homeopathy
- IHMPs (verum; n = 67),
- or identical-looking placebos (control; n = 67)
Both treatments were administered alongside standard concomitant care including sitz baths, pelvic floor exercises, and dietary advice.
- Department of Repertory, D. N. De Homoeopathic Medical College and Hospital, Government of West Bengal, Kolkata, India.
- East Bishnupur State Homoeopathic Dispensary, Chandi Daulatabad Block Primary Health Centre, under Department of Health & Family Welfare, Government of West Bengal, Parganas, India.
- Department of Pathology & Microbiology, D. N. De Homoeopathic Medical College and Hospital, Government of West Bengal, Kolkata, India.
- Department of Organon of Medicine and Homoeopathic Philosophy, D. N. De Homoeopathic Medical College and Hospital, Government of West Bengal, Kolkata, India.
- Department of Materia Medica, D. N. De Homoeopathic Medical College and Hospital, Government of West Bengal, Kolkata, India.
- Department of Organon of Medicine and Homoeopathic Philosophy, National Institute of Homoeopathy, Ministry of AYUSH, Government of India, Salt Lake, Kolkata, India.
- Department of Community Medicine, D. N. De Homoeopathic Medical College and Hospital, Government of West Bengal, Tangra, India.
This list does not inspire me with confidence that this study is reliable.
Next I looked around for further trials of homeopathy for hemorrhoids – and I found another study by the same authors published 2 years earlier in the same dodgy journal:
Objectives: To investigate the efficacy and safety of individualized homeopathic medicines (IHMs) in treating hemorrhoids compared with placebo. Design: This is a double-blind, randomized (1:1), two parallel arms, placebo-controlled trial. Setting: The trial was conducted at the surgery outpatient department of the State National Homoeopathic Medical College and Hospital, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, India. Subjects: Patients were 140 women and men, aged between 18 and 65 years, with a diagnosis of primary hemorrhoids grades I-III for at least 3 months. Excluded were the patients with grade IV hemorrhoids, anal fissure, and fistula, hypertrophic anal papillae, inflammatory bowel disease, coagulation disorders, rectal malignancies, obstructed portal circulation, patients requiring immediate surgical intervention, and vulnerable samples. Interventions: Patients were randomized to Group 1 (n = 70; IHMs plus concomitant care; verum) and Group 2 (n = 70; placebos plus concomitant care; control). Outcome measures: Primary-the anorectal symptom severity and quality-of-life (ARSSQoL) questionnaire, and secondary-the EuroQol 5-dimensions 5-levels (EQ-5D-5L) questionnaire and EQ visual analogue scale (VAS); all of them were measured at baseline, and every month, up to 3 months. Results: Out of the 140 randomized patients, 122 were protocol compliant. Intention-to-treat sample (n = 140) was analyzed. The level of significance was set at p < 0.05 two tailed. Statistically significant between-group differences were elicited in the ARSSQoL total (Mann-Whitney U [MWU]: 1227.0, p < 0.001) and EQ-5D-5L VAS (MWU: 1228.0, p = 0.001) favoring homeopathy against placebos. Sulfur was the most frequently prescribed medicine. No harm or serious adverse events were reported from either of the groups. Conclusions: IHMs demonstrated superior results over placebo in the short-term treatment of hemorrhoids of grades I-III. The findings are promising, but need to be substantiated by further phase 3 trials.
Are we to believe that the authors were able to pull off 2 large almost identical studies within just 2 years?
Pull the other one!
The Spanish Agency for Medicines and Medical Products (AEMPS) has just published a comprehensive technical report entitled “Homeopathy and Homeopathic Products: Evaluation of Evidence on Their Efficacy and Safety”, which categorically concludes that there is no scientific evidence supporting the efficacy of homeopathy as a therapeutic tool. After a systematic review of scientific literature and evaluations by state agencies internationally, the report states that the observed effects are comparable to placebo.
The report, which analyzed 64 systematic reviews published since 2009, highlights that most studies suggesting benefits from homeopathy have low methodological quality, often invalidated by small samples, short follow-up periods, or biases in randomization. Furthermore, it notes that as the quality and rigor of clinical trials increase, the supposed effect of homeopathy diminishes until it disappears entirely.
From a scientific standpoint, the principles of homeopathy clash with the laws of physics and current pharmacology. In typical dilutions like 12 CH—where one part of the original substance is mixed with 100 parts of solvent twelve times consecutively—it is mathematically impossible for a single molecule of the original ingredient to remain in the preparation, breaking any cause-and-effect relationship between the product and the therapeutic effect.
To illustrate this disproportion, the report points out that a dilution of just 6 CH (far less extreme than 12 CH) equates to dissolving a packet of sugar in the entire Mediterranean Sea. For this reason, the AEMPS classifies theories like “water memory”—the belief that the liquid retains the properties of a substance even without its molecules—as empirically baseless postulates that challenge scientific and rational thinking.
In compliance with European and national regulations, the AEMPS has completed a regularization process that has resulted in the market withdrawal of numerous products. As of the report’s publication date, no homeopathic product with authorized therapeutic indications exists in Spain. The 976 that remain registered did so via a simplified procedure, based on extreme dilutions ensuring the preparation’s innocuousness, which does not require proof of therapeutic effect and legally prohibits any therapeutic claims on labeling.
Spain aligns with a global trend of health institutions adopting critical stances:
- United Kingdom: The Science and Technology Committee recommended halting public funding and requiring labeling warnings about lack of efficacy.
- Australia: The National Health and Medical Research Council concluded that homeopathy should not be used for chronic or serious diseases.
- France: The Haute Autorité de Santé eliminated public reimbursement for these products in 2021 due to lack of demonstrated efficacy.
- Germany: Approval is expected in 2026 for the definitive removal of homeopathy coverage from statutory health insurance.
- United States: The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) considers these products “unapproved new drugs,” and the Federal Trade Commission requires warnings that there is no scientific evidence of their functioning.
Although there is a popular belief that these preparations are innocuous because they are “natural,” serious adverse reactions have been reported, including poisonings from poor dosing and infant deaths linked to teething products in other countries.
However, the AEMPS warns that the main associated risk is the abandonment or delay of proven effective medical treatments. Citizens opting for homeopathy to treat serious or chronic conditions may endanger their health by replacing evidence-based therapies with products lacking such evidence.
The AEMPS report reaffirms the Ministry’s commitment to public health protection and evidence-based medicine. In line with other international agencies, it emphasizes the need for transparent information so citizens can make safe health decisions. The conclusion of the report is firm:
Given the lack of evidence of efficacy, homeopathy cannot be considered a valid therapeutic alternative, and its use must not lead to delaying or abandoning treatments proven to be effective.
The Nazi’s endorsement of homeopathy during the Third Reich was a complex fusion of pseudo-science, ideology and pragmatic policy. Homeopathy was deemed to align ideologically with National Socialism’s völkisch worldview and, foremost, it was considered to be practical:
- It had pure German (“Aryan”) origins.
- It was considered to be natural.
- It was inexpensive.
- It was abundantly available.
- It was deemed to be harmless.
Several top Nazis also promoted “New German Healing” (Neue Deutsche Heilkunde), which integrated natural therapies like homeopathy into healthcare emphasizing racial purity, folk traditions, and self-reliance. Conventional medicine (“Schulmedizin”) was derided as “Jewish medicine” (verjudete Medizin), tainted by Jewish physicians who were disproportionately represented in German academia and practice. By purging Jews – over 5,000 doctors were expelled by 1935 – the Nazis created a vacuum which they filled with “Aryan” alternatives, e.g. the “Heilpraktiker” framing homeopathy as a proud German invention free from “internationalist” or capitalist pharmaceutical dependencies.
Pragmatic motives amplified this support. Homeopathy was inexpensive, used mostly locally available materials and promised self-sufficiency amid wartime shortages of synthetic drugs. Heinrich Himmler championed it personally, funding research and integrating it into SS clinics; Rudolf Hess, the “Deputy of the Führer”, was also a vocal advocate. The regime licensed homeopathic training, established research institutes, and started a most comprehensive research program of homeopathy. In one of the darkest chapters, the SS conducted experiments at the Dachau concentration camp to test homeopathic treatments for various conditions. Authors from the era celebrated homeopathy as compatible with Nazi racial hygiene, linking it to family doctors fostering generational health.
However, the outcomes were far from what homeopaths had hoped for. The Donner Report on the Nazi’s large research program of 1941–1943 revealed “wholly negative” findings: homeopathic remedies failed catastrophically. Official evaluations deemed it ineffective for epidemics, leading to its sidelining in military hospitals by 1943. After the war, German homeopaths suppressed these findings by making the documents disappear.
Yet the Nazi legacy endures. Nazi promotion entrenched homeopathy in German culture, at least partly explaining its persistence today. This contributed to vaccine hesitancy during COVID-19, as historical distrust of “allopathic” medicine (like “Schulmedizin, a derogatory term created by Hahnemann) lingered.
The Third Reich history of homeopathy highlights how pseudo-science tends to thrive under authoritarianism, masking inefficacy with nationalism, dogma or untruths. While the Nazis tolerated homeopathy for ideological purity, its empirical failure exposed the regime’s bankruptcy.
The parallels to what is currently happening to healthcare in the US are difficult to overlook.
The Indian Ministry of Ayush was established in 2014 with a vision of reviving the profound knowledge of India’s ancient systems of medicine and ensuring the optimal development and propagation of the Ayush systems of healthcare. Earlier, the Department of Indian System of Medicine and Homoeopathy (ISM&H) formed in 1995, was responsible for the development of these systems. It was then renamed as the Department of Ayurveda, Yoga, and Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy (Ayush) in November 2003 with focused attention towards education and research in these therapies.
In the global landscape of public health, India’s Ministry of AYUSH stands as a profound anomaly. While most middle‑ and high‑income countries have converged around evidence‑based, scientifically grounded medicine, India has instead expanded this large, state‑run administrative apparatus where cultural nationalism and traditionalist narratives dominates over clinical efficacy and scientific rigor. The Ministry’s current trajectory reveals a troubling pattern: the systematic promotion of unproven therapies, flawed research, and notorious breaches of ethical principles, particularly with respect to the treatment of India’s most vulnerable populations.
The Homeopathy Anomaly
The most glaring anomaly must be the Ministry’s continued, high‑level support for homoeopathy. India is currently the only country in the world that maintains a dedicated national ministry and a statutory regulatory framework – via the National Commission for Homoeopathy – specifically to promote a system widely regarded as implausible, ineffective and harmful. Global assessments, including those by no less than 28 independent organisations worldwide, have concluded that there is no reliable evidence that homeopathic remedies work beyond placebo. Yet the AYUSH Ministry funds and publicizes a central research council (the Central Council for Research in Homoeopathy, CCRH) as well as a network of homoeopathic hospitals and teaching institutions, with annual budget allocations now exceeding ₹4,400 crore (roughly 470–480 million US dollars at current exchange rates). By directing substantial taxpayer funds to homoeopathic research and infrastructure, the state effectively endorses a “placebo‑as‑medicine” model, elevating it to the status of a national health strategy. This is not merely an academic dispute; it is a policy outlier that places India’s healthcare posture at odds with well‑established chemical and physical principles, as well as with the recommendations of leading international scientific bodies.
The Facade of Rigor
The Ministry tends to defend its approach by claiming a pivot toward “evidence‑based” or “scientific” AYUSH medicine, but an examination of its research output suggests a facade of rigor rather than its substance. Much of the work produced by bodies such as the Central Council for Research in Ayurveda (CCRA) and their counterparts in Unani and Siddha consists of investigations that are methodologically weak and wide open to bias. Key methodological flaws recur:
- Small sample sizes: Many trials involve fewer than 50–100 participants, rendering them statistically underpowered.
- Lack of blinding: A large proportion of studies is open‑label, where both clinicians and patients know the assigned intervention, amplifying placebo effects and observational bias.
- Selective reporting and publication bias: Negative findings – where AYUSH interventions fail to demonstrate benefit – are rarely published.
By branding such useless studies as “scientific proof,” the Ministry engages in a form of “science‑washing.” This practice misleads the public, uncritical clinicians, and policymakers into believing that AYUSH therapies have undergone the same rigorous, independent scrutiny as conventional therapies.
The Ethical Violations
In my view, the most serious concern is ethical. Under the banner of “Self‑Reliant India” (Atmanirbhar Bharat), the Ministry has aggressively promoted AYUSH products, for instance, during the COVID‑19 pandemic. This push could be viewed as an exercise in cultural pride and national self‑reliance but, in fact, it carries serious risks.
Medical ethics rely on two core principles: informed consent and non‑maleficence. When a state body, backed by cabinet‑level authority, “flogs” unproven and potentially dangerous treatments to a largely rural population with limited health literacy, it undermines both. Many patients are not able to distinguish between an ancient tradition and a clinically validated drug, yet they may be led by government‑sponsored messaging to defer or abandon evidence‑based treatments.
This is particularly dangerous in chronic conditions such as diabetes mellitus and hypertension, where effective pharmacological control and regular monitoring are both available and potentially life‑saving. If patients substitute proven allopathic regimens with state‑endorsed AYUSH alternatives of uncertain efficacy, the consequences can be dire. They include uncontrolled blood glucose, stroke‑risk elevation, organ damage, and avoidable mortality. The Ministry’s conduct, in effect, offloads these risks onto the most vulnerable while shielding itself behind appeals to tradition and national identity.
Conclusion
The Ministry of AYUSH has become the institutional vehicle for a “pluralistic” health model that, in practice, functions as a state‑funded rejection of the scientific method. This constitutes a regression in public‑health governance rather than a progressive pluralism. Until the Ministry subjects its therapies to the same scrutiny as any other medicine, and until it accepts transparent, independent evaluations without recourse to political or cultural vindication, it will remain less a health body and more a department of cultural preservation and doctrine.
The ‘Smallwood Report‘, entitled “The Role of Complementary and Alternative Medicine in the NHS” was published in October 2005. It recommended greater integration of so-called alternative medicine (SCAM) into the UK’s National Health Service and to address “effectiveness gaps” in treating chronic and psychosocial conditions, claiming potential cost savings.
Its core recommendations were:
- NICE assessment: Urged Health Ministers to task the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) with a full review of the cost-effectiveness of therapies like acupuncture, chiropractic, osteopathy, herbal medicine, and homeopathy.
- Targeted applications: Suggested these SCAM options for lower back pain (manipulative therapies over conventional), asthma (homeopathy), common colds (echinacea), and other chronic issues where orthodox medicine falls short, potentially reducing absenteeism and NHS costs by hundreds of millions.
- Implementation steps: Promote GP referrals to SCAM, target deprived communities, prioritize research on cost-effectiveness/safety, address regulatory barriers, and use case studies showing reduced GP visits and secondary care savings.
At the time, I called its evidence “grossly misleading,” citing ignored Cochrane reviews showing no superiority for most of the claims. Many critics agreed with me, and the Lancet editor Richard Horton famoulsy called it “dangerous nonsense”.
As the recommendations were pure BS, it is comforting to note that – 20 years later – they have been largely ignored.
NICE assessments:
NICE has issued selective endorsements—e.g., acupuncture and manipulative therapies for low back pain—but stopped short of broad SCAM evaluations, often citing “insufficient evidence” or requiring further trials, directly countering the report’s call for comprehensive cost-effectiveness reviews. No large-scale NICE program emerged to validate the report’s claimed savings (hundreds of millions annually), and guidelines frequently dismiss or deprioritize unproven modalities like homeopathy.
NHS integration status:
- Limited GP referrals: Sporadic pilots exist (e.g., acupuncture in some pain clinics, osteopathy/chiropractic for musculoskeletal issues), often GP-led and adjunctive, but not systematic; social prescribing now favors mindfulness over traditional SCAM.
- Funding barriers: Most Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) classify SCAM as “low priority” absent robust evidence, funding only exceptional cases in palliative or pain management pathways; many services closed due to austerity post-2010.
- No deprived-community focus: The report’s equity push for high-need areas saw negligible uptake, with barriers like clinician resistance and regulatory hurdles persisting.
The report’s optimistic case studies (e.g., Glastonbury) proved anecdotal and unscaled, undermined by critiques highlighting flawed evidence (e.g., ignored Cochrane reviews). Today, NHS policy emphasizes evidence-based conventional care, with SCAM relegated to private or niche settings – realization sits at ~10-20% for endorsed therapies, 0% for broader vision.
In other words, ignoring the report has saved the NHS many millions. More importantly, it has prevented UK evidence-based healthcare from getting watered down by ineffective therapies.
Could that also have happened without my loud protests (e.g. here and here) at the time?
Nobody can know for sure?
But when I feel a little bit down, I tell myself that I had an important role in saving the UK millions!
How accurate are Dana Ullman’s articles? To answer this amusing question, I asked the AI platform ‘Gemini’ to find all the false statements in one of Dana’s articles (yes, I do admit that I am reluctant to read though an entire nonsensical paper – it would give me a headache or worse). This is the precise task I asked for:
Give me a bullet point list of all false statements in this text: Lessons from the Flu Epidemic of 1918: The Dangers of Using Fever Suppressing Drugs for Viral Infections.
[In case you want to read this lengthy paper yourself, here is the link]And here is the response I got from Gemini (bold emphasis by AI):
The text you provided is a well-known article by Dana Ullman that blends historical events with controversial medical theories. While some of the historical context (like the 1917 aspirin patent expiration) is accurate, the medical conclusions and the data regarding homeopathy are widely considered false or highly misleading by the scientific and medical communities.
Here is a bulleted list of the primary inaccuracies and misleading statements in the text:
1. Misrepresentation of the 1918 Pandemic Deaths
- The “Aspirin Theory”: The text suggests that a “large number” of the 50 million deaths in 1918 were due to aspirin overdose. This is based on a hypothesis by Dr. Karen Starko. While high doses of aspirin likely contributed to some deaths, the scientific consensus remains that the vast majority of deaths were caused by secondary bacterial pneumonia and the extreme virulence of the H1N1 virus itself, not aspirin poisoning.
- Aspirin and Bleeding Lungs: The text claims bleeding in the lungs is a “known side effect of aspirin overdose.” While salicylates can cause pulmonary edema, the “hemorrhagic” (bloody) lungs seen in 1918 victims are a hallmark of the severe viral pneumonia caused by that specific strain of influenza, not a specific marker for aspirin toxicity.
2. Inaccuracies Regarding COVID-19 and NSAIDs
- NSAIDs and Blood Clots: The text states that ibuprofen and naproxen are “known to lead to blood clots.” This is a significant mischaracterization. While chronic, long-term use of certain NSAIDs is linked to a slight increase in cardiovascular risk, they are not a primary cause of the acute “clotting storms” seen in COVID-19 patients. In fact, many COVID-19 protocols involve using blood-thinning agents (like aspirin) to prevent clots.
- The 80% Risk Claim: The claim that NSAID users have an 80% greater risk of venous thromboembolism is taken from observational studies that show correlation, not causation. People taking NSAIDs often have underlying inflammatory conditions that already increase their risk of clots.
3. False Claims About Homeopathy’s Success
- 1918 Mortality Rates: The text claims a 1.2% death rate in homeopathic hospitals vs. 29% in conventional hospitals. These figures are widely considered unreliable and anecdotal. They were self-reported by homeopathic practitioners at the time, lacked standardized diagnostic criteria, and did not account for “selection bias”.
- WHO Recognition: The WHO does not recognize homeopathy as the “second largest system of medicine” in terms of efficacy or official endorsement. It only recognizes it as a widely used traditional practice.
4. Scientific Misconceptions About Fever
- Fever Suppression Spreading Virus: The text claims that suppressing a fever “can enable the virus to spread throughout the body.” Clinical studies have generally shown that taking antipyretics does not significantly worsen disease outcomes or increase viral shedding.
- The “Cytokine Storm” Claim: The article suggests that when a fever-suppressing drug wears off, a person may experience a “cytokine storm.” This is medically incorrect.
5. Out-of-Context Quotes
- Paul Offit and Jane Brody: The text quotes them in a misleading way. They are vocal supporters of conventional medicine and vaccines, and the usage here is considered cherry-picking.
Summary Note: The FDA and the CDC have both clarified that there is no scientific evidence that taking ibuprofen or other NSAIDs worsens COVID-19.
_________________________
I know, this is just one of his many nonsensical papers. But it nevertheless suggests that Dana puts in quite a lot of effort into misleading the public.
Guest post by Richard Rasker
Homeopathy has existed for 230 years already, but so far, good evidence for any efficacy is lacking. The Big Problem of course is that most homeopathic dilutions, if prepared correctly, don’t contain a single molecule of the original substance any more, which means that they cannot possibly (and don’t) have any effect – which is also the overwhelming consensus among scientists.
Yet undaunted, homeopaths not only keep claiming that their dilutions actually do something beyond placebo, but they also come up with various mechanisms to explain that even their most extreme dilutions still contain something that can have an effect. The latest claims involve nanoparticles, which are basically particles of the original, undiluted substance with sizes in the 1-100 nanometer range.
Here, I take a closer look how this nanoparticle hypothesis may or may not apply to one particular homeopathic preparation, natrum muriaticum or homeopathically diluted table salt (sodium chloride, NaCl). This ‘remedy’ was already created by Samuel Hahnemann himself, and still widely used by homeopaths today. Homeopaths ascribe a stunning range of ‘symptoms’ and thus therapeutic properties to this homeopathic salt.
If the nanoparticle hypothesis indeed describes the essential mechanism behind homeopathy, then it must by necessity apply to ALL homeopathic preparations, including natrum muriaticum.
According to homeopaths, homeopathic nanoparticles
1. are created by simply diluting and shaking a homeopathic solution,
2. are persistent, i.e. they somehow escape the normal dilution rate of 1:100 per dilution step,
3. are stable, i.e. they don’t break down easily,
4. enter a patient’s body by ingestion, and travel to the very sites where they are needed,
5. have almost miraculous therapeutic effects in patients,
6. yet evoke the exact opposite effects in healthy people (cf. ‘provings’).
However, there are problems:
Ad. 1: Table salt in an unsaturated solution does not form nanoparticles period. It always dissociates into sodium ions (Na+) and chlorine ions (Cl-). Yes, it is possible to create NaCl nanoparticles, but this is a very delicate process taking place outside a watery solution, and involves several other chemicals. Even then, those nanoparticles aren’t very stable, and dissociate into ions again within 24 hours; also they can’t be administered in liquid or pill form. But it is ludicrous to claim that a salty solution can produce NaCl nanoparticles simply by diluting and shaking the solution. Also, no homeopathic NaCl nanoparticles have ever ever been observed in a watery solution. The same goes for many other highly soluble substances that are often used in homeopathy.
Ad. 2: Homeopaths point to various mechanisms how their homeopathic substances supposedly get concentrated at the surface of the solution, where they somehow evade the 1:100 dilution ratio that occurs with each dilution step. One of these proposed mechanisms is so-called froth flotation – but froth flotation does not work for soluble substances like salt. In fact, people working on desalination projects would give their right arm for an easy way to get dissolved salt to concentrate by just shaking it. There is no evidence that such a localized concentration effect has ever been observed for salt, or for any other highly soluble substance.
Homeopaths also claim that it is this surface layer that is preferentially transferred to the next dilution step. They are wrong. In korsakovian dilution, all dilution steps take place in one small container. After every dilute-and-shake step, the container is upended, tossing out almost all of its contents – including the surface layer; it is then assumed that 1 percent of the solution is left behind, to be diluted by adding 99% water again. But even with the Hahnemannian method, dilution is usually done with a pipette – which means a liquid sample is taken from below the surface, not from a ‘surface monolayer’. Only when carefully pouring over liquid from one container into another can most of the surface layer be preserved in any consistent way. But this is very likely not how most homeopathic dilutions are made, especially in an industrial context. Exit persistence, even for insoluble substances that may actually aggregate at the surface as claimed.
Ad. 3: As no NaCl nanoparticles are formed or transferred, the only stable substance present is the water used.
Ad. 4: Any solid table salt nanoparticles will immediately dissociate again the moment they are ingested by a patient. No salt nanoparticles make it beyond the mouth and stomach, let alone that they are taken up and travel through the body in their original nanoparticle form.
Ad. 5, 6: No specific effects have ever been observed for homeopathically diluted salt. The Nuremberg Salt Trial of 1835 confirmed that natrum muriaticum does nothing special in healthy people, and there are no trials showing clear and repeatable effects in any patients suffering from any condition whatsoever. Which is of course to be expected: we all have some 200 grams of sodium chloride in our body, and it is de facto impossible that an infinitely diluted ghost of salt (or even a few milligrams of salt) can have any effects at all.
But lack of effects aside: if the nanoparticle hypothesis doesn’t apply to natrum muriaticum, then it doesn’t apply to homeopathy period – because otherwise, there would have to be multiple mechanisms of action for homeopathy, which is astronomically unlikely.
So what DO homeopaths have? Basically, they have a few (with the emphasis on ‘few’) studies where they purchased particular homeopathic preparations from manufacturers, and examined samples from those preparations using a Transmission Electron Microscope (TEM) – at which point they found nanoparticles of the original substance.
So how can this be explained? Easy: the manufacturer most likely botched the dilution process or took shortcuts, resulting in a certain amount of the original substance ending up in what should be a 30C or 200C or whatever dilution – and that is what the researchers found. But why did they find nanoparticles? Also easy: TEM samples can’t contain water, so they are dried by evaporating the water. At which point any dissolved substance will clump together and/or crystallize – forming small solid (nano)particles, even if there weren’t any nanoparticles in the solution to begin with.
To the best of my knowledge, researchers never created a homeopathic dilution from scratch while monitoring/analyzing it for the presence of nanoparticles, nor did they actually test the proposed mechanisms involved. Again, they simply purchased a few homeopathic preparations, found nanoparticles, and then went wild, fantasizing about how those nanoparticles got there, and jumping to the conclusion that those nanoparticles not only have magical therapeutic properties, but also ‘explain’ all of homeopathy. This assuming things and jumping to conclusions is the hallmark of pseudoscience, not science.
Also note that most claims about nanoparticles are based on one paper by Chikramane et al., in which exclusively metal-based homeopathic preparations are analyzed. No trials with salt or other soluble substances could be found.
What is more: several studies mention analyzing homeopathic preparations, without finding any trace of the original substance, nanoparticles or otherwise.
In other words: homeopathic nanoparticles are just nonsensical, pseudo-scientific nanobabble. They certainly don’t ‘explain’ homeopathy. If 30C or 200C or whatever diluted homeopathic preparations still contain traces of the original substances, then that is likely due to a flawed dilution process. This is infinitely more plausible than those hypothetical musings about elusive nanoparticles, highly variable (read: unreliable) transfer mechanisms and completely unexplained (and so far unobserved) effects on living organisms.
We all know, I think, what homeopaths say about homeopathy. We also know what everyone else says about it. And the two set of opinions could not be more different. In this context, it might be interesting to learn what writers have to say about the subject. Here is a list of quotes from the non-medical, non-scientific literature (I am sure there are many more; if you know some, please let me know):
Boyd, W. (Restless, 2006)
“She had a small leather case of homeopathy remedies, Nux Vomica, Pulsatilla, Arnica, that she treated like a traveling reliquary.”
Coetzee, J.M. (Elizabeth Costello, 2003)
“He is a believer in homeopathy, in the healing power of water, in the memory of water. He is a man of the eighteenth century, really.”
Cunningham, M. (The Hours, 1998)
“She has tried everything: homeopathy, psychotherapy, prayer. She is a woman who lives in the hope of a miraculous adjustment.”
Enright, A. (The Gathering, 2007)
“My mother had a great belief in homeopathy, which is just a way of saying she had a great belief in nothing at all, provided it came in a very small bottle.”
Franzen, J. (The Corrections, 2001)
“Enid was deep into a phase of homeopathy, convinced that a decillionth of a gram of honeybee sting would cure her husband’s tremors.”
Márquez G.G. (“Serenade: How My Father Won My Mother”, 2001)
“…devoted his talent as an autodidact to a science on the decline: homeopathy.”
Hustvedt, S. (The Blazing World, 2014)
“He was the kind of man who treated his neuroses with homeopathy and his physical ailments with intense, silent resentment.”
McEwan, I. (Solar, 2010)
“He had no time for homeopathy, which he considered a form of witchcraft for people who were too polite to carry crystal wands.”
O’Farrell, M. (Instructions for a Heatwave, 2013)
“She kept a kit of homeopathy in her bag, tiny glass vials of white pills that looked like the breath of ghosts.”
Self, W. (How the Dead Live, 2000)
“Lily’s faith in homeopathy was such that she believed if she diluted her own death enough, she might eventually become immortal.”
St. Aubyn, E. (At Last, 2011)
“He had reached that stage of desperation where even homeopathy seemed like a robust and evidence-based option.”
H.G. Wells (Tono-Bungay, 1909)
“By the time my uncle had taken to homeopathy, I realized that his faith in science was of a very elastic kind.”
George Bernard Shaw (Preface to The Doctor’s Dilemma, 1906)
“I have a faith in homeopathy that would make a Harley Street physician shudder, though I suspect it rests less on evidence than on temperament.”
Thomas Mann (The Magic Mountain, 1924)
“He spoke of homeopathy with a curious mixture of irony and conviction, as though the less there was of it, the more there must be.”
Aldous Huxley (Eyeless in Gaza, 1936)
“She placed her trust in homeopathy, preferring infinitesimal certainties to the gross invasions of modern medicine.”
Doris Lessing (The Golden Notebook, 1962)
“She was experimenting with diets and homeopathy, as if the body might be coaxed into sanity by gentler means.”
Margaret Atwood (Cat’s Eye, 1988)
“My mother believed in homeopathy, in small doses and invisible forces, which seemed to me another way of saying she believed in hope.”
Zadie Smith (White Teeth, 2000)
“He dabbled in homeopathy, convinced that the less substance there was, the more profound the cure.”
David Lodge (Therapy, 1995)
“I tried homeopathy for a while, but it seemed to require a belief in something so small it might not exist at all.”
Hilary Mantel (Giving Up the Ghost, 2003)
“Homeopathy offered the promise of healing without intrusion, a whisper of cure rather than a command.”
Martin Amis (The Information, 1995)
“He regarded homeopathy as a joke that had somehow outlived the punchline.”
______________________
It seems to me that, when it comes to homeopathy, the writers tend to agree with the scientists.
Some papers on so-called alternative medicine (SCAM) are such that I am almost lost for words. Here is the abstract of such an article:
Background: Autism Spectrum Disorder is a complex neurodevelopmental condition with characteristic
challenges like persistent deficits in social communication, restricted and repetitive behaviors, sensory
processing anomalies. Defined by DSM-5criteria, it affects about 1in 100 children globally and 1in 36 in
united states and poses a significant burden for families and healthcare systems. Research on homoeopathy
and Bach flower Remedies as adjunctive or primary therapies has often explored by families and clinical
interest in complementary and alternative medicine for additional support.
Materials and Methods: A comprehensive study of related review articles, related different components
of Autism spectrum disorder treated with homeopathy treatment, Bach Flower Remedies and
complementary medicine in children were search out. Databases search is PubMed, Google Scholar,
ResearchGate and Web of Science, Scopus and Homoeopathic journal.
Result: Reviewed evidence indicates that no systematic studies have been done to manage autism
spectrum disorder with Bach flower Remedies as an adjuvant or primary treatment along with
homoeopathy. Although individualized homoeopathic treatment has promising results in reducing core
and associated symptoms in children including improvement in social interaction, hyperactivity,
communication and behavioral regulation. Although there is less data available thorough trails, Bach
Flower Remedies especially Rescue remedy that have help in treating the emotional dysregulations and
anxiety that are frequently connected with autism spectrum condition.
Conclusion: The available clinical data on autism spectrum with homoeopathy and Bach flower remedies
is not enough to provide new and sufficient evidence. To overcome this more well-designed study of RCT
and larger sample with standardized procedures will be able to help to this rising burden of autism
spectrum disorder.
In the article itself, the authors state the following: “This review article indicates that both homoeopathy and Bach Flower Remedies are promising adjunct intervention in treatment of Autism spectrum disorder in children especially marked improvement in social interaction, communication, behavioural rigidity, emotional dysregulation and sensory processing. Based on the reviewed data from case series, controlled clinical trials and systematic reviews it can be state that individualized homeopathic treatment leads to clinically relevant improvement in core and associated symptoms of autism spectrum disorder.
Studies on Bach flower remedies specifically in autism spectrum disorder are very less but it suggests that Bach flower remedies offer practically accessible intervention for emotional and behavioural dimension mostly in anxiety, emotional dysregulation, sensory hyperactivity and resistance to change. Evidence from controlled trials and clinical studies shows a statistical and significant in symptom.
Homoeopathy and Bach flower remedies should not replace evidence-based behavioural and development intervention for autism spectrum disorder, but rather be investigation as complementary modalities within an integrative care framework. Despite of growing clinical observations, the field of homoeopathy and Batch Flower remedies in autism spectrum disorder is characterised by substantial and identifiable research gaps that limit the formulation of evidence-based clinical guidelines and urgent research priorities include the multicentric, double-blind RCTs with standardised diagnostic criteria and validated core outcome sets; longitudinal follow-up.”
Bearing in mind that this comes from the “Head of the Department, Department of Practice of Medicine, Bharati Vidyapeeth (Deemed to beUniversity), Homoeopathic Medical College”, this is remarkably embarrassing!
Why?
The review is badly written and poorly done. More importantly, according to the data provided by the authors, there is only one rigorous RCT. Here is its abstract:
Objective: To evaluate the effectiveness of Bach flower remedies in the treatment of children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), in a double blind prospective controlled study.
Methods: Fourty Children with ADHD, aged 7-11 years, diagnosed according to the DSM criteria, were randomised to Bach flower remedies or placebo treatments for a period of 3 months. Children’s performance was evaluated by the teacher before commencement of treatment and subsequently each month during the study period.
Results: Bach flower remedies have no statistically significant effect when compared to placebo in the treatment of children with ADHD. There was a significant correlation between treatment duration’s and improvement of performance, with no difference between the treatment group compared to the placebo.
Conclusions: There is no statistically significant difference between the effects of Bach flower remedies compared with placebo in the treatment of children with ADHD.
If a head of department nonetheless concludes that “both homoeopathy and Bach Flower Remedies are promising adjunct intervention in treatment of Autism spectrum disorder in children especially marked improvement in social interaction, communication, behavioural rigidity, emotional dysregulation and sensory processing”, it is, I fear, high time to replace him.
Some homeopathy-fans claim that tiny “nanoparticles” survive even in remedies diluted a trillion trillion times (i.e. the process of manufacturing a high-potency homeopathic remedy). They furthermore assume that this phenomenon can explain how homeopathy works. This argument sounds ever so modern and sciency but – unless you are a bit of a dim-wit – it falls apart for several fairly straightforward reasons that almost anyone should be able to grasp.
Too Dilute
Imagine starting with a single drop of medicine and diluting it by adding 99 drops of water, shaking it up, then repeating that hundreds of times. By the 12C stage (about 1 part in 10^24), there’s statistically zero original molecules left – way before most remedies hit 30C or higher. Even if some nanoparticles somehow cling on from the mixing process or glass vials, they’d be so rare (fewer than one per bottle) that they couldn’t reliably affect your body like a real drug.
Breaks the Main Rule
Homeopathy’s main axiom is “like cures like” assumption: a substance that causes a headache in a healthy person should cure headaches when you’re sick. But nanoparticles would just deliver a tiny dose of the ingredient itself, acting like an extremely weak remedy – not following homeopathy’s main axiom. This would turn homeopathy back into normal medicine and miss the basis of its own theory.
Not Based on Materials
Not all homeopathic remedies start with physical ingredients. Some are “imponderables” like “X-ray” (sugar pills exposed to X-ray radiation, then diluted), “vacuum” (made by evacuating air from water), or even “moonlight.” There’s no material at all to leave nanoparticles behind, so this explanation can’t cover those products.
Useless Ingredients
Most homeopathic remedies are based on mother tinctures that have no heath effects, like sepia (ink from cuttlefish), cantharis (Spanish fly blister beetle), or even bits of the Berlin Wall. These aren’t bioactive – they don’t fight infections or reduce pain or do anything else in normal doses. Nanoparticles from such useless junk wouldn’t magically gain healing powers; they’d still do nothing useful for health.
Lack of Convincing Clinical Evidence
As discussed ad nauseam on my blog, there simply is no sound evidence to show that homeopathy works better than a placebo. Any benefits people feel are thus likely from expectation, natural recovery, or doctor attention – and not from nanoparticles. If homeopathy had any real effects to explain, nanoparticles might be worth debating; without them, it’s a dead end.
I do sympathise with the desperation of homeopaths. They feel they must identify a plausible mode of action for their remedies. Their 200 year old struggle to find anything at all is in many ways remarkable. Here are some of the main explanatory ideas homeopaths (or homeopathy-friendly authors) have previously proposed for how homeopathy might work:
- Vital force / life energy – the remedy is said to act on a non-physical “vital force” or life energy that supposedly governs health and disease.
- Water memory – water is claimed to “remember” substances once dissolved in it, even after dilution beyond any remaining molecules, via changes in water structure or hydrogen bonds.
- Electromagnetic signatures – remedies are said to carry subtle electromagnetic patterns or “information” of the original substance, sometimes claimed to be recordable, transmitted electronically, and imprinted on new water.
- Quantum coherence domains – models suggest water forms coherent quantum domains storing drug “information” as electromagnetic frequencies, inspired by Del Giudice and Preparata’s ideas, though lacking solid experimental support.
- Stable water clusters / clathrates – hypotheses that long-lived clusters or cage-like structures (clathrates) in water somehow encode the properties of the starting substance.
- Nanobubbles and interfaces – suggestions that gas nanobubbles or interfaces in the solution store and transmit information about the starting material.
- Hormesis-based explanations – the idea that ultra-low doses act via hormesis (beneficial effects of mild stress or toxins), extended to the extreme dilutions used in homeopathy.
- Resonance with the body – proposals that remedies resonate with biological systems (cells, tissues, or “vital force”) through frequency matching or electric resonance, rather than via chemistry.
- Quantum entanglement / non-locality – claims that patient, practitioner, and remedy become “entangled,” so healing occurs via non-local quantum effects rather than molecules or doses.
- Information medicine / encoding – framing remedies as carriers of abstract “information” rather than substance, supposedly acting like a software signal on the body’s “hardware.”
Is it not time for homeopaths to accept the only well-proven, plausible explanations as to why their patients feel better after taking their remedies?
- The empathetic therapeutic encounter.
- The natural history of the condition.
- Regression towards the mean.
- Concommittant conventional treatments.
- The placebo effect.
