No more homeopathy on the NHS, MPs demand
By politics.co.uk staff
A damning new report on the use of homeopathy in the NHS by an influential panel of MPs has demanded an end to government funding of the controversial treatments.
The science and technology committee also said the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) should not allow homeopathic product labels to make medical claims without evidence of efficacy.
“We were seeking to determine whether the government’s policies on homeopathy are evidence based on current evidence,” committee chairman Phil Willis said.
“They are not.
The committee’s investigation into the evidence base of government policies on homeopathy fund a distinct mismatch between the evidence and the policy.
It concluded that further trials of homeopathic treatments could not be justified and that homeopathy “is a placebo treatment”.
The government is reluctant to address the appropriateness and ethics of prescribing placebos to patients, which usually relies on some degree of patient deception, the report concludes.
“It sets an unfortunate precedent for the Department of Health to consider that the existence of a community which believes that homeopathy works is ‘evidence’ enough to continue spending public money on it,” Mr Willis said.
“This also sends out a confused message, and has potentially harmful consequences.”
