prevention
Conversion therapy is a form of so-called alternative medicine (SCAM) that attempts to change an individual’s sexual orientation from homosexual or bisexual to heterosexual, or to change their gender identity from transgender or non-binary to cisgender. The practice is built on the false premise that being LGBTQ+ is a mental illness or a developmental flaw that can and should be “cured.” It can range from talk therapy and prayer groups to extreme and physically abusive techniques, such as aversion therapy. Major medical, psychiatric, and psychological organizations worldwide have overwhelmingly rejected conversion therapy. Research consistently shows that it is completely ineffective and causes severe psychological harm, including high rates of depression, anxiety, substance abuse, and suicide. Because of these dangers, dozens of countries have banned or heavily restricted the practice.
Amongst all the many dubious SCAM therapies, conversion therapy must be amongst the most vile, as discussed previously several times, e.g.:
- “Gay exorcism” and conversion therapy by the “Forward In Faith Church International Incorporated” in Scotland
- The ‘Association of Catholic Doctors’ and homeopathic conversion therapy
- Conversion therapy is ‘despicable and degrading’. IT SHOULD BE BANNED EVERYWHERE
Now the Church of England has decided to permit a General Synod event promoting “sexual identity transformation”, i.e. conversion therapy. Entitled “People Change: Sexual Identity Transformation”, the event features Matthew Grech, who claims to have left behind a homosexual lifestyle. Hosted by General Synod member Rebecca Hunt, the meeting highlights speakers who claim to have experienced “positive, beneficial change,” aligning with the Church’s traditional teaching on marriage. Although the Church cancelled an associated exhibition stand, the meeting itself is going ahead despite a 2017 Synod vote overwhelmingly rejecting conversion therapy.
This story unfolded shortly after the UK Government published its draft Conversion Practices Bill, aimed at banning abusive attempts to alter a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity. Humanists UK have long advocated for a comprehensive, loophole-free ban on these discredited and harmful practices, which seek to change, suppress, or “cure” LGBT individuals through coercive counselling, pseudo-psychological interventions, or intense prayer.
Crucially, data from the National LGBT Survey highlights that faith groups are the primary setting for conversion therapy. Furthermore, the LGBT+ charity Galop has documented numerous cases of faith-based conversion abuse.
Laura Newlyn, Policy and Campaigns Manager at Humanists UK, emphasized that conversion practices cause lasting harm, particularly to young and vulnerable individuals facing intense pressure from religious communities. She rejected the idea that these practices constitute harmless pastoral care or ordinary prayer, stressing that most of the public, including most Christians, support a ban. Humanists UK maintains that any effective legislation must fully cover religious settings and eliminate exemptions for “consent” or religious practices to ensure all LGBT individuals are protected from abuse.
A recent paper published in the Lancet was entitled “Wellbeing for people and the planet: how to value everyone and everything on a thriving planet beyond 2030“. Here is its abstract:
Humanity is crossing multiple planetary boundaries while facing rising inequality, democratic fragility, and worsening mental health, exposing the incompatibility of unlimited gross domestic product-driven growth with a finite, socially interdependent planet. Only 17% of the Sustainable Development Goal targets are on track, indicating the need for a deeper transformation rather than faster implementation. Synthesising evidence across disciplines, we argue that human beings are evolutionarily wired for cooperation and relational wellbeing, and not perpetual consumption and status competition. This argument underpins a post-2030 shift in a global development paradigm that places multidimensional wellbeing, of people and the planet, at its core. We outline three mutually reinforcing systemic shifts: deliberative democracy that gives communities real power to shape collective futures; economic democracy that redirects finance, enterprise design, and fiscal policy towards equitable, regenerative outcomes; and transformed land and resource governance that recognises ecological limits and the rights of nature. By aligning institutions with the cooperative nature of humans and the Earth’s regenerative capacity, societies can achieve flourishing lives for all within planetary boundaries, offering a scientifically grounded agenda for the decades beyond 2030.
While reading the article, I asked myself: will our current leaders and governments accept shared limits, long time horizons, and fair trade-offs? In practice, men like Donald Trump or Vladimir Putin would probably view this framework through the lens of power, national and personal advantage, as well as political control, rather than collective wellbeing. In addition, sizable sections of the public might simply be too ignorant to comprehend the need for such a strategy. In other words, the proposal may sound morally strong but could be politically unrealistic.
If Trump or Putin were asked to follow the strategy, I fear that several objections would appear immediately.
- First, they would reject the idea that planetary limits should constrain national ambition, especially as they seem to think that economic or military strength or even personal advantage matter more than global cooperation.
- Second, they would treat wellbeing metrics as soft or ideological compared with jobs, growth, security, or sovereignty.
- Third, they would use the language of wellbeing selectively, supporting parts that could further their agendas, while ignoring parts that require sacrifice, redistribution, or international restraint.
Of course, such caveats do not make the paper and its arguments wrong, but they suggest a significant gap between theory and practice. The altruistic strategy is strongest when actors are willing to cooperate and are able to think long term. I am afraid that it is weak in a world where leaders like Trump or Putin can gain by rejecting climate obligations, weakening institutions, or prioritising short-term national interest. In other words, the paper offers a vision for a better governing ethic, but it does not solve the problem of how to make uncooperative or authoritarian leaders comply.
So, my concern is not that the strategy is useless, but that it is unrealistic and far too dependent on political goodwill. A system that works only when leaders are already committed to fairness and restraint cannot be a robust system. What we also need, therefore, is a strategy by which we are able to get such leaders … improving the education of the general public might be a start.
In the US, the dismantling of public health is in full swing. That this development would sooner or later involve chiropractic had to be expected:
- The shady love affair between Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and the Chiropractic Profession
- Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his harmful ideas about so-called alternative medicine (SCAM)
- The ‘International Chiropractors Association’ Congratulated Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. on His Selection as ‘Secretary of Health and Human Services’
- Eric S Kaplan, the strange chiropractor-friend of Donald Trump
- What does Trump think about so-called alternative medicine (SCAM)?
Thus, the recently launched MAHA Chiropractic Hub cannot come as a surprise. The new Hub is a national lobbying and promotional initiative designed to position chiropractic care as a drug-free, “prevention-first” solution to chronic disease and to reshape US healthcare policy in its favour. Launched as part of the broader “Make America Healthy Again” campaign, the Hub is a coordinated partnership between the MAHA Centre, MAHA Action, and various chiropractic associations, practitioners, and educators. The initiative promotes chiropractic as a root-cause fix for a broken system.
However, medical researchers and public health experts note that the broader claims of chiropractic, particularly those regarding “prevention-first” wellness and treating chronic non-musculoskeletal diseases, lack a credible evidence base. While an optimistic reading of the clinical evidence might support spinal manipulation for short-term relief of acute lower back pain, high-quality scientific data remains weak or non-existent for its efficacy in managing systemic health issues, preventing disease, or acting as a primary care substitute.
Operationally, the Hub seems to organize its strategy around 4 main pillars:
- Public Relations & Branding: Launching a national media campaign to rebrand chiropractic as a credible, prevention-focused discipline, an effort critics argue pushes past the boundaries of evidence-based medicine.
- Legislative Lobbying: Pressing for the Chiropractic Medicare Coverage Modernization Act and the full enforcement of Section 2706 of the Affordable Care Act to expand federal funding and reimbursement.
- Military & Veterans Integration: Promoting chiropractic within Defense Health and Army medical structures for musculoskeletal injuries and pushing the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to expand access and reduce wait times.
- Targeted Outreach: Explicitly marketing these non-drug, non-surgical options to vulnerable or specialized demographics, including children, military personnel, veterans, and seniors.
By targeting federal policy and public perception, the Hub seeks to institutionalise chiropractic care across major public health sectors. In the true MAHA tradition, skepticism from the medical and scientific communities regarding the effectiveness and safety of chiropractic is being ignored.
What is next?
You may well ask!
A homeopath to run the FDA, or the flat earth society taking over NASA?
Nothing can surprise me now!
In my view, it gets increasingly hard to ignore parallels between US anti-regulatory health movements and historical eugenics programs like the one enacted by the Nazis during the Third Reich. Evaluating the rhetoric of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. regarding disease, public health infrastructure, and chronic illness, an underlying philosophy emerges of prioritizing a return to idealized “natural health”, while dismantling the medical systems designed to protect the vulnerable. This, I would argue, echoes the tenets of “eugenics” as practiced by the Nazi regime.
To understand this comparison, we must examine the foundational ideology of Nazi eugenics. It was a concept wrapped in the language of public health and hygiene, biological purification, and economic efficiency. The Nazis aimed to eliminate what they deemed to be lebensunwertes Leben (life unworthy of life). German physicians at the time feared that medical science was keeping the weak alive at the expense of the strong, thereby subverting the natural laws of selection. The Nazis viewed chronic illness and disability to be a drain on the collective national body (Volksgesundheit). Their conclusion was that the elimination of the genetically inferior was a biological necessity.
A modern variant of this ideology manifests in rhetoric that views chronic illness not as a collective societal responsibility requiring robust medical intervention, but as a biological failure stemming from a corrupted modern infrastructure. Kennedy’s actions focus on dismantling federal health agencies and drastically alter the regulatory framework governing medicine. In public addresses, he has consistently attacks established medical consensus, stating that public health policies are “ruining our children’s health” and leading to an “epidemic of chronic disease.”
Further alignment with eugenicist thinking lies in the proposed solutions to this perceived crisis. Rather than strengthening protective medical care, the rhetoric frequently leans towards a form of biological determinism that views modern medical interventions, such as vaccines and standard pharmaceuticals, as inherently corrupting influences that prevent the human body from achieving its “natural” state. This brand of anti-science rhetoric effectively abandons the vulnerable, stating that the aggressive opposition to standard medical treatments threatens to reverse decades of progress in child survival and disproportionately harms those with compromised immune systems.
When politicians advocate dismantling public health protections in order to let ‘natural immunity’ or ‘cleansing’ of dependencies determine who survives and who does not survive, they risk endorsing a “survival-of-the-fittest” ideology that overlaps with social Darwinist and eugenic ways of thinking. By declaring chronic illness as something to be purged via the withdrawal of institutional medical support, the rhetoric subtly shifts from a message of health advocacy to one of biological exclusion.
Please don’t get me wrong! I do not for a moment seek to diminish the crimes and atrocities of Nazi eugenics; they remain a singular and unprecedented horror. My purpose, rather, is to highlight that any ideology which calls for the erosion of medical safeguards for the sick rests on a perilous philosophical kinship with the Nazi project of privileging the “healthy” over the “infirm.” By recognising these parallels, we may hope to remain vigilant and help forestall the repetition of such history.
Homeopaths tend to voice a standard set of arguments when confronted with irrefutable evidence against homeopathy. In the discussion sections of this blog, we heard them all:
- “The negative trials are flawed designed.” They claim these trials were done by ungifted therapists or used the wrong remedies, wrong potencies, wrong dosing schedules, etc. Therefore, they do not reflect true homeopathic practice.
- “Homeopathy is individualised, RCTs can’t capture it.” They argue that randomised clinical trials are inherently unsuitable because homeopathic treatment must be tailored to each patient, rendering RCTs “unfair” or even “unscientific.”
- “Only a fraction of the evidence has been considered.” They assert that critics cherry-pick negative evidence and ignore positive small trials, case series, or observational data that they regard as equally valid.
- “There is much positive evidence.” They point to older or methodologically weak positive studies and claim these outweigh or at least balance the otherwise negative body of evidence.
- “Meta-analyses and systematic reviews are biased and/or politically motivated.” They allege that negative evaluations are driven by ideological hostility to homeopathy, Big Pharma influence, or institutional bias.
- “Statistical significance is not the same as clinical reality.” They argue that statistics miss “real-world” benefits observed in practice and that evidence-based medicine is too narrow.
- “Evidence-based medicine overvalues RCTs and undervalues experience.” They insist that long clinical experience, case reports, patient testimonies, etc. should count as strong evidence and that their accumulated practice is itself proof of efficacy.
- “Patient demand and satisfaction are evidence.” They use high patient satisfaction, repeat consultations, and word-of-mouth popularity as a proxy for effectiveness.
- “Millions use it worldwide.” They argue that longstanding, global usage implies that it must work; otherwise it would have disappeared.
- “Conventional medicine is not perfect either.” They respond to criticism by highlighting harms, errors, and historical reversals in conventional medicine, implying that science-based critics lack moral authority.
- “If it were only placebo, it wouldn’t work on XY.” They claim efficacy in infants, animals, or unconscious patients as evidence that placebo cannot fully explain the effects.
- “Mechanisms aren’t fully known, but that doesn’t matter.” They liken homeopathy to earlier medical advances whose mechanisms were unknown at the time (e.g. aspirin), arguing that lack of a plausible mechanism is not a valid reason to reject positive clinical observations.
- “Physics and chemistry are incomplete; future science will explain it.” They invoke concepts like quantum physics, nanostructures, or complex systems to argue that current science is still too limited to explain homeopathy.
- “Regulatory / institutional conspiracies.” They suggest that powerful pharmaceutical or medical lobbies seek to suppress homeopathy to protect their financial interests.
- “Homeopathy is cheap and safe; risk–benefit favours it.” They argue that even if evidence is thin, the very low risk and low cost justify its use.
- “The therapeutic encounter itself is part of the effect.” They turn criticisms about placebo and context effects into a strength: the long consultation, empathy, and attention are claimed to be legitimate and central components of homeopathy.
- “Freedom of choice / patient autonomy.” They shift from scientific to ethical/political ground, insisting that patients should be free to choose homeopathy regardless of scientific consensus.
- “Skeptics misunderstand what homeopathy really is.” They claim that people conflate homeopathy with herbalism, confuse potencies, or misunderstand Hahnemann’s principles, so their critiques do not address true homeopathy.
- “Critics don’t see the individual ‘miracle’ cases.” They counter population-level data with vivid anecdotes of dramatic improvements which they regard as decisive.
- “Negative evidence is ‘absence of evidence’, not ‘evidence of absence’.” They argue that failed trials or negative reviews merely show that efficacy hasn’t been proved yet, not that homeopathy does not work.
- “Science evolves; today’s ‘overwhelming evidence’ may be overturned.” They claim that scientific consensus has been wrong before and that homeopathy will eventually be vindicated when paradigms shift.
In discussions with homeopaths, these points are repeated endlessly. One could easily get the impression of a broken record. All of the above arguments have in common that – even as some of then contain a kernel of truth – they are erroneous. In theory it could be easy to point this out to the stereotypical homeopathy promoter; in practice, however, it often is impossible, since the broken record continues turning senselessly.
A recent survey of the “Österreichische Gesellschaft für Marketing” (OMG), a Viennese opinion research and market research institute shows a notable shift in public attitudes towards homeopathy. In 2010, nearly one in five Austrians reported greater confidence in homeopathy than in evidence-based medicine. By 2026, that proportion had fallen to just one in ten (10%), indicating a substantial erosion of support over the past decade and a half. Interestingly, the percentage differed acconding to politics; for voters of the right-wing freedom party and the greens the percentages were notably higher (15 and 19% respectively).
Several factors likely contribute to this trend. One important driver is the increasingly critical stance adopted by mainstream media. Over recent years, reporting on homeopathy has become more evidence-focused, often highlighting the lack of plausible mechanisms and robust clinical efficacy beyond placebo. This shift in media tone may have played a significant role in reshaping public perceptions, particularly among more scientifically literate audiences.
Equally important is the growing distance between homeopathy and the scientific community. As medical research continues to emphasize rigorous methodology and reproducibility, homeopathy has struggled to meet these standards. The accumulation of negative or inconclusive findings in high-quality trials has further weakened its credibility within academic medicine.
Yet, the responsibility for declining trust does not rest solely with external critics. Instances of scientific misconduct within homeopathy research – such as studies later found to involve highly probable data manipulation and subsequently retracted – have likely contributed to skepticism. In particular, the now infamous study by the Vienna-based Michael Frass might have contributed to the decline. Such events undermine not only individual studies but also the broader integrity of the field.
Overall, the Austrian data suggest a gradual but meaningful realignment toward evidence-based medicine, driven by both external scrutiny and internal weaknesses within homeopathy itself. This surely must be good news. But, as a rational person, I still ask myself, how is it possible that 1 in 10 Austrians have greater confidence in homeopathy than in evidence-based medicine?
To me, this indicates that much more work is needed to inform the public responsibly about homeopathy and other bogus alternative treatments.
France, like most countries, has long had its fair share of pseudoscience (see also my previous post). What is new, I feel, is the fact that opposition to the promotion of this dangerous nonsense is becoming more visible and hopefully more effective.
The recent revelations about pseudoscientific content in the biology and geology (sciences de la vie et de la Terre) teacher‑training program at the “Institut National Supérieur du Professorat et de L’Education” in Dijon illustrate how deeply irrational ideas and outright quackery can infiltrate institutions that should embody and promote scientific rigour. For several years, future secondary‑school biology teachers enrolled in the master’s degree programme “Métiers de l’Enseignement, de L’Education et de la Formation, Sciences de la Vie et de la Terre” were reportedly offered modules on so-called alternative medicine (SCAM), such as “self‑healing,” homeopathy, and “mind over cancer,” where the power of mindset was presented as more important than chemotherapy. Such teaching does not simply represent a minor pedagogical eccentricity; it directly undermines the principles of evidence‑based medicine and science education.
Instead of learning how to critically appraise data, distinguish levels of evidence, and communicate scientific uncertainty, these trainees were exposed to narratives that elevate anecdote, belief and spurious “energy” concepts over controlled clinical trials and established oncological knowledge. More troubling still, students describe a climate in which questioning these contents could be seen as a lack of openness, thus inverting the very logic of critical thinking: scepticism toward dubious claims was implicitly discouraged, while credulity was smuggled in as a virtue.
The institutional response – acknowledging that “certain contents” might be problematic and promising internal reviews – remains inadequate as long as it treats pseudoscience as a marginal excess, rather than as a systemic failure of quality control and epistemic standards. In a context where schools already face conspiracy thinking and health misinformation, the responsibility of teacher‑training institutes is not merely to avoid obvious charlatanism, but to actively inoculate future teachers against it.
If those tasked with teaching biology and geology to the next generation are introduced to homeopathic and “mind‑healing” discourses without critical thinking, the boundary between science and pseudoscience becomes dangerously blurred. Defending that boundary is not an academic luxury; it is a matter of public health, intellectual integrity, and respect for the patients and families who depend on honest, evidence‑based information.
As calling out pseudoscience in France gets more effective, we will doubtlessly hear more about this issue. And as this development gathers momentum, the French will become more rational … yes, I know, I am an incurable optimist!
I have never commented on football before on this blog (I am not even a big fan, yet I have been involved in doctoring for a team many years ago). Today, I make an exception because, in the very early hours of 6 July (UK time), England will be playing Mexico in the World Cup. This would, of course, not be worth writing about, were it not for a crucial detail: the match will be at the ‘Estadio Azteca’ in Mexico City, at about 2,240 meters above sea level, at a hight of roughly 2250 metres above seal level.
It is almost 40 years ago that I was interested in the human physiology at high altitudes. At the time, we concluded that this affects the fluidity of blood unfavourably, an effect that is likely to limit physical performance. But this is just one factor of several that can prove to be a significant handicap for a non-adapted athlete.
Playing at high altitude is medically significant mainly because the thinner air lowers the partial pressure of oxygen, so England’s players will absorb less oxygen with each breath. That means the muscles receive less oxygen when they need it most, e.g. during repeated sprints, accelerations, and recoveries.
The immediate consequence is a higher heart rate, heavier breathing, and faster, profounder and longer-lasting fatigue. In a football match, that can reduce high-intensity running, impair decision-making, and slow recovery between bursts of effort. The extraordinary fitness of professonal football players does not fully protect against low oxygen availability, because the body’s aerobic energy system is being forced to work under a constraint it is not used to. The body can adapt to high altitudes by making more red blood cells, but that process takes days to weeks, so a short turnaround leaves little time for meaningful acclimatisation.
Altitude also creates problems that are less obvious but might still turn out to be important. Sleep would be worse after arrival at high altitude, and poor sleep impairs recovery and performance the next day. In addition, there may also be a tactical issue that few have thought about. The ball travels a little faster and farther in thin air. This obviously can alter passing, shooting, and goalkeeping judgments.
The Mexican team is of course well adapted to the altitude. Their players are used to training and playing at Mexico City’s elevation, so the thinner air is far less of a shock for them. That matters because the home side can maintain intensity for longer, recover more quickly between sprints, and avoid unusual fatigue.
In short, high altitude is not just an inconvenience. It is a significant medical stressor that reduces oxygen delivery, worsens recovery, and makes sustained effort harder for the unadapted England team.
Fingers crossed, I hope they win nontheless.
Will I stay up to watch?
No, that would also be a significant medical stressor, one that I prefer to avoid.
Ten years after Brexit, it seems reasonable to ask what effects Brexit has caused on health-related matters for the UK and beyond. Here is my attenpt to provide an answer; these are the 8 issues that come to my mind:
- Workforce Disruption and Recruitment Shift: The ending of free movement led to a sharp drop in EU-trained doctors, nurses, and social care staff. To plug these vacancy gaps, the UK was forced into recruiting heavily from non-EU nations. This created a fragile reliance on international recruitment from countries facing their own healthcare worker shortages. In turn, this further supported the xenophobic sentiments of some UK citizens.
- Medicine Supply Problems: Leaving the EU single market introduced significant customs and regulatory friction. This friction directly contributed to the frequency and severity of local pharmaceutical shortages in the UK.
- Loss of Regulatory Leverage: By exiting the European Medicines Agency (EMA), the UK became a standalone market. Pharmaceutical companies now regularly prioritize the much larger EU and US markets for rolling out cutting-edge new treatments, leaving the UK Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) to act as a “rule-taker” by fast-tracking approvals already granted elsewhere.
- Cross-Border Friction: Reciprocal healthcare arrangements became more complex under the new Global Health Insurance Card (GHIC) system. While basic travel is covered, specialized cross-border medical networks face ongoing administrative and legal hurdles. Many British ex-pats’ found themselves without health cover.
- Regulatory Divergence in Training and Innovation: The UK has increasingly diverged from EU rules, such as lowering the mandatory clinical training hours required for a nursing degree to get staff into hospitals faster. Additionally, medical technology and AI developers now face double-compliance costs (clearing separate UK and EU hurdles). This makes the UK a more expensive market to launch new health technologies.
- The Macro-economic Squeeze: The overall economic downturn resulting from Brexit reduced UK GDP, shrinking the available tax revenues. This has directly limited the government’s financial capacity to fund the NHS, to clear post-pandemic backlogs, and to invest in long-term social care reform.
- Exacerbating Health Inequalities: As inflation, food costs, and supply chain disruptions damaged the UK, vulnerable socioeconomic groups have been hit the hardest. These economic pressures, combined with a chronically strained social care sector, significantly widen UK health inequalities.
- Compounding Pressure on Patient Outcomes: While ultimate health metrics, such as mortality rates and overall life expectancy, are influenced by dozens of complex variables, an underfunded NHS, chronic staffing vulnerabilities, and restricted access to new drugs create a persistent, negative headwind against public health which, in the long run, can only negatively affect patient outcomes.
All of these effects are clearly negative.
Can anyone think of a positive effect?
I can’t!
The WHO’s supportive stance on so-called alternative medicine (SCAM) has been discussed on this blog many times before. Now a BMJ editorial criticized the WHO for uncritically promoting SCAM within mainstream health systems. It argues that WHO’s new strategy gives undue legitimacy to interventions whose evidence base is often weak, inconsistent, or absent. The author’s main concern is not cultural respect or patient choice, but the risk that policy language about “integration,” “tradition,” and “people-centred care” can blur the line between evidence-based medicine and therapies that have not demonstrated reliable benefit. The article points out that, while some traditional practices may be harmless or even useful, broad institutional support should depend on rigorous proof of safety and effectiveness. It also warns that promoting such therapies may waste scarce resources, confuse patients, and create false equivalence with established medical care. More broadly, the editorial presents this as a scientific and ethical issue: global health bodies should strengthen standards, not weaken them. The WHO should prioritize robust clinical evidence, transparent regulation, and careful harm-benefit assessment before endorsing any therapy for widespread use. In short, the article sees WHO’s current approach as a misguided attempt to accommodate alternative medicine rather than critically evaluate it.
The team of international authors of the editorial argue that an ideal strategy should mandate pharmacovigilance, including adverse event reporting, as a prerequisite. Large workforces should be redirected toward evidence-based primary care, such as screening, vaccination, chronic disease identification and maternal health. Research funding should prioritise independent clinical trials with negative results published as systematically as positive ones. The WHO Traditional Medicine Global Library must catalogue documented harms alongside knowledge claims. Commercial conflicts of interest must be transparent. And WHO’s messaging must remain unequivocally aligned with scientific consensus – a proven tool against misinformation that mixed messaging would fatally undermine.
The authors conclude that “billions use traditional medicine – many from uninformed choices. The ethical response is not to validate what remains unvalidated, but to expand access to what withstands scrutiny. Patients everywhere deserve nothing less.”
Readers might remember that I posted my own critique of the WHO’s new strategy on this blog already on 6/11/2025. Here is an excerpt of my post:
The WHO aim to “advance the contribution of evidence-based traditional, complementary and integrative medicine” seems laudable, yet it also raises concerns: once any form of medicine is “evidence-based”, it is not “traditional, complementary and integrative”. Then it is by definition EBM, evidence-based medicine! Thus, the entire premise of the WHO Global traditional medicine strategy 2025–2034 makes no sense.
The fact that “traditional medicine is the primary or preferred care for billions of people worldwide” does not necessarily mean that its “clinical potential is considerable”. More likely it means that billions have to rely on obsolete forms of medicine from the dark ages because they cannot afford effective treatments. This is far from an opportunity; it is a challenge for us to improve this inhuman situation.
The fact that “acupuncture is recommended for migraine”, while the evidence for this (and almost all similar) recommendations are not supported by sound evidence, amounts to a scandal. One would have hoped that, instead of promoting unproven ‘traditional medicine’, an urgent task of the WHO would be to warn people of bogus and often dangerous claims that are ubiquitous in this sector.
The fact that “1% of global health research funding is dedicated to traditional medicine” might look unfair at first glance. But global health research funding is in the range of US$ 200 billion per year. Thus 1% would amount to 2 billion, and I suggest that one could do plenty of good research with this money. Instead, the sector tends to waste its funds on lousy pseudo-research, as anyone interested can confirm by reading this blog. Why does the WHO not point this out and take measures to stop pseudo-science in the realm of ‘traditional medicine’? Do they really think that offensive ideological platitudes such as “restoring balance is a scientific, rights-based and sustainability imperative” cuts the mustard?
My recommendation to the WHO is as simple as it is important: if you want to create meaningful articles, documents or strategies on ‘traditional medicine’ (or indeed any other subject), don’t charge biased proponents with the task but recruit a few well-informed critical thinkers as well.
It is good that the BMJ editorial concurs with my assessment. The question is, will it have an effect? Considering the multiple times we had to criticise the WHO for its irresponsible stance on SCAM, it would be high time for adopting an evidence-based attitude.
