Homeopathy
Mar. 7th, 2010 04:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
duncanLast weekend I went to see Oxford West and Abingdon MP Evan Harris talk at Skeptics in the Pub, where one of the subjects he brought up was homeopathy. Afterwards I had a chat with him about EDM 908, where some rather silly MPs are gathering to support homeopathy being available on the NHS.
According to Evan Harris, many MPs will sign pretty much any EDM that more than one of their constituents writes to them in support of. I assume this is the excuse he'd give for seven of his Liberal Democrat colleagues having signed EDM 908.
This means it is crucial to inform your MP not just when there is something they should sign, but also when there is something they really really shouldn't. You could save your MP the embarrassment of joining what Ben Goldacre recently referred to as a convenient one-stop list of parliament's most scientifically ignorant MPs
My MP never signs any EDMs, so I didn't need to mention it to him in this letter I just sent via WriteToThem.
Dear Andrew Smith,
I am writing to you today on the subject of homeopathy. As I am sure you will be aware, the Commons Science and Technology Committee has recently published a report titled 'Evidence Check 2: Homeopathy' (http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmselect/cmsctech/45/45.pdf). This report concludes that there is no evidence that homeopathy works beyond the placebo effect. In fact, it goes further and states that the question of whether homeopathy works is settled, that there is no point in wasting resources on further trials, and that it would be unethical to put patients through such trials rather than giving them real treatments.
In these times of reduced means, it is important that the NHS spends our money on treatments that are known to work. But more importantly, any NHS involvement in homeopathy lends this frankly ridiculous pseudo-medicine credibility, and may well confuse patients into doing things like taking homeopathic 'remedies' instead of vaccinations.
Please encourage the government to accept the report in full and implement all of its recommendations.
Yours sincerely,
Duncan Parkes
According to Evan Harris, many MPs will sign pretty much any EDM that more than one of their constituents writes to them in support of. I assume this is the excuse he'd give for seven of his Liberal Democrat colleagues having signed EDM 908.
This means it is crucial to inform your MP not just when there is something they should sign, but also when there is something they really really shouldn't. You could save your MP the embarrassment of joining what Ben Goldacre recently referred to as a convenient one-stop list of parliament's most scientifically ignorant MPs
My MP never signs any EDMs, so I didn't need to mention it to him in this letter I just sent via WriteToThem.
Dear Andrew Smith,
I am writing to you today on the subject of homeopathy. As I am sure you will be aware, the Commons Science and Technology Committee has recently published a report titled 'Evidence Check 2: Homeopathy' (http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmselect/cmsctech/45/45.pdf). This report concludes that there is no evidence that homeopathy works beyond the placebo effect. In fact, it goes further and states that the question of whether homeopathy works is settled, that there is no point in wasting resources on further trials, and that it would be unethical to put patients through such trials rather than giving them real treatments.
In these times of reduced means, it is important that the NHS spends our money on treatments that are known to work. But more importantly, any NHS involvement in homeopathy lends this frankly ridiculous pseudo-medicine credibility, and may well confuse patients into doing things like taking homeopathic 'remedies' instead of vaccinations.
Please encourage the government to accept the report in full and implement all of its recommendations.
Yours sincerely,
Duncan Parkes
