This should be a crime

Giving smallpox infected blankets to Native Americans = using homeopathy to treat Africans... a lot of people are going to die.

It's one thing to sell a product that claims to have magical curative powers to people in developed first world countries were we can say "They should have known better" and "They could have checked the Internet to find out that it doesn't work". But to do this in rural Tanzania‽ This particular quack has started the "Homoeopathy for Health in Africa" project, "specifically intended to help patients with AIDS". In 2008 he claimed to have treated 40 people with AIDS, one of whom was totally negative. He is going back to Tanzania to put more lives at risk do more research. Homeopathy/homoeopathy doesn't work, there is no way it can work, there is no reason it should work. It might have made sense a long time ago, now it should be laughed at along with other primitive and archaic practices like bloodletting, using leeches, chiseling holes in the head to let out evil spirits and tobacco smoke enema's.

Tanzania...there is no reason why you have to accept people like this as doctors. They are not medical doctors and they do not have the best interests of your citizens in mind. It would benefit you greatly if you passed laws (or enforced them if they already exist) regarding practicing medicine without a license. A homeopath (also spelled homoeopath) is NOT a medical doctor, even if they do put Dr. in front of their name. While your at it...naturopaths (ND's or Dr. of naturopathy) are not medical doctors (MD's) either. Don't be fooled! Stop these people at the airport and put them on the next plane home before they cause any more damage.

Boiron and Oscillococcinum: fairy dust diluted out of (non)existence

You know the details of how homeopathy is supposed to work, right? If not review this and come back when you're done...

James "the Amazing" Randi on the subject of homeopathy/homoeopathy

That was the serious version, this is the not so serious version...

via Luke Surl Comics

Boiron, a company that sells homeopathic nostrums, has threatened Italian blogger Samuele Riva who dared point out that there is no active ingredient in Oscillococcinum (which anyone can see by understanding basic chemistry, how homeopathy works, and reading the back of the package).

Many people don't know what homeopathy is or say "What's the Harm?" and it is showing up on more and more pharmacy shelves, like Walmart, CVS, Target. So I'm posting this not only to contribute to the Streisand Effect, but also to raise awareness of the fact that there are major retailers selling homeopathic products.

And to the people at Boiron... if you want me to link to your site instead of the other sites when I'm talking about Oscillococcinum, then that would be advertising and I expect a large sum of money. If you want bloggers to give up our free speech rights, and not say bad things about you when it's in the public interest, then you can take all that money, put it in a blender and grind it up to dust. Then put a ml of it into 99 ml of water (hope that water doesn't have any memories of money that might have been in it before), do the magical shake-shake-shake...take 1 ml of that put it into a different 99 ml of water, repeat the shaking... repeat that about 200 times and send that last 100 ml to me...I'll be the richest person in the Universe!

* The thing in the title about "fairy dust diluted out of (non)existence" comes from Steven Novella's article at Science Based Medicine about Oscillococcinum.

** Time Magazine seems to agree. Homeopathic flu remedies is the #1 thing they say you should stop buying. I didn't mention that Oscillococcinum is being sold to treat "influenza-like symptoms". Many people might mistake that to mean that it treats influenza, which isn't what it's claiming. There are homeopaths who claim there are homeopathic treatments for influenza, which should be a crime. It can be dangerous to lead people to believe that it treats the flu...people die from the flu.