McGill science group takes aim at pharmacies for selling 'quack' flu remedy

[SidDithers]

https://ottawacitizen.com/pmn/news-pmn/canada-news-pmn/mcgill-science-group-takes-aim-at-pharmacies-for-selling-quack-flu-remedy/wcm/63ff66c9-6448-4705-9dac-af94a23e5eb7

MONTREAL — A McGill University science communication group is taking aim at a commonly available homeopathic flu remedy and questioning why pharmacies continue to sell what it calls “quack remedies.”

A survey of 150 Montreal pharmacies conducted last month by the McGill Office for Science and Society found that two-thirds of them stocked Oscillococcinum despite the fact that the product “does not work (and) cannot work according to our scientific knowledge,” reads a publication on the office’s website.

The product, which claims to shorten the duration of flu symptoms, was retailing for $37.99 for a box of 30 doses at a Montreal Jean Coutu pharmacy on Wednesday.

Oscillococcinum is a homeopathic pill that is made by taking the heart and liver of a duck and diluting it until there is no trace left of the organs, according to Jonathan Jarry, a science communicator who helped conduct the study.

Jarry, who has a master’s degree in molecular biology, said he decided to target Oscillococcinum in particular because he considers it the most “egregious” of homeopathic products on the market. “Nothing in homeopathy really makes any sense or is scientific, but this one because of its high dilution factor is particularly ridiculous,” he said.

Sid

[NRaleighLiberal]

1. Boooo for homeoquackic medicine.

Only use is to study placebo effects...!

[in2herbs]

2. Alternative medicines existed before pharmaceuticals. If alt-meds did not cure at some level the

world's population would have died out before pharmaceuticals were invented.

[Igel]

3. Which explains why so many other creatures continue.

Most species do just fine. Colds don't kill. And most diseases kill the weak or critters that have already reproduced.

Even if you argue that dogs have inner wisdom that tells them to chew particular plants for particular diseases (which is intriguing, since they've spread far beyond where they'd evolved and must have some sort of world-soul guiding their chewing habits ... making me wonder what the disease that slippers cure is, but I digress), then you still have to ponder how starfish ever survived. Or tuna.

[eShirl]

4. This is specifically about homeopathic remedies.

Homeopathy is not that old really.

[octoberlib]

5. Homeopathic medicine is basically water.