Homeopathy does not have improved health benefits compared to conventional medicine

The argument

The case against homeopathy here is made on the evidence rather than on the implausibility of its mechanism. The question asked is a comparative one: do people who use homeopathy experience marked health benefits compared with those who use conventional medical practices? The answer given is that they do not. Multiple large studies, across thousands of individual cases, have shown no significant scientific evidence for the efficacy of diluting medicine in water many times over. The most useful test of a treatment is not any single trial but a systematic review, which gathers the whole literature on a question, discards the work too poorly designed to interpret and reports what the remainder shows. One such exercise is cited. In 2015, Smithsonian Magazine reported that 'After assessing more than 1,800 studies on homeopathy, Australia's National Health and Medical Research Council was only able to find 225 that were rigorous enough to analyze. And a systematic review of these studies revealed "no good quality evidence to support the claim that homeopathy is effective in treating health conditions."' Two things in that finding carry the argument. The first is the scale: more than 1,800 studies is not a thin or selective literature. The second is the attrition from 1,800 to 225 — the great majority of the literature was not rigorous enough to analyse, and when only the analysable studies were examined, no good quality evidence of effectiveness appeared. Statistically, any evidence for such a correlation is minimal at best. On that record, the argument concludes, the scientific community should not regard homeopathy as a viable treatment option for illness: it is not proven to cause health benefits, and so it does not work.

Premises

Counter-arguments

The mainstream scientific community does not take homeopathy seriously, and they certainly do not take into account the incredibly convincing bits of evidence supporting homeopathy as a legitimately beneficial form of treatment for symptoms of illness. The bias within science cuts to the core of the mission of homeopaths, who wish to expose the public to alternative methods of treatment that do not temporarily suppress symptoms and bankrupt large-scale pharmaceutical corporations. Do not always trust mainstream scientific publications and studies.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P2] Scientific studies today are notoriously biased and do not show the whole picture of bodily healing. Big pharmaceutical companies only look to profit from temporarily suppressing, conventional medication, while alternative medicine could be the answer to ailments around the world. [Rejecting P3] Homeopathy should not necessarily be discounted and more research should be done.