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Homeopathy: there's nothing in it

What is homeopathy?

Ask many people what they think homeopathy is and you'll be told "it's herbal medicine" or "it's all-natural".

Actually, it is neither of these. Few people realise that homeopathy involves diluting substances so much that there's literally nothing left in them.

Homeopathy is an unscientific and absurd pseudoscience, which persists today as an accepted form of complementary medicine, despite there never having been any reliable scientific evidence that it works.

The 10:23 Campaign

The 10:23 Campaign aims to raise awareness about the reality of homeopathy. We will tell you how it can be shown not to work, why homeopaths' claims are impossible, why you should care.

The campaign is organised by the Merseyside Skeptics Society, a non-profit organisation for the promotion of scientific skepticism. More information about Merseyside Skeptics is available on their website.

What's the Harm?

If there is nothing in it, it can't do any harm, right? Wrong! Journalist and science writer Simon Singh MBE explains why homeopathy harms.

An Open Letter to Alliance Boots

Last year, Boots admitted that they don't believe homeopathy works. They said they stock it because "customers believe it works". Sign our open letter and demand Boots stop lending legitimacy to nonsense.

Hot Comments

Boots wouldn't sell faulty parachutes on the basis that customers thought they would work, would they? Then stop selling fake treatments which you know won't help.
- Neil Andrew Coates, United Kingdom
Boots has a duty of care to its customers: please stop selling this dangerous nonsense.
- Tanya Jones, United Kingdom
It would be understandable if you or your advisors believed in the efficacy of these remedies like other health stores may. To provide them knowing they're no better than placebo and could be very dangerous is irresponsible.
- Rachael Worrall, United Kingdom
By stocking homeopathic remedies in your outlets, you are misleading some customers who might mistake them for medicine that will have an observable pharmacological effect.
- Luke Dabin, United Kingdom
Homeopathy is not only scientifically implausible, it is of unproven effectiveness, in fact the weight of scientific evidence is against it. You know that and yet you still sell it, thus condoning its use and acceptance by the public. Shame on you.
- Mel Lloyd, United Kingdom
Boots; would you provide psychic surgery or crystal healing to a patient with an illness? No, so stop putting profits before the needs of desperate and vulnerable people.
- Carla Phillips, United Kingdom
I will not go to Boots any more, now that I know it is untrustworthy. Not only is it greedy to profit from a placebo, but it is dangerous and bad for national health, education and understanding of science.
- Alice Sheppard, United Kingdom
It isn't appropriate. You do all of us pharmacists a great disservice by exposing us to this, thereby tarring us with the profiteering brush.
- Lindsay Evans MRPharmS, United Kingdom
It is a disgrace that this is being sold in Boots. My wife was nearly taken in by it, believing that as it's being sold in a pharmacy, it must be proper medicine.
- Andrew Pitt, United Kingdom
Boots are a pharmacy and one of the biggest chains in the country. They have a responsibility to provide medicines and remedies that are supported by evidence based science, not ones supported by myths and pseudo science.
- Adrian Wells, United Kingdom
The fact that this twaddle is still supported by the UK taxpayer and available on the NHS is an absolute disgrace. This is the absolute antithesis of the fundamental modern clinical principle of practicing evidence-based medicine.
- Dr David Bramble, United Kingdom
You might aswell go back to using leeches and toadstools to cure disease, there's just as little evidence for their effectiveness.
- Stephen Taylor, United Kingdom
It's a shame there is no real competition to Boots who could position themselves as a trusted Pharmacist, since Boots no longer seem interested.
- Matthew Gwyn Jones, United Kingdom
As the market-leading pharmacy, Boots has a responsibility to offer accurate advice and guidance to customers, for whom it may be their first port of call before going to a GP. It is immoral for Boots to promote a fraudulent medicine in its stores.
- Dr. Alistair Brown, United Kingdom
For years I believed homeopathy was a legitimate, proven alternative to conventional medicine. Now that I know otherwise I find it truly astounding that mainstream organisations are allowed to peddle this rubbish onto an ignorant public.
- Dev Chopra, United Kingdom
Boots is abusing the trust of patients by knowingly selling "medicines" which have been shown to have no effect. It's time to put homeopathy behind us along with blood-letting and witchcraft.
- Jerry Huxtable, United Kingdom
The fact that Boots chooses to sell these 'products' which might easily be used in ignorance, by the purchaser on themselves or their children, rather than a working medicine, just disgraces them as a company, in my view.
- Nick Day, United Kingdom
Admitting that homeopathy is nonsense, but stocking the products anyway just because they sell will only harm the brand name. Do the right thing!
- Peter Harrison, United Kingdom
Boots is a market leader in healthcare, so I feel thay have a responsibility to make sure that they are at the forefront of medical science. Homeopathy is not that.
- Roy Hunter, United Kingdom
I conveyed my disgust at Boots selling these products before I realised this campaign existed. "How can they sell this rubbish?", I asked myself. There's a simple answer unfortunately - money. And I thought Boots were better than that.
- Tina Anobile, United Kingdom
As a former employee of Boots the Chemist, I am very dissapointed, stocking homeopathic pseudo-remedies when the company viewpoint is that they believe they don't work is completely at odds with everything Boots used to stand for.
- Pete Ring BSc, United Kingdom
When asked the pharmacist in my local Boots agreed that Homeopathic products don't work. Why sell this trash?
- James Marwood, United Kingdom
It's time for Boots to stop putting the profit motive above the truth where homeopathy and other ineffective forms of treatment are concerned. The public's trust in Boots has been betrayed.
- Chris French, United Kingdom
Boots should be ashamed of itself making a profit out of something which is clearly proven not to work and which might actually harm people who do need proper medical treatment but buy homeopathic "remedies" from Boots. Shame on you.
- Elizabeth Harvey, United Kingdom
I cannot believe this is still being debated. Homeopathy has been shown numerous times to be non-efficacious. The entire premise is nonsense to begin with. The science has spoken. Homeopathy does not work. End of story.
- Jason Wesley Bowen, United States
I'm all for natural remedies, but if something does not work and has been proven not to work, then it should not be promoted, especially not by a chemist such as Boots, which people trust.
- Emma Taylor, United Kingdom
I think Boots should realise that their profits rest on their good reputation with the public rather than on any one product that they sell. Please protect your good reputation and our health by not stocking unproven "remedies".
- Niklas Smith, United Kingdom
Having worked for Boots, now retired, I find it depressing that their standards have sunk to the level of selling quack medicines.
- David Vaughan, United Kingdom
I really think its a disgrace the Boots sell homeopathic "remedies" even though they state that they know they don't work.
- Hollie Fisher, United Kingdom
Profiting from the sick and injured by selling them products they KNOW are ineffectual.... "because they want to buy them". Totally irresponsible.
- Scott Chapman, United Kingdom
How can they admit that they are knowingly selling placebo? Isn't that embarrassing for a pharmacy?
- Dr Matthew Hayes, United Kingdom
As a pharmacist, I am find it ashaming that Boots and other pharmacies sell these products. They should remove from sale all products not support by evidence immediately and dedicate their efforts to promoting the best evidence-based practice.
- Matthew Jones, United Kingdom
Do you know what they call Alternative medicine when it's been proven to work? Medicine.
- Daniel Andersen, United States
People think it works because of where they buy it- Stop lending credibility to homeopathy!
- Bernard Knappenberger, Canada
The brazen exploitation of sick people being perpetrated by Boots is unforgiveable! Give them something that will actually help their conditions!
- Christopher Hassall, Canada
While Boots is a business, and I fully accept your right to turn a profit, I believe that you have a duty of care to potentially vulnerable customers not to sell products with no appreciable properties.
- Steven Orr, United Kingdom
Stocking a placebo because it makes money rather than aids healing? And admitting to it? More front than Blackpool.
- Jordan Harper, United Kingdom
I can't believe you've got to the stage where people have to protest the fact that you're selling snake oil. You are a supposedly reputable and trusted company!
- Frances McCarthy, United Kingdom
Boots is a trusted brand and should lead the way in getting homeopathy out of pharmacies. You'll make a bigger profit from publicly rejecting homeopathy than from selling it.
- Nicola Franklin, Australia
Providing nonsensical, pseudoscinetific cures can cause genuine harm - both in seperating the gullible from their money, and potentially preventing them from seeking real help with genuine illness.
- Russell Rimmer, United Kingdom
A pharmacy should only be in the business of selling legitimate, science-based medical products. Supporting homeopathy in any way is the same as supporting magic.
- Matthew Frederickson, United States
I once analysed some homeopathic "medicines" using the most sensitive elemental analysers in the world (ICPMS). They were very pure water samples.
- Dr Andrew N. Eaton, United Kingdom
It saddens me that the public are encouraged to think of science as another faddy belief system by people keen to make money. Where the science is clear, it should be used to guide all of us to make better decisions.
- Helen Harris, United Kingdom
What can one say except it's just wrong of you!
- Thomas Edward Hall, United Kingdom
Boots - understand that selling homeopathic remedies may lead to people delaying seeking proper medical treatment - people trust you as a "Chemist's shop" you are seen to know what you are talking about. Please free up this shelf space for something else!
- Ross Clark, United Kingdom
Supporting a £13bn industry based on untruths and exploiting the ignorance of the uninformed cannot be defended as proving a freedom of choice.
- Andrew Holding, United Kingdom
Why not cast horoscopes as well? It makes just as much sense...
- Richard Smith, United Kingdom
How can anyone trust a Boots pharmacist to provide impartial, evidence-based advice, when their shelves are stocked with snake oil for suckers?
- Peter Phelan, United Kingdom
Having been a registered physician assistant for twenty years, I find your promotion of homeopathy both a betrayal of the public trust and unethical, not to mention unseemly for a major corporation.
- David M. Penzel, United States
Homeopathy is not medicine. It is water. Boots selling it will make some people think it is a legitimate medicine.
- Philip Wade, United Kingdom
Homeopathy invokes a trust in a group of people who believe it to work. A problem comes if a few of these people try to cure more serious ailments with it, without seeking proper medical advice.
- Patrck Simpson, United Kingdom
"Homeopathic medicines? yeah, they are on that shelf over there next to the paper condoms... Weeeeellll some people Think they work, so its ok to sell them right?"
- Jono Dewhurst, United Kingdom
I have chosen not to shop at Boots untill they remove these products from their shelves. Profit should not come above being honest.
- Abby Sims, United Kingdom
How do you justify selling something you know that does not work. On any other product there would surely be some consumer law to protect people against goods that don't work.
- Gareth Dafydd Dee, United Kingdom
Boots should be ashamed of themselves peddling this rubbish as medicine even though it could prevent people seeking real help. How many people's health have you damaged though this shameless quackery?
- Dr. Keith Collyer, United Kingdom
No robust placebo controlled trials of homeopathy has shown any evidence of efficacy over placebo. The provision of homeopathy leads to delay in receiving genuinely effective treatments. To promote such behaviour is negligent.
- Dr Robert Devoy MRPharmS BMBS, United Kingdom
Nonsense isn't always harmless
- Roger Jeffery, United Kingdom
My best friend died through a homeopath telling her it would be safe to stop the medication for bi-polar disorder that had kept her well for 12 years, and replace it with quack sugar pills. She was dead within 6 months.
- Dr Melody Clarke, United Kingdom
Homeopathy in itself is not dangerous - after all it is only water. What is dangerous is people forgoing evidence-based medicine in favour of this quackery. Boots, by selling and promoting this stuff is adding to that danger.
- Ross W Sargent, United Kingdom
I am utterly astounded that Boots is still prepared to have these products on their shelves. Please look at the clear science and evidence.
- Ian David Sharp, United Kingdom
There should be no place for magic and superstition in healthcare, and certainly no profit in it for Boots.
- Simon Garrett, United Kingdom
To guage the real effect homeopathy has on Boots reputation, try a google search just using "Boots Homeopathy". Boots - Time to act like a responsible & trusted pharmacy - Drop the homeopathic nonsense!
- Alastair Grant, United Kingdom
You know this stuff doesn't work, you know that selling it undermines the credibility of your pharmacists (and of the company as a whole) - yet you continue to exploit and enlarge the ignorance of your customers. Please stop doing this.
- Alistair David Hirst, United Kingdom
You could not sell aspirin tablets that contained 0mg aspirin - if you did it would be considered a scam. Why is it legal to sell "Arnica Tablets" that contain 0% arnica?
- Pennie Blatchford, United Kingdom
Boots shouldn't lend the weight of its reputation to what they themselves realise is snake oil.
- Dean Morrison, United Kingdom
Acceptance of moderate use for the worried-well acts as a breeding ground for the more insidious pushing of homeopathy for serious diseases in the developing world. Catch it. Bin it. Kill it.
- Dr Jim Caryl, United Kingdom
If Homeopathy worked, they'd be using it in hospitals and surgeries. If your ill, don't trust in pseudoscience, go and see a REAL doctor.
- Jason Goodwin, United Kingdom
Do Boots want to sell products that will actually benefit people, or do they want to profit from people's lack of understanding? If they only want to give people what they want, then why not sell heroin and lottery tickets too?
- Dr David Hardman, United Kingdom
I'm glad I no longer work for Boots. I'm not sure I could justify working for a company that knowingly and deliberately scams the gullible
- Jess Bennett, United Kingdom
It's vital for the integrity of Boots that you don't sell something that you have no evidence for. It's your responsibility to sort this out; people trust you.
- Amy Blencowe, United Kingdom
Why stop at homeopathy, Boots? Why not sell prayers in a jar or offer reiki? Same outcome: money in the coffers whilst the customer is getting nothing but a placebo.
- Trystan Swale, United Kingdom
I'm surprised and disappointed a trusted institution as Boots is involved with snake oil sales and promotion.
- Niall McCallion, United Kingdom
If Boots stopped selling homeopathic products and publicly, graciously admitted the truth of the matter, it would do a great deal to promote public understanding of what is or isn't genuine medicine.
- MJ Simpson, United Kingdom

Write to your MP!

On June 21st 2010, David Tredinnick MP proposed four 'Early Day Motions' supporting homeopathy. Three of these motions were based on cherry-picked scientific papers, when the overwhelming majority of science indicates that homeopathy is no more effective than placebo.

The fourth appears to criticise the British Medical Association for having a position on the efficacy of an intervention. Want to know what you can do about it?

Download the leaflet

Not everyone uses the internet, so if you can't send them a link, download and print our flyer. Give it to family, friends - whoever you think may be interested. We're sure you will come up with some more creative uses too!