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Homeopathy in Russia rated as a pseudoscience
The Russian Academy of Sciences (RAW) has classified homeopathy as a pseudoscience. According to the experts, there is no medical rationale for the effectiveness of the small, white globules. Advocates of the alternative cure, however, point out that the efficacy of homeopathic remedies in studies has been well documented.
State clinics should no longer use homeopathic remedies
While some people idolize homeopathy, others refer to the procedure as charlatanry. Scientific evidence for the effectiveness of the small white beads is hard to find. Although some physicians point out that homeopathy is effective, for example, in pain, according to studies, but an Australian research team found in a study that such drugs do no better than placebo. In Russia, state clinics should no longer use homeopathic remedies, scientists suggest.
In Russia, homeopathy has now been classified as a pseudoscience. According to experts, there is no scientifically sound evidence of the effectiveness of the healing method. Proponents, however, see it differently. (Image: Björn Wylezich / fotolia.com) No scientifically sound evidence
The Russian Academy of Sciences (RAW) has officially classified homeopathy as a pseudoscience. According to Russian media reports, a commission of the Academy wrote that there is no scientifically sound evidence for the effectiveness of the alternative cure.
According to the news agency APA, the experts recommended that the Ministry of Health refrain from using homeopathic medicines at state clinics. According to a message from the Interfax agency, Health Minister Veronika Skvortsova announced in Moscow to set up a working group.
Homeopathy was not prohibited in the Soviet Union
Founded more than 200 years ago by the German doctor Samuel Hahnemann (1755-1843), the theory of healing has many supporters in Russia as well.
As Michael Schkolenko of the Homoeopathic Association of the former Soviet republics told the newspaper "Kommersant", Tsar Nicholas I and Soviet Marshal Georgy Zhukov also resorted to homeopathy.
"If homeopathy had not helped, the members of the Central Committee would not have been treated with it."
Homeopathy was not banned in the Soviet Union, but it was not promoted. In the 1990s, it was integrated into the Russian healthcare system.
The belief in the effect works
As part of a homeopathic treatment, sufferers receive - in strong dilution - the substances that cause the disease in the opinion of homeopaths. Patients often report an improved condition through such treatment.
This is partly because of how the placebo effect can work - the belief in the effect alone works. On the other hand, homeopaths usually focus intensively on their patients.
Lack of scientific evidence on the effects of homeopathy is unimportant to many: experience is more important to you than studies.
"People want to believe in miracles," says Dr. Natalie Grams. The doctor, who had practiced a homeopathic practice and a critical book on homeopathy ("Homeopathy rethought - what patients really helps") wrote, said in a critical discussion with "Heilpraxisnet":
"People are not necessarily prone to rationality in the first place. We like to believe in miracles, we find great promises more appealing than critical thinking and consistent questioning - all of us. "
Special status in German pharmaceutical law
In Germany homeopathy enjoys a special status in pharmaceutical law. The effectiveness of the funds need not be proven by scientific studies. Nevertheless, the treatments are now paid by some health insurance companies.
"Why then homeopathy was included in the pharmaceutical law is from today's perspective, no longer understandable," said Dr. med. Natalie Grams. "Homeopathy is an outdated remedial doctrine from the pre-scientific era whose basic assumptions are in complete contradiction to scientific and medical knowledge," said the expert.
The Dr. Natalie Gram's Information Network Homeopathy (INH) aims to help "get the right information about homeopathy," it says on its website.
According to their own statements, the experts want to explain, among other things, "what is still true about homeopathy, which Hahnemann invented 200 years ago. And what not". Or "how homeopathy works. And how not ". (Ad)