As long as I can remember, the ‘Austrian ‘Chamber of Veterinarian Medicine’ (CVM) has been a staunch supporter of homeopathy. If anyone doubts this statement, he/she should perhaps have a look at the three courses the CVM offered during the last month alone:
| Datum | PLZ, Ort | Titel |
|---|---|---|
| 05.11.2024 | 123 online | Vortragsreihe Teil 1 – Allgemeine Homöopathie |
| 19.11.2024 | 123 online | Vortragsreihe Teil 2- Allgemeine Homöopathie |
| 23.11.2024 | 9313 St. Georgen am Längsee | EAVH-Grundausbildung Veterinärhomöopathie Modul 11 |
It thus stands to reason that the CVM has been nominated for this year’s satirical award “Goldenes Brett vorm Kopf” (Golden Plank in Front of the Head). You might remember that I reported about this rather hilarious award before when in 2017, it was given to the ‘German Association of Doctor-Homeopaths’
Sadly, the CVM seems somewhat displeased with the nomination and argues that homeopathy is ‘a legally recognised speciality in veterinary practice, and training to become a veterinarian homeopath is an officially recognised and legally enshrined specialisation’. In addition, the CVM insists that the Austrian Supreme Court has ‘clarified in several judgements that homeopathy cannot be classified as pseudoscience’.
Moreover, the CVM rejects the claim that it threatened critics of homeopathywith legal action and states that it attaches ‘great importance to upholding professional ethics’ and considers ‘collegiality, respect and the avoidance of exposure’ to be key principles.
On the CVM’s website, we also find the following statement (my translation):
“Homeopathy has been used worldwide for more than 200 years. Since then, it has not only proven its worth in the treatment of humans, but has also been successfully used in livestock and domestic animal husbandry.”
The people in charge of the CVM are evidently not keen readers of my blog. If they had shown a little interest in the actual evidence, they would have realised that veterinary homeopathy is bogus that often borders on animal abuse, e.g.:
- Veterinary homeopathy is without effect … but not without risk.
- Post hoc ergo homeopathy – the sad story of homeopathically mistreated penguins
- Homeopathy for canine oral papillomatosis: a ‘proof’ that homeopathy works?
- SCAM for animals. Part 1: homeopathy
- Good news regarding homeopathy for animals: RCVS POSITION ON CAM
- Homeopathy for bovine mastitis? HOW MUCH MORE EVIDENCE IS NEEDED BEFORE HOMEOPATHS ABANDON THEIR BOGUS CLAIM?
- A new RCT tests homeopathy in cats … and the results are unsurprisingly negative
- And again: no good evidence that homeopathy works in animals
- Homeopathy as a way of reducing antibiotic use in livestock ?
- Homeopathy works for animals – so it can’t be a placebo!
- So-called alternative medicine (SCAM) for animals is not evidence-based and borders on animal abuse
- Homeopathic Arnica more than trebles the length of analgesia in dogs – SHOULD WE BELIEVE IT?
The final winner of the ‘award’ will be announced at the award ceremony on Monday (2 December) in Vienna. We will see whether the CVM is victorious in obtaining this year’s award. There is – as always – fierce competition. For my part, I feel that merely the CVM’s reaction to getting nominated renders them a well-deserving winner.
Fingers crossed!
10 Responses to The ‘Austrian ‘Chamber of Veterinarian Medicine’ … and a storm in a homeopathic tea cup
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Can anyone find any of these judgments? I’d be interested in what they say, and in why the court was making declarations about the status of homeopathy. I’ve tried searching what I think is the court’s database of decisions for the term “Homöopathie”, but got the response, “Die eingegebene Suchabfrage liefert keine Treffer”. I don’t read German, though, so it’s entirely possible that I’m either not looking in the right place, or not using the search function properly. Someone who knows the language might have a better chance of finding them.
@Mojo
I tried the same, but through Google, using their ‘site:’ keyword, plus ‘Pseudowissenschaft’ or ‘Homöopathie’, so searching for
site:www.ogh.gv.at/entscheidungen/entscheidungen-ogh/ Pseudowissenschaft
site:www.ogh.gv.at/entscheidungen/entscheidungen-ogh/ Homöopathie
produces zero hits.
Just to make sure, I checked with a few random words taken from the Supreme Court’s judgements, and indeed e.g.
site:www.ogh.gv.at/entscheidungen/entscheidungen-ogh/ Angriff (‘attack’)
produces several dozen hits. So there’s nothing wrong with the search parameters.
This means that the Austrian Supreme Court never used the terms ‘Pseudoscience’ or ‘Homöopathie’ in any of their judgements. And I think it is very likely that CVM is simply lying, like homeopaths so often do.
And oh, when I go the other way round, and search the CVM site for any occurrence for ‘Supreme Court’, I only get one hit, and it’s not about homeopathy at all.
site:www.tieraerztekammer.at “Oberste Gerichtshof”
->
https://www.tieraerztekammer.at/fileadmin/daten/Oeffentlicher_Bereich/Kammer/Positionen/2014/Stellungnahme_Blutentnahme_durch_Nichttieraerzte_20.08.2014.pdf
So it seems that the CVM is lying about those Supreme Court rulings.
Unfortunately the Austrian Supreme Court has indeed written the following in 2004 (translated by ChatGPT):
The term “medical-scientific knowledge” is not synonymous with conventional medicine. Scientifically substantiated methods can also include those that have (not yet) been incorporated into conventional medicine, such as homeopathy and acupuncture. However, as outlined above, an activity based on medical-scientific knowledge is only practiced when the method applied demonstrates a certain minimum level of rationality and requires the comprehensive knowledge typically provided through medical studies for its execution.
Original Text: https://www.jusline.at/entscheidung/288509
very interesting, thanks
but not quite the same as the CVM try to make out of it.
“… a certain minimum level of rationality” – at which degree of dilution?
It is not only homeopathy……
I have gone through the years 2018-2020 of the official periodical of the Austrian Chamber of Veterinary Medicine and found a lot of other pseudomedicine in addition to homeopathy:
https://www.initiative-wissenschaftliche-medizin.at/index.php?id=186 in German.
why am I not surprised?
It appears that things aren’t much better in Germany. Yesterday, I had an hour to spare in Vreden, a small German town just across the Dutch border, so I decided to take a walk around.
ALL four or five of the doctors’ offices that I came across in just 30 minutes listed not just real medicine (‘Dr. Med.’), but also acupuncture, homeopathy, TCM, and even bioresonance …
Critical thinking skills are definitely not a priority in the German and Austrian medical curriculum.
Hear, hear!