The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners has told GPs to stop prescribing homeopathic remedies and says pharmacists must also stop stocking such products for the same sort of reason they shouldn’t prescribe/stock candy or kale or blueberries as medicine.
The official body for Australian GPs has asked pharmacists to strip their shelves of homeopathic products and warned doctors not to prescribe them because they do nothing.
The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners (RACGP) has formally recommended GPs stop prescribing homeopathic remedies and says pharmacists must also stop stocking such products because there is no evidence they are effective in any way.
The RACGP’s position statement on homeopathy, released on Wednesday, follows recent findings by the National Health and Medical Research Council that homeopathy produces no health benefits over and above a placebo.
Homeopathic “remedies” are shelved in drugstores – at least in this country – next to actual remedies, with nothing at all to indicate that they are just pretend. People who don’t know better have no way of knowing that homeopathic “remedies” are not remedies at all. The whole thing is utterly fraudulent and I have never understood why it’s allowed.
Dr Jones said the lack of evidence about any benefits from homeopathy must prompt doctors and pharmacists to turn their backs on it.
“Given this lack of evidence, it does not make sense for homeopathy products to be prescribed by GPs or sold, recommended or supported by pharmacists,” he said.
RACGP noted all taxpayers were funding homeopathy through the federal government’s private health insurance rebate.
The Pharmacy Guild of Australia says it’s up to individual pharmacists to decide if they’ll stop selling homeopathic remedies branded useless by doctors.
“Branded” useless? As if it’s just an epithet, or insult, or opinion?
And why is it up to individual pharmacists to decide if they’ll stop selling fake medicine labeled as medicine? That’s fraud.
Oh well. Fraudulent sneakers or DVDs or tennis balls can do serious harm, but fraudulent medicine is no big deal.