What is the irrelevant statement ” that there was no control or randomization”? A trial with shaken water requires controls? What controls would you have suggested?”
1) I don’t know what their logic was. You will need to write and ask them. What do you think it was?
2) Any medical trial, with shaken water or anything else, definitely requires conrtols, in order to be credible. The controls I meant, are the standard ones, including double-blind randomisation. Only results from properly controlled trials have any validity.
Fallacious post hoc ergo propter hoc “outcomes” are not evidence of anything other than human perfidy or gullibility.
@ I KRISHNA
does the source of your information not ever trouble you?
what exactly do you believe that this fact free rant in a homeopathy rag proves?
it would appear that you are incapable of learning anything – you are immune to logic and facts.
you are looking more and more like a troll.
Dr. John Campbell in Cumbria, UK, has been posting regulat YouTube commentaries on Covid-19. His comments yesterday on the rising infection rate in India are interesting: https://youtu.be/_jFYrpAkQwA
According to The Independent online newspaper just under an hour ago, Covid-19 cases in India “are now skyrocketing” https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/this-is-a-catastrophe-india-looked-like-it-had-beaten-covid-but-cases-are-now-skyrocketing/ar-BB1fKHr5?ocid=msedgdhp
Has homeopathy caused this dramatic increase?
(I don’t think so, but I don’t think homeopathy caused the earlier decrease, either!)
According to Reuters news agency, India’s capital, New Delhi, is “under seige” from Covid-10″ – “The cases are rising very rapidly. The beds are filling fast” https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/indias-capital-under-siege-from-covid-19-seeks-emergency-help-from-federal-govt/ar-BB1fLHRT?ocid=msedgdhp
So much for homeopathic prophylaxis in India.
Since, in the minds of many homeopaths, correlation proves causation, clearly the increased availability of homeopathy in India must be responsible for this dramatic rise in cases.
Of course it must: it’s what they call a “healing crisis”, I believe. 🙂
Ahhh yes! Of course!
I opened a web browser tab (Microsoft Edge) a few minutes ago, to find a Microsoft news report with this headline “India’s Covid spiral is nothing short of horrifying – and the UK must act
Navendu Mishra 2 hrs ago”
But surely – in view of the effective prophylaxis achieved by early distribution of homeopathic medicines in India (particularly Kerala), there is no Covid-19 in India?
If Dendra would deign to reappear, doubtless he or she could provide an explanation for this apparent discrepancy……