[quote]“Some small hop fields here in Slovenia are pest and deasease protected by homoeopathy preparations. Last year results very good.#health#hops”
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Now, I know there will be some of you who believe homeopathy cures your headaches (Head-on, apply directly to the forehead) and some of you will be asking “homeo-what?”
In theory, theory and practice are the same, except in practice.
I always thought my Mom was pretty smart, but she raised us all on homeopathy in spite of that. My Dad always said, “homeopathy and a little faith will cure anything.”
73% of all statistics are made up. I don’t believe in homeopathy but at least the " cures" are harmless unlike our " normal" profit driven health care system which IMO is more worthy of our scorn.
I agree. Anyone can find statistics that prove their point to people less educated or invested in the subject. It does not mean their point is valid. Factual evidence provides proof, not statistics. (And I do realize that is essentially a blanket statement)
Just remember that there are levels to the term believe. To some people, if the things they believe to bevtrue are found to not be they shrug and immediately believe something else. Others can’t go on living if that happens. I believe homeopathic medicine is great… shrug… whatever.
There is plenty of literature out there documenting adverse effects from the use of homeopathic preparations, sometimes severe. Even though these are dilute preparations, some toxins are active at quite low doses.
The biggest harm with homeopathy comes more from patients stopping, or overlooking, conventional treatments, which are generally quite effective, and seeking homeopathic treatment instead. This will often lead to patients getting sicker. And with communicable diseases, this can lead to unnecessary spread of infection.
I agree with all this. Where conventional medicine is effective by all means use it, I do. And its irresponsible not treat communicable diseases. I also realize that ccfoo242 brought this up in response to a particularly silly incident so maybe a larger conversation about conventional healthcare wasn’t expected. I just wanted to point out that the level of delusion in regards to conventional medicine is at least as high and the costs to society much greater. While tens or hundreds of thousands might partake in homeopathy I suspect that most are supplementing rather than foregoing conventional methods and others are trying to treat something not successfully treated by a doctor. This pales in comparison to the millions who spend their time on the couch eating crap then go to their doctors asking for the diabetes or cholesterol medicine they see advertised and having health insurance or medicare pay while doing nothing to change their habits. Or the millions who go to the doctor when they have a cold demanding antibiotics for them or their kids for a viral infection. The doctors usually oblige because their job is to make money for their employer or their partnership. Better to ineffectively treat with homeopathy than create more resistant strains of bacteria IMO. Or the perverse incentives for big pharma: pills that treat symptoms and provide instant relief for a condition or a pill to treat side effects of the other pills are very profitable, cures and preventative strategies are not and the public funding for R&D that had filled in the gaps is dwindling. Boner pill? Yes! Cure for breast cancer? No way!
just in case there are brewers in here who like me pay no attention to homeopathy but have had a significant other who spent a lot of time playing Sims:
“Woo” or “woo-woo” apparently does NOT refer to sex, but rather is a term of skepticism for pseudoscience.
I do agree with many of the concerns you bring up with some of the downfalls of our current healthcare system. Where I disagree is with your assessment of the incentives for big pharma. As a pharmacist at a location that specializes in women’s medicine (and is involved in a considerable amount of ongoing research in the field), I wholeheartedly disagree that there is no incentive for a cure for breast cancer. Oncology treatment is by far one of the most profitable areas within our healthcare system as it is structured today. This is closely followed by finding treatments for rare disease states that currently do not have effective treatments available.
Could things be better? Absolutely. But to do so would involve blowing up our entire healthcare system and starting over from scratch - and I just don’t see that happening. All I see is Band-Aid after Band-Aid being slapped onto a mediocre system.
And as another side note, as a pharmacist I think that direct-to-consumer marketing for prescription medications is BS. Especially for disease states that require close monitoring my a physician. You shouldn’t be basing your diabetes or hypertension therapy based on a commercial. Your healthcare provider should be making that decision based solely on factors related to your health and medical history.
Thanks for the insight re:breast cancer. I gave an example without facts to back it up. I think you probably recognize the shortcomings of the response that there is incentive for a cure for breast cancer because oncology is profitable. Therein lies the problem. They just came out with what I hear is a great drug for hep C: at $84,000 for a 12 week treatment.
Maybe it’s a translation thing. They could just mean “natural” or “organic”, which can sometimes be effective, unlike true homeopathy which is about as baseless as the ancient Greek belief in body humours…
