I've created a Wikipedia page for the Society of Homeopaths

A few months ago I spotted that the British Homeopathic Association (BHA) and Faculty of Homeopathy (FoH) had Wikipedia pages but the Society of Homeopaths (SoH) didn't and I'd been meaning to create a page to redress that. It's been interesting revisiting some of their activities and with their recent re-accreditation by the Professional Standards Authority (PSA) and the Judicial Review into that decision that has been requested by the Good Thinking Society I thought it was time to get a move on, so here it is: Society of Homeopaths.

The BHA's page begins with a paragraph about when the association was formed and by whom, then highlights that homeopathy is an unevidenced pseudoscience before going on to highlight two examples of BHA's activities. The first is about the quality (apparently not great) of the evidence they submitted to the House of Commons Evidence Check on Homeopathy from 2009, the second is about their failed Judicial Review of NHS England's decision to top funding homeopathy.

I followed the same pattern for the SoH page and so far I have the following information in there.

• An Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) adjudication against the SoH in 2013 for engaging in false advertising and discouraging people from seeking essential treatments
• SoH considered legal action in 2016 against the ASA after it wrote to UK homeopaths to remind them of the rules for marketing material, but they were advised against it by their legal advisor
• In 2017 skeptics* complained to the PSA about the SoH as their members were offering CEASE therapy for autism. The PSA put some obligations on the SoH in place but re-accredited them. One of the obligations was to publish a position statement on CEASE (and monitor risks from member homeopaths offering this).
• In May this year there was an undercover interview by The Times with a number of homeopaths one of whom was both a member of the SoH and also offering 'homeoprophylaxis' (an alternative to vaccination, which doesn't offer any protection). Rather than bring about disciplinary proceedings the SoH defended the member and said they would complain to the press regulator.
• As a result of the PSA re-accrediting the SoH (on 1 April no less) the GTS has filed a request for a Judicial Review to be undertaken of that decision, you can read more about that here (and donate to the crowdfunder).

*the term skeptics refers not just to bloggers and activists by doctors, scientists, healthcare professionals and patients who are concerned about health claims.

Next to investigate, write, reference and add are

• Info on the 2006 Newsnight undercover 'sting' into homeopaths offering homeopathic alternatives to malaria prevention medicine, alongside a lack of general advice about bite avoidance. Some of the homeopaths involved appear to have been SoH members (a spokesperson from the SoH certainly appeared on follow-up programmes). This will take time to unpick as I need to remind myself of the sequence of events, and of SoH's involvement.
• Related to the above, a year later in 2017 blogger @lecanardnoir wrote a post about the SoH's response about their members re: the malaria sting and received a legal letter asking him to remove his post (which he did). Doing so triggered a chain of events resulting in the mirroring (copying, republishing) onto over 60 other sites and was probably the first time I hear the phrase the Streisand Effect (in which by seeking to hide information you end up drawing more attention to it).
• A retrospective link to this 2014 article which appeared when the SoH first began to be accredited by the PSA, pointing out how ill-advised this seemed.
  "It’s unscientific for a medical regulatory body to give accreditation to homeopaths" - New Statesman (18 September 2014)

Obviously I want the Wikipedia article to be reasonably encyclopaedic (kind of the point!) but I don't think it's necessary to itemise every single thing. Here are some things I've not added, or only lightly referenced.

• I've added the latest (as at Sep 2018) official number of society members (according to PSA's accreditation document) but struggled to make sense of the membership numbers overall so haven't included further information. Their current 'About us' website page has 1,200. In their 2009 submission to the HoC EvCheck they give it as 2,500, in 2013 it was 1,300.
• Probably I won't add anything about the problem of Lady Margaret Hall at Oxford University letting the SoH have their conference and AGM on site despite concerns about legitimising homeopathy, not to mention how the university's autistic students might feel about that happening. 
• Also there's some stuff about alleged links between a (former) SoH staff member and the long-since debunked MMR-autism controversy but that might require legal considerations, so probably best left out for now.
• The SoH has today published a news article on the fact that members can add additional therapies to their insurance package. Some SoH members offer a range of services, including homeopathy, but the standard insurance covers them only for homeopathy. Whether or not society members are underinsured might be a bit niche for Wikipedia.

The purpose of this post then is to combine some stuff that's on Wikipedia with stuff that isn't. I think it's important and helpful to have overview information of a topic, particularly where something involves many years of historical skeptic activism. It's easy to forget things and so useful to keep it all together.

There's a petition to Wikipedia asking it to be less mean to homeopathy + FTC action in US

Wikipedia petition
By any metric this is a very successful petition. At the time of writing it is 531 people shy of reaching 15,000 signatures all of whom are signing in support of the petition's aim to amend Wikipedia's article on homeopathy. Many fans of homeopathy are concerned that the article, as it currently stands, is biased against homeopathy and excludes evidence of its successes in treating people (and animals). The fact that the evidence is not of sufficient quality is neither here nore there.

What amuses me most about the petition is that it is TO Wikipedia, an organisation whose founder agrees that the best evidence shows homeopathy to be no better than placebo.

I am one of many people who have edited the homeopathy page on Wikipedia. Anyone can edit it, and the edit will remain as long as they have made a sensible contribution. If not, their contribution is either simply wiped by reverting the page to its previous edit or the contribution is amended by someone else.

Sending a petition 'to Wikipedia' is sending a petition to me and to all other people who've edited that page. Obviously I can only speak for myself but 'bad luck' is my official response to this petition ;)

Have a giggle over at https://www.change.org/p/wikipedia-call-to-action-to-update-homeopathy-at-wikipedia

FTC toughens up on labelling rules for homeopathy pills
There's been quite a lot in the news lately about the US's Federal Trade Commission's toughened stance on the labelling of over the counter (OTC) homeopathy pills. Homeopathy confections must now include text on the packaging which makes it clear that there's no scientific evidence supporting the use of the pills for health conditions. This is a big deal, but it is not quite right to say - as headlines have - that the FTC requires manufacturers to say the pills don't work. Although it is rather implied.

It would be interesting to know if consumers pay a great deal of attention to the labelling and, more importantly, if they understand its implication. Saying something has no scientific evidence in its favour is vastly more oblique than saying "these pills do not work".

The FTC's publication "Enforcement Policy Statement on Marketing Claims for OTC Homeopathic Drugs" on the updated rules for homeopathy marketing says

"In light of the inherent contradiction in asserting that a product is effective and also disclosing that there is no scientific evidence for such an assertion, it is possible that depending on how they are presented many of these disclosures will be insufficient to prevent consumer deception. Marketers are advised to develop extrinsic evidence, such as consumer surveys, to determine the net impressions communicated by their marketing materials." (emphasis added)

Telling people homeopathy doesn't work hasn't stopped people from using it so I can't really see that obliquely implying it by phrasing it as 'there's no scientific evidence that homeopathy works' would make a great deal of difference.

I also wonder if this updated labelling will make it harder for consumers, on realising they've been duped, to get their money back. After all the products will now say (or at least more strongly imply) in the small print that there's no good evidence that a 'pill for self-limiting condition X' is any good at helping the symptoms of X. Buyer beware.

Homeopathy 'treatments' must be labelled to say they do not work, US government orders (21 November 2016) The Independent
The Federal Trade Commission has demanded that producers of homeopathic treatments say on the label that they do not work