A 12X potency of Belladonna completely eradicated my daughter’s sudden onset high fevers on every occasion. And within three minutes. Using Tylenol, liquids and bed rest did nothing to bring her fevers down throughout childhood.

A 12C potency of Lachesis resolved an unexplained and severe inflammation of one of my taste buds in thirty minutes, after having it for several days.

One dose of a 30C potency of both Ruta Graveolens and Arnica Montana enabled me to walk normally minutes after a knee dislocation on more than one occasion. For years prior to trying homeopathics, it would be two weeks before I could walk normally.

I have had three surgeries in my forty nine years, belong to a fabulous PPO, and appreciate the value of traditional medicine equally. I’m not fond of the myriad of side effects of many synthetic pharmaceutical medications, but many times the benefits can outweigh those side effects so am not averse to having a doctor explain the action of a “standard” medication and then using it as prescribed.

I guess my point is, homeopathy can’t simply be the placebo effect at work, as it works beautifully on pets and children and babies who have no concept of science, medicine, and the placebo effect. And since science is an ongoing and changeable systematic enterprise of gathering knowledge, close-mindedness has no place in furthering our knowledge. Quantum physics may indeed explain it, so how about we let those with the expansive and brilliant minds resolve the issue.

Perhaps the answer to the money issue may lie in continuing to offer the lower pellet potencies to the public, and should they seek the higher liquid potencies that dumbfound the scientific community, require them to pay for them out of pocket.

This of course is just the sharing of one person’s experience and thoughts. No bashing, no taking sides, no fanaticism here. If homeopathy works (even if inexplicably) for some and causes no harm, why not relax and simply put a disclaimer on all homeopathic remedies that they are not a substitute for consulting a physician or traditional medicine.

Bringing occultism, witchcraft, name calling and outrage into the discussion helps to resolve nothing.

I have opened a general page on facebook to get ideas what can be done

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Stop-Governments-from-Promoting-Homeopathy/118072948238441

Ever been to a Steiner follower’s home? They are flooded with Weleda products. Weleda is part of the Steiner business: http://www.answers.com/topic/weleda-ag

Weleda also produces a homeopathic cancer remedy, Iscador, which I am sure will be peddled in the above mentioned hospital in Africa.

I haven’t got time right now, but will look into this more. Hope to have sparked some interest

I disagree. Homeopathy has its uses. For one, it’s a very useful placebo, a real effect that requires belief to work. People in these age are often overmedicated, gobbling up pills for the slightest of ailments. Often, what people really need is a good placebo and the caring and reassuring personal attention that many homeopaths provide, unlike to many cold and clinical “allopaths”. There may well be good ethical arguments against the use of such “deceit” in treatment, but entirely useless, it isn’t.

Or who knows, maybe I’m just clutching at straws to rationalize my guilt of having had most of my life financed by the wasted money of poor dupes who got suckered by the well-meaning and sincerely-held passion for homeopathy that my dad has always wielded in his often delusional zeal to save people. Maybe I should join my fellow sceptics in the stalwart condemnation of this irrational scourge of the world and push to make my father lose the job through which I was fed and educated since childhood…

It is however still appalling that “magical” water was allowed as medicine at all… and that it has taken this long to get noticed.

He had a string of what we call bad behavior but his autopsy showed he was suffering from an advanced case of CTE (Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy).

As a lot of new evidence is coming to light about long term affects of concussions and sub-concussive hits, those of us who played football, ice hockey, wrestled or soccer in high school, college or even just weekend warrior style are concerned.

Should we allow our kids to play these rough contact sports? When does CTE start? How soon is it to stop? Pop Warner, Junior High, High school?

How many cases of irrational or violent behavior can be attributed to undisclosed cases of CTE?

Is it just professional athletes at risk or anyone whose played contact sports for a long time?

There are semi pro football leagues, fireman vs. policeman leagues, full contact flag football leagues, adult ice hockey leagues, etc…etc…

Can many cases of Alzheimer’s really be CTE misdiagnosed?

And since there is no way of diagnosing it while alive, is there anything that can be done about it?

Please consider the subject. A lot of concerned former players and parents to future players would really like your insight on this very important subject.

Thank you.

This is my experience too. Hardly anyone I come across realises that Homeopathy is the name of a…what shall I call it?…a specific type of bullcrap. Many take it as a catch-all phrase for ‘natural’ or ‘alternative’.

I recently pick up a cat-fanciers’ magazine in a waiting room and looked at the ‘ask the expert’ pages. Many queries were related to cat health and, to my surprise, many of the questions were answered by some sort of homeopathic vet.

It seems that homeopathy is very big in cat circles as many people were specifically asking for homeopathic cures for various problems. Did they know what homeopathy was? I would guess not: one reader asked if there was a homeopathic way of stopping neighbourhood strays using her cat flap and stealing her pet’s food.

As a consequence I am now rebranding my Magic Turnip Oil (Pat Pending) as a combination hair restorer ‘and’ cat repellent.

I’m English and live in the UK and I finally have something to be proud of: and no, I’m not really talking about the 4-1 defeat to Germany.

From personal experience many, many people believe in this stuff and the best approach has so far been to inform then leave people with the questions they then look for answers to. Now I have the government on my side – we must applaud and hope that this becomes ‘law’ with the caveats mentioned in the articles i.e. clearly labelled as placebos, are carried out, because trying to remove it in any other fashion doesn’t work well.

And on to ‘natural’ remedies and vitamin supplementation, which I hope will be next up for STC treatment – do these people really know that Big Pharma (cough) synthesises in large quantities the adjuncts (vitamins etc.) that go into the bottles? I worked for Roche years ago on the HIV Protease Inhibitor project in the ’80s and they boasted about the huge tonnage of Vitamin C they produced. Now see this single reference from wiki about the 110,000 tonnes per year that appear in all those lovely ‘natural’ alt med/SCAM medications http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitamin_C#Industrial_synthesis.

Thanks again Steve.