Homeopathy

Homeopathy has been in the news again lately. There was a discussion between David Tredinnick MP [Conservative] and writer Simon Singh on Radio 4's 'Today' programme on the 24th June where surprisingly the MP was FOR homeopathy and the writer was AGAINST it. Surprising also for me to agree so wholeheartedly with a Conservative MP!

Then on Tuesday at the BMA's annual conference in Brighton there was a vote which stated 'The NHS should stop funding homeopathy and it should no longer be marketed as a medicine in pharmacies' according to

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/10449430.stm

and other web pages. Am I cynical in wondering whether the drug companies are behind some of this unrest? After all drug companies make big money from their products, homeopathy is a really 'cheap alternative' [sorry about the pun!]

When I see these sort of statements I always wonder what people are so worried about. We as a family have used homeopathic medicine alongside conventional medicine for over 30 years, so obviously we believe it works. I would never be so prescriptive [oops another bad pun!] as to say that anyone should only use homeopathic medicine but would certainly say it is worth trying. After all not every convential medicine suits everyone, often different antibiotics have to be tried before an appropriate one can be found, for example.

An individual has the right to 'own' his/her body and take part in the management of any disease or drug regime. I know this to my cost having ended up in hospital on more than one occasion due to the inappropriate prescription of convential drugs by doctors - well meaning as they were. I have to use convential drugs to keep me going, as it were, but I use homeopathic ones as well and am convinced this helps me keep my 'drug quota' down, which can only be a good thing, surely? When my children were small I used homeopathic drugs alongside convential medicine and always thought if it saved one lot of antibiotic prescriptions in, say, four, again surely that was a good thing?!

Today's picture is of Samuel Hahneman, the 'discoverer' of homeopathic medicine. To find out more about him go to:

http://www.heilkunst.com/biography.html