PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Bad Science Watch to Health Canada: De-register Homeopathic Vaccines
Toronto, ON – Wednesday August 1st, 2012 – Today, the new Canadian science advocacy group Bad Science Watch announced plans to convince Health Canada to de-register homeopathic health products that are offered as unproven replacements for childhood vaccinations. This project will combat the anti-vaccine camps within homeopathy that offer these so-called "nosodes"; the sale of which directly contradicts Health Canada's own efforts to promote childhood vaccinations.
Nosodes are ultra-dilute homeopathic remedies prepared using diseased tissue, such as blood, pus, and saliva, that are based on the unsupportable "like-cures-like" hypothesis where you give someone a very low dose of the offending substance to then cure or prevent the disease in question.
Homeopaths in Canada are offering these nosodes for a variety of childhood diseases, like pertussis, or whooping cough, a deadly disease that is currently afflicting more Canadian children, mostly infants, than it has in the past 50 years. The anti-vaccine messages spread by homeopaths have caused parents to needlessly question the usefulness and safety of vaccines and as a result the level of vaccination in Canadian communities has dropped to as low as 62%. A level of 80% or higher is needed to have proper protection from pertussis in the community.
"The un-scientific approach of homeopaths is a real threat to parents who just want their child to be healthy and safe," said Jamie Williams the Executive Director of Bad Science Watch, "and Health Canada, through their approval of these products, is complicit in this message. We will show that the policy of approving nosodes is working against the best interest of public health and we demand that Health Canada review these products and have them pulled from the shelves."
Even a cursory search of the Natural Health Products Directorate, the agency that oversees the approval of non-orthodox alternative medicine products, brings up remedies purporting to prevent or treat such diseases as measles, polio, and mumps, three diseases that can be life-threatening in children and that vaccines have been effectively suppressing for decades.
"These nosodes may not directly injure a child, as they are so dilute as to contain none of the original substance," said Michael Kruse, chair of the board of Bad Science Watch, "but they can give a very false sense of security. The basic tenets of homeopathy contradict basic chemistry and physics and there is no good evidence for its use in the prevention or treatment of disease."
To get involved in the promotion of good science and help stop the spread of the anti-vaccine message, please contact info@badsciencewatch.ca.
Further Reference:
Evidence for Homeopathic Medicines Guidance Document – Health Canada
http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/dhp-mps/prodnatur/legislation/docs/ehmg-nprh-eng.php
Pertussis Outbreak in Alberta
http://www.edmontonjournal.com/opinion/fashioned+killer+puts+Alberta+children+risk/6989299/story.html
Nosodes for Major Communicable Diseases Approved for Sale by Health Canada
http://www.badsciencewatch.ca/bad-science-watch-asks-health-canada-to-stop-approving-homeopathic-vaccines/
For media enquiries, or additional information, please contact:
Jamie Williams
Executive Director
Bad Science Watch
jwilliams@badsciencewatch.ca
1-888-742-3299 x 102
Bad Science Watch
180 Danforth Avenue
Toronto, ON M3K 3P5
Tel: 1-888-742-3299
Fax: 1-888-813-3569
Email: info@badsciencewatch.ca
Bad Science Watch is an independent non-profit activist organization that provides analysis of dubious scientific claims to Canadians, our government, and the media, promotes objective critical thinking and advocates for the enforcement and strengthening of consumer protection regulation.
Bad Science Watch is funded by individual donations, and is committed to organizational transparency.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteSpam comment is spammy.
Delete