Whenever Ullman cites a source, it's always illuminating to check to ensure it says what he might want you to believe it says.

In this case, he seems to want us to believe that AIM have published a study that demonstrates that nanodoses are able to penetrate cell membranes, etc. His citation is simply an article from 1999 titled: Homeopathy re-revisited: is homeopathy compatible with biomedical observations?, not original research. It is not a study that shows what Ullman wants us to think it shows.

No. Nature India published a short article on its website (not in its journal) that said little more than a paper had been published elsewhere. Ullman seems to want to derive some respectability for what he says by claiming it was published in Nature India. The actual paper was published in the far less prestigious Frontiers of Pharmacology.

Ullman doesn't cite these studies he's referring to, but even if they did show some effect on gene expression in a petri dish that were attributed to the homeopathic product used (and not, say, the alcohol carrier used), that does not mean that homeopathic products - whether in liquid or sugar pellet form - will have the effects claimed for them in humans or other animals.

No. After a campaign by proponents of homeopathy, etc, 67% of those who voted) (not 67% of the Swiss population as Ullman claims), voted for homeopathy, etc to be reimbursed by the Swiss health care system, despite the fact that the Swiss Government had already ruled that it did not meet the requirements of efficacy, appropriateness and cost-effectiveness. The referendum did not change that.

This high degree of interest in homeopathy and acupuncture provides some insight as to what to expect in the future in Brazil.

It might have been expected that, after quoting a survey from over a decade ago and musing on the future of healthcare in Brazil, Ullman might have been able to provide an analysis of homeopathy use in Brazil now.

However, popularity is not a proxy for efficacy.

Ullman provides no evidence for this assertion. The Swiss report into homeopathy was no more than a limited literature review. The pro-homeopathy authors of the report that was submitted to the Programm Evaluation Komplementärmedizin (PEK) set up by the Swiss Government to review reimbursement for homeopathy in their state health insurance scheme. In their evaluation of the evidence for homeopathy, the authors (mostly with homeopathy conflicts of interest) chose to 're-interpret' the conclusions of the original studies, making them more favourable to homeopathy. When the PEK reviewed the report, they had to downgrade the conclusions to achieve a more balanced view of the evidence, saying, 'Even less skeptical academic doctors will regard many interpretations as very optimistic and not scientifically convincing.' It has been heavily criticised elsewhere with one going as far as calling it 'research misconduct'.

The report only looked specifically at evidence for upper respiratory tract infections and allergic reactions, so even if their conclusions had been valid, they cannot be extrapolated to the homeopathic treatment of any other condition. Also, homeopathy had not been found cost-effective because it had not been found effective.

As a direct result of the Swiss homeopathy report, the Government removed the previous temporary reimbursement of homeopathy from its insurance scheme.

Unfortunately, Ullman neglects to provide any evidence for his claims for his 'Big Pharma' allegations.

Surveys provide evidence of popularity, not of efficacy. And the answers that are obtained depend very much on what questions were asked.

Ullman cherry-picks the stories he tells. For example, in the UK, data from NHS Digital show that prescriptions for homeopathy on the National Health Service that were dispensed in community pharmacies in England has fallen 96% in the past two decades. Additionally, the number of homeopathic 'hospitals' run by the NHS has dropped to just two now (in Glasgow and London), with the closure of those at Tunbridge Wells, Liverpool and Bristol in recent years. This paints a different picture to the one Ullman seems to want to do.

Dana Ullman has also appeared as an expert witness on the topic of homeopathy in a number of court cases. In at least 1 of these he has been described as being "not credible"[1] [2]

Nanodoses are a real thing.

Claiming that this is a potential mechanism for how homeopathy supposedly works, despite the rigorous research that shows it doesn't, is a stretch though. Making a claim like this demonstrates that the claimant doesn't understand the nature of the scales involved with the level of repeated dilutions that are occurring in your typical 30C "remedy".

If there are any molecules of the active ingredient left to form the nanodose it would be more plausible to suspect that the manufacturing process was at fault.

So, literally people that don't have all the training yet. This would be an interesting thing if they were to complete their training and then run the survey on the same students again. As it stands though, this is less than worthless.

But again, we end up is a situation where Dana is taking something that sounds positive and uses it to impress those that may not know what to question.

Dana is demonstrating all the integrity of wet paper bag.

1. Not the largest (and Dana knows this)
2. Not a Government review (and Dana knows this)

At best the "Swiss Report" was a very limited assessment of select literature. The ongoing misrepresentation of this publication caused Felix Gurtner of the Federal Office of Public Health FOPH, Health and Accident Insurance Directorate, Bern, Switzerland posted a letter to the editor of Swiss Medical Weekly entitled The report “Homeopathy in healthcare: effectiveness, appropriateness, safety, costs” is not a “Swiss report” to clarify this. Dana is very aware of this, but continues to misinform his readership with this blatantly and demonstrably false claim.

Given how often this has been pointed out there is only one reasonable conclusion for him continuing to put this out there.

Dana Ullman is a liar.

Dana Ullman has also appeared as an expert witness on the topic of homeopathy in a number of court cases. In at least 1 of these he has been described as being "not credible"[1] [2]

The linked paper is from 2007. The National Sample Survey Office (NSSO), Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation has much more recent numbers from 2015.

This has been pointed out to Dana a number of times in the past, but, as with most things that he doesn't like, the more recent data paints a worsening scenario for homeopathy so he ignores it.

See the previous correction on the title of this section for the commentary on the actual figures.

This is a classic misrepresentation of the facts that is typical of Dana. While the number may be right, the representation of it as being "large" is designed to leave the reader with an impression that is actually wrong.

Homeopathy in India is a fringe therapy.

India has a huge population. You take any tiny fringe group and you can come up with a very large sounding number. Right up until you look at that number as a percentage.

For context: NSSO - Key Indicators of Social Consumption in India Health

Here, the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO), Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation reports on medical modality choices. The "other" category makes up about 5-7% usage. In "Other" we have AYUSH. So that's only part of that 5-7%. The "H" in AYUSH is Homeopathy so that makes up a part of a part of the 5-7%.

Looking at it from this angle you get a much more realistic representation of Homeopathy usage in India. An fraction of a fraction of 5-7% of 1.5 billion people still sounds like a lot if you look at it as a stand alone figure.

Nanodoses are a real thing.

Claiming that this is a potential mechanism for how homeopathy supposedly works, despite the rigorous research that shows it doesn't, is a stretch though. Making a claim like this demonstrates that the claimant doesn't understand the nature of the scales involved with the level of repeated dilutions that are occurring in your typical 30C "remedy".

If there are any molecules of the active ingredient left to form the nanodose it would be more plausible to suspect that the manufacturing process was at fault.

Whenever Ullman cites a source, it's always illuminating to check to ensure it says what he might want you to believe it says.

In this case, he seems to want us to believe that AIM have published a study that demonstrates that nanodoses are able to penetrate cell membranes, etc. His citation is simply an article from 1999 titled: Homeopathy re-revisited: is homeopathy compatible with biomedical observations?, not original research.

So, literally people that don't have all the training yet. This would be an interesting thing if they were to complete their training and then run the survey on the same students again. As it stands though, this is less than worthless.

But again, we end up is a situation where Dana is taking something that sounds positive and uses it to impress those that may not know what to question.

Dana is demonstrating all the integrity of wet paper bag.

This study has been dealt with in Nanoparticles in Homeopathic Dilutions? More Like, Wishful Thinking. Or Magic Pixie Dust..

Ullman doesn't cite these studies he's referring to, but even if they did show some effect on gene expression in a petri dish that were attributed to the homeopathic product used (and not, say, the alcohol carrier used), that does not mean that homeopathic products - whether in liquid or sugar pellet form - will have the effects claimed for them in humans or other animals.

1. Not the largest (and Dana knows this)
2. Not a Government review (and Dana knows this)

At best the "Swiss Report" was a very limited assessment of select literature. The ongoing misrepresentation of this publication caused Felix Gurtner of the Federal Office of Public Health FOPH, Health and Accident Insurance Directorate, Bern, Switzerland posted a letter to the editor of Swiss Medical Weekly entitled The report “Homeopathy in healthcare: effectiveness, appropriateness, safety, costs” is not a “Swiss report” to clarify this. Dana is very aware of this, but continues to misinform his readership with this blatantly and demonstrably false claim.

Given how often this has been pointed out there is only one reasonable conclusion for him continuing to put this out there.

Dana Ullman is a liar.

To quote a fictional character...

Reality shows that high quality research actually demonstrates, conclusively, that homeopathy is no better than a similarly administered placebo. i.e.; doing nothing.

Ullman cherry-picks the stories he tells. For example, in the UK, data from NHS Digital show that prescriptions for homeopathy on the National Health Service that were dispensed in community pharmacies has fallen 96% in the past two decades. Additionally, the number of homeopathic 'hospitals' run by the NHS has dropped to just two now (in Glasgow and London), with the closure of those at Tunbridge Wells, Liverpool and Bristol in recent years. This paints a different picture to the one Ullman seems to want to do.

It might have been expected that, after quoting a survey from over a decade ago and musing on the future of healthcare in Brazil, Ullman might have been able to provide an analysis of homeopathy use in Brazil now.

However, popularity is not a proxy for efficacy.

Surveys provide evidence of popularity, not of efficacy. And the answers that are obtained depend very much on what questions were asked,

Unfortunately, Ullman neglects to provide any evidence for his claims for his 'Big Pharma' allegations.

The WHO, of course, do not attribute that to homeopathy, so this is simply an attempt by Ullman to borrow the legitimacy of the WHO for his own purposes. Additionally, that report was published seventeen years ago.

The National Sample Survey Office of the Indian Government, in its survey on Social Consumption: Health, conducted between January to June 2014 and covering all of India, including urban and rural sectors (n=333,104), stated:

3.2.2 Clearly a higher inclination towards allopathy treatment was prevalent (around 90% in both the sectors). Only 5 to 7 percent usage of ‘other’ including AYUSH (Ayurveda, Yoga or Naturopathy Unani, Siddha and homoeopathy) has been reported both in rural and urban area.

Since homeopathy is not identified separately but included under the banner of AYUSH, it is not known how many use it — all that can be stated is that less than 7% (and likely a lot less) use homeopathy. While this indicates that a number as high as 87 million could be using homeopathy, that still means that 1,224 million Indians do not.

No. Nature India published a short article on its website (not in its journal) that said little more than a paper had been published elsewhere. Ullman seems to want to derive some respectability for what he says by claiming it was published in Nature India. The actual paper was published in the far less prestigious Frontiers of Pharmacology.

Ullman provides no evidence for this assertion. The Swiss report into homeopathy was no more than a limited literature review. The pro-homeopathy authors of the report that was submitted to the Programm Evaluation Komplementärmedizin (PEK) set up by the Swiss Government to review reimbursement for homeopathy in their state health insurance scheme. In their evaluation of the evidence for homeopathy, the authors (mostly with homeopathy conflicts of interest) chose to 're-interpret' the conclusions of the original studies, making them more favourable to homeopathy. When the PEK reviewed the report, they had to downgrade the conclusions to achieve a more balanced view of the evidence, saying, 'Even less skeptical academic doctors will regard many interpretations as very optimistic and not scientifically convincing.' It has been heavily criticised elsewhere with one going as far as calling it 'research misconduct'.

The report only looked specifically at evidence for upper respiratory tract infections and allergic reactions, so even if their conclusions had been valid, they cannot be extrapolated to the homeopathic treatment of any other condition. Also, homeopathy had not been found cost-effective because it had not been found effective.

As a direct result of the Swiss homeopathy report, the Government removed the previous temporary reimbursement of homeopathy from its insurance scheme.

The Swiss Government's enquiry into homeopathy and other practices concluded that they did not meet the requirements of efficacy, appropriateness and cost-effectiveness. As a result, it removed the temporary reimbursement of homeopathy in their health insurance system.

No. After a campaign by proponents of homeopathy, etc, 67% of those who voted) (not 67% of the Swiss population as Ullman claims), voted for homeopathy, etc to be reimbursed by the Swiss health care system, despite the fact that the Swiss Government had already ruled that it did not meet the requirements of efficacy, appropriateness and cost-effectiveness. The referendum did not change that.

Actually, this is more because study at this level would expect the students to dig deeper than an overview on a topic. The references section, and discussion page, for an article on Wikipedia are often a very good starting point.

In reality the strong bias on Wikipedia is towards robust citations and sources. It is not the fault of Wikipedia or their editors that fans of Homeopathy (and other alternatives to actual medicine) are unable to meet these standards.

This AKA is an internal thing withing the skull of Dana. I've seen it used by a very small number of other homeopaths but it has not gained common use either in or out or homeopathy circles yet.

"AKA" is a bit of a stretch here.

They are compelling if you are scientifically illiterate.