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There is an American group called Homeopaths without Borders (HWB), who claims that it provides humanitarian aid, in the form of homeopathic “medicine” or just plain water, to devastated areas of the world. The more famous group that does real lifesaving work across the world, Doctors without Borders, are probably too busy, utilizing real evidence-based medicine with real medications, risking their own lives, and performing great service humanity, to be worried that a bunch of pseudoscientific homeopaths stole their noble trademark to push quackery.

HWB is sending their water magicians to Haiti, Guatemala, Dominican Republic, Sri Lanka, and El Salvador, all countries that have suffered so much during the past few years. During their time in Haiti, “the team will be in Port-au-Prince to complete the final session of the Fundamentals Program—a foundational curriculum in homeopathic therapeutics incorporating theoretical and clinical training.” So not only are they providing nonsense, useless, unscientific healthcare to Haiti, they are training new homeopaths there. Haiti needs to train real doctors who use science based medicine, not quack medicine.

Homeopaths without Borders in Haiti

So what is HWB specifically planning to do in Haiti?

HWB volunteers provided homeopathic care to 890 people in 2012 in community clinics in Port-au-Prince and rural communities—in some locations, a full two-day walk from the nearest doctor.

We concluded our inaugural, four-part Fundamentals of Homeopathy program, training and certifying 13 Haitian homeopathic caregivers, who earned the title “Homeopathe Communautaire.”

We enrolled 24 students and began the second Fundamentals program in rural Belle Anse, the remote, southeastern coastal region of Haiti.

To ensure that homeopathy holds a respected and sanctioned place in Haiti’s healthcare community, the Homeopathe Communautaires are currently seeking licensing through Haiti’s Ministry of Health.

We’ve begun to develop valuable organizational infrastructure in Haiti, by partnering with two community services [sic] nonprofits in Haiti and establishing an on-site homeopathic stocking pharmacy in Port-au-Prince.

Stocking a pharmacy? With water?

The scientific evidence and homeopathy

Let’s review the pseudoscience behind homeopathy:

As opposed to the pseudoscience pushing crowds, I didn’t cherry pick, except to not spend 10 hours listing out every single article that debunks the myth of homeopathy. Three of the articles are meta reviews from the gold standard of meta reviews, the Cochrane Collaboration.

Recently, there’s been a push by the pseudoscience front to claim that homeopathic potions can relieve coughs. Yes, water can relieve coughs better than – not sure what, since they didn’t actually compare it to standard treatment. They just looked at sputum velocity – gross.

This article was published in a journal with the microscopically low impact factor of 0.151. Seriously, that means an average article published in this trash journal gets cited 0.151 times a year. It’ll take 7 years for it to even be cited once. And the “research” (damn irony meter broke again) was sponsored by the most vile (get it) Big Homeopathy company, Boiron. Real evidence that they are nothing more than shills.

So the researchers placed children into two placebo groups, then jump to all sorts of crazy conclusions, like antibiotics wouldn’t help. As if a real physician would give antibiotics for a cough.

To quote Mark Crislip, “Worst. Homeopathy. Study. Ever.” Succinct. Snarky. Love it.

And homeopathy is not harmless

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What harm can HWB really cause? Well, let’s go to a recent article by David Shaw attacks the fake humanitarianism of HWB:

[infobox icon=”quote-left”]Despite Homeopaths Without Borders’ claims to the contrary, “homeopathic humanitarian help” is a contradiction in terms. Although providing food, water, and solace to people in areas affected by wars and natural disasters certainly constitutes valuable humanitarian work, any homeopathic treatment deceives patients into thinking they are receiving real treatment when they are not. Furthermore, training local people as homeopaths in affected areas amounts to exploiting vulnerable people to increase the reach of homeopathy.

Much as an opportunistic infection can take hold when a person’s immune system is weakened, so Homeopaths Without Borders strikes when a country is weakened by a disaster. However, infections are expunged once the immune system recovers but Homeopaths Without Borders’ methods ensure that homeopathy persists in these countries long after the initial catastrophe has passed. Homeopathy is neither helpful nor humanitarian, and to claim otherwise to the victims of disasters amounts to exploitation of those in need of genuine aid.[/infobox]

We shouldn’t confuse humanitarianism with quack medicine. Homeopathy doesn’t do anything, except to quench thirst. Of course, fresh water is always a problem in disaster areas, so maybe I shouldn’t complain too much that homeopaths decide to provide water to these people. Except for that pretending that it cures maladies, thereby keeping these people from getting real help.

These quack medicine pushers have no ethics, no morals. Go away.

Editor’s note: This article was originally published in September 2013. It has been revised and updated to include more comprehensive information, to improve readability and to add current research.

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