Homoeopathy and WHO

[steenkh]

On the BBC yopu can find an article named Homeopathy's benefit questioned.

It is about a Swiss-UK review of homoeopathy that yet again finds no evidence of effectiveness for homoeopathy. So far nothing to create controversy here, but I expect the usual comments from homoeopaths that there were too many controls and so on.

What woke me up was that at the end, it says

However, the Lancet also reports that a draft report on homeopathy by the World Health Organization says the majority of peer-reviewed scientific papers published over the past 40 years have demonstrated that homeopathy is superior to placebo in placebo-controlled trials.

Furthermore, it says that homeopathy is equivalent to conventional medicines in the treatment of illnesses, both in humans and animals.

The article continues with critics claiming that the WHO draft report is biased, but I would like to know if anybody here knows more about this draft report and if the WHO have been infiltrated with homoeopaths who have the power to suppress all the absence of evidence for homoeopathy?

 

[Minkster]

I was delighted when this story blew up. It was ALL over the media over here, with debunking of homeopathy every 30minutes on pretty much all our news channels. It was fun.

Unfortunately, the BBC 'have your say' section attached to the story ended up as a list of comments from people who believed in it and few from skeptics (they didn't publish my point either, which made me wonder the motivation of the have-your-say team).

The most frustrating thing was that I was unable to get on the JREF forum because of the storm, so I couldn't mobilise backup

 

[Wudang]

Unfortunately, the BBC 'have your say' section attached to the story ended up as a list of comments from people who believed in it and few from skeptics (they didn't publish my point either, which made me wonder the motivation of the have-your-say team).

I suspect they like to have a "balance of views" and b*gger the facts. No, I've never had a comment published either.

 

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

majority of peer-reviewed scientific papers

Oh, the power of weasel words!

Certainly the majority of peer-reviewed papers do show that homeopathy works, because the peers doing the reviews are homeopaths. Brilliant!

However, the majority of good quality, placebo controlled studies do not.

The magic route to respectability is to choose your peers properly not your controls.

Is that WHO misinformation being challenged?

 

[steenkh]

Re: Re: Homoeopathy and WHO

Oh, the power of weasel words!

Certainly the majority of peer-reviewed papers do show that homeopathy works, because the peers doing the reviews are homeopaths. Brilliant!

However, the majority of good quality, placebo controlled studies do not.

The magic route to respectability is to choose your peers properly not your controls.

Is that WHO misinformation being challenged?

Will you comment on on the story at NCH or may I quote you?

 

[Badly Shaved Monkey]

Re: Re: Re: Homoeopathy and WHO

Will you comment on on the story at NCH or may I quote you?

Please quote me. Despite my recent level of activity here, I am still trying to spend less time scratching the itch of homeopathy! (or should that be the psora of homeopathy?)

 

[steenkh]

Re: Re: Homoeopathy and WHO

Is that WHO misinformation being challenged?

In the BBC article it gets these comments:

Professor Edzard Ernst, professor of complementary medicine at the Peninsula Medical School in Exeter, said the draft WHO report seemed overtly biased and that all of the trials cited happened to be positive.

I wonder if it is standard to leak draft reports, or if it is done because the report is in danger of never making it past draft status.