badscienceblogs

Systems biology is all the rage, No surprise then, to see the University of Westminster advertising a job for a systems biologist in the The Department of Molecular and Applied Biosciences. Well, no surprise there -until you read the small print. Much has been wriiten here about the University of Westminster, which remains the biggest [...]

NHS Scotland are advertising a job for a ’specialty doctor in homeopathy’, which pays up to £68,638. They are also letting go of hundreds of other staff who have actual jobs. Obviously this is fucking stupid, and so several bloggers have applied for it already, and obviously so have I. You can read their supporting [...]

Having recently been fired from Ofquack, the Complementary and Natural Healthcare Council (CNHC). I found I was missing the constant dribble of double-speak, Then, as luck would have it, a friend emailed me to draw my attention to a lucrative job at Ninewells Hospital, Dundee.  On August 11th I put out a tweet, just in [...]

Yesterday I was fired from the Conduct and Competence Committee of the CNHC. That is the organisation that was very quickly dubbed Ofquack in the blogosphere.  So now I am free to write what I like about about it. It has now become clear that voluntary self-regulation can not work. Recent events at the CNHC [...]

A letter to my MP regarding the government response to the Select Committee’s evidence check on homeopathy.

Suggested twitter tag: #buckgate

Number 19 Buckingham Street, London WC2N 6EF.is to be the home of the proposed "College of Medicine" that has arisen from the ashes of the late unlamented Prince’s Foundation for Integrated Health (their last accounts can be seen at Quackometer).
Naturally one must ask if the "College [...]

If something has to be believed in for it to work properly, it doesn’t work properly.

Germany’s system of mandatory universal healthcare is the oldest in Europe; in fact, we’ve been commies since the 1880s …only some 3 decades after Marx and Engels wrote their Communist Manifesto.

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In May, the British Medical Association’s annual conference of junior doctors declared that homeopathy is witchcraft and now the BMA’s conference in Brighton has voted overwhelmingly against commissioning or funding for homeopathic remedies or homeopathic hospitals in the health service. They also want training posts in homeopathic hospitals scrapped.

What’s more, pharmacists should remove homeopathic remedies from their shelves because this strongly suggests to the public they are medicines. Instead they should be put in a section marked ‘placebos’.

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Tory MP David Treddinick is calling for an Early Day Motion (EDM). He has found a study that apparently shows homeopathy is beneficial in the treatment of breast cancer.

The Abstract of the Texan study begins: ‘The use of ultra-diluted natural products in the management of disease and treatment of cancer has generated a lot of interest and controversy’.

In other words, here we go again.

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Western herbal medicine need not be mystical nonsense, but it usually it is, 
Plants often contain chemicals that have pharmacological actions, with all the possibilities for good and for harm that implies (see Plants
as medicines).  It would be quite possible to teach about the plant constituents and their actions in an [...]

“Homeopathy is witchcraft” said Dr Tom Dolphin, deputy chairman of the BMA’s junior doctors committee at their annual conference in May. It seems the rest of the delegates agreed, since they passed a motion denouncing the use of alternative therapies where there was no evidence for their effectiveness.

I’m no expert on medicine or homeopathy. Witchcraft on the other hand …

Is the good doctor right? Or is he recklessly impugning homeopaths? Or witches?

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This post is about a product called Esperanza Homeopathic Neuropeptide which is marketed for the treatment of multiple sclerosis. 
The case is still under investigation by the Medicines & Health Regulatory Authority (MHRA) but so little has been done in the last six months, I thought it was time to bring this heartless scam to [...]

The term ‘evidence-based medicine’ seemed to me, when I first heard it, utterly ludicrous. It still does. What’s the alternative? Guess-work based medicine?
Quacks are fond of using cuddly words like ‘holistic’ and ‘integrative’, partly, one suspects, in an attempt to gain respectability and to disguise some of their barmier views. See, for example, Prince [...]

The British Medical Association’s annual conference of junior doctors has declared that homeopathy is witchcraft. They have voted for a blanket ban and an end to all placements for trainee doctors to teach them homeopathic principles.

Dr Tom Dolphin, deputy chairman of the BMA’s junior doctors committee in England told the conference: “Homeopathy is witchcraft. It is a disgrace that nestling between the National Hospital for Neurology and Great Ormond Street there is a National Hospital for Homeopathy which is paid for by the NHS”.

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Hot off the press
The Prince’s Foundation for Integrated Health (FIH) has been spreading misinformation about medicine since 1993.  It has featured often on this blog.
Now it has closed its doors.

An announcement has appeared on the FIH website

30 April 2010

The Trustees of The Prince’s Foundation for Integrated Health have decided to [...]

I voted labour in every election (apart from my very first) up to and including 1997.  This is about my feelings for the 2010 election.  Make up your own mind (but don’t let Rupert Murdoch manipulate you).

Downloadable button from Mark Golding at http://www.coia.org.uk
Don’t Get Fooled Again “I agree with Rupert“

By 2001 election, I [...]

There are very few scientifically literate, evidence-based and openly secular MPs in parliament. Dr Evan Harris has been the LibDem MP for Oxford West and Abingdon since May 1997 and is standing again at this election. I’ve never voted LibDem but I do support him for his work on scientific research, medicine, free speech, equality and secularism. He backed Simon Singh in his libel case and has actively supported Skeptics in the Pub, a group I belong to - most recently in our 1023 homeopathy campaign. He is the LibDem spokesman for science and serves on Parliament’s Human Rights Select Committee.

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This article, is a response to this article:

http://hpathy.com/homeopathy-papers/africa-the-last-frontier-the-battle-…

I’m also going to try to post this response in their comments, to see what reply I get.

Hey, I’ve got a great idea to get more homeopathic treatment funded by the WHO, for treatment of AIDS and malaria in Africa.

Prove it works! Do that, and I’m sure you’ll get lots of funding.

South Africa has a great reputation with homeopathy does it? If I’m not mistaken, I do believe they have the worst rates of AIDS then any other african nation, even though they are the richest? Directly a result from their AIDS denialist health ministers and head of government? What about Matthias Rath?

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It is currently WHAW – World Homeopathy Awareness Week – so let’s be aware.
Sponsored by professional associations and businesses selling homeopathic remedies, WHAW is the creation of the non-profit volunteer organisation WHAO – who began WHAW in order to “promote homeopathic awareness all around the world”. Let the awareness-raising begin.
Science-Based Medicine give an answer to [...]

Yet another university has stopped its homeopathy course. The particular interest of this course was that it was being run at Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen, the vice-chancellor which was Michael Pittilo, until his recent premature death. Pittilo is the person who recommended to the government that herbalists and Chinese medicine practitioners should get honours [...]

Jerome Burne posts on Patrick Holford’s blog about the need to “Save NHS money on ineffective drugs, not homeopathy”. Some self-reflection would be helpful, here.

Malaria in the news, yet again.
Today I had a not-very-friendly letter from Kate Birch

From: kate birch <katebhom@hotmail.com>
To: david colquhoun <d.colquhoun@ucl.ac.uk>
Subject: FW: Abha Light Products: Announcing NEW MalariX InfoSheet
As I said we keep on working. while you and your kangaroo committee put on a good show. [...]

Jump to follow-up
An‘early day motion1 (EDM 908) has been tabled in parliament which opposes the conclusions of the science and technology committee report on the evidence for homeopathy. After two weeks it has been signed by an amazing 49 MPs. That is 7.6% of all 646 MPs.  Nothing shows more clearly the scientific illiteracy that [...]

It’s fair to say that 2010 hasn’t been a vintage year for homeopathy so far. At the end of January, a mass public ‘overdose’ by critics aiming to demonstrate the fact that homeopathic remedies contain no active ingredients received widespread coverage. Weeks later, the Science & Technology Select Committee released a report that damned not just homeopathy, but the homeopaths themselves, ultimately concluding that homeopathy works no better than placebo, and that NHS funding for the alternative medicine should be scrapped.

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In the wake of the report by the Science and Technology Committee (STC) on the lack of evidence for homeopathy, and the Chinese medicine poisoning, the BBC carried at least three very bad reports. Being a strong supporter of the BBC that saddens me. 
Nevertheless it has to be said that the BBC does not [...]

Yes, it’s that most boring of non-medicine topics, homeopathy, again.  At lunchtime on Thursday I got a call from a Times journallst, Fay Schopen, to ask if I could do 500 words on the Science and Technology Committee’s Evidence Check report on homeopathy. Bang goes another evening.  The (im)balance was provided by Sara Eames, President [...]

To discover how honest homeopaths are, here is a passage from the Society of Homeopaths’ website, edited for accuracy:
Homeopathy simply explained: What is Homeopathy?
Homeopathy is an effective system of healing which assists the natural tendency of the body to heal itself. It recognises that symptoms of ill health are expressions of disharmony within the whole person [...]

In the words of one blogger, “the Select Committee was biased - biased by the evidence.” Today the Science and Technology Select Committee delivered their verdict on homeopathy, and it was devastating. The committee have called for the complete withdrawal of NHS funding and MHRA licensing of homeopathy.

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