BBC Drops the Ball with Very Misleading Story
April 15th, 2009
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The BBC likes to promote itself as a world class news organization which can be trusted for acurate information for the benefit of the British people and the world in general. But a look at this story from their website indicates otherwise:
Homeopathy ‘eases cancer therapy’
Some homeopathic medicines may ease the side-effects of cancer treatments without interfering in how they work, a scientific review has concluded.
The Cochrane Collaboration said, while there were few studies, it did appear that some effects of radiotherapy and chemotherapy could be alleviated.
It highlighted in particular calendula to prevent dermatitis, and what is known as Traummel S for mouth sores.
But it said further work was needed to confirm these findings.
Eight studies with a total of 664 participants were considered by the group, led by Dr Sosie Kassab, a specialist in complementary cancer therapies at the Royal London Homeopathic Hospital.
Based on the headline and the first part of the story one would think that homeopathic preparations actually had been proven to be useful for something, namely treating the side effects of cancer therapy. It’s not until you read much further and more carefully that it becomes apparent that this is not quite what it seems:
Two other studies of homeopathic treatments on menopausal symptoms brought on by cancer treatments were declared to be of high quality but did not provide any evidence that the treatments worked.
There was no evidence to show that any of these treatments interfered with cancer therapies, and indeed one study showed that radiotherapy was less frequently interrupted in the group receiving homeopathic care.
But the Cochrane team acknowledged: “The review found few studies, and most were small.”
Edzard Ernst, professor of complementary medicine at the Peninsula Medical School, said there were “several problems with the body of evidence examined by this review.
“First, independent replications are lacking completely but would be necessary before we can accept any of these treatments in routine healthcare.
“Second, nobody doubts that undiluted remedies can have effects; and interestingly, the positive studies here seem to be on such medicines rather than on the highly diluted treatments which are a hallmark of homeopathy.
“In fact, the calendula cream found to be effective in one study is not diluted at all and thus it cannot, to all intents and purposes, be considered to be a typical homeopathic remedy.
“Finally, this review found hardly any high quality studies in the first place. So overall, this new piece of evidence simply confirms plenty of previous research demonstrating the unproven nature of homeopathy.”
So let’s get this straight: At least three studies were done and considered “high quality” and two of them find zero evidence for any kind of benefit. This, of course, adding to the mountain of studies that already show homeopathy is worthless. The final study, the one which found a small benefit, on closer examination was looking at something that wasn’t even diluted and therefore not homeopathic at all.
Of course, one would have to read the entire article to realize that, and all too often the headline is the one thing that sticks in then mind of readers. In fact, newspapers are supposed to be written with the assumption that not all readers will have the time or interest to read past the first few lines. Therefore, the first few paragraphs are traditionally supposed to get the gist of the story across while further reading reveals more details.
Lets not forget something here: homeopathic does not mean “traditional” or “herbal” or “natural” as some might be lead to think. The fact that an herbal or “natural” preparations may be of some use shouldn’t be too surprising. After all, the only thing they were really looking at was side effects of cancer therapy and ways of providing some relief. Any idiot knows that a little aloe feels good on sore skin. It is also not surprising that the homeopathic groups in all studies had less interruption to their therapy, since homeopathic treatments are nothing but water (or whatever other solvent may be used in the preparation)
If there were a prize for misleading headline then this story should get it.
It’s interesting to see how the various news agencies have picked up on this story. Reuters reports that “Homeopathy appears compatible with cancer therapy.” That’s true in the sense that it doesn’t cause any direct harm, but tends to cast the fact that it does nothing in a very favorable light. On the other hand, Cancer Research UK cuts right to the chase with “‘No convincing evidence’ for benefits of homeopathy in cancer treatment.” You can find some other reports from various news outlets here, on Google News.
Truly amazing! It makes me wonder if some of these news outlets have some kind of pro-homeopathy interest. These kind of stories don’t help with getting the facts out about homeopathic treatments. The whole concept of homeopathy is bunk, against all we know about medicine and chemistry and downright stupid. There is no controversy or debate about homeopathy in science or medicine. It doesn’t work, it’s worthless and that’s the way it is. Homeopathy is long overdue for being thrown onto the pile of ridiculous notions like bloodletting, phrenology and “psychic healing.” Yet these kind of deceptive news items and false claims of evidence or even controversy seem to play a role in keeping it alive.
This is not a philosophical or political issue. It’s not even a complex issue! Water, which may or may not contain a single molecule of the original active ingredient does not cure anything* and that’s the way it is.
(except possibly dehydration)*
This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 15th, 2009 at 10:14 pm and is filed under Bad Science, Not Even Wrong, Obfuscation, Quackery, media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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April 16th, 2009 at 1:25 am
Can’t for the life of me understand why anyone would have a problem with helping those with cancerr endure even a tiny bit less suffering. Homeopathic natural treatments do work and I’m not saying that they can do everything that other medicines can do, but if they bring some comfort and reverse some of the side effects then I don’t think there is a leg to stand on.
Probably many of these cancers were caused by nuclear power anyway. The one thing I can’t ever understand is that despite the fact that we know cancer is caused by radiation and is so badly we actually expose cancer people to radiation and wonder why it gets worse. I guess the idea is that if you use enough it will reverse what it did in the first place, but that doesn’t seem to always work. I think soon radiation will be banned from cancer treatment. It makes no sense to me.
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April 16th, 2009 at 1:31 am
The BBC is still held on a pedestal by some due to the whole historic thing with the BBC providing hope to occupied Europe and broadcasting behind the Iron Curtain. Some still have a very fanciful idea of it as being a kind of light shining for freedom and justice and the British gift to the world. I suppose there is still something to that becasue they do have the shortwave services that do provide vital information and news to various regions and everything, but to some degree the BBC can hide behind the achievements and prestige of its name. It has had more than its fair share of bad reporting and is not the gold standard for information in any regard.
There has been some backlash against the BBC’s cutting back on analogue high power radio stations and world programing such as educational and cultural, but I see it as part of a commercialization of the whole system that appears unavoidable. BBC is trying to find its place in the world and is not sure quite yet if it is just another television and radio company to compete with others or if it is a public service. It is a little bit of both. Commercial interests are more and more creeping into it.
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April 16th, 2009 at 2:24 am
RBR1978 said:
There was also once true that “if it was in the Times (London) it must be so” and that too sadly is no longer the case. The reputational fall of the BBC should be enough to persuade that no-one is immune.
What really is happing here is that as newspapers, radio and television loose audience, they also loose the attraction of working in those media, and what you get is those that can’t make it at the cutting edge chasing a shrinking market made of those who cannot cope with the new ether. It’s a race to the bottom, exacerbated by the fact that it is also driving out those who would help.
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April 16th, 2009 at 2:57 am
To be fair, the story was not false, it was written and titled in a missleading way, but the information was not untrue and if you read the whole thing it’s clear. I hear you on the whole issue of people who might just see the headline or the first paragraphs, but still I think it deserves mentioning that they are not lying or publishing something that is factually wrong.
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April 16th, 2009 at 4:14 am
Magic Donuts said:
The very fact that they are reporting on this at all, and using misleading headlines grants the whole issue more status than it is due. Homeopathic treatments are patent nonsense and should only be treated seriously by the press when demanding that they be delegitimatized and its practitioners charged with quackery.
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April 16th, 2009 at 5:44 am
Robert Tusserno said:
Homeopathy works only through the placebo effect – and it’s considered unethical to use that effect in real medicine (frauds don’t have those moral problems). Water can do many things, but medically it isn’t really important other than to prevent some conditions (such as dehydration or kidney stones).
Nuclear power emits a very low dose of radiation – lower than the natural background radiation. People can live very well in environments with relatively high exposure to radiation, as demonstrated by some parts of Iran, or anywhere where there are important quantities of uranium ore. Maybe you haven’t heard of the concept of “hormesis”, which says that a low dose radiation can help the body recovering from physical stress, but radiation doesn’t need to be deadly. We’ve always lived in it, and we always will. Even your own body is radioactive – thanks tot K-40, a radioactive isotope of potassium.
Higher doses of radiation can kill cells, which is why they are used for cancer treatment – those cancer cells must be eradicated. Your uninformed and ridiculous opinion (which makes me think you’re nothing but a troll) on what makes sense to you has no bearing on the real fact that radiation will continue to be an important part of cancer treatments. It’s just irrelevant, and a clear indication that whatever education system turned you out should take more time to teach science and critical thinking skills – one of which is to have some knowledge of what you’re talking about, and getting that knowledge from reputable, trusthworthy sources. Greenpeace (of whatever propaganda machine misinformed you) may be reputable, but they emit more nonsensical blather than something else.
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April 16th, 2009 at 7:54 am
Robert Tusserno said:
The reason it makes no sense to you is becasue you lack the most basic understanding of the concept. THe whole issue with cancer treatment is to destroy the cancerous cells and to do so in a manner that avoids causing damage that could potentially kill the patient. Whenever possible the tumor is simply removed with surgury, but if that’s not possible then radiation is used because in high doses it can kill off the tissue and it can be targeted to the area. Also, cancer cells divide faster than other cells which potentially makes them weaker against a stressor like radiation or chemo.
It’s not that complicated in principle. The radiation is just a way of killing cells. It amazes me that someone so poorly informed and generally clueless would spout their own contrived nonsense without even the most basic grasp of what they’re talking about. It shouldn’t because I see it all the time, but it still does.
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April 16th, 2009 at 12:42 pm
Robert Tusserno said:
Sadly, I fear you might be correct.
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April 16th, 2009 at 8:37 pm
The best ready-for-a-poster criticism of homeopathy ever
Warning: slightly NSFW (depending where you work)
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April 17th, 2009 at 1:28 am
Homeopathy is an excellent and long standing way of treating conditions and preventing them as well. This site and those on it are prejudiced and I ask that they look in their hearts and consider the suffering of human kind and the need to improve life and health in the world. Is that not worth something? Surely you have some compassion in you. Homeopathy is very important and it can be afforded by many who can’t other medicine.
Put your ignorance and greed aside and look at the good it does. There may not be as much money for big companies in it, but even companies are made of people and people suffer from disease. Sympathy, compassion and honesty will always support homeopathy. The government of the British Isles is already working to integrate homeopathy into their health services. This is already done extensively in India. When will the rest of the world catch up?
Your insulting of homeopathy is sad because it shows your inner prejudice. Ask yourself why you are bitter.Look in your deepest depths of your heart and ask how much money is worth a world with suffering. It is not worth any money you gain and your cynical nature does not help improve health. Do not run away from doing the right thing.
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April 17th, 2009 at 1:43 am
@HealthyByNature
Homeopathy works? Good to know. Please refer me to the double-blind tests (preferably supervised by Health Canada or other national equivalent – not funded by an organization which stands to make money based on the result) used to determine the efficacy of its various treatments, both alone and compared with standard treatments. Every medication currently in use went through this testing procedure and passed – they worked as well or better than their antecedents, in a situation where both the placebo effect and experimenter bias were removed by the simple expedient of not telling either the experimenter or the subjects whether any particular patient was taking the new drug, the old drug, or a sugar pill.
That’s the standard which medicine is held to – it has to work, and do so without producing disproportionate side effects.
So far, I can’t find a single such study in which homeopathy met the standard. So please point me towards one.
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April 17th, 2009 at 1:47 am
HealthyByNature said:
It’s exactly because I have compassion that I reject homeopathy – it’s nothing but an elaborate (and much too expensive, considering it’s water and eventually some sugar) placebo, which can persuade people to shun reality-based medicine, which works regardless of you believing it or not (although belief can probably help it). Sympathy, compassion and honesty don’t support homeopathy – they support the use of things that actually work, and getting those things where they are needed.
I’m not greedy when I write against homeopathy (=quackery) – I don’t make money out of it, I’m not payed by those “nasty evil big corporations” and it’s unlikely I’ll ever be in a position where I could directly make money out of my opposition to homeopathy. And while I may be pretty ignorant about much things, I have a certain basic knowledge of fysics, chemistry and biology, which tells me that diluting something until at best a single molecule is left (you’re quite oblivious of Avogadro’s number) won’t have much effect if it’s not an singularly potent katalysator.
As long homeopathy doesn’t prove it actually works – which would require us to rethink most of science, leading us to justly require more clear evidence than your irritating hand-weaving – our attacks on it are attacks on superstition, idioty and irrationality. Those hinder the development of a truly civilized culture, so attacking them isn’t “inner prejudice” or bitternes – the fact that so many ignorant fools with too much a sense of their own judgment accept those idiocies is what makes us bitter. Homeopathy does no good that couldn’t be achieved better by other means with less destruction of rational thinking.
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April 17th, 2009 at 1:58 am
HealthyByNature said:
There is no proof that homeopathy as any medical benefit better than a placebo. If you have any verifiable evidence to the contrary please show us. Without that your statement is without value.
HealthyByNature said:
We look to the facts, not to our hearts for guidance. How dare you suggest that we have no compassion? We don’t want to see people ripped off by quacks, and false cures.
HealthyByNature said:
So what? If it doesn’t work (which it doesn’t) it is not even worth that.
HealthyByNature said:
We are all independent and are not being payed by anyone for our posts here
HealthyByNature said:
No. Stupidity, ignorance, deceit are the tools of quacks and homeopaths are quacks
HealthyByNature said:
Hopefully never.
HealthyByNature said:
I am bitter because jerks like you are leaving behind centuries of science to follow a path of lies and deception probably because you can’t cut it as a real doctor
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April 17th, 2009 at 3:33 am
DV82XL said:
DV8 I (and others) agree with much of what you say but please don’t sour it by resorting to their level in the form of personal attacks. It only degrades an otherwise unimpeachable argument.
In fact all it does in this instance is give HealthyByNature’s hand waving nonsense more weight than your commentary.
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April 17th, 2009 at 9:00 am
I think alternative treatments have their place, if a cancer patient or another sick or injured person goes to get a massage after their treatment to help them relax or feel better then I’m all for it, mental attitude towards recovery and pain management is important. There are lots of cases of people becoming “sick” just because they believe they should be. But you shouldn’t attribute some kind of “healing effect” to these things, it’s a massage or foot rub or whatever the hot item is this week, nothing more and nothing less. It’s when these people cross the line and claim that these treatments are cures in and of themselves without proof, that’s just criminal.
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April 17th, 2009 at 10:05 am
HealthyByNature said:
Not all the British are exactly proud about their government in any way funding or endorsing homeopathy. Some are pretty outraged about it. This site and many others, including many British sites, find the whole practice to be harmful and a waste of money. The Guardian’s Bad Science column is British and it is constantly railing against tax money spent on homoepathy, just as strongly as this site.
Also India is hardly the kind of health model the rest of the world would like to follow. India is full of quacks and scam artists who exploit those without real health care and try to get their money with homeopathy and other magic cures.
The British system has some strong political pressures because they have a well established homeopathy sector there and they have political clout even from Prince Charles who is pro-homeopathy. There are plenty of national health programs that have found homeopathy to be worthless. Health Canada, the Japanese Ministry of Public Health the US Food and Drug Administration, the World Health Organization.
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April 17th, 2009 at 12:53 pm
LambdaDriver said:
If alternative therapies work, they should cease to be alternative – they should become mainstream.
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April 17th, 2009 at 2:02 pm
The problem with tolerating worthless practices, no matter how harmless, is that it leave the door open to things like the anti-vaccination, self-medication with untested and potentially harmful nostrums, and other fads of this nature. Someplace a line has to be drawn by the law and the only rational place for that line is after science-based mainstream medicine. Vjatcheslav is essentially right: if homeopathy had any real value, it would have been incorporated a long time ago into standard practice.
[Other] Matthew said:
While I am not above making personal attacks on these pages – and indeed I think they are justified when responding to tripe that calls for ‘looking into one’s hearth’ and ‘not running away from doing the right thing’ – in this case, I was stating fact. The bulk of these practitioners of alternate medicine are just wannabes that couldn’t cut it in the mainstream, when they are not outright mountebanks that have victims not patients.
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April 17th, 2009 at 2:43 pm
Depleted Cranium MiSSSpellsss headline with surfeit of esses.
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April 17th, 2009 at 3:28 pm
Jim Bob said:
corrected
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