Shrunk wrote:

Alan C wrote:Read a number of them.
I know it's a very small sample size but please Canada, tell me there isn't a significant number of ignorant suckers there!

There are far more than the usual number of comments to that story, compared to other episodes, the large majority supportive of homeopathy. I suspect an organized campaign by CAM advocates, but have no direct evidence of that. (Although the fact that a large number of the comments were posted before the episode was broadcast on Jan 14 is also suggestive.)

It doesn't matter, anyway. The episode itself is now up (at least, I can see it) and it is devastating in its attack against homeopathy, with the most damaging evidence coming from the testimony of homeopaths themselves. It's interesting that this program, with its focus on consumer protection, was able to do a better than usual journalistic job of sticking with the facts and evidence, as opposed to the too-common practice of giving equal weight to both sides in the mistaken belief that this constitutes "objectivity."

Dudely wrote: As for how rampant it is in Canada: I've lived here all my life and didn't even know what it was until I started having an interest in being a "skeptic" and ran across it. No one I know uses it or has ever mentioned it, I have never met or heard of a doctor practicing it, and I've never seen it mentioned in an advertisement or business sign. And I live in a very conservative part of the country.

The root is very poisonous, with a paralyzing effect on the nervous system. In two cases of fatal poisoning from eating the seeds, the toxins veratridine and cevadine were present in the blood at 0.17–0.40 nanograms/milliliter and 0.32–0.48 nanograms/milliliter, respectively. In 1983 sneezing powders produced from the herb in West Germany were reported to have caused severe intoxications in Scandinavia.

Animavore wrote:Well, is it not odd that it says, Inactive ingredients: Charcoal (ACTIVATED).
Is this a contradiction?

Animavore wrote:Well, is it not odd that it says, Inactive ingredients: Charcoal (ACTIVATED).
Is this a contradiction?

wikipedia wrote:"Activated Carbon", also called activated charcoal or activated coal is a form of carbon that has been processed to make it extremely porous and thus to have a very large surface area available for adsorption or chemical reactions.

orpheus wrote:
Here's the kicker:
Activated charcoal itself is listed as an inactive ingredient.

Drink plenty of clear fluids to prevent dehydration caused by diarrhea

orpheus wrote:Here's a weird one. In a pharmacy the other day, I saw this box of "homeopathic formula" activated charcoal capsules, and I just had to take pictures of it to share with you all.

Here's the front:


As you probably know, activated charcoal is used in hospitals for emergency treatment of some kinds of poisoning. It is also thought to be an effective treatment for diarrhea, although there is less evidence for its efficacy in this area. But there's no doubt that it really does have medicinal uses.

Now look carefully at the ingredients on the back:



The "Active Ingredients" are the ones diluted to homeopathic levels (and we all know what that means).

Here's the kicker:
Activated charcoal itself is listed as an inactive ingredient.

http://www.latimes.com/health/boostershots/la-heb-skeptics-homeopathy-01052011,0,2326137.story

Magician James Randi, skeptics launch attack on makers of homeopathic 'drugs'

Magician James Randi, who has devoted the latter part of his career to exposing fraud, scams and charlatans, and a network of skeptics known as the 10:23 Campaign launched a major campaign Saturday against the manufacturers of so-called homeopathic drugs, charging that the companies that sell the drugs are packaging worthless products that are cheating customers out of their money.

In an online video, Randi consumed an overdose of homeopathic sleeping pills to demonstrate that they have no effect, and skeptics elsewhere consumed large overdoses of other homeopathic drugs in similar demonstrations. Randi also offered $1 million of his own money to any manufacturer of a homeopathic product who could prove that the product actually worked as claimed, and challenged major retailers like CVS, Rite-Aid and Walgreens to remove the products from their shelves.

"Consumers have the right to know what they are buying," he said. "No one should walk out of a drugstore with a homeopathic product without knowing these basic facts: There is no credible evidence that the product does what it says. There is not one bit -- not a single atom -- of the claimed 'active ingredient' in the package, and no U.S. health agency has tested or approved the product."

Continues