All in your Head? (for my parents to read!)

As you walk into my parents’ room, stacked on top of one another, you’ll find a plethora of different homeopathic medicines: Kali Bichromicum to control my mom’s migraines, Arnica, Magnesia phosphorica for those intolerable period cramps, and many others.

Homeopathy is “a medical system based on the belief that the body can cure itself,” according to WebMD, and basically involves using natural substances like plants and minerals in order to treat the body, quite different from our conventional drugs. The most basic principle of homeopathic treatments is that “like cures like,” or in other words, an illness can be treated by the same thing that creates similar symptoms in healthy people.

Homeopathic medicine quite contradicts the whole object of medicine in that homeopaths (homeopathic health practitioners) take very small amounts of plants and minerals and highly dilute them by adding either water or alcohol. So essentially, there is very little medicine to the treatment and a whole lot more dependency on the body’s ability to self treat.

One of the most common substances used in homeopathic medicines is red onion: it makes a person cry in the kitchen, but homeopaths believe that in the same way, a red onion can be used to reverse allergies as per the “like cures like” idea (“What is Homeopathy?”). Sometimes, the most unbelievable substances are used in homeopathic medicines including poison ivy, deadly nightshade, and even crushed bees! But for the most part, thankfully, herbs are the common go to substance for many homeopaths. Homeopathy is used to treat a range of conditions like migraines, allergies, depression, chronic fatigue syndrome, and even arthritis.

Now, the major problem arises in the labeling of these homeopathic medicines and the gullibility of many people. A 2012 systematic review found that not all products labeled “homeopathic” are actually diluted enough, therefore, making the ingredients such as mercury or iron much more active and toxic to a person (“Homeopathy”). Additionally, sometimes people replace their standard treatments with homeopathic medicine and put complete faith into these pills, which is inadvisable especially when dealing with life-threatening illnesses, like asthma, cancer, and heart disease (“Homeopathy”). Regardless of what homeopaths say, there is absolutely no scientific evidence suggesting that it is more reliable.

Even more recent studies suggest that at the end of the day, the success of homeopathic medicines should be attributed to the placebo effect. A “placebo effect” is a positive or negative response to a placebo (substances that appear to be drugs but are not) caused by subjects’ belief that they are taking real drugs. If it really is a placebo, should it always be used as a treatment even in extreme cases or is it best to stick with standard treatments? Homeopaths claim that their medicine creates a physiological response, which in turn can treat an illness (Schwarcz 1). As per Dr. Joe Schwarcz, however, homeopathy is a pseudoscience and questions whether it is truly possible for “mysterious aura of salt…[to have] engaged in a chemical reaction”? (Schwarcz 1).

Countries like the United Kingdom have stopped funding homeopathy so why do people like my parents still use them and fully believe that it actually works? Is it all in their heads and more specifically, the placebo effect or can its success actually be attributed to molecular auras?

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Works Cited:

“Homeopathy.” National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health, U.S. Department of

Health and Human Services, www.nccih.nih.gov/health/homeopathy.

Homeopathy: The Controversy Ensues. 5 July 2017, www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/quackery/homeopathy-

controversy-ensues.

Homeopathy: What You Need to Know. 22 Mar. 2019, www.webmd.com/balance/what-is-

homeopathy.