|
U-Know! Forum » Homeopathic overdose protest in Boots |
Log In to post a reply
|
|
|
|
| Topic View: Flat | Threaded | |
handofdave 3515 posts |
Feb 04, 2010, 05:00
|
||
|
Merrick wrote: Big Pharma is certainly guilty of profiteering. Mind you, the profits margin on homeopathic sugar nibs is far greater. You mean that the profit margin on a small bottle of sugar water is enormous, yes... but the totality of the homeopathic market is dwarfed by the establishment medical scene. The profits of the big pharmaceutical corporations in the USA are colossal compared to the alternative medicine market.
|
|||
Merrick 2148 posts |
Feb 04, 2010, 11:57
|
||
the latter
|
|||
|
Merrick 2148 posts |
Feb 04, 2010, 12:03
|
||
|
Obviously i can't know why one worked for her and the other didn't, but among the possibilities I'd say; - The attention and treatment given by a homeopath are different to that given by a GP. Being told by a trained person that they're treating your whole person, getting an hour's consultation, it's a lot more involving. I suspect this is why a lot of healers practices work. - The 'conventional' medicines had failed, making her even more desperate to find something that works. but I don't know exactly why, indeed we can't know - the interplay of body and mind are unfathomably complex, and the placebo effect tells us there's a lot more at work there than we understand. It also tells us - some empty pills working better if they're certain colours, etc - that when you change the details of administering a treatment, you change its effectiveness.
|
|||
Hunter T Wolfe 1710 posts |
Feb 04, 2010, 13:43
|
||
|
Merrick wrote: The attention and treatment given by a homeopath are different to that given by a GP. Being told by a trained person that they're treating your whole person, getting an hour's consultation, it's a lot more involving. I suspect this is why a lot of healers practices work. Yes, but this shouldn't be discounted as being irrelevant. Spending an hour with a patient discussing their background, their living conditions, their mental worries, their family history, other problems and ailments, while being sympathetic and actually listening to the patient, rather than giving them a 5 minute interview in which the doctor is typically arrogant and high-handed, probably makes a large and significant difference, wouldn't you say? Of course, it's a lot easier for a homeopath to do this unlike an NHS doctor because you're paying for the priviledge. Nevertheless, it seems a better way of going about things and I'd be inclined to find ways to make this available to all for free rather than try to shut it down. This is a bit off-topic. I'm as scientifically sceptical as anyone about the homeopathic tinctures, but there's far more to homeopathy than prescribing pills- indeed, the whole focus of homeopathy is finding an alternative to just prescribing pills, which often have harmful side effects. I think the principle of treating the whole person, on concentrating on the importancr of diet and lifestyle are pretty common sense measures, and this is what homeopathy is more about than the media uproar about 'sugar water' scams. Again, I was a sceptic, but my girlfriend has received remarkable results from a homeopath in the last couple of years. Not from taking useless pills- that was what the NHS doctor tried to give her. But from changing her diet and taking herbal supplements, fish oil etc. I won't go into details, but it's worked, and it makes sense as to why it worked, too. Don't throw the baby out with the sugar water as far as homeopathy is concerned, is all I'm saying.
|
|||
Squid Tempest 8769 posts |
Feb 04, 2010, 14:50
|
||
I'd go along with that. A sensible view point.
|
|||
|
Squid Tempest 8769 posts |
Feb 04, 2010, 14:55
|
||
|
Merrick wrote: but I don't know exactly why, indeed we can't know - the interplay of body and mind are unfathomably complex, and the placebo effect tells us there's a lot more at work there than we understand. I don't think we're going to see completely eye-to-eye on this Merrick, so I'm happy to leave this discussion unresolved. I do see your points, and I would agree wholeheartedly if it wasn't for my friends experience. I do, however, think it is important to remain open-minded, for the very reasons you state in the quote above!
|
|||
|
Merrick 2148 posts |
Feb 04, 2010, 20:08
|
||
|
Hunter T Wolfe wrote: Yes, but this shouldn't be discounted as being irrelevant. I absolutely agree, making a patient feel listened to, advising them on a range of aspects of their life that will improve it for them undoubtedly makes a huge difference. Indeed, that's the point I was suggesting! and I completely agree that such a level of treatment should be available to all (and i dare say would go a long way to paying for itself by preventing expensive conditions from occurring) Hunter T Wolfe wrote: there's far more to homeopathy than prescribing pills True, and again we broadly agree. I think the difference between us comes in the validity of ascribing the healing power to homeopathic pills. Surely we should be finding what works. What elements of the homeopaths treatment work? Can we replicate or even improve these? Are they, as the evidence overwhelmingly suggests, getting results from things other than their pills? If that's the case then we could give people effective treatment. And if it's the interaction that works rather than the pills, then putting the pills in bottles and selling them in chemists labelled for specific ailments is surely misleading and betrays the people suffering who could be being given effective treatment instead.
|
|||
|
dave clarkson 2988 posts |
Edited Feb 04, 2010, 21:30
Feb 04, 2010, 20:42
|
||
|
"Mind you, the profits margin on homeopathic sugar nibs is far greater." Are you serious? The big pharma companies generate the largest profit margins not from complementary medicines but from 'trademark' products and being the first in the bullying race to develop these medicines......GSK - zantac, asthmatic/ inhalation medicines, Novartis - flu, cold, cough medicines, massive profits off the swine flu problem, putting them several notches up the big pharma top ten. Pfizer - Sutent, Viagra etc. Sutent can cost people with the wrong postcode £3.5K a month for treatment. Most of the above products are incredibly cheap to manufacture, seal, package, inspect and release to market against the sale prices. The intense race for position of pharma industry is why there are occasional unanswered questions concerning the validity of thorough clinical trials and process inspection prior to product launch. Excipients, containers, packaging costs for the big selling trademarks are low. Tabletting presses, filling machines, labellers, cartonners, checkweighers etc are inexpensive machinery which can last up to 20 years in validated state. Production lines normally operate at 100 units per minute minumum. Work out the figures against drugs manufactured for popular symptoms (colds etc).....also the more serious the treatment condition is, the more expensive the drugs generally are but are generally not expensive to manufacture. Sugary water or low content tablets still go through the same production and packaging processes and have similar constraints. The packaging and presentation is no cheaper nor is the R&D performed on them. Homeopathic medicines are small fry to big pharma against their popular sellers. This could change in time if there is massive sea change but unlikely. 8)
|
|||
|
dave clarkson 2988 posts |
Edited Feb 04, 2010, 21:17
Feb 04, 2010, 21:08
|
||
|
"Can't say I'll be losing any sleep over that, personally." You wouldn't lose any sleep but you might not wake up too! That's if you were one of those unlucky gamblers who buy potentially unvalidated drugs from an internet trade which may not have any regulatory standards or control apart from a few badges on the home page. On the other hand, they could work though in a homeopathic way or as a placebo! 8)
|
|||
|
Hunter T Wolfe 1710 posts |
Feb 04, 2010, 22:42
|
||
|
Merrick wrote: Hunter T Wolfe wrote: Yes, but this shouldn't be discounted as being irrelevant. I absolutely agree, making a patient feel listened to, advising them on a range of aspects of their life that will improve it for them undoubtedly makes a huge difference. Indeed, that's the point I was suggesting! and I completely agree that such a level of treatment should be available to all (and i dare say would go a long way to paying for itself by preventing expensive conditions from occurring) Hunter T Wolfe wrote: there's far more to homeopathy than prescribing pills True, and again we broadly agree. I think the difference between us comes in the validity of ascribing the healing power to homeopathic pills. Surely we should be finding what works. What elements of the homeopaths treatment work? Can we replicate or even improve these? Are they, as the evidence overwhelmingly suggests, getting results from things other than their pills? If that's the case then we could give people effective treatment. And if it's the interaction that works rather than the pills, then putting the pills in bottles and selling them in chemists labelled for specific ailments is surely misleading and betrays the people suffering who could be being given effective treatment instead. We do broadly agree. The incredibly-diluted tinctures part of homeopathy is also the element I find hardest to accept. I also agree that there really shouldn't be this divide between 'alternative' and 'conventional' medicine- either something works and it can be shown why it works, or it doesn't. I think that eventually the effective elements of homeopathy and alternative medicine will be incorporated into conventional medical practise, and what doesn't work will be discarded as superstition and old wives' tales. I think right now though there is still a need for the alternative sector, which may contain its fair share of charlatans and frauds, but also in many cases provides positive, inexpensive, common sense approaches to health, and (at its best) encourages the patient to have more responsibility for, and control over, their own well-being. I have no time for any 'healer' who shrouds what they do in mysticism and bunkum- and that goes for GPs as well as the crystal merchants. There's a lot wrong with the medical industry- vested interests and all that- and it's in the interests of this powerful and well-funded lobby to discredit homeopathy wholesale. It gets a negative press generally anyway, and I guess that's why I feel the need to put the other side of the story when something like this comes up.
|
| Pages: 9 – [ Previous | 1 … 4 5 6 7 8 9 | Next ] | Add a reply to this topic |
|
|
|
| U-Know! Forum Index | |
