Irish Times article

MrCreosote

Good article in the IT today:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/health/2011/0308/1224291571073.html

At least they put it in the "family" rather than "health" section. Although would most appropriately be filed under "bullsh*t".

I love the way the homeopath says they treat the whole person, not just the symptoms, and then proceeds to churn out a long list of symptomatic treatments.

bleg

Every 6 months the IT publishes a story about how great homeopathy is and how awful medicine is. Sick of the argument to be honest, they're just trolling us at this stage. One of the science journalists contributes fairly regularly on this forum, I wonder what her opinion is.

Vorsprung

MrCreosote wrote: »

Good article in the IT today:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/health/2011/0308/1224291571073.html

At least they put it in the "family" rather than "health" section. Although would most appropriately be filed under "bullsh*t".

I love the way the homeopath says they treat the whole person, not just the symptoms, and then proceeds to churn out a long list of symptomatic treatments.

Spot on Mr C!!

Would you consider writing a letter into the IT with the above?

Dave!

And they're not allowing users to leave comments on the article either.

nesf

Seriously, you guys are such ungrateful sceptics. Using the homeopathy method my wife and I turned a months supply of birth control pills into ten years supply!

take everything

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMGIbOGu8q0

Love this.

RobFowl

nesf wrote: »

Seriously, you guys are such ungrateful sceptics. Using the homeopathy method my wife and I turned a months supply of birth control pills into ten years supply!

JuliusCaesar

For example, if the fever is only in the child’s head and has not dispersed through the body, so that their face is red and their hands are cold, and they might be raving, Ni Chinneide would treat them with fast-acting belladonna.

BELLADONNA???!!!!


Oh hang on, it's water. Forgot it was about homeopathy.

tallaght01

JuliusCaesar wrote: »

BELLADONNA???!!!!


Oh hang on, it's water. Forgot it was about homeopathy.

Yea it's good to see there's no thought of sepsis in kids who are delirious because of their high temperatures!

Biologic

This link has me lost for words. The woman (who goes by the self-appointed title of Dr.) wanted to treat her son's spinal injury with herbs until the courts drew the line.

Then there's this one of an 11 year old girl who died of diabetic ketoacidosis because her parents decided to "pray to god" for her to recover as opposed to bringing her to a hospital. While I was reading, I was hoping that stories such as that would convince people to side with evidence based medicine. Needless to say my hopes were dashed when the parents of the deceased girl said "Only our faith in god is giving us strength at this time". Gobsmacked.

Sardonicat

Biologic wrote: »

This link has me lost for words. The woman (who goes by the self-appointed title of Dr.) wanted to treat her son's spinal injury with herbs until the courts drew the line.

She also plans to use another compound she calls "P" because "its name is so long I can't remember it." It will, she said, help her son's spine to "fuse."

So, she can't remember what the stuff is called, but she knows it will heal her son?

FFS.:rolleyes:

What do you all think of health insurers including cover for homeopaths (and the like)? Does it not lend homeopathy a legitimacy when it is included in the same breath as physiotherapy or a visit to a GP?

oceanclub

I was shocked when I read another article in the Indo featuring the same homeopathist:

http://www.independent.ie/lifestyle/parenting/battling-sickness-is-childs-play-2115496.html?start=3

My son had meningitis at 13 months. We ended up in Temple Street, which was very frightening, but we asked to treat him homeopathically. They were very respectful and he pulled through without any medication," she said.

Sorry, but don't homeopathists always claim their treatments supplelment - not replace - conventional medicine? Also, how on earth can an layperson demand that a hospital follow their orders?

P.

Thomas_S_Hunterson

James Randi covers Homeopathy pretty conclusively in this lecture at Princeton:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BWE1tH93G9U

tallaght01

oceanclub wrote: »

I was shocked when I read another article in the Indo featuring the same homeopathist:

http://www.independent.ie/lifestyle/parenting/battling-sickness-is-childs-play-2115496.html?start=3



Sorry, but don't homeopathists always claim their treatments supplelment - not replace - conventional medicine? Also, how on earth can an layperson demand that a hospital follow their orders?

P.

Thank fook they must have known it was viral in the hospital.

I presume they knew it wasn't HSV either, or that would be negligence.

MrCreosote

They don't seem to mention in the Indo that she is a homeopathologist. That article is even worse if you ask me.
If there was any hint of bacterial meningitis I'm sure they'd have been getting the child a ward of court fairly smartly.

oceanclub

A friend of mine asked his doctor wife about this. She presumes it was viral meningitis, in which case the child would have been just under observation. Otherwise, she would have short shrift with her demands for homeopathy.

P.

WildBoots

Great to see public awareness of homeopathy being raised, long may it continue. It would be fantastic if articles like this were a regular feature of our national newspapers.

WildBoots

take everything wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMGIbOGu8q0

Love this.

I think you'll be hard pressed to find any homeopath that would claim homeopathy should be used to replace conventional treatment when you're dealing with serious physical injury.

Dave!

WildBoots wrote: »

I think you'll be hard pressed to find any homeopath that would claim homeopathy should be used to replace conventional treatment when you're dealing with serious physical injury.

Is that because it doesn't make any sense?

oceanclub

WildBoots wrote: »

Great to see public awareness of homeopathy being raised, long may it continue. It would be fantastic if articles like this were a regular feature of our national newspapers.

I'm sure it will be fantastic until the first death from meningitis because a parent thought conventional medicine wasn't needed.

P.

SleepDoc

WildBoots wrote: »

I think you'll be hard pressed to find any homeopath that would claim homeopathy should be used to replace conventional treatment when you're dealing with serious physical injury.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9w7jHYriFo

Here's another charlatan being exposed.

MatthewVII

These stories all go the same:

1) People talk about how awful modern medicine is, how doctors don't treat "the whole person", don't listen and just shove random medications down their throats. Parents say "I'm treating my child using ALL NATURAL methods" with a smug sense of satisfaction

2) Child gets sick. Dies from not being treated

3) People say "Homeopathy still works, it was the parents fault for not bringing the child to a doctor because it was obviously ACTUALLY sick instead of FAKE sick"

And the circle repeats. And nobody learns anything. And homeopathy gets away with it because it never has to claim responsibility for anything.

MrCreosote

A couple of replies were published in the times yesterday:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/letters/2011/0311/1224291883835.html

Decent enough replies, although the bit about febrile convulsions could have been left out. They're hardly an "adverse reaction", more a benign manifestation. And anyway the conventional treatments are about as effective as homeopathy- not at all.

mambo

More letters today, one pro, one con.

http://www.irishtimes.com/letters/index.html#1224292159721

Note how the pro-homeopathy letter writer, apart from having a strange way of phrasing things (" - a German - " ?!), quotes an *anecdote* to justify her position, rather than any proper studies. Kind of says it all really.

fricatus

mambo wrote: »

...a strange way of phrasing things (" - a German - " ?!)

Maybe that nationality is supposed to lend "homeopathy" a veneer of scientific credibility? Vorsprung durch Technik and all that?

This is the bit I love from that letter:

Despite being a different kind of science from that prevalent in our society...

:rolleyes:

Honestly... a "different kind of science"? WTF does that mean?

Dave!

Stop being closed-minded!