The CNHC won't be publishing my complaints

Following my complaints to the CNHC about 14 reflexologists claiming to treat specific diseases without any credible evidence, you may have noticed that nothing has yet appeared on the CNHC’s decisions page.

I contacted Maggie Dunn about this matter. It appears that because my complaints were dealt with before it got through to the conduct and competence committee, they do not intend to publish the details on the web site, nor do they intend on ever naming the offending practitioners.

I do not believe that they intend to go any further than this press release published in December 2009 congratulating themselves on a job well done.

With still no clarification from the CNHC on what practitioners are allowed to claim, it seems likely that there are many more CNHC members continuing to do exactly the same with no worry about regulation.

Maybe it’s time to submit a few more complaints.

Boots avoid admitting there's nothing in it. 10:23

If you thought I'm too old for this sort of childish moron-baiting, I'm afraid you're sorely mistaken. This month I've been emailing Boots to ask how much Arnica is in one of their Arnica 30C remedies. Obviously I know the answer - there is none. Boots also know the answer.

It's quite amusing however, to see them trying to avoid giving me this answer. The email trail follows.

10:23.

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8 January 2010 21:03

Hi,

I'm used to seeing the quantity of ingredients listed in mg rather that as "6C" or "30C" as your homeopathic remedies are labelled.

Can you clarify for me how many mg of Arnica is in one of your "Arnica 30C" tablets? I tried to work it out, but I think I got confused at some point.

Thanks,

Simon

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11 January 2010 17:39

Dear Simon

Thank you for taking the time to email me regarding Boots Arnica 30c (item code 37-71-814) with regard to converting the content of Arnica into milligrams.

I am afraid, however, that it is not possible to convert "centesimal" (c) dilutions of Homoeopathic remedies into milligrams (mg) or micrograms (mcg).

During the manufacturing of Homoeopathic remedies the amount of Arnica is not quantified in milligrams or micrograms. Instead one drop of Arnica (or other Homoeopathic ingredient) is added to ninety-nine drops of diluent (carrier) to produce a 1 centesimal (1c) potency, which is then further diluted to produce a 6c or 30c product.

I hope that this information is of use to you.

Regards

Paul Williams MRPharmS
Medical Information (Pharmacist) Officer

---

11 January 2010 18:17

Hi,

Sorry, I'm confused by this. Surely there is a specific amount of Arnica in the pills which can be measured in mg?

If, as you suggest, that a 1C remedy is 1% Arnica then surely if it was a 100mg pill, then this would be 1mg Arnica. Why isn't this correct?

Simon

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14 January 2010 13:27

Dear Simon

Thank you for your second e-mail regarding Boots Arnica 30c (item code 37-71-814).

Unfortunately, the amount of Arnica (or other Homoeopathic ingredient) in the drop that is then subsequently diluted with 99 drops of diluent (carrier) is not quantified in milligrams (mg) or micrograms (mcg).

Thus, although it is true to say that a 1 centesimal (1c) Homoeopathic remedy contains 1 part of Arnica, as the amount of Arnica is not initially quantified then it is not possible to convert this into milligrams (mg) or micrograms (mcg).

Therefore, with regard to Homoeopathic remedies we are not able to state the quantity of Arnica in milligrams (mg) or micrograms (mcg) for the reason outlined above.

The labelling of our products is in accordance with guidelines on the labelling of Homoeopathic remedies, which are derived from The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (known as the MHRA), which is the UK medicines regulator. These guidelines state that the scientific name of the "stock" (i.e. Arnica) and centesimal dilution should be declared on the labelling.

I hope that this further information is of use to you.

Kind Regards

Paul Williams MRPharmS
Medical Information (Pharmacist) Officer
Medical Services

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14 January 2010 15:39

Dear Paul,

Thank you for your reply, and I understand that without knowing the mass of the original drop of Arnica it would be impossible to determine the subsequent mass of Arnica in the final product. However, it should easily be possible to determine the percentage of Arnica in the final 30C remedy.

Am I correct that a 1C remedy is 1% active ingredient? That it is 99% water and 1% Arnica?

What is the percentage of Arnica in the final 30C product?

I've been trying to work this out myself, but I think I've gone wrong somewhere. This will allow me to make an approximate estimate of the number of mg of Arnica.

Many thanks for your help,

Simon

---

18 January 2010 16:29

Dear Simon

Thank you for you further e-mail regarding Boots Arnica 30c (item code 37-71-814).

I can confirm that a 1c Homoeopathic remedy comprises of 1% of the Homoeopathic ingredient i.e. Arnica and 99% of the diluent (carrier).

I can also confirm that to produce a 2c Homoeopathic remedy 1 drop of the 1c Homoeopathic dilution is then further diluted with 99 drops of diluent (carrier). This would equate to 0.01% of the Homoeopathic ingredient i.e. Arnica.

To produce a 3c Homoeopathic remedy this method of dilution is repeated with one drop of the 2c dilution and so on in order to produce a 30c Homoeopathic remedy.

The labelling of our products is in accordance with guidelines on the labelling of Homoeopathic remedies, which are derived from The Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (known as the MHRA), which is the UK medicines regulator. These guidelines state that the scientific name of the "stock" (i.e. Arnica) and centesimal dilution should be declared on the labelling.

I hope that this information is of use to you and is sufficient to allow you to calculate the percentage of Arnica.

If you require further support in understanding Homoeopathic remedies then you may wish to contact the supplier for this product, Nelsons, via enquiries@nelsons.net.

Regards


Paul Williams MRPharmS
Medical Information (Pharmacist) Officer

---

18 January 2010 18:02

Hi Paul,

Thanks for your reply, however I'm still having problems with my calculation. While the figures seem to make sense from a mathematical point of view, the percentage of Arnica seems to reduce fairly rapidly to seemingly absurd quantities.

As you said in your email, these products are licensed by the MHRA and of course they are sold by Boots, so I've no doubt as to their effectiveness.

So the only logical conclusion I can draw is that I've made a mess of the mathematics.

Can you confirm the answer you get for a 30C remedy?

Many thanks,

Simon

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22 January 2010 15:37

Dear Simon

Thank you for your further e-mail regarding Boots Arnica 30 c (item code 37-71-814) with regard to calculating the percentage of Arnica.

Whilst the information about the dilutions of Homoeopathic remedies is freely available from validated reference sources, the actual percentage in a 30 c Homoeopathic remedy is not stated and, therefore, I am afraid I am unable to provide this information.

At Boots we take our responsibilities as the leading Pharmacy-led Health & Beauty retailer in the UK very seriously and as part of this we pride ourselves on being able to offer all of our customers a choice of products that support them in their day-to-day lives. We know that many people believe in the benefits of complementary medicines and we aim to offer the products we know our customers want.

I can confirm that Boots Arnica 30 c are a licensed Homoeopathic product without approved therapeutic indications. The pack is labelled in accordance with the requirements placed upon the Marketing Authorisation holder, Nelsons, by the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency. If you would like to contact the Marketing Authorisation holder to discuss the formulation of this product and the manufacturing process in more detail they are contactable at enquiries@nelsons.net.

Our Pharmacists are trained Healthcare Professionals and are on hand to offer advice on the safe use of complementary medicines. The Royal Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain issues guidance to Pharmacists on the correct selling of Homoeopathy, which our Pharmacists adhere to.

I would like to conclude by confirming that Boots support the call for scientific research and evidence gathering on the efficacy of Homoeopathic medicines as this would help our patients and customers make better informed choices about using Homoeopathic medicines.

I hope that this information is of use to you.

Regards
Paul Williams MRPharmS
Medical Information (Pharmacist) Officer
Medical Services

---

23 January 2010 08:52

Hi Paul,

I get the impression that you are trying hard to avoid answering my question.

In an earlier email you say that it is possible to calculate the percentage of Arnica in a 1C and 2C remedy but then without reason you say you cannot do it for a 30C remedy. Yet in a previous email you state that the information you gave me should be sufficient for the calculation.

The problems I was having when calculating the amount of Arnica is that every time I did the maths, the result came out that there was no Arnica remaining in the 30C remedy.

This is a perfectly simple and clear question: is there any Arnica remaining in an Arnica 30C remedy?

Many thanks,

Simon

---

As yet - no response.

David Tredinnick MP Promotes Dangerous Ideas

The ability to use reason, weigh evidence and make rational decisions is an essential skill. Strongly held beliefs unsupported by evidence can cause significant damage to the deluded individual and those who surround them.

An individual approaching a homeopath for a cold remedy will probably do no more self harm than to waste their money and feed their own delusion, but the homeopath who convinces their client that they're safe to go to West Africa with nothing more than a sugar pill for malaria protection may well kill them.

But mumbo-jumbo becomes most dangerous when it is believed by those with power.

In the late 1980s, the Government launched an Aids awareness campaign warning people not to "die of ignorance". But 13 years later in South Africa, the Mbeki government was infected with the very ignorance we Brits were warned against.

Mbeki started to doubt HIV was the cause of Aids and the regime started promoting the eating of potatoes and garlic as Aids treatment while warning of the dangers of anti-retro viral drugs.

The South African government's stance is estimated by scientists to have caused the premature deaths of between 300,000 and 350,000 people, the equivalent of a 9/11-sized catastrophe once a week for two years.

Under Chairman Mao, the People's Republic of China embarked on its Great Leap Forward, combining a set of absurd pseudo-scientific farming practices with a socialist economic doctrine so daft that its flaws could have been spotted by a teenager half way through their economics GCSE.

The farming practices were devised by Trofim Lysenko, who denied many basic tenets of biology, even genetic theory.

His farming advice included ploughing to a depth of two metres, storing wet seed in snow and planting rows of seeds extremely close together under the belief they would not compete with each other.

With the expected productivity gains, they reasoned there was little need to farm much of the land. But then these expectations were not based on any kind of rational thought or evidence.

This lethal combination of nonsense-biology, nonsense-agronomy and nonsense-economics caused the greatest famine in history, with estimates of the number of deaths ranging from 15-30 million.

But you think you're probably safe, right? Our MPs place their trust in independent scientific advisers who are at the top of their profession, right? Well, no.

Should you wish to find the MP who I believe promotes some of the most scientifically illiterate and dangerous ideas in Parliament, then look no further than the Leicestershire constituency of Bosworth.

On October 14 last year, David Tredinnick, MP for Bosworth, voiced controversial ideas during a Parliamentary question. His speech included: "There are now people who teach, such as Jane Ridder-Patrick, who published A Handbook of Medical Astrology. They look at aspects of the subject and how it affects people's health. Whatever one believes personally, the issue is one that we should look into and consider."

I find it unbelievable that a democratically-elected MP seems to be suggesting we should be looking into using astrology within our system of health care.

His question also included the lines: "A number of disciplines were mentioned and I could have referred to radionics, for example, for which a double-blind trial is almost impossible, yet it is very popular because people believe that it gives them the ability to get remote healing.

"We need to think out of the box here. As with healers who can do remote healing, it is no good people saying that just because we cannot prove something, it does not work. The anecdotal evidence that it does is enormous."

Radionics is a system of healing where you take a sample of hair or blood, or even a signature and use it in what I can only describe as a kind of remote psychic healing machine.

It's the friendly but equally wacky equivalent of sticking pins into a voodoo doll. Yet it seems Mr Tredinnick is suggesting we should consider it within the NHS.

But, in my view, the most dangerous of Mr Tredinnick's suggestions concerns his promotion of homeopathy: "Attacks have also been made on the efficacy of homeopathy. A letter was sent to the World Health Organisation warning against the use of homeopathy, but it ignored the very clear randomised, double-blind trials that proved it is effective in the particular area of childhood diarrhoea on which it was criticised.

"Will the Government therefore be robust in their support for homeopathy and consider what can be done so that it is used more effectively in the health service?"

Let's put this into context. Homeopathy is best described as a magical belief system that uses chemicals at such ludicrously huge dilution levels the majority of remedies contain little but water. The implausibility of homeopathy has been already covered in my column on December 10 and I will not bore you by repeating it.

Mr Tredinnick is technically right when he says there have been double-blind trials that have come out positive. However, that is not the whole story.

The trials he refers to were all conducted by the same person. In science, repeatability is key: if other people repeat your trial and get the same results then your results are likely to be trusted. If all the trials are performed by the same person they should be treated with more skepticism. The first name on all the papers Tredinnick refers to is Jacobs J. I'm not confident in the open-minded nature of this person's experiments.

For a start, writing an article entitled "Homeopathy, not evidence-based, but now?!" seems to me to be implying a motivation to create evidence in favour, rather than simply conducting research and be led by the outcome.

What's more interesting is in 2003, Jacobs did a meta-analysis of his previous three trials. In a meta-analysis, a researcher will combine the results of several trials into one to produce more statistical power.

Of course, if you combine the results of three positive trials all done by the same person the outcome will be positive. But in total, the three trials only involved 242 children.

In the conclusion, Jacobs noted the results "suggest larger sample sizes be used in future homeopathic research to ensure adequate statistical power".

In 2006, Jacobs did just that. This time, six other researchers were involved in the trial and the number of subjects in the test was larger even than the total of the previous trials – 292 children.

The latest trial, which had the largest number of subjects, concluded: "There was no significant difference in the likelihood of resolution of diarrhoeal symptoms between the treatment and placebo groups".

Or, in other words: homeopathy does not seem to work for childhood diarrhoea.

But all Mr Tredinnick is suggesting is that we use this form of quackery to treat a bit of Delhi Belly.

Diarrhoea, according to the World Health Organisation, kills about 2.2 million people each year – most of them children.

Internationally, it is responsible for 4% of all deaths.

And by specifically mentioning the advice given out by the Worldwide Health Organisation his agenda appears to take a global perspective.

Yes, one in every 25 people worldwide will die of diarrhoea. They need the best that medical science has to offer them – which is usually simple and pretty cheap really: just a basic mix of water, salt and sugar.

But if you live in the Bosworth constituency, it seems your MP may prefer to treat these poor children with something even simpler: quackery.

Black Magic Psychic in Leicester

You may have thought that black "magic" was consigned to the Dark Ages or only manifested itself in faraway places such as Haiti. But a man in Leicester who goes by the name of Pandit Harinath Mukya claims he can not only diagnose spells put on you by others, but he can also cast spells to counter them.

I'm always interested in paranormal claims, but was particularly interested in Mukya (pictured), because most self-proclaimed psychics I have previously visited have come from a British cultural background.

It would be interesting to see similar claims originating from an Asian cultural background.

Having said that, I went along expecting readings similar to those I've experienced before – someone making a small amount of money providing simple readings, deluding their clients and themselves into believing their cold reading skills are genuine psychic ability.

What I found, at least to me, appeared very, very different. The entire interaction seemed as if it was designed to separate as much money as possible from the client.

Mukya's operation is run from a terrace house on Paton Street, off Narborough Road, in Leicester's West End.

Having phoned ahead to book a £10 consultation, I arrived to find the bay window decorated with posters advertising his services, and even an A-frame sign outside.

Inside, the front room of the house had been converted into a small shrine. The fireplace was decorated with religious paraphernalia, as was the table we sat at.

Religious posters covered the walls. By contrast, Mukya seemed remarkably unceremonious. He answered the door in jeans and a T-shirt, though he did add what I can only describe as a kind of religious scarf when he sat down.

Mukya's English was poor, but I could follow what he was saying. I was initially sceptical of the professionalism of this operation after he failed to predict my age shortly after I gave him my date of birth.

But it wasn't long before he demonstrated he was serious about this business.

Mukya told me that four of my friends were out to get me, that they were conspiring against me behind my back and this was bringing me bad luck. I had the impression that he was attempting to get me to trust him as the only friend who could help.

It wasn't long before we moved on to the question of money. He could help me but this was going to cost £350. He confirmed that this would take away any bad luck and bring me good luck.

He claimed it was important to start immediately, and asked me how much money I had with me. I opened my wallet to show him that all I had was £15. He suggested that we visit a cash point.

I told him that I didn't have that kind of money – I could only get £200. He said he would help me out, he would use some of his money.

He told me he was my friend – that he was there to help. At the end, he asked me to put all the money I had with me on to the fireplace and we performed what seemed to be some sort of Hindu-style prayer together. He gave me some nice red rice to put in my pocket and keep with me all the time.

Before I left, I confirmed with him that if I returned the next day with £200 all the bad luck would go away. I was there for less than 25 minutes. I was amazed how quickly he had progressed on to such significant money.

I came back the next day and told him apologetically that I could only muster £120. I wanted to drag out this payment as long as possible to enable me to discover more about the operation without parting with much money.

He assured me not to worry, he would help me by using some of his own cash. But we soon reverted back to how much money I could find. He asked how much I could bring the next day, and when I would be able to bring more.

He asked me to come back tomorrow and see how the pooja was going. A pooja is a kind of Hindu prayer or magic spell.

The visit lasted less than seven minutes and I left him with £120.

The third visit was the strangest. After a brief introduction, he immediately guided me upstairs, whereupon a second person started chanting. So far as I could tell, this person only began chanting when he heard us start to ascend the stairs. We entered a room where a man in religious dress was sitting next to a rug covered in what I can only describe as a variety of vegetarian sacrifices. There were a couple of large opened bags of turmeric powder in the centre with some other foodstuffs and the whole rug was circled with about 25 small apples.

This set-up appeared designed to convince me that my money was being well spent on the pooja rather than going straight into his pocket.

When we came back down he told me that he'd performed the same pooja three times already with three more to go and each time the sacrifices were thrown away and replenished. I found that hard to believe.

Again he asked for more money. He tried to convince me again of the costs, saying that they were sure to bring results. In the end, we agreed that I would come back next week with more money. He started hinting at this point that he would just be giving me the names of the people that were conspiring against me rather than removing the bad luck. Once again the consultation was brief. I was there for less than seven minutes.

On my fourth and final visit, I approached with the remaining £80 and looked forward to seeing the names of my four friends who were conspiring against me.

This time inconsistencies started to creep in. Initially, he had told me that he would be able to get the names of my enemies after I had ceremoniously thrown an item into moving water. Then it seems that he had forgotten this, and it no longer seemed important. Secondly, when he revealed the names of the four friends, it turned out that there were only three – and that two of them were not my friends after all, but people who simply knew of me.

The name of the friend was simply given as "John" with no surname. I think I know about 10 Johns.

It was then that the subject turned to money. In order to reverse the pooja, more money was required. I was told that some of the rituals could not be performed in this country for legal reasons and the man I previously saw upstairs had already flown out to India to begin the next stage.

I tried to push him to give me a price for this next stage but he flatly refused.

He did, however, appear to want to prepare me for significant costs. Obviously, if someone needs to go to India, I should be expecting a large figure.

But then he started telling me that the three people conspiring against me had already spent £28,000. The implication was clear – if they'd spent £28,000 I would need to at least match it.

I've visited a few other self-proclaimed psychics in Leicestershire and although I thought none of them demonstrated any real psychic ability, I did get the impression that they believed in what they were doing. I didn't once get that impression with Mukya.

I'm not sure how many people have gone through this operation, but even one person progressing to the next stage would be deeply concerning.

The rented house on Paton Street seems to be dedicated to this purpose, and full colour leaflets are being distributed as far as Oadby, so if nobody had paid money into the scheme, it is unlikely to be financially viable over a period of time.

I brought an audio digital recorder to each of my visits and the sound quality is crystal clear. The recordings have been passed on to trading standards.

The Difficulties with Psychic Photography

My recent article in the Mercury exposed a Leicester psychic attempting to scam a punter (well, me) out of a lot of money. We had a bit of an adventure trying to get a photo for the piece.

The Leicester Mercury sent along a photographer who I met at the end of the street a couple of minutes before my appointment. Our strategy was fairly basic: he'd hide behind a car across the road and I'd knock on the door. When the door was answered, I'd bend down to tie my shoelaces so he could get a clear shot of the guy over my head.

It didn't work. The guy was extremely cautious, first checking at the window before answering the door, and then staying way back in the house when he opened the door. Our photographer just couldn't get a clear shot.

I managed to get this quick shot below while inside. The psychic had asked if I could return for another appointment on Monday, and while I "checked my calendar" on my iPhone, I took this snap.

But we needed better quality for the paper. At this point, I owed him £80 for the fine "work" he'd done so far. To give our hidden photographer another chance, I told him I'd left my wallet in the car. As he opened the door so I could pop back and get it, the photographer tried again. Same problem; the guy was too far back in the house.

The photographer and I met up at the end of the street and hatched a second plan. The operation was being run from a terrace house. The street was one-way and with cars parked on both sides and there was only room for one car to drive down the gap in the middle. The plan was for me to drive back to the house and stop outside the house with the photographer following in the car behind. I'd stop to deliver the money and just when the psychic answered the door, the photographer would beep his horn to get me to move. I'd try and draw the psychic out by saying the cash was in the car. When he came out, the photographer would snap him from the car behind. Hopefully he wouldn't be noticed and our undercover photography mission would be complete.

It didn't work. As soon as I tried to draw the psychic out he got suspicious and hid back into the house, closing the door promptly.

I moved the car and pulled over at the end of the street. The photographer overtook and parked round the corner. A couple of minutes later, the photographer walked back towards my car and shrugged his shoulders to signal that he couldn't get the shot. At this point, I noticed the psychic had come out of the house and was walking towards my car. In a panic, I signalled to the photographer "that's him!". Our undercover photography mission lost some of its clandestine value when the photographer proceeded to take multiple pictures of him using a lens the size of a scuba tank from a distance of approximately two metres.

After a couple of seconds, the photographer realised that he had just been photographing a professional fraudster who most likely was not going to be particularly happy about having his picture taken. Looking around, the only clear route for escape was to jump in the passenger seat of my car. However, being equally worried myself, the doors of my car were firmly locked.

For about 5 seconds the I kept trying to unlock the doors while the photographer prevented me from doing so by franticly pulling on the handle. Eventually he got in and the psychic ran off.

We got a nice, clear shot:

(reduced quality for web publication)

Trust Boots

This is a repost of my article in the Leicester Mercury. I wanted to repost it here so I could fix the messed up text. When they copied and pasted it they lost all the formatting and most importantly the scientific notation. I've fixed it below.

“Trust Boots” is the tagline that has been offered by the high street pharmacist since 2005. According to Boots’ 2006 Corporate Responsibility Strategy, “Everything we do that builds trust is good for our business; anything which could compromise it, a risk we can't afford to take.” So have Boots shown themselves to be worthy of our trust?

On the shelves of their pharmacy on Gallowtree Gate in Leicester you will find a small section devoted to homeopathy. Many people I meet are confused about exactly what homeopathy is – some thinking it is simply a type of herbal or natural medicine.

Allow me to explain.

The first principle of homeopathy is what they call the “law of similars”. Homeopaths look for a chemical that produces a similar symptom to the disease they aim to treat. For instance, caffeine causes you to stay awake, so homeopaths may decide to use this in a remedy to treat insomnia. Another example is hay fever. Hay fever causes runny eyes and so do onions – so some homeopaths will treat hay fever with a preparation of onions. I realise that all this may sound a little bit unconventional, but please bear with me – in a moment it’s going to sound even more so.

Turning a chemical such as onion juice into a homeopathic preparation involves a process of “dilution” and “succussion”. To create the centesimal or “C” remedies they sell at Boots, the homeopath takes one drop of the chemical and mixes it with 99 drops of water (dilution). In centuries past, this was then banged against a leather covered board or book, often a bible, although in modern times the shaking is often done by machine. This shaking is called "succussion". This is now a 1C homeopathic preparation. It contains 99% water and 1% “active ingredient”.

To turn this into a 2C remedy, the process is repeated. One drop of the solution is taken from the 1C remedy is mixed with 99 drops of water and then shaken. The 2C remedy now contains 99.99% water and 0.01% “active ingredient”. Repeat the process again to create a 3C remedy at 0.0001%, and so on. Homeopaths believe that the higher the level of dilution, the more powerful the remedy.

Many homeopaths will use the solution directly, but Boots and many others prefer to sell homeopathy as pills - or pillules as they call them. One pillule is meant to contain the equivalent of one drop of homeopathic solution.

We can calculate approximately how many molecules of “active ingredient” get into the one drop that makes it into the pillule. A drop of water contains about 1,700,000,000,000,000,000,000 molecules. Scientists write this as 1.7x10²¹. That’s a 17 with 20 zeros after it. Boots sell remedies at 6C and 30C. A 6C remedy will contain around 0.0000000001% “active” ingredient – which works out at about 1.7 billion molecules of active ingredient. But what about when we dilute this further? By the time you get to 10C, there are only 17 molecules of active ingredient left. And at 11C, you only have about a one chance in 6 of finding a single molecule.

The branch of Boots on Gallowtree Gate in Leicester display a guide, provided by the manufacturer, that states a Bryonia 30C remedy “Relieves the symptoms of a dry painful cough, pressure and dehydration headaches” and that a Kali Bich 30C remedy “Soothes the symptoms of sinusitis”.

30C. I already explained that at 11C, you only have about a one in 6 chance of finding a single molecule of active ingredient. At 12C, there is only about one chance in 600 that you will find a molecule and at 13C just one chance in 60,000. By the time you get to 30C, you have more chance of winning the National Lottery jackpot five weeks in a row than you do of finding a single molecule of active ingredient.

Or think about it this way: how much water would you need to contain one molecule of active ingredient at 30C dilution? According to my calculations, the body of water would weigh 5 billion times more than the planet you are standing on. If you want that in pillule form, you'd need to buy 6x10³⁸ pillules (a 6 with 38 zeros after it). At Boots' retail prices, that would cost you 35 trillion trillion trillion pounds. That's a rather expensive molecule.

These pills do not contain any active ingredient.

To my way of thinking, homeopathy is entirely implausible, but science is incredibly open-minded to seemingly implausible ideas. Ideas such as Einstein’s theory of general relativity and quantum theory are utterly bizarre, but once they were demonstrated to be true with fair tests then scientists accepted them.

Testing for a pill is essentially simple. Take a large number of people with a particular disease and randomly divide them into two groups. Give one group the pills you want to test and the other group some placebo pills that don’t contain anything. Neither the patient nor the researchers working with them can know which patients were given which pill. After an agreed period of time count how many people in each group got better.

So what do the trials show? Actually, that’s a little complicated. Some of the poor quality trials where the patients were told which drug they were getting, or had very small sample sizes showed an effect. But those effects could easily be down to the placebo effect or random variation due to the small sample sizes.

But when the experiments are done properly with larger numbers of patients, the vast majority do not show homeopathy to be any better than a placebo. A quick search of Cochrane articles leads us to reviews of homeopathy for the treatment of dementia, chronic asthma and attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder. They all end in similar conclusions: “No evidence that homeopathy is effective in treating dementia”, “Until stronger evidence exists for the use of homeopathy in the treatment of asthma, we are unable to make recommendations about homeopathic treatment.” and “Overall the results of this review found no evidence of effectiveness for homeopathy for the global symptoms, core symptoms or related outcomes of attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder.”

But what do they tell you in Boots? When I popped into their Oadby branch and asked about homeopathic treatment, the pharmacist tried to politely steer me away from the homeopathic remedies citing the lack of evidence. Fair enough.

But a pharmacist at the Gallowtree Gate branch was not so off putting. Despite a couple of points in the conversation where I felt she certainly gave the impression that she did not believe in homeopathy, she was still happy to say things that I would never expect to come out of the mouth of professional pharmacist, by explaining that homeopaths “don't just treat the condition, they look at the whole person” and “If you want absolutely spot on accurate treatment you need to see someone who is a qualified homeopath."

Boots' professional standards director Paul Bennett was asked about homeopathy at a parliamentary science and technology sub-committee on the 25th October: "Do they work beyond the placebo effect?" He replied, "I have no evidence before me that they are efficacious and we look very much for the evidence to support that."

I think it's unlikely that Boots don't know where to look for medical evidence. So what we're being told by Boots' professional standards director is that they've looked around, found evidence - but he hasn't found any that show homeopathy to work.

He was asked to clarify with the line, "You sell them, but you don't believe they are efficacious?" He replied, "It's about consumer choice for us."

If it is about consumer choice, I personally believe that Boots should be ensuring that their consumers are properly informed to make a choice. Their labels should clearly state "the best evidence shows that these products work no better than placebos." But their labels don't say that. The information on their shelves makes claims such as "Relieves the symptoms of a dry painful cough." Selling this quackery may well be about consumer choice. Making these claims of efficacy is most certainly not.

Is this likely to lead you to “Trust Boots”?

GCC extends complaints to cover all dubious claims

My complaints to the BCA focussed on claims to treat colic. I chose to just complain about colic claims for reasons of simplicity. It was easy to search the pages for one word and gather the evidence. When you’re submitting 55 complaints, it makes sense to go for the easiest method possible.

The GCC has now sent me copies of the responses to my complaints. What's interesting is that it appears that the GCC’s investigating committee has gone further than asked. They have manually gone through the Chiropractor's web pages looking for other claims.

Where they existed, the chiropractor will be investigated for those claims too.

I’m not sure of the GCC’s motivation is to make life easier for themselves in the knowledge that they will soon be needing to deal with Zeno’s 500+ complaints, or if this is a genuine attempt to properly regulate the profession. Either way, this is a positive step from the GCC and should be applauded.

A copy of one of the letters is below.