Trick or Treatment?: Alternative Medicine on Trial

In Trick or Treatment: The Undeniable Facts About Alternative Medicine, Simon Singh and Edzard Ernst, M.D., set out to analyze the scientific literature on acupuncture, homeopathy, chiropractic, herbal medicine, and a host of other modalities of so-called alternative and complementary medicine. The book begins with a long, fascinating chapter about the history of medicine and the emergence of the modern, evidence-based approach to medicine--i.e., conventional, Western, or allopathic medicine. Their stated purpose is to keep an open mind while applying the principles of evidence-based medicine to popular alternative modalities. Their backgrounds as medical outsiders and the careful, measured language of the introduction gave this skeptical reader confidence that the authors would be able to satisfy this goal.

But in my case, Singh and Ernst were preaching to the choir. I listen regularly to several podcasts that focus on science and skepticism (e.g., QuackCast and The Skeptic's Guide to the Universe) and I follow medical news and blogs (e.g., Science-Based Medicine). So I probably have a better idea of the current medical consensus on some of these modalities than most members of the general public. I was not surprised by their conclusions, which found most alternative modalities to fall somewhere in the range between barely useful and downright dangerous.

I know a lot of alt-med True Believers, though, and I fear that Singh and Ernst are overly optimistic about the willingness of the proponents of alternative medicine to rely on science as the best way of understanding the world. Any sensible person who's willing to spend 10 minutes googling "homeopathy" can figure out pretty quickly that this particular form of "medicine" has absolutely no plausible mechanism, and yet Americans spent $1.5 billion on homeopathic remedies in 2000. I suspect that believers in complementary and alternative medicine don't want to know what science has to say about these modalities, because they don't know enough about science to evaluate its conclusions. I would enthusiastically prescribe Trick or Treatment for anyone who's interested in the facts about alternative treatment modalities. But I make no promises that it will cure the lack of intellectual curiosity that infects the alt-med True Believer.

Doctors have treated patients for thousands of years, and patients generally trusted their doctors. This was true when doctors based their treatments, like bleeding, on superstition rather than science, treatments that did nothing, or that even made things worse. Patients paid their fees and thought health had arrived, or at least was just around the corner. People don't change much: these days internationally they pay about $40 billion a year for "alternative medicine" that has little chance of making things better and some chance of making things worse. This is despite that we know how to test a treatment and we can tell scientifically if it works or not. _Trick or Treatment: The Undeniable Facts About Alternative Medicine_ (W. W. Norton) is a serious look at how we can know which of these therapies are bunkum, but at the same time it allows how a very few might have potential for actual healing. The two authors make a winning team to create an informed and entertaining volume. Edzard Ernst is a medical doctor who at one time practiced the useless homeopathy, and received its treatments himself, and is a professor of complementary medicine. Simon Singh is a science journalist who has written fine layman's introductions to big subjects like _Fermat's Enigma_. Together they have produced an informative work to explain to readers how the science of telling good treatments from bad works, and how alternative medicine time and again does not. "Our mission," they say at the outset, "is to reveal the truth about the potions, lotions, pills, needles, pummelling and energizing that lie beyond the realms of conventional medicine, but which are becoming increasingly attractive for many patients." They have succeeded.

In a lucid first chapter, the authors set down the history and principles of evidence-based medicine. Experimenting to find what works seems to have first been practiced by James Lind, who in 1747 conceived the idea of taking groups of sailors suffering from scurvy and giving each group a different treatment to see which ones got better. It seems obvious to us now, but there was no precedent for such experimentation when the standard was to stick to traditional, and ineffective, treatments, no questions asked. Lind, of course, had no idea about vitamin C; this didn't matter, as he could tell which subjects got better on oranges and lemons without knowing the vital reason why. Another hero blazing the way toward evidence based medicine was Florence Nightingale. Famous as the founder of modern nursing, her role in the use of statistics is less well known but just as important in saving patients' lives. When she was assigned to a filthy hospital in Turkey in 1854, she pushed ahead with good food, clean linen, and fresh air for patients. She was adept at data display, inventing a variation of the pie graph, and she marshaled data and illustrations to demonstrate different outcomes for differently treated groups. Medical experimentation worked, and statistics demonstrated it. After an overview of how humans eventually came to understand how evidence based medicine was the way to go, the authors give four chapters about specific treatments which don't have the evidence to back them up: acupuncture, homeopathy, chiropractic, and herbal medicine. The authors are not universally condemnatory; experimental evidence shows, for instance, that some herbs have good effect, and chiropractors might help with a lower back problem (but it is dangerous to let them fiddle with your neck or with any other health conditions).

Besides the main chapters, there is an appendix which gives one page summaries of other therapies, including magnets, leeches, crystals, ear candles, and more. The authors explain how most of these can have no effectiveness, but in each case they summarize what evidence is available and what the risks of such treatment are. It seems that their decisions are judicious, in that they accept that certain relaxation techniques or massage might have specific usefulness. The book is wittily dedicated to HRH The Prince of Wales, and it would be nice to think that Prince Charles might benefit from its contents as well as from its dedication. He has, after all, been a major force in the advocacy for alternative treatments, but the authors show that his advocacy has been misdirected. They quote Michael Baum, a cancer specialist who was frustrated by the Prince's role: "The power of my authority comes with a knowledge built on 40 years of study and 25 years of active involvement in cancer research. Your power and authority rest on an accident of birth." You won't find the authors themselves saying anything quite that scornful. They have done a splendid job of their own advocacy here, advocacy for rationality, experimentation, and evidence. Anyone who is considering spending money on an alternative treatment ought to read this book carefully first. Even if you are at no risk for throwing your money away in that fashion, you will find this an entertaining tour of the power of applied good sense.

This is exactly what we should want--a fair minded, extensive review of what works and what doesn't. The authors identify some alternative treatments as showing success and some (most) as not providing anything beyond what a placebo would.

Investing time and attention into ineffective treatments costs lives so this book is saving lives by urging us to look at results.

I find it perplexing the way some people simply assume to be correct what others tell them with no deeper inquisitiveness or afterthought. We know we cannot simply trust anyone otherwise we run the risk of being duped as we see from various successful scams.

What is more perplexing is how intelligent people can simply assume to be correct what their own gut feelings tell them or be tricked into actually believing they've experienced things that they haven't. I remember a study done a while ago where a group of random people took part in a psychological experiment. These people were shown a photo taken from their early childhood and asked to remember and describe the scene in it. The only problem was, some of the pictures had been cleverly doctored to show events that never actually took place, such as a hot air balloon ride! Many in the group, as you'd expect, drew blanks and were confused and could not recall the balloon ride. However, astonishingly, many of the participants after a while actually `recalled' this fake event and even `remembered' how elated they felt up there in the sky and how cold it was! (For those interested, it was the Wade et al 2002 study; link here: h--p://[...])

We know we can't unquestioningly rely on strangers but worryingly, it seems not all of us can 100% rely on our own feelings! So then how do we find truth? Perhaps one way is to rely on the testimonials or opinions of the people around us. But is this totally wise, especially when we see that many people are not reliable sources of information? For me, this is where the scientific method of testing and evidence steps in and proves its absolute authority. Surely this is the best method we have of discovering what the truth is in any given situation; surely nothing can beat evidence derived from proper tests.

Trick or Treatment is about proving that the vast majority of alternative medicine doesn't work but it is also a celebration of the scientific method in the context of medicine. It begins fascinatingly by recalling various important historical moments when the scientific method first began to be used and how it then revealed such hugely important secrets that had eluded mankind for so long, particularly in the field of healthcare.

These introductions serve a very useful purpose, because the crux of the book is based on the results of many high quality scientific trials that render most alternative medicine completely ineffective or even dangerous. However, there are still many out there who, for some reason, don't accept the authority of the clinical trial / scientific method and these first few chapters provide an excellent case for counteracting this mistrust.

The rest of the chapters are devoted to one of the main types of CAM and begin by providing a detailed description and background to it. Then the authors bring in the mighty weight of a vast range of quality evidence (meaning evidence from the types of trials that eliminate all possibility of bias or erroneous results) to finally blow up any doubt in the rational mind that much of this stuff is childish nonsense and simply doesn't work.

As you'd expect, there's also a lot of fascinating information and evidence about the placebo effect and whether it is morally acceptable to sell it, and why, despite lack of evidence for and concrete evidence against, people continue to waste vast amounts of time and money on CAM and continue to steadfastly believe in it.

The book came out at a similar time to one by Rose Shapiro, Suckers - How Alternative Medicine Makes Fools of us All. It treads much the same ground but is an excellent companion piece to Trick or Treatment, as both books often both elaborate on details the other one glides over. However, Trick or Treatment is better for focusing on the available evidence and therefore acts as a great reference book.

Also, to the authors' credit, they don't back away from including the results of various high profile trials that bizarrely seemed to acknowledge the efficacy of some of the main types of CAM, For instance, the WHO trials that seemed to support homeopathy and a certain BBC documentary that seemed to show somebody undergoing major heart surgery without any anaesthetic, only acupuncture (shame on you BBC!). This may be quite disheartening for the rationalist as he/she reads through this but order is soon restored once we read that such trials or PR stunts were riddled with bias or faked and that meta-analysis in fact shows the opposite.

Trick or Treatment is an important book and it's hard to believe that millions of westerners still buy into much of this nonsense. The book won't change people's minds overnight; many will still cling to their anti-Big Pharma stance, egocentric fashionista lifestyle or desire for more mystery in the world. But for those of us who place more importance in what's actually true and don't want to be a dupe, this book is invaluable as well as a fascinating read.

It's a good book, well-reasoned. The authors walk through acupuncture (not), homeopathy (not), chiropractic (limited but reservations), herbal medicine (mostly not, with good reasons). If you buy or contemplate buying any of these treatments, it's worth reading.

On the downside: one sloppy sentence (astrologers can't predict star signs) caught my eye; that's true because astrologers don't work with star signs. One wonders what other uninformed editing colored a sentence or two.

What I don't see discussed is the situation of N=1 not subject to double blind testing. Praying for other people may not objectively help those other people. But does it help the one who prays? Or does it help to pray for oneself? Can't test that. My own experience is that chiropractic works better than "conventional" treatment for the type of back pain I get. I've tested that enough.

Some of Micheal Pollan's work about the "American" diet demonstrates that for some variables, significant controlled studies are virtually impossible. For others (long term benefit of vitamin supplements), one pretty much has to decide for one's self or risk being on the wrong side if/when the answers do come in.

Conventional medicine fails in some major areas, long-term chronic pain control being one. Until conventional medicine can harness the placebo effect, there are people who need whatever else works.

I suspect readers will find in this book the evidence they need. It's reassuring to hear another voice about homeopathy; never tried acupucture myself and probably won't chose to pay for it. OTOH, I'll keep swallowing my supplements.

I've struggled with the proper perspective of CAM for a long time. Both sides acknowlege the grand potential of our own healing. Both sides regard our own body as the world's greatest pharmaceutical source. Both sides acknowlege that our bodies can turn against us (auto-immune diseases and imbalance). Both sides acknowlege the essential participation of our body in healing. They are more alike than different, and yet...
And, I say the word 'body' when I mean body/mind for which our culture has no concept nor word (other than as a dichotomy).

We have an established scientific practice that works within limits and within these constraints (of the body). Just so you know my predilection, I think CAM is full of quacks.
People aren't dumb. We know that this scientifically-based practice is largely an art as well. In what % of cases is the doctor absolutely sure of the diagnosis? Sure, in a broken arm or whatever, great. We don't have this %? And we don't have it in a scientifically based practice? Actually, the cure or not/cure is helped used to confirm a particular diagnosis, and there's nothing wrong with that... But people know.
What % of conditions are auto-immune... again, why don't we have these statistics... In these cases, the doctor treats the symptoms. At this point we have to admit that doctors cease being doctors, in the medical sense. It becomes a practice of healing based on statistical guess-work and trial and error. It's a pseudo-scientific approach. What's the % of that, oh great healers? I'm not dissing our only remaining approach but how often is that approach administered with the false assurance of the 'backing' of scientific authority? How often do our approaches fail or do more harm than good? We don't have those statistics and never will. Although we have the means to collect it, I doubt we ever will.

Hence the search for alternative approaches with perspectives our scientific approach misses completely. Although we know the body/mind is a huge, intimate and essential factor in healing... we don't even have a concept for it. This is the concept of 'chi' and balance. We can say that doctors are right... let's pick a # since we don't have one... 20% of the time. They can be 90% sure about 30% of the time. Those are good numbers actually and people should take advantage of them. The rest of medicine (established) is less scientific or pseudo-scientific with the intent to do less harm than good.

So, it would behoove our practices to pay more attention to the largest factor in healing, more essential in a larger % of cases than not and that is the body/mind. The only direct and comprehensive reference to this in medical literature is called the 'sugar pill'. That's our homage to the greatest force and variable in the healing process in our great art.

So CAM tries to fill in this void in areas and with its non-scientific yet 'historic' approaches, while being innocuous, will succeed in 30% of the cases (according to our literature). This is actually better than some medical approaches... So who's right? In these cases, not the losers. It's not faith or belief, it's the intervention of procedures that kick the body/mind into participation or balance, whether it's a needle or an herb. It's also growth because disease is brought about by lifestyle, habit facing external factors and inner approach and natural healing is an internal and necessary learning process.

So, don't believe in your approaches, it won't make any difference in the outcome (the body/mind intervention is a largely subconscious affair) but don't blindly believe in our mildly scientifically based practice of western medicine either. That can also do more harm than good.

Sorry, I didn't read the book. If you look at a non-scientific approach through scientific methods, you'll disprove it and I think it's an essential and correct thing to do. I'd like to see similar scrutiny of our traditional medicine in terms of certainty. (when you veer off of certainty, you can't be practicing scientifically either, it's an art with pseudo-scientific trappings which may deceive as easily as CAM trappings).

To sum it up.. there is a reason the 'sugar pill' and/or 'deception' works and it isn't the sugar pill or deception (or belief). It might make sense to find out what's really at stake and how to properly incorporate it into our fabric of our healing approach.

Trick or Treatment, by Simon Singh and Edzard Ernst, is a great read that is designed to debunk alternative medicines used in modern society that provide no evident help to people and can actually in some cases harm people's health to even extreme cases resulting in death. The book uses a skeptical approach towards all alternative medicine and essentially uses the scientific method beautifully to support its claims and test other claims. Singh and Ernst's great use of reasoning, examples, and irony provide a quite entertaining and educational book that can be very helpful to people in today's society, especially those that use, or are considering using alternative medicines in their everyday lives.
The authors immediately show their cleverness at the beginning of the book by dedicating it to the Prince of Wales, Prince Charles, who as many know is a huge advocate of alternative medicine and encourages these treatments. This ironic tone from the very beginning shows that the book will be enjoyable as well as instructive. The first chapter entails the basis for all scientific testing, the scientific method. A great thing about this book that people must realize from the beginning is that while the book is based on science and written by well-known scientists, its language throughout the book is by no means scientific jargon. It is not as if you are reading a science magazine, but actually is very easy to interpret and understand even for the average person. The reason they make sure to use common language is because their main targeted audience is the average person. Their goal with the book as the state at the beginning is "to apply the principles of evidence-based medicine to the field of complementary medicine such that those treatments which demonstrably do generate more good than harm become part of conventional medicine and those which fail to meet this criterion become obsolete." They excel in their demonstrations and the first chapter does an excellent job at providing the average person with the knowledge necessary to see what basis they will use to conduct their skeptical analysis of the alternative medicines that follow.
The chapters that follow cover four main alternative treatments including: acupuncture, homeopathy, chiropractic, and herbal therapies. They use numerous examples to highlight the fallacies of alternative medicine and show how unreliable most of it really is. One example they use is focused on debunking acupuncture. "While there is tentative evidence that acupuncture might be effective for some forms of pain relief and nausea, it fails to deliver any medical benefit in any other situations and its underlying concepts are meaningless." They go into detail about how there is no difference between acupuncture use and placebos with random positioning of needles, according to tests and studies. This brings up another main and very interesting point that many people never even consider. Since the use of placebos sometimes does help the patient feel better and sometimes does have a marginal positive effect, acupuncture advocates state that this reason alone should stand firm in supporting the use of acupuncture. If nothing else, it will at least help the patient feel like they are better right? As the authors prove, this is not really a good reason for the use of placebos in acupuncture or even the use of it at all. They give three huge reasons why this is not the case saying that it involves wasting a huge amount of money, involves borderline unethical standards on the part of the doctor, and prevents the patient "to seek out more effective conditional treatment." The authors show that even though the placebo effect may not directly have harmful results, indirectly it can prove to be detrimental in people's health.
Singh and Ernst continue to find holes and weaknesses in alternative medicine and leave the reader completely unable to question their views. Later in the book they seem to take on the advocate's point of view and show that they commit many fallacies by saying that alternative remedies are "traditional" and "science can't test alternative medicine." They stress that science actually is testable and can be proven, contradictory to alternative medicine, and therefore is obviously more reliable. They show that even scientific methods are required to be tested before they can be confirmed reliable to use and perform on people. They give an example of a scientist who used ACTH in a attempt to treat infants and reduce blindness in newborns. He had great success compared to the other nearby hospital that did not use it. However, he did not immediately conclude that ACTH was a savior for helping babies not lose their sight. He did another test and found that ACTH really had no effect at all on the children. They use examples like this to show that science is a belief system based on knowledge that can be tested, confirmed, and used confidently.
The authors are quick to show and demonstrate that they are not attacking alternative medicine and are willing to believe it if it can be tested and proven to have an effect. Ernst even goes as far as boldly offering $10,000 to any person that proves homeopathy is any better than the use of a placebo. It is difficult to accuse the authors of bias, especially Ernst, because he states that he supports any alternative medicine that can be proven. He actually says that he approves and accepts the use of some herbal remedies, and actually has used them on himself. The authors repeatedly state that their main goal and only objective is to find the truth. They also show why it is logical for people to be attracted to alternative medicine because while evidence-based medicine prevents and reduces illnesses, alternative medicine is solely focused on curing. This is why despite the lack of evidence, people are swayed towards alternative medicine, because of the will to believe.
Trick or Treatment is an amazing book that I would recommend to anyone, especially those that are taking, have ever taken, or are even considering taking alternative medicine. It opens the eyes of the general public and is a book aimed to steer people away from wasting money, and more importantly risking their lives. It is an absolute necessity for the contents of this book to get spread into the general public soon because alternative medicine is only becoming more popular and growing in size. The authors do a great job of debunking alternative medicine without bias. Instead, they use hard facts and evidence to support their claims and prove to be credible sources that people can rely on. They agree that a few alternative remedies are useful in some situations and leave the door open for future acceptance if anything is ever proven. They are able to use their wit to keep the reader entertained as well, and provide anecdotes and examples that allow the reader to see all the downfalls of most of alternate medicine. The authors leave the reader without question and prove their points thoroughly. The book is successful in its attempt to prove to people how most alternative medicine is useless, and in some cases even harmful, and is overall a great quick read that I highly recommend to everyone.

This is an excellent primer on the history science based medicine (that should be a redundant), methodology and the top "alternative" therapies. Highly recommend for a balanced overview on the subject of complementary medicine. If there would be one book to cover this topic, this would be the one.

A must read for anyone interested in the truth. It actually speaks favourably of some alt-med ideas, opposed to what some of the nutters are complaining about. All that matters is understanding and discovering the truth, and unfortunately, much of alternative medicine is bunk.

If you're a fan of acupuncture, homeopathy, chiropractic therapy,
or holistic medicine, you probably won't want to read TRICK OR
TREATMENT by Simon Singh and Dr. Edzard Ernst . . . its premise,
as stated in the subtitle, is to present THE UNBELEVABLE FACTS
ABOUT ALTERNATIVE MEDICINE.

In doing so, they state in the very first two paragraphs what readers
can expect to find:

* The contents of this book are guided entirely by a single pithy
sentence, written over 2,000 years ago by Hippocrates of Cos.
Recognized as the father of medicine, he stated:

"There are, in fact, two things, science and opinion;
the former begets knowledge, the latter ignorance."

There's much to like about this book . . . for one, there were
interesting tidbits about famous people, including the following
about Florence Nightingale:

* Nightingale's passion for statistics enabled her to persuade the
government of the importance of a whole series of health reforms.
For example, many people had argued that training nurses was
a waste of time, because patients cared or by trained nurses
actually had a higher mortality rate than those treated by
untrained staff. Nightingale, however, pointed out that this was only
because more serious cases were being sent to those wards with
trained nurses. If the intention is to compare the results from two
groups, then it is essential . . . to assign patients randomly
to the two groups. Sure enough, when Nightingale set up trials
in which patients were randomly assigned to trained and untrained
nurses, it became clear that their counterparts in wards with untrained
nurses. Furthermore, Nightingale used statistics to show that home
births were safer than hospital births, presumably because British homes
were cleaner than Victorian hospitals. Her interests also ranged
overseas, because she also used mathematics to study the influence
of sanitation on healthcare in rural India.

I also liked how the authors clearly explained concepts and while
doing so, incorporated some humor into what otherwise could have
been very dry material . . . for example, as indicated in this passage:

* Scientists even began to poke fun at homeopaths. For example,
because homeopathic liquid remedies are so diluted that they
often contain only water, scientists would sarcastically endorse
their use for the treatment of one particular medical condition,
namely dehydration. Or they would jokingly offer to make each
other a drink of homeopathic coffee, which was presumably
incredibly diluted and yet tasted incredibly strong, because
homeopaths believe that lower amounts of active ingredient
are associated with greater potency. Similar logic also implied that
a patient who forgot to take a homeopathic remedy might die
of an overdose.

At the very end of the book, there's an excellent "Rapid Guide to
Alternative Therapies" . . . these cover some 36 others, including
Colonic Irrigation, Feldenkrais Method, Magnet Therapy, Osteopathy,
and Reiki.

Be forewarned that you might not like what you read in TRICK
OR TREATMENT, particularly if you believe in any and/or all
of the above . . . however, it will get you thinking--and that's
always a good thing.

The obvious bias of the authors is troubling.

It seems that they have "cherry picked" the data and have presented mostly those "facts" that support their point of view. A double blind collection and processing of data is needed here. Authors can take too much control in books like this. Be careful about some of their conclusions and recommendations.

The history of the healing arts is perplexing. Traditional medicine saves lives but also kills and/or decreases the quality of life. We are beyond blood-letting, but not by leaps and bounds.

I suggest that the authors apply the same sharp lens to traditional medicine and write a follow-up book. I was troubled by the repeated inferences of profit-seeking to alternative medicine practicioners, when it is patently obvious that traditional care givers often practice the same techniques.

On the bright side, this book certainly and clearly illuminates many of the "goofy" side streets and alleys of medical care. It is a must read for those considering how to choose among the myriad of medical care options.

Worth the read for anyone. A good introduction to scientific research methods and comprehensive guide to alternative treatments.
Probably won't change the opinion of the fanatic but then again which reasoning will.

Trick or Treatment: The Undeniable Facts about Alternative MedicineIt's one of the best approaches I've read to bring some light on such a difficult issue such as alternative medicines. Real truth doesn't exist but there are ways to walk toward it and that's what the two authors do in a very easy language.

Is alternative medicine bad? Well, the authors of this book certainly think so. And they have a strong belief that scientific reasoning will prove it is bad. Unfortunately, while they spend a lot of time explaining "science", they spend very little time using it to back up their arguments.

The book focuses on four alternative medicines: Homeopathy, Acupuncture, Chiropractors and herbal remedies. Homeopathy is viewed as purely bogus, while the others are seen as having some very limited value. Significant space is devoted to the history of each of these alternatives (as well as a history of modern scientific medicine.) These histories are easily the best part of the book. Their biggest fault is the writing style, which comes across as juvenile and condescending.

The analysis of alternative medicine is where the book really falls apart. A typical analysis will provide some anecdotes that appeared to show it worked. Those will be brushed off as "anecdotes", and then some studies showing success. Those will then be brushed of as "invalid" and a "metastudy" will then show that the "alternative" is of very little value. Finally anecdotes will be used to show that harm can occur when using the alternative remedy. Very little data is given to back up the statements given (not even a footnote with a paper citation!) Do the metastudies include studies by alternative medicine practitioners? Or are these studies filtered out in favor of studies by conventional doctors? How would a more conventional treatment stand up to similar scrutiny? (Is a study with a doctor performing "fake" acupuncture any more reliable than one with an acupuncturist performing "fake" surgery?) The over-reliance on anecdotes is also problematic, as it could just as easily be switched to provide negative anecdotes for conventional medicine, with positive ones for the alternatives.

It is obvious that the authors have a distaste for much of alternative medicine and have produced this book in an attempt to persuade a large audience of their belief. Unfortunately, by using the "snake oil" arguments that they claim to be fighting, they provide very little of value to the debate.

Trick or Treatment purports to provide only "proven scientific evidence," but is filled with anecdotal horror stories spiced like raisins midst the scientific evidence. And the anecdotal stories are trotted out like trained dogs as gold standard science. Many of the herbs are treated as ineffective and the studies were based on inappropriate application to the herbs primary use. But that is science "show business" when you see so many ads for pills on televsion. It came to mind while reading this book that maybe it was written to prevent a person from considering a cup of peppermint tea without a physician consult first.

Books like this smell of "Mother May I" mentality. Let others think for me and ask permission first to think. There is very good advice based upon real science in this book. That much gives credit to the authors, but then they launch a sally into oft repeated "The Doctor Is God."

Because of this alone, it is my considered opinion, and my opinion only, that this book should be read with a grain of salt. But be careful, the authors may find even a grain of salt dangerous to your health. My advice? Read a copy from the library, but save the space on your bookshelf for real nonfiction unless you need something to scare you to sleep.

I give the book two stars against my better judgement because of the account of the bleeding to death of George Washington and his three (count them) attending doctors. He came down with a serious sore throat and instead of opening his windpipe, they gave him mercurial enemas and bled him to death by removing over 50% of his total circulating blood. Yep that's right folks, the Father of our country was killed by his doctors.

Burton Dale

Poorly written with an insufficient evidence base, this book was a big disappointment. Was hoping for a more balanced view of the treatments. From a traditional science background, I was hoping to gain an insight into eastern medicine. Instead, the writers failed to convince me of anything. I felt like I was reading a yr 6 persuasion piece.

If you use any type of alternative medicine -- chiropractic, homeopathy, whatever -- you should read this book! Education, licensing, and other forms of regulation of alternative medicine practitioners DO NOT protect you from worthless treatments and physical harm (even death). An honest, factual risk-benefit analysis explained by your health care provider prior to treatment -- the cornerstone of informed consent in conventional medicine -- is virtually non-existant in alternative medicine. You must protect yourself with the type of unbiased, well-researched information this book provides. Don't worry about it being "too scientific." The authors do a fantastic job of explaining alternative medicine in easily understood language. Think about it: considering what you are paying for alternative treatments, isn't it worth the price of Trick or Treatment to find out if you're getting your money's worth? Or better yet, if you are risking your health for no good reason?

It would be almost impossible to review this book properly at the store.com. It would take more than words that what we are supposed to write, and I try not to exceed the limit. Also, I don't work in the healthcare profession, but I have studied many topics related to healing for years. In order not to repeat the same qualification over and over, many of the statements in this review are based on my experience, as someone who has experienced both conventional and alternative treatments, from extensive reading and other research, and also from discussing health problems that people I know have dealt with.

Before I state many criticisms of "Trick or Treatment," I do think that people should read it, and I appreciate what I think are valid criticisms of some alternative treatments. Because this book either in detail or in summary covers so many alternative treatments, I think that it would be fascinating to use this book as a reference to really get to the truth of which treatments do and don't work, and when applicable, specifically for which maladies.

As I read many of the reviews at the store and others on the Internet, I can only assume that these reviewers haven't had serious health problems that were not solved by conventional treatments, and haven't spent huge sums of money on conventional treatments that did not work. Alternative treatments work, and at least in the US they are usually far less expensive. Changing one's diet can make a huge difference in one's health, whatever the authors believe. Their knowledge of supplements also leaves a lot to be desired. I can attest to that from experience, and what is really lacking in their writing is the fact that ingredients in supplements often work *together*, so stating that a supplement is not effective can sometimes be quite misleading.

The authors make the point over and over that alternative treatments don't pass clinical trials, and that's fine as far as it goes, but let me ask the reader of this review: if someone you know tried an alternative treatment for a condition you knew was very serious, and the treatment worked, would you care if that treatment had passed clinical trials, assuming you or someone you wanted to help needed to be cured of this illness? In a similar vein, on p. 286 the authors write that "conventional medicine has no prejudice against any alternative treatment that can prove its worth, both in terms of safety and efficacy." This is such bunk it's hard to know how to react. There are many, many books written by physicians and healthcare professionals that refute this very false statement. A book called "The Medical Mafia," written by a Canadian physician, comes to mind. The Rife treatment from the 1930's was falsely and unfairly suppressed by the medical establishment. Dr. Burzynski had years of legal troubles because his cancer treatment didn't put money in the controllers' pockets. That the US medical establishment is overwhelmingly controlled by the pharmaceutical industry is beyond question.

People are not nearly as stupid as the authors obviously believe. They try alternative treatments because they have given up with the time and expense of conventional treatments that don't work, and they've decided either through research or from word of mouth that an alternative treatment works. The authors want us to believe that overall if an alternative treatment works, it's only because of the placebo effect or the "normal" course of an illness resolving itself. My comment to this is: if you can't explain something, explain it away.

Over and over we read that huge amounts of money are spent on alternative treatments. Surely this isn't a fraction of what is spent on conventional treatments. What world are these authors living in? I've read differing accounts of what it costs for an average cancer patient in the US to receive the "slash and burn" chemo and radiation treatments, but it is at least hundreds of thousands of dollars. And that brings up another problem with the book. They make cost assessments using data from what are clearly countries with socialized medicine when they choose to, but never refer to the unbelievable costs of healthcare in the US when it doesn't suit their agenda.

They cherry pick incidents of someone taking St. John's Wort when their mental problems require more serious medication, or someone else taking too much vitamin B6. So what? I found this reference: "according to the groundbreaking 2003 medical report Death by Medicine, by Drs. Gary Null, Carolyn Dean, Martin Feldman, Debora Rasio and Dorothy Smith, 783,936 people in the United States die every year from conventional medicine mistakes." But we get only vague snippets of problems with conventional medicine. Referring back to the St. John's Wort case mentioned above, the problems with people's behaviors when taking conventional psychiatric medications surely dwarf the authors' selective use of data. Anyone can look these things up on the Internet.

Referring to comments page on p. 243, I challenge anyone to look into the Gerson Therapy and say that it doesn't work. Watch a video called "Dying To Have Known" and decide for yourselves. The documentary claims, for example, that 446 of 450 people with TB were cured. Are the authors of this book going to tell us that the Gerson people are lying? Many people who were cured of cancer are interviewed. A clinic in Japan uses the treatment. It was built by doctors who are interviewed, and at least one of the doctors was helped by the therapy. Are these all lies? What is wrong with doctors who say that such evidence is "anecdotal" or not supported by clinical trials, and thus not true?

I will conclude this review at this point, but I would advise anyone to check what I am saying and find your own truth. And I can tell you from experience, sometimes conventional treatments are best, and sometimes they are not, and you do not get this impression at all from reading this book, regardless of the fact that the authors do say this in certain places.

An incredibly biased and uninformed perspective on alternative medicine. (Made me wonder if the authors have ties to pharmaceutical companies)

Example: aromatherapy - they briefly state that it is used primarily via massage and it may well be the massage and not the aroma doing the work. There are a number of solid unbiased studies referencing how specific essential oils like bergamot, lemon balm, grapefruit, and peppermint can be extremely uplifting as it stimulates the limbic system. Ditto with more relaxing oils like lavender for relaxation...

I found the entire book to be incredibly biased referencing how "dangerous" herbal remedies are (scare tactics for extremely tiny portions of the population) when there are "effective conventional pharmaceuticals" available. Have you read the potential side-effects for most medications in the tiny print?

I appreciate the pros and cons of health issues. I had picked this book up at the library thinking I might learn something - I found it to be incredibly misleading and prejudicial.

The book is flawed. For example, the section on chiropractic doesn't talk about pain caused by the spine being out of alignment. I have personally seen the impact of chiropractic on back spasms. Once I started chiropractic, that pain could be relieved immediately or reduced to mild soreness. The authors admit that chiropractic could be useful, but no more useful than conventional treatment. Really? I could have gotten the same result from back surgery or addiction to pain medication?

There is some quackery in the alternative medicine field, but it doesn't logically follow that alternative medicine is useless. Practitioners don't have representatives from a few multi-billion dollar pharmaceutical companies telling them what to think. So there's going to be some practitioners that have crazy ideas and do dangerous things. The choice isn't dangerous or completely safe. Look at the statistics for people that die due to pharmaceutical drugs, particularly interactions. There's danger everywhere and the authors imply that the danger is only with alternative medicine.

Why do the authors focus on quackery in each of the alternative medicine fields? It appears that they have a strong bias against alternative medicine, but perhaps they can't scientifically discern the quackery from the strengths of various alternative medicine disciplines. I was really excited when I heard about this book, and, unfortunately, disappointed when I read it.

The short version is that alternative medicine is useless, except for the placebo effect, with a few quack ideas highlighted and some cherry-picked studies to support that conclusion. Not the objective analysis I was looking for. It's similar to doing a scientific study of Christianity and concluding that it does no good and will likely result in suicide, and include stories of a few fringe groups as "proof".

As someone who is a technologist and regularly worships at the altar of experimental and scientific methods for disciplines other than medicine, I can't think of a more pointless book. The reason for the proliferation of alternative medicine is the abysmal record of drugs created by following the scientific method - and the fact that their side effects far exceed their ostensible (and severely attenuated) benefits for anything more serious than a headache. My empirical experience over a few decades of being subjected to diagnostic medicine for any meaningful ailment, is that calling it a science might be premature - and a view from that hill certainly doesn't justify the supercilious attitude that pervades this book.

So the starting point of this book - namely to assume scientific method's efficacy in medicine as self-evident and to examine alternative medicine's with that lens, could be flawed at the outset. the point worth studying is not whether alternative medicine is successful, but why.

Learned men often can be blind to the efficacy of a given treatment. They may be unfamiliar with the culture the treatment has successfully been used in. They don't know nor do they understand the thinking in the culture, it's beliefs and levels of faith and knowing of how things work there. These guys easily dis Auyervedic . . . my goodness, could Deepak Chopra be wrong all these years on the amazing things in this branch of medicine? They also dis Feng Shui . . . an understanding of energy flows and movements just by whose subtlety these guys are left far behind. Accupuncture comes out of a culture 1000s of years older than ours . . . they just might know something that our few 100 year old culture doesn't know. Accupuncture broke my 103 degree fever in minutes where a western medicine internist couldn't do a thing. The single element these guys have no belief in is the capability of the mind in itself. It's power is vast, and we're only now touching in to that. If you've no sense of faith, of possibilities, of believing things, anything, can be better or different, then this book is for you. It thinks precision and absolutes are all there is . . . hmm, I wonder if they're atheists? Or if they believe in God how they explain faith?

From the summary:

>>"chiropractic...their conclusion is that these therapies are largely worthless."

Chiropractic works. Twice, over the years, I have gotten IMMEDIATE relief from intense back pain through a chiropractor -- one time on a weekend (twice the usual charge), but try & get your M.D. to come into the office on a Sunday at ANY price! Worker's Compensation supports the use of chiropractic in my state, for good reason. I've spoken with folks who avoided surgery by seeing a chiropractor.

The results are so far from "worthless" that the only reasonable conclusion is that the authors' "facts" are not checked, or have been cherry-picked; ie: "These are the opinions on which I base my facts." (Churchill)

Such bias makes this book is not worth a read, even free -- I would not bother even checking it out of the library.

On page 326 the authors talk about shiatsu, and they don't seem to know what they are talking about.
They mention Tokujiro Namikoshi as the creator or developer of shiatsu, which is correct,
and a bit later they say that shiatsu is based on yin/yang concepts.
For their, Mr Namikoshi NEVER mentioned yin/yang in all his life or in his writings.
That was done by one of his students 50 years after he had opened his first shiatsu school,
when both men followed different paths.

They also say that shiatsu might be dangerous for people who are at risk of suffering a stroke.
This is absolutely true. ANY type of massage - or even going for a run - might trigger the stroke.
However, the implication in the book is that Western Massage is not dangerous for those at risk,
which is completely unscientific and totally untrue.

They claim that shiatsu can hurt people who suffer from osteoporosis.
I wrote to Dr Singh asking where they got that information from.
Any scientific studies? Someone mentioned it? Or did they just make it up?
I didn't get a reply. I didn't expect one either. After all, who am I?

And finally, they also mention that there aren't enough clinical trials of shiatsu.
I agreed, but explained that this is because hospitals and research centres don't let us do them.
I challenged them to set up a clinical trial with shiatsu for people with osteoporosis.
I'd gladly participate in such a trial.

This is only from one page in the book. I wonder how many other things they have made up
and not researched properly.
Scientific book? Hardly.

A shiatsu practitioner who believes in clinical trials.

It would be difficult to explain all the instances of unproven statements which fill the book in just one post. Many of the criticisms which the authors present are not based on clinical trials or case studies as they would have us believe ("Every conclusion we reach in the book depends on an unbiased analysis of the best medical research") but on opinions and anecdotal evidence. In other cases they cherry-pick the bits that are convenient for their thesis and don't mention the rest (what is called bias).
I am relying on the impartiality of those who want to comment, and acknowledge that, if anecdotal evidence doesn't prove the efficacy of a therapy, then, anecdotal evidence is not proof of its dangers either.
Example No 1: "some reports suggest that mental illnesses can be exacerbated through meditation"
Singh himself was kind enough to provide the reference: NCCAM says: "There have been rare reports that meditation could cause or worsen symptoms in people who have certain psychiatric problems, but this question has not been fully researched."
I don't think he is too keen on explaining why they have deleted the word rare, and have not mentioned the lack of research.
He didn't reply either when I pointed out that there are lots of studies (for example in [...] that show meditation is GOOD in cases of mental health problems, nor to the study published by the university of Exeter
[...]
BIG LIE No 1: all their conclusions are unbiased and based on scientific research.

The authors go to some length to explain how the cure for scurvy was discovered by James Lind, whom they praise. They also say: "He had no idea that oranges and lemons contain vitamin C, but none of this was important - the bottom line was that his treatment led to a cure."
Therefore - I understand - some treatments are scientific and evidence-based even if we don't know why. Their exact words about acupuncture are: "clinical trials have nothing to do with philosophy. Instead, clinical trials are solely concerned with establishing whether or not a treatment works"
Example No 2: "While many massage therapies are based on a sound understanding of anatomy, some rely on unproven and unlikely philosophies"
Am I to understand that massage was ineffectual in Ancient Greece and Rome because they didn't have a sound understanding of anatomy, but the same massage is effective nowadays?
Obviously, massage in all its forms, is based on empirical observation (the same as the cure for scurvy). Whatever theories surround them are irrelevant to their efficacy.
Example No 3: "Adverse effects [of massage] are rare" "People with bone or joint conditions of the feet or lower legs might be harmed by the often forceful pressure applied during treatment [of reflexology]" I think that people with this condition could be harmed by massage of those areas too. The authors are being dishonest, because people who study reflexology study contraindications. People who study massage study contraindications too. Or are they saying that there are no contraindications in massage but there are in reflexology?
Ditto for contraindications of craniosacral therapy and shiatsu.

BIG LIE 2:"Science employs argument and discussion in order to arrive at an objective consensus of the truth"
From Simon to me: John, sorry, but it is hard to justify spending time engaging with someone who reviews my book with the headline "Unscientific and unprincipled. Lies No 1, 2 and 3"
Simon.

BIG QUESTION: Why, if he knew of my review, he didn't refute it? Why doesn't he show they are telling the truth here, in public? Why does it bother him so much that I ask for references and clarification?
What conclusion should I reach?

Facts? Not many, since the few offered are twisted, as a dozen one-star reviews here point out in some detail: and this book has no references, no case studies, no science! Unbelievable? Yes indeed: unbelievably one-sided, unbelievably negative review of classic and well-respected therapies - apart from chiropractic, which does indeed have many victims (even in my own limited experience). Singh is a trustee of "sense about science" a lobby group that is funded by bigpharma. Ernst claims to be a "professor of complementary medicine" yet - for example - holds no formal qualifications in homeopathy (although he did work for some time during his early career in a homeopathic hospital - you could say that his notion of "training as a homeopath" is about the same as watching some surgical operations and then claiming he trained as a surgeon...).

As Dr. Pannozzi comments: "Genuine scientists, such as chemist and homeopath Lionel Milgrom, have already exposed the intellectual cargo cult fallacies behind Ernst's "scientism", the claims of allegiance to pure science while, in fact, operating at a restricted evidentiary level which allows and disallows "evidence" on whims, inapplicable double blinded testing, revolving door double standards and other curious and questionable unstated wrong premises". Dr. Alex Hankey, a professional scientist working in UK's CAM (National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine) states: "For example his [Ernst's] reviews of studies of the effects of CAM programs on hypertension were always full of inaccuracies that my colleagues took pains to refute on each occasion. Yet Ernst never eliminated them in subsequent reviews. [His] group's reviews always deliberately omitted the best studies, for reasons that were spurious, and never accurately reported the state of the field".

One small but telling example anyone can check for themselves: The book claims, towards the end and basically as an aside, that it has not covered the damage that can be caused by these alternative therapies. The truth is that the authors avoided addressing it because the examples they then trotted out - for homeopathy, herbal and acupuncture - were vanishingly tiny, statistically speaking. They even had to put all these examples together in one small section, trying to "bulk" them up in your subconscious. Apparently an average of 2 people a year "have been accidentally killed by badly trained acupuncturists over the past 45 years, according to Britain's leading expert on alternative medicine". This average of 2 people a year is WORLDWIDE! In other words, 2 in the whole world, each year. Yes, even 2 dead is too many. Hold that thought.

By contrast, doctors are now almost certainly the leading cause of death. (It is admitted now that doctors are the third leading cause of death but that's only because all the damage is seriously under-reported: search on words like iatrogenic and "doctors kill millions" and hospitals + dangerous ). Yet no mention was made of doctor-killings in this book - don't you think a fair review would make SOME reference to it?

Here are some more REAL statistics to chew on:
- Hospitals have the worst death rate of any institution in the world - it is more dangerous to be hospitalized than to be on the front lines in Afghanistan.
- Statistics consistently reveal a DROP in mortality - during the strike period only - whenever and wherever physicians go on strike.
- Doctors are about a million times more lethal than gun-owners. Hard to believe? Here are the figures, with thanks to Rense:

Doctors
(A) The number of physicians in the U.S.:
700,000
(B) Accidental deaths caused by physicians
per year:
120,000 [but keep in mind that doctor-damage is seriously under-reported]
(C) Accidental deaths per physician:
0.171

Statistics courtesy of U.S. Dept of
Health and Human Services.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Now think about this:
Guns
(A) The number of gun owners in the U.S.:
80,000,000
(Yes, that's 80 million)
(B) The number of accidental gun deaths
per year, all age groups:
1,500
(C) The number of accidental deaths
per gun owner:
.000188

Here's my own experience:
- Herbal medicine: most of it didn't help me, but mostly I dosed myself (amateur). Once a master herbalist (who owed me a favour) sent me one small bottle of herbal tincture which totally cured over 20 years of recurring cystitis (I suffered every 2 or 3 months and had to take antibiotics every time). NEVER got it again - and that was 20 years ago. Want to call that placebo? You should be so lucky as to enjoy such a placebo effect!
- Acupuncture: cured my eczema (had it for 40 years). Want to call that placebo? You should be so lucky as to enjoy such a placebo effect!
- Homeopathy: again, with amateur self-dosing (but studied homeopathy at home for 15 years, off and on) I have been able to quickly stop (but not cure permanently) several root canal infections (3 courses of antibiotics failed to help in my first one). Another placebo effect? Really?

There's great emphasis on "clinical trials" in this book - unfortunately, there's now a great deal of evidence that most such trials (esp those paid for by bigpharma) are fraudulent. Search on "drugs don't work" and "is medical science built on shaky foundations" (article in New Scientist) and also read any or all of these books:
Fear of the Invisible
Selling Sickness
Dirty Medicine
Racketeering In Medicine
Bad Pharma: How drug companies mislead doctors and harm patients
Heart Frauds
Malignant Medical Myths
The Cholesterol Myth (the Kendrick one)
How to Protect Your Heart from Your Doctor
The Truth About Vaccines
Cancer: Why We're Still Dying to Know the Truth
The Cancer Industry
Confessions of a Medical Heretic (a classic, written by a medical doctor, both amusing and shocking)
The Medical Mafia (also by a medic, similar theme as Confessions and passionately but badly written)

Ok, Mr Singh. Let us accept that from your perspective acupuncture is minimally effective. I don't agree with the placebo approach to testing acupuncture but I will give it to you rather than get bogged down to a larger point.

There is so much placebo in Western Medicine it is appalling. You act as though you are on a mountain of truth when you are, in reality standing in a ditch and slinging mud.

You fail to place any of the same rigor to Western medicine, assuming that all Western treatments have gone through rigorous triple blind studies. What about placebo knee surgery? Arthroscopic knee surgery for arthritis has been proven to be no more effective than placebo. Has this led to a call to stop in the medical community? Is this surgery still performed? Did the authors of the study extend their findings to arthroscopy of the shoulder or elbow? No, it was found to be an interesting result and left at that. In fact, I would wager that more people are harmed through this ineffective procedure than all of alternative therapies combined.

Get your own house in order...Oh, and you can find my source below.

[...]

This author thinks that he knows something about various "alternative" or complementary modalities. He clearly does not - except that he obviously has an agenda against them and is hell bent on writing a book that debunks them - but you can't debunk something that you know NOTHING about. He writes that " . . . homeopaths, acupuncturists, chiropractors, herbalists and other alternative therapists will continue to prey on the most desperate and vulnerable in society, raiding their wallets,offering false hope, and endangering their health." This is not an unbiased or accurate portrayal - this is a hatchet job by a dundering idiot. How many deaths are caused each year by homeopaths, acupuncturists, chiropractors, herbalists and other alternative therapists - I'd say the number is pretty close to zero. How many deaths in the US are caused by prescription drugs taken as prescribed my medical doctors. . . somewhere between 100,000 and 200,000 each year are the best conservative estimates - not to mention the over 700,000 emergency room visits yearly due to Rx drugs. I have been helped by acupuncturists, nutritionists, and chiropractors. I have a science background and three graduate degrees and am confident that I know more about all of these modalities than this ax grinder and I certainly would not consider myself qualified to write a book debunking or affirming the worthiness of the thousands of practitioners of these arts. I can also say that I have been crippled by western medicine and that the vehement, frantic denial in the medical community about the dangers of their prescription poisons is what ought to be made public and exposed. This book is nothing like the title says - it is not undeniable and these are not facts. Why am I not surprised that it is co-authored by an MD? A famous physicist said that rarely do people change their minds - the old guard eventually dies out and the new guard takes over. This is the old guard trying hard to hang on. Read something worthwhile instead.

The authors of the book present themselves as unbiased, but I found the book to be extremely biased against alternative treatments in general. Their discussion of chiropractic in particular is blatently biased against the profession and includes all sorts of rumor and innuendo, glaringly absent of any of the data they so fervently profess to subscribe to. I say, either substantiate your claims or don't, but the authors seem to like to play both sides of the fence in order to pursue their agenda. Now that these guys have "proven" that chiropractic is a sham, I have to go to little Anna and tell her that she has to stop walking. If chiropractic is only good for some back pains, it could never have gotten her to throw those crutches away and walk for the first time in 6 years and after 7 doctors told her she never would.
This book is a tremendous disservice to the world: a scathing indictment of treatments, some of which simply do not operate in the realm that the narrow reductionist paradigm of western science can currently measure. "Evidence-based medicine" relies on studies like randomized clinical trials as the gold standard (a standard that medicine itself rarely applies to its own treatments). Yet RCT's fail to take into consideration the emotional, mental, interpersonal and spiritual component of the healing process. EBM in fact considers these factors to be "disruptive" to the pursuit of quality data. However, the fact is that a person's emotional, mental, interpersonal and spiritual experiences are critical and dynamic elements of their healing process, whether western medicine and science can measure them or not. Alternative therapies like chiropractic do not consider these elements distractions or "placebos", they are integrated into a comprehensive paradigm for healing. Had this book been impassive and objective as it describes itself, it would only be reckless. As it is, a highly biased and narrow minded joy ride, it is directly harmful to the public, most of whom will be unable to discriminate between the facts and the opinions. Were their intentions purely unbiased as they claim, their next tome would be a scathing indictment of western medicine and it would be called, "Maybe Acupuncture is not such a bad idea: the Lack of Evidence in Modern Medicine".

John P.A. Ioannidis, chief of the Prevention Research Center at Stanford University, and medicine's top "mythbuster", set out to subject biomedical research to its own standards of proof: evidence and data. His question: how many biomedical studies are wrong?

His answer: most.

According to Ioannidis, the unbalanced treatment of positive and negative trials (the negative ones being those which show a drug or treatment failing to be effective- these, he discovered, "sit in a file drawer, or the trial keeps going in hopes the results turn positive.") lead to skewed research results.
`"People are being hurt and even dying" because of false medical claims, he says: not quackery, but errors in medical research", reports Sharon Begley in Newsweek (Jan 24th, 2011) Ioannidis' early work debunked several claims that certain genes were the cause of illnesses like Parkinsons (debunked in 2010) and cardiovascular disease (2009). Begley writes: "Geneticists have mostly mended their ways, tightening statistical criteria, but other fields still need to clean house, Ioannidis says.

Surgical practices, for instance, have not been tested to nearly the extent that medications have. "I wouldn't be surprised if a large proportion of surgical practice is based on thin air, and [claims for effectiveness] would evaporate if we studied them closely," Ioannidis says."

I'll stick with chiropractic, thank you very much.

Dont expect a balanced perspective from this book. This not about science but about the politics of healthcare. Ernst is funded by drug companies to attack the alternatives to drugs so that... people buy more drugs. SIMPLE

Firstly, the vaccine hoax:

'Vaccines did not save humanity and never will. Vaccines have never been proven truly safe ...Smallpox was not eradicated by vaccines as many doctors readily say it was. They say this out of conditioning rather than out of understanding the history or science. Polio virus was not responsible for the paralysis in the first part of the 20th century. Polio vaccine research, development, testing and distribution has committed atrocities upon primates and humanity. Bill Gates is not a humanitarian. Vaccines are dangerous and should never be injected into anyone for any reason. They are not the answer to infectious diseases. There are many more sustainable and benevolent solutions than vaccines,.---Suzanne Humphries, MD Dissolving Illusions: Disease, Vaccines, and The Forgotten History

Bog standard medical propaganda. The Allopathic/Pharma boys churn out this rubbish 24/7, as they know attack is the best form of defence. And boy do they have things to hide/defend!

I have to admit it was clever to make a Pharma boy a professor, no less, of complementary medicine, who spends all his time slagging off non-pharma (complementary, alternative) medicine!

1. The Pharma boys (Allopaths) invented the term 'complementary' as the proper term 'alternative' is taboo, wouldn't want anyone thinking there were any real alternatives.

2. Anyone who has reserached acupunture will know it does something, e.g. you can use it to stop pain during surgery or while giving birth!! And we all know Homeopathy is effective, even the Royal family use it, and it stopped one of my children crying from colic when a baby, instantly, so the usual placebo effect excuse is busted with one simple example. And the Homeopaths had a 2% death rate with smallpox, over the Allopaths 18-26%! Etc etc.

and we have plenty of Medical Doctors who become Homeopaths (my local one did 4 years medical training!), which busts their argument all by itself, read Rediscovering Real Medicine: The New Horizons of Homeopathy Title is self-explanatory, and sums up the fear of these two propagandists. Elmiger takes apart vaccination btw.

"BCG is a goldmine for ear, nose and throat specialists."--Dr Jean Elmiger MD

as an aside, if the Allopaths fear disease so much then let the Homeopath deal with it!

Other homeopathic books that expose their game are:Impossible Cure: The Promise of Homeopathy

Talking of placebo effect, this applies to Pharma as well:

"Early statistics kept by referral physicians demonstrated that 80% of those who follow our (Arthritis Fund) recommendations got well...providing they hadn't been treated by traditional methods (which) drops our successes to 50%, which is considerably greater than the "improvement" rate of about 33% obtained through traditional treatments. Incidently, that 33% "improvement" rate claimed by establishment treatments is just about equal to the placebo effect."---di Fabio author of Arthritis: Little Known Treatments.

3. re homeopathy being useless, brings to mind their main ploy here, avoiding the stinking elephant in the allopath room---iatrogenic disease.

In the USA alone they kill 780,000 people every year, which includes 120,000 drug reaction deaths, plus a few million addicted to psychiatric drugs,which are completely useless, except in inducing mental illness, and addiction, 4 million being addicted to Benzos, see Mad in America: Bad Science, Bad Medicine, and the Enduring Mistreatment of the Mentally Ill

so the homeopaths have some way to go before they reach such heights of amorality.

Plus the thousands given alzheimer's from drugs, see: Drug-Induced Dementia: a perfect crime

while another stinking elephant is the fact allopathy has suppressed cures for alzheimer's such as Chelation, see Toxic Metal Syndrome: How Metal Poisonings Can Affect Your Brain (Dr. Morton Walker Health Book)

"Since 1952 the medical profession has had the means to reduce or reverse the signs and symptoms of Alzheimer's disease."--H. Richard Casdorph, Morton Walker

4. as for herbal medicine being ineffective, read There Are No Incurable Diseases: Dr. Schulze's 30-Day Cleansing & Detoxification Program

to bust that lie.

Then there is the well documented herbal formulas, Hoxey: When Healing Becomes a Crime: The Amazing Story of the Hoxsey Cancer Clinics and the Return of Alternative Therapies and Essiac, see Bridge of Hope, the Life of Rene M. Caisse, RN Canada's Cancer Nurse and the History of Essiac

I think we all would prefer those non-toxic effective herbs over the Pharma boys efforts at herbal extracts such as Taxol! Not fogetting their killing of 80% of the sacred yes in China.

5. Notice how they avoid the well documented success of Vitamin C, this one vitamin would put them and all the Pharma boys out of business overnight if it was widely known. Cure for infections, see Curing the Incurable: Vitamin C, Infectious Diseases, and Toxins only 1,200 medical citations to back that up! Plus reverses heart disease, see Stop America's #1 Killer, effective against cancer

"We studied patients with advanced cancer (stage 4). 40 patients received 40,000-75,000 mg intravenously several times a week. These are patients that have not responded to other treatments. The initial tumor response rate was achieved in 75% of patients, defined as a 50% reduction or more in tumor size. . . As a radiation oncologist, I also give radiation therapy. Vitamin C has two effects. It increases the beneficial effects of radiation and chemotherapy and decreases the adverse effects. But this is not a subtle effect, is not 15-20%. It's a dramatic effect. Once you start using IV vitamin C, the effect is so dramatic that it is difficult to go back to not using it." Victor Marcial, M.D., an oncologist in Puerto Rico

prevents cot-death!: Medical pioneer of the 20th century: Dr Archie Kalokerinos : an autobiography

"We know the cause of SIDS. We can and have prevented them. It's all done with a compound called ascorbate. Not to use it means deaths will continue. There is no other answer. There never will be. For our findings are based on scientific facts. Not medical opinion."---Dr Kalokerinos

Cures drug addiction:

"We have developed a non-toxic, detoxication procedure where we can take the addicts off heroin or methadone with no withdrawal symptoms. The addicts have no desire to return to the drug and if they do take a "fix," it is like injecting plain water, the detoxication is so complete and rapid. ........Methadone is far worse on the body, from a metabolic point of view, than is heroin.........It is unconscionable to me to put a person on methadone maintenance with no way to get them off......Why is it that the media supports orthodox views so readily, rejecting all other avenues of scientific investigation? --Dr kalokerinos

That is just the tip of the iceberg, but enough examples to expose the racket of these two Pharma shills, and it isn't pretty is it?!!!

My all problems was caused by conventionally medicine. I wish I would know earlier about power of homeopathy and chiropractics .
There are good specialists and bad specialits in every profession , but allopathy was/is unable to help me , instead it made things worse : 70% of my problems are due to allopatic "treatment".

Authors make very bad service to uninformed reader : some people whose condition can be significantly improved by alternative medicine may be discouraged from seeking alternative treatment.

I perused this book at the bookstore. As a Chiropractor I was especially interested in the information on Chiro and their suggestions. One statement was that Chiros commit more malpractice than medical doctors. That is an absolute lie. If that were true than insurance rates would reflect that. I pay $96.08 per month for 3 million dollars worth of malpractice coverage. They are either very poor researchers of the literature or they are purposely being dishonest. They also neglected to include some very important data on the use of Chiropractors as primary care physicians in Illinois and published in the peer-reviewed journal JMPT May 2007. Here is a summary statement from Richard I. Sarnat, M.D. (An honest medical doctor) "My research, conducted over a ten-year period utilizing clinical and cost outcomes data from one of the largest insurance underwriters, suggest that the regular utilization of chiropractic could reduce the need for hospitalization, pharmaceutical usage and overall global healthcare costs by almost 50%" The 10 year study showed that using Chiropractors as primary care physicians resulted in a 60.2% decrease in in-hospital admissions, 59% decrease in hospital days, 62% decrease in outpatient surgeries and procedures and an 85% decrease in pharmaceutical costs. If all these patients saw the MD first (as they suggest you should) then these savings would not be realized. It's so easy to paint any picture they want by conviently leaving out vital information. Let's also look at who utilizes Chiropractic care. Tiger Woods, Lance Armstrong, Tom Brady, Joe Montana, Dan Marino, Peyton Manning etc. All the NFL, NBA and MLB teams have staff chiro's. These athletes would not subject their million dollar bodies to Chiro care if it wasn't safe and effective. These authors need to get together with Michael Moore and make a fake-u-mentary. They can leave out facts such as prescription drugs being the 3rd leading cause of death or that medical errors are the fourth leading cause of death (Facts that are well documented in PubMed and books written by other honest MD's). They can convince everyone that the only solution to your health problems are man-made patented, synthetic toxic substances and that everything natural is "unscientific". Americans consume more prescription drugs than the rest of the world combined but the US is rated 37th in health. Using logic, and common sense, it is apparent that drugs do not equal health. I could go on and on about these bozo's but that should suffice. The fact is that most of their undeniable facts are in fact deniable.

This book claims to offer "an unparalleled level of rigour, authority and independence" in the assessment of alternative medicine. In fact it has nineteen major faults in the areas of evidence, science, definitions and analytical tools:

Evidence: (1) The authors frequently rely on figures, trials, events, quotations, statements, opinions and explanations which are unsupported by reference to sources. (2) This evidence is frequently misleading as a result of being presented out of context. (3) The authors use different criteria when assessing the validity of evidence, depending on whether the evidence supports their views or not.

Science: (4) The authors commit the common fallacy of confusing absence of proof with proof of absence. (5) The importance of theory is minimized or even ignored, when discussing both science in general and individual alternative therapies. (6) The authors assume that orthodox medicine is scientific, but offer no justification for this position. (7) There is evidence that the authors do not understand the principles and practice of orthodox medicine.

Definitions: (8) Alternative medicine is defined in four different ways in the course of the book. (9) Other significant terms, such as `science', `disease', `cure', `effectiveness' and `orthodox medicine' are undefined. (10) This allows arguments to be built on vague preconceptions rather than on clearly defined principles. (11) The differences between orthodox medical and alternative medical definitions is not taken into account, despite their impact on the design of trials. (12) The authors fail to present the ideas of evidence-based medicine accurately. (13) The authors fail to present the nature and development of homeopathy accurately, raising doubts about their presentation of the other therapies. (14) They also call into question the principles of orthodox drug therapy, despite the fact that the tests used by this therapy underpin much of their argument.

Analytical tools: (15) The authors fail to prove that their main tool, the randomised controlled trial (RCT), is valid for testing curative interventions, while presenting evidence that there are serious problems with using it for this purpose. (16) They show that a tool derived from these trials, the meta-analysis, is prone to lack of objectivity, yet they rely on this for some of their conclusions. (17) Their conclusions are also dependent on the concept of the placebo effect, but they make it clear that this effect has no scientific basis and is so unpredictable as to have questionable scientific validity in this context. (18) They acknowledge the importance of individuality in the curative process, but deny its significance for the design of analytical tools. (19) They fail to take into account the need for analysis of evidence from clinical practice.

Full details of these faults can be read in Halloween Science, a new work commissioned by the charity Homeopathy: Medicine for the 21st Century (H:MC21), which concludes that Trick or Treatment? "has no validity as a scientific examination of alternative medicine". [...]

Long story short: visit [...] and read the thousands of testimonies of people cured by ozone therapy, apple cider vinegar, hydrogen peroxide, oregano oil, chelation, baking soda and more.

Orthodox/allopathic medicine kills more people every year than aromatherapy, vitamins, aryuvedic medicine, accupuncture, herbal medicine ever has in the history of the planet. How many monks do you see riding wheelchairs to pick up their prescription drugs with a "healthy" burger in hand?

Consider this: less than one hundred years ago, mercury (a toxic element) was used extensively to "cure" people and cigarettes were "safe" in the West. You really think the surgeon general just found out cigarettes aren't safe?

Having been trained in neurosciences and having a long career in finance I am a fairly linear thinker. That said, while I enjoyed reading the book I noticed that the authors had no credible discussion of the limitations of the science applied to the alternative therapies they write about. For example, in the review on acupuncture the author states that they is little credible evidence that it works. He fails to describe the limitation of applying a "gold standard" approach to a system in which the components of a system contribute to the entire system. He accepts the premise that the body should be viewed as if it were made of parts that have isolated functions like parts of a car. Any electrical engineer knows that the energy that flows through a system impacts the operation of the entire system. Thus, having the authors ignore the bioelectromagnetic nature of the extra cellular matrix is a sure sign that they do not understand human physiology. One cannot test acupuncture points for their efficacy. That is because the nature of using those points is a function of the diagnostic efficacy of the practitioner who would determine that the use of THOSE points for THAT patient at THAT moment in time was the ideal protocol. Ignoring that is a classic methodological blunder and speaks to the challenge of finding ways to validate alternative and complimentary therapies.

Of course, the science must get done. That said, it is worth remembering that being a patient of conventional medical care in the US is the leading cause of death in the US. So, defending the status quo of chemical medicine is nothing to tell your mother about. It should be a source of shame. If you are not familiar with this fact - see the text "Death by Medicine". It was crafted by 5 MDs and PhDs trying to quantify, from only the scientific literature, an answer to the question; Just how much of a problem is conventional medical care anyway?

So, the author's willingness to degrade the CAM space by engaging in crap science does an injustice to the reader. Moreover, it reflects an intellectual dishonesty that does not advance either scientific understanding or patient care.

Oh yes, the US Military uses acupuncture in field hospitals throughout the world. They aren't subject to the market distortions that the rest of us are subject to. They use it because it works. See references to battlefield acupuncture.