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Massive Recall of Homeopathic Kids' Products Spotlights Dubious Health Claims (arstechnica.com)
Earlier this week, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a statement that the homeopathic drug company King Bio is recalling 32 of its children's pain-relievers. According to the FDA, a "small percentage" of those products tested positive for bacterial contamination during regular, random testing by King Bio. From a report: The announcement does not provide any specifics about the contamination or potential risks. However, the North Carolina-based manufacturer behind the recall, King Bio, issued a similar announcement back in July. At that time, the company recalled three other products after an FDA inspection found batches contaminated with the bacteria Pseudomonas brenneri, Pseudomonas fluorescens, and Burkholderia multivorans. Pseudomonas brenneri is a bacterium recently found in natural mineral waters, and its clinical significance is murky. However, Pseudomonas fluorescens is known to be an opportunistic pathogen, causing blood infections, and Burkholderia multivorans can cause infections in people with compromised immune systems and cystic fibrosis. It was also recently found to be a rare but emerging cause of meningitis. King Bio did not respond to Ars' request for comment on the contamination, its potential source, or the company's actions to prevent further contamination.
Homeopathic products, as Ars readers are likely familiar, are those based on a pseudoscientific belief that substances generating similar symptoms to an ailment can cure that ailment, aka the "law of similars." The potentially dangerous substances are generally safe to consume because homeopaths believe that "vigorous shaking" and excessive dilution -- often to the point where no atoms of the original substance remain -- make them more effective. As King Bio puts it, this preparation "potentizes" the substances. King Bio told the FDA that the items of concern were a group of various over-the-counter remedies produced between August 1, 2017 and April 2018.
Homeopathic products, as Ars readers are likely familiar, are those based on a pseudoscientific belief that substances generating similar symptoms to an ailment can cure that ailment, aka the "law of similars." The potentially dangerous substances are generally safe to consume because homeopaths believe that "vigorous shaking" and excessive dilution -- often to the point where no atoms of the original substance remain -- make them more effective. As King Bio puts it, this preparation "potentizes" the substances. King Bio told the FDA that the items of concern were a group of various over-the-counter remedies produced between August 1, 2017 and April 2018.
One time I forgot to take my homeopathic medicine and I overdosed.
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
Can we please cut the bullshit and call it what it is - "non-science". It's not "pseudo" anything. It's complete horseshit backed by no science. Stop giving these dumb motherfuckers credibility.
TIL there are "homeopathic kids products".....
WTF. Don't do this to your kids.
This is clearly child abuse to deprive your children of actual medical care.
If you're going to peddle water as phony medicine, you should at least have the decency to sterilize the water and the container before you push it on your marks. And filter the water, for that matter. If it's not bacterial contamination, it's metals or whatever leeches out of the pipes or storage areas.
I'm in favor of regulating the entire sector out of existence, unless we just want homeopathy to be a form of social Darwinism, but I feel like that's unfair to the children of the idiots who buy into this bullshit. They'd probably just go back to crystals and magnets, though.
Created by the comedy team "That Mitchell and Webb Look":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
I will make one exception - arnica montana That is actually because it isn't really homeopathic.
It is an infusion of the flowers of the arnica Montana daisy in vodka or isopropyl alcohol, and used as a spray to eliminate pain. just keep it out of cuts.
And it works, performing a pretty good numbing effect, and smells pretty good - like fresly mown hay.
Living with daily pain, and being allergic to opioids, I need something to ease my poor abused joints.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
or more tragic. Homeopaths believe "Like cures like", "Water has memory" and that the more you dilute something the more effective it is at curing. So they put poison in water and dilute it until the poison is gone. Then they sell that as "medicine".
Sometimes they screw up and don't dilute enough. When they do that kids get sick and die. It's usually the kids since adults can often survive (being older).
That said, most homeopaths aren't idiots, they're desperate. Especially in America. We don't guarantee healthcare. Lots of people can't afford it. So they turn to something to give them hope. It doesn't help that homeopathy is sold in packaging that looks like medicine and thanks to easily bought off politicians can make medical claims with a wink and a nod. There is the occasional person who buys homeopathy thinking they just bought real medicine because it's often sold right next to real medicine and in packaging that makes it look like real medicine.
But it's mostly desperate people without healthcare looking for hope. Most human being can't live without hope, so they'll take it where ever they can find it. They're easy prey.
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Just what I need. This presents the perfect opportunity for me to market to these parents my latest book: 8 Do It Yourself Homeopathic Recipes You Can't Live Without
Here's a sneak peak at the book:
Table of Contents
1. Homeopathic Birth Control - page 1
2. Homeopathic Nausea Relief - page 1
3. Homeopathic Constipation Relief - page 1
4. Homeopathic Diarrhea Relief - page 1
5. Homeopathic Antacid - page 1
6. Homeopathic Plan B - page 1
7. Homeopathic Epidural - page 1
8. Homeopathic Sodium Thiopental - page 1
It might work, if you believe in it. Like all placebos.
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
It's what happens when snake oil salesmen discover water is cheaper to procure than actual snake oil.
and in America you're discouraged from discussing wages. I have friends at work and we flaunt that (as we're legally entitled to). I make a lot more than some of them, and less than others. We all pay the same for health insurance, but my ability to meet copays is better than theirs (since I make more). And I'll say this, I have excellent insurance and I still pay $2400 before it kicks in and 20% after that. My Bro's, which is worse, doesn't kick in until $10k and it's 40% after that.
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and I don't think there are too many of these, but they do exist, are spiritualists. America has become a lot less religious, but oddly enough some folks miss it. So they turn to crap like homeopathy and Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop. Again, they're not dumb. They know what they're doing is silly. But they're doing it to fill a void. These ones are, in my experience, few and far enough between to be mostly harmless.
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If you visit a homeopath for a non life-threatening condition and he listens to you and gives you something that cannot harm you and you get a sense of optimism and a sense of control that you are doing something to get well, it only helps your body do what it is supposed to do -- heal itself. Does it not? It doesn't matter that homeopathy is outside of science when health to a large part is outside of science.
All negations of homeopathy are based on chemistry but you are not a sack of chemical reactions gone wrong.
As a parent, you suddenly learn that due to various overdosing in the past, nothing is recommended for young kids. So parents see their kids in pointless agony over teathing or toddler colds, etc and find nothing at the store for them. Except for homeopathic crap. If you won't sell what works, people will find something else to try.
Homeopathy is to medicine what Donald Trump is to America.
The Russians have won. They have made the world a cesspool of distrust, greed, fear and hate.
It doesn't matter that homeopathy is outside of science when health to a large part is outside of science.
To paraphrase Pauli, that statement is so incorrect it isn't even wrong.
Keep reading this site until you understand better, please.
https://sciencebasedmedicine.o...
All negations of homeopathy are based on chemistry but you are not a sack of chemical reactions gone wrong.
"Negations of homeopathy" are based on a very facile understanding of chemistry and the causes of disease. Your body is a sack of unbelievably complicated chemical reactions operating under ideally homeostatic conditions. It's common for those processes to go out of whack from time to time. Usually your body can fix those processes itself. Sometimes it needs help. That's what modern medicine is for.
My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
The problem is that people who understand that homeopathy is bollocks, won't visit them for any reason. Those that believe homeopathy works will try to use it for serious conditions and the homeopaths will try and treat them anyway and won't tell them to go and see a real doctor.
The fact that some people will see a homeopath for serious conditions that need proper treatment is why it is harmful.
If you visit a homeopath for a non life-threatening condition and he listens to you and gives you something that cannot harm you and you get a sense of optimism and a sense of control that you are doing something to get well, it only helps your body do what it is supposed to do -- heal itself. Does it not? It doesn't matter that homeopathy is outside of science when health to a large part is outside of science.
All negations of homeopathy are based on chemistry but you are not a sack of chemical reactions gone wrong.
As Stephen Colbert might note, this is truthiness writ large.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
Your assumption here is that chemistry-based medicine is the most effective approach to treating ALL conditions. Even medical doctors would disagree with you. The good ones anyway.
n/t
Have gnu, will travel.
All negations of homeopathy are based on chemistry but you are not a sack of chemical reactions gone wrong.
No, you're a brain in a sack of chemical reactions and bacteria which often goes wrong.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Drinking water does not cure pain, of course that medication would fail.
If I understand what you mean (as brain is organic matter just as much as the rest of the body) I think those are medical views from circa 1950s. E.g. now we have good reasons to believe that gut bacteria for example influences our decision making. The whole is not just the sum of the parts.
It seems like a clinical trial is a nice simple truth detector but the truth is often too nuanced for this tool. Studies on acupuncture (which is also outside of our scientific framework) when done by Eastern medical doctors show higher effectiveness than when done by their Western counterparts, for whatever variety of reasons.
That said I agree, clinical trials are at least some tool, and as far as I know they show homeopathy is as effective as placebo. Which is better than nothing, since the placebo effect is not trivial to induce.
The whole is not just the sum of the parts.
No, it's the product of its parts.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
It seems like a clinical trial is a nice simple truth detector but the truth is often too nuanced for this tool. Studies on acupuncture (which is also outside of our scientific framework) when done by Eastern medical doctors show higher effectiveness than when done by their Western counterparts, for whatever variety of reasons.
"Whatever reasons?". The reasons are simple; bias and poor methodology. A properly designed and executed double-blind study will have the same results regardless of where it's done. The fact that there are shoddy studies out there does not mean that "the truth is too nuanced for this tool" any more than the fact that there are crappy mechanics out there means you need to take your car to a homeopathic mechanic. It just means we need to look at the good studies and ignore the bad ones.
That said I agree, clinical trials are at least some tool, and as far as I know they show homeopathy is as effective as placebo. Which is better than nothing, since the placebo effect is not trivial to induce.
This is just nonsense. The placebo effect is trivially easy to induce. When I'm sick I drink a cup of tea, and I feel better. Even just talking to someone about how you feel, and having them listen and respond with compassion, induces a placebo response. Different types of "intervention" may generate a stronger or weaker placebo response, but let's not pretend that this is some massively complex thing which you need a multibillion dollar industry for.
A properly designed and executed double-blind study will have the same results regardless of where it's done.
This article of faith reminds me of what Nassim Taleb said, "We have managed to transfer religious belief into gullibility for whatever can masquerade as science."
This article of faith reminds me of what Nassim Taleb said, "We have managed to transfer religious belief into gullibility for whatever can masquerade as science."
And this is how I know that you are as much of an idiot as Taleb. What I've stated is no more "an article of faith" than if I were to say that when someone flicks a light switch the lights will come on regardless of whether the person doing the flicking is Chinese or European. The fact that you see it as an article of faith only demonstrates that you have no clue what's going on.
Your name calling is stupid and your views are limited -- and limiting -- but I respect your zeal for wanting to know reality. That quality seems to be depressingly rare among intellectuals today. Check out the book "An Introduction To General Systems Thinking" by Gerald Weinberg, written in the 70s and stood the test of time.
I'm glad you've found a way to make yourself feel superior to all intellectuals; I'm sure you need some kind of ego boost in your life. However, you may want to think about keeping your smugness to yourself, so that the rest of us aren't put in the position of having to point out your ignorance.
Your assumption here is that chemistry-based medicine is the most effective approach to treating ALL conditions
As distinct from magic-based medicine?
Considering our present knowledge of the human body, healing in general is often the result of "magic". We may observe that something happened but do not know why that happened. If that's not magic, I don't know what is.
And regarding the original topic,
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...
"CONCLUSIONS:
Homeopathic intervention offered positive health changes to a substantial proportion of a large cohort of patients with a wide range of chronic diseases. Additional observational research, including studies using different designs, is necessary for further research development in homeopathy."
Again you do not observe the chemical effect of sugar pills in isolation. The "system" here is the patient with his own motivations and concerns and the homeopath to talks to him and gives him herbal remedies and other advice.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/p...
What is that study supposed to prove? They asked people who chose homeopathic care after a traditional medical intervention if they think homeopathy helps. It's not a study, it's a questionnaire. They don't even compare it to regular post-intervention care. It's like asking people who visit a chiropractor if they think going to the chiropractor helps. I'm somewhat shocked 30% said the homeopathic care didn't help in a study set up this way.
My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
It's supposed to prove that "Additional observational research, including studies using different designs, is necessary for further research development in homeopathy."
"but you are not a sack of chemical reactions gone wrong.", That is exactly what we all are. Just a bunch of chemicals. There is nothing else, no magic, no soul, nothing. "It doesn't matter that homeopathy (sic) is outside of science when health to a large part is outside of science." What part of health care is outside of science?
Sounds like "This shows nothing, can someone do a real trail?" to me. There has probably been enough research, it does not work, it can not work, it is not science..
Still just chemicals in the body...
I'm interpreting your post as a desperate subconscious wish for someone to prove you wrong. "You" as in what you consciously believe.
I can't be that person, sorry. But if if my interpretation is correct it shows there's a part of you that still wishes to believe, to dream, to hope, to live. Try to find a way to give that part in you a little more space to spread, to grow, to flourish. It will make life feel good again.