The Charity Commission’s Failure to Stop Quack Charities – The Quackometer Blog

The regulator of charities in the UK, the Charity Commission, is undertaking a consultation into how it should approach registering charities that promote so-called Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM). The Commission have an obligation to ensure that only organisations that provide a benefit to the public gain the benefit of charitable status. CAM, by definition, is the set of medical beliefs and practices that are based on pseudoscientific and superstitious belief systems that lack scientific rationale and robust evidence. Promoting such practices, therefore, calls into direct question the ability of the charity to actually provide a public benefit. Furthermore, such beliefs may actually harm...

Full post here: The Charity Commission’s Failure to Stop Quack Charities – The Quackometer Blog

The False Hope of the Hufeland Klinik – The Quackometer Blog

Wales Online reports the tragic story of a two-year old girl with stage-four neuroblastoma. I cannot imagine the emotions the parents must be going through. I am sure if my children were ever in this position, I would consider anything to save them. Such desperation though provides rich pickings for those offering miracle cures and dubious treatments. As a society, we do a very poor job of protecting children and parents from such questionable practices...

Read full story: The False Hope of the Hufeland Klinik – The Quackometer Blog

The Futility of Finding Physical Explanations for Homeopathy – The Quackometer Blog

From the very first decades of homeopathy’s existence in the early 19th Century, mainstream scientists have dismissed its claims for one simple reason: the extremely dilute nature of the remedies. As Oliver Wendell Holmes remarked in 1842 “So much ridicule has been thrown upon the pretended powers of the minute doses”.

Read the full post at The Futility of Finding Physical Explanations for Homeopathy – The Quackometer Blog

Chris Heaton-Harris MP Resurrects Lord Saatchi’s Zombie Quacks’ Charter. | The Quackometer Blog

Lord Saatchi has been trying for a number of years now to introduce a law that would drive a coach and horses through well established medical negligence law. The effect of the law would be to seriously erode a patient’s right to sue a doctor if they were harmed through negligence. Under the Saatchi Law, a doctor who would currently be found acting without proper care would be free from fear of claims against them. Maverick doctors, quacks and profiteering doctors could recklessly practice without worry, treating their patients as guinea pigs, uncontrolled test subjects and sales opportunities for untested treatments. Drug companies could push unproven treatments to the dying without knowing about potential harmful effects. Quacks could exploit desperate patients with nonsense treatments...

Read the rest here: Chris Heaton-Harris MP Resurrects Lord Saatchi’s Zombie Quacks’ Charter. | The Quackometer Blog

Your Perfect Homeopathy Kit for Christmas | The Quackometer Blog

Have you over-done it this Christmas?

Don’t worry. That homeopathic pharmacy to the Royals has the perfect remedy kit to see you through the following days.
Ainsworths Pharmacy is pleased to bring you the following remedies. Remember, these are homeopathic medicinal product used within the homeopathic tradition for the symptomatic relief of Christmas overindulgence.

More on this at: Your Perfect Homeopathy Kit for Christmas | The Quackometer Blog

Homeopath Finds a Cure for Ebola: Violin Music | The Quackometer Blog

Peter Chappell has previous form. I wrote in 2007 how he was creating MP3 files that he claimed could treat Malaria and HIV. The Society of Homeopaths held a symposium to discuss his ideas.

Chappell now has a new web site: http://boosters4africa.com/. On this site he is promoting a new MP3 file that plays some violin music. He claims that listening to these files can treat and prevent ebola...

Read more on this dangerous insanity here: Homeopath Finds a Cure for Ebola: Violin Music | The Quackometer Blog

Ottolenghi and the Quack HIV Homeopaths in Africa | The Quackometer Blog

This blog has been a long term critic of the Society of Homeopaths, and other British Homeopathic organisations, who support their members who practice homeopathy in Africa on people with life threatening conditions such as malaria, HIV and TB. Indeed, the Society of Homeopaths threatened to sue me and my web hosts for pointing out that the Society did nothing to stop these dangerous
practices, despite their Code of Ethics suggesting they should and despite the fact that treating people with homeopathic sugar pills could kill them if it interfered with real medical attention.

The subject has received its fair share of media attention too, with BBC Newsnight performing ‘secret camera’ investigations into UK homeopaths who give travellers sugar pills instead of malaria tablets when travelling to Africa. The BBC also found Neal’s Yard Remedies offering similar lethal advice.


The Independent,working with the Kenyan Standard newspaper and the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, found UK-funded homeopathy groups telling people with HIV they will not need ARV drugs if they take homeopathy – lethal advice.

Read more about this horrific exploitation of a serious chronic illness by evangelistic quacks here: Ottolenghi and the Quack HIV Homeopaths in Africa | The Quackometer Blog