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Homeopathy Congress Senator for Science and the Miracle Healers
An esoteric model
The physician Samuel Hahnemann (1755-1843) thought up homeopathy. He was attached to an idea of medicine in the Middle Ages: something similar had to be fought with something similar. So he was looking for substances that cause a symptom similar to that of the patient, but diluted them, in contrast to vaccinations, to a degree that the substance actually no longer existed chemically.
According to critics, homeopathy does not belong to medicine but to religious thinking, such as astrology, magic or Christian saints. In the everyday life of many doctors and naturopaths, however, the homeopathic remedies are quite successfully used. (Image: Sonja Birkelbach / fotolia.com) According to Hahnemann, it was not about the chemical-material substance, but about the "spirit", the information. The would allegedly by constant dilution and shaking always concentrated.
Leading Nazis opposed Hahnemann's theory as Germanic medicine of empirical modern medicine.
Alternative medicine or superstition?
So far, science has not been able to provide any evidence for Hahnemann's theory, and his teaching is therefore not part of evidence-based medicine or empirical science. The critics put them therefore equal to ecclesiastical miracles and other religious fantasies.
Religious fantasies
Ms. Quante-Brandt himself wrote that the efficacy of homeopathic therapies could not be proved by conventional medicine. At the conference, for example, it is about the fact that "the unconscious of a person knows about the suitable homeopathic remedy", about "research on subtleness" or "quantum vacuum". For critics scientifically sounding spells of the esoteric scene. Uwe Friedrich, for example, claims that a tumor can be cured with homeopathy.
Petition Against Patronage for Esoteric Congress
Edzard Ernst, a former professor of alternative medicine and the dentist Hans-Werner Bertelsen launched a petition to protest against the senator's patronage. Bertelsen says doctors in the statutory health care system have little time for patient talks; this gap was filled by homeopaths. Therefore, especially insured cancer patients should be able to be intensively advised, "so as not to drive them into the hands of charlatans."
Ernst sees irrationality already in its origins; Homeopaths have no interest in science and their teaching is more a religion than medicine. He concludes: "There can not be a scientific explanation of homeopathy."
The Bremen Medical Association awards continuing education credits to physicians attending the conference. Ernst asks provocatively, if such training points would soon be awarded for clairvoyance and dowsing. In his view, patients are being fooled around here.
Pure greed for profit?
The behind-the-scenes slogans of homoeopaths are not always greed for profit or evil will. The homeopathic critic and ex-homeopath Natalie Grams says: "Calling on scientific-sounding phrases or entire theories makes an impression - especially among the homeopaths themselves. Nanoparticles, quantum physics, vibration, energy and the reference to the future: All this sounds hopeful and saves the knowledge that with today's knowledge we can easily explain why shaking an aqueous solution with ever greater dilution produces no "energy" or "information."
Placebo effect
An Australian meta-study of 176 experimental studies and 58 review studies came to a clear conclusion: First, in a number of diseases, homeopathic remedies do no better than placebos. These include asthma, anxiety disorders, headaches, migraines, diarrhea in children, colds, warts, pre-period pain and many more. Second, studies that testify to these agents as having some efficacy in a few diseases are neither random nor controlled - so they are not very meaningful. Third, no studies on their effectiveness are available for certain diseases using homeopathic remedies.
Dangerous loss of time through superstition
The globules called sugar globules and the homeopathic solutions of water and alcohol are not only ineffective, according to critics, but a "therapy" with them can even endanger life - namely, when cancer patients carry out surgery or chemotherapy. From a circumscribed tumor, which could be removed well, could be such a deadly cancer.
Naturopathy?
Homeopathy often sails under the flag of "natural medicine" over the esoteric ocean. Natural remedies have originally but little in common with homeopathy. Healing with water, earth, fire and air, in the form of baths, mud massages, heat and cold therapy or stay in spas is medically effective - and this is empirically proven.
Also, the herbal medicine as part of evidence-based medicine is far from the homeopathic treatment. Medicinal herbs contain strong active ingredients - in contrast to the ineffective sugar balls.
Acts homeopathy?
Patients often report an improved condition through homeopathic 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. The afflicted, often emotionally afflicted, left alone, see a professional listening to them. Physician or non-medical practitioner and patient actually do a talking therapy, in which the sugar balls have symbolic meaning.
Conversation instead of globules
This psychotherapy activates self-healing, which can explain the success of the treatment and makes it clear why many people still do not care about the lack of scientific evidence on the effects of homeopathy: their experiences are more important than studies. (Dr.Utz Anhalt)