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“The long-term benefit of homeopathy to the patient is that it not only alleviates the presenting symptoms but it reestablishes internal order at the deepest levels and thereby provides a lasting cure.” George Vithoulkas, Director,Athenian School of Homeopathic Medicine The World Health Organization has cited homeopathy as one of the systems of traditional medicine that should be integrated worldwide with conventional medicine in order to provide adequate global health care. In Britain, homeopathic hospitals and out-patient clinics are part of the national health system, and homeopathy is recognized as a postgraduate medical specialty by virtue of an act of Parliament. Homeopathy has also enjoyed the patronage of the British royalfamilyfor the pastfour generations. The highest ideal of cure is the speedy, gentle, and enduring restoration of health by the most trustworthy and least harmfiil way. -Samuel Hahnemann,founder of Homeopathy Homeopathy is well suited to self-care and can become an integral part of your and your family's health maintenance program. Official acceptance of homeopathy and its integration into the American health care system couldprove to have an enormous impact on lowering the cost Of national health care due to the low cost, safety, and effectiveness of homeopathic remedies. |
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The government should providefimdsfor research into homeopathy due to its 180 years of clinical success. The results of recent European research also indicate that it deserves to become an integral part of America's health care system. Write your congressional representatives and demand that research be carried out in this importantfield of health care. CombinationRemedies Today, many homeopathic practitioners use "combination" formulas that contain several remedies to cover a broad range of symptoms for an acute condition. For example, people with colds experience runny noses, watery eyes, sneezing, fever, and headaches. A combination cold remedy contains remedies for each of these symptoms. The appropriate remedies in a formula will have a therapeutic effect, while the unnecessary remedies will be shed off and have no effect at all. Combination homeopathic remedies have a unique effect on the body-the body assimilates what it needs, and throws off what it doesn't, making it a completely safe, nontoxic form of medicine. The Future of Homeopathy The official acceptance of homeopathy and its integration into the American health care system could prove to have an enormous impact on lowering the cost of national health care, due to its low cost and tremendous health benefits. Although controlled clinical studies might prove costly, homeopathy's history of clinical success and the results of studies being carried out in Europe indicate that this is an area where the United States government should provide funds for research. Because homeopathic remedies are derived from natural substances, and as such, are unpatentable, no pharmaceutical company will provide the necessary funds for research to gain FDA approval. The low cost of homeopathic remedies also guarantee that it would be impossible for a company to recoup its research investment. Clearly, homeopathy, like other forms of natural medicine including herbal medicine and nutritional supplementation, is caught in an economic catch22. But as part of the growing tide of national awareness of al ' ternative medicine, homeopathy should soon receive the attention it deserves from the United States government and become part of the solution to America's national health care crisis. 'HOMEOPATHY IN THE UNITED STATES Homeopathy has a long and distinguished history in the United States, and Was popular from the mid-nineteenth to early twentieth centuries Dr. Constantine Oering, a student of German physician Samuell Hahnemann, and father of Homeopathy in the United States, established the first homeopathic medical school in the U.S. in 1835 in Allentown, Pennsylvania. By 1844, there were so many physicians claiming to be homeopathic practitioners that the homeopathic medical profession formed the American Institute of Homeopathy, the first national medical association in the United States. The American Medlcal ,Association (AMA) was formed three years later and denounced homeopathy as a delusion. AMA members were forbidden to associate with homeopathic physicians either professionally or socially, and physicians practicing homeopathy were expelled or blocked from becoming members. Still, homeopathy continued to gain attention in America due in part to its great success in treating acute and ,epidemic diseases, notably cholera and yellow fever. During an 1849 cholera,,epidemic in Cincinnati, Ohio, only 3 Percent of those patients treated homeopathically died, as compared to the,40 to 70 percent death rate among those treated with conventionai'medicine. In the 1879 epidert?ic of yellow fever,homeopaths in New Orleans treated 1,945 cases with a mortality rate of 5.6 percent, while the mortality rate w1ith standard medical treatment was 16 percent. At this time some of homeopathy's more illustrious supporters included John D. Rockefeller, Thomas Edison, and Mark Twain By 1900, there were twenty-two homeopathic medical schools and nearly one hundred homeopathic hospitals in the United States. In fact, 15 percent of all American physicians practiced homeopat'hy at the turn of the century, according to Trevor Cook, Ph.D., DI Hom., President of the British Homeopathic Medical Society, However, by the same time, the bond between the AMA and the pharmaceutical companies was firmly established. Paid advertisements from pharmaceutical companies in the AMA journal were the AMA's main source of revenue (as it is today), prominent physicians were paid to endorse proprietary drugs, and doctors were deluged with free samples of pharmaceutical drugs. Through a series of maneuvers including a new rating system for medical schools aimed at eliminating homeopathic colleges, the practice of homeopathy had nearly disappeared as a force in American medicine by 1930. However, homeopathy is again becoming recognized as a viable alternative medicine, and statistics now show that the American public is returning to this form of treatment in dramatic numbers, with annual sales of homeopathlc medicines in the United States now reaching $150 million.
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