The Myths of Conventional Medical Success: Antibiotics

Ask most people about what they believe has been the most important and successful pharmaceutical drug ever produced, and most people would say, without hesitation - Antibiotics. Yet is this popular belief just another result of successful pharmaceutical promotion?

The first myth concerning antibiotics is their origins. "Antibiotics have been used for millennia to treat infections, although until the last century or so people did not know the infections were caused by bacteria." So antibiotic substances have been used in medicine from very ancient times. In Egypt, for example, it is known that mouldy bread was applied to infected wounds. The ancient Egyptians may not have known what they were doing, or why doing it worked; but clearly they were empiricists rather than medical scientists, and this knowledge was available to them; and they used it. Modern medical 'science' is not the only source of wisdom about drugs!

Science discovered bacteria in the latter part of the 19th century. Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin in 1928. Penicillin was manufactured and used throughout the 1939-1945 World War, not least for battle injuries and infections, and thereby gained its reputation as a "wonder drug". Thereafter the progress of antibiotic treatment continued with other serious infectious diseases, like tuberculosis, for which, hitherto, there had been no conventional medical treatment. In addition antibiotics were used to control post-operative infections, making surgery less dangerous, and so more successful.

So, in less than 100 years, antibiotics drastically changed conventional medicine, and many believe that antibiotic drugs heralded "a golden age of medicine". They worked; they killed bacteria; they were a 'miracle' cure. The result is that many claims have been made for antibiotic drugs, not least have extended the average human lifespan by over 20 years. So what is the problem?

First, antibiotic drugs confirmed to conventional medicine, which had spent some 700 years looking for 'heroic' cures, that pharmaceutical drugs would be the future of modern medicine. Where there was illness there would be a chemical agent able to deal with it. Medical science would soon conquer all illness and disease. Conventional medicine has believed this ever since.

Yet the seeds of antibiotic failure had already been sown. Following the discovery of bacteria and other microbes in the late 19th century there had been an important scientific debate about how important germs generally were in causing ill-health and disease. For many scientists, led by Louis Pasteur, thought they were the central cause of illness; and they believed that illness could be overcome simply by killing the 'offending' organism. This belief was popular with the drugs industry, which would be the main agent for discovering new drugs that would do just this. The future of medicine would be pharmaceutical.

However this belief was strongly challenged by another group of scientists, led by Antoine Bechamp, who said that it was the host (the person, the individual, and his/her immune system) that was important, not the germ. If the host was healthy, if his/her immune system was strong, the germ was immaterial; it would not cause illness. The scientific world was divided over the issue, but eventually the germ theory of disease 'won' the argument. This led to the rise of the pharmaceutical industry, which had hitherto been small, and relatively insignificant. Drug companies spent the next century pursuing more and more elaborate ways of killing germs.

It was natural health therapies, like homeopathy, herbalism, naturopathy, acupuncture, et al, that continued to focus on 'the host', who believed, like Bechamp, that looking after the body, and notably its immune system, was the safest and most effective route to good health. But this approach was sidelined, marginalised, overtaken, by the new, burgeoning pharmaceutical industry, and its search for, and the promotion of 'wonder drugs' and 'magic bullets'.

There has been two results of the use, and over-use, of antibiotic drugs over the years that are sufficiently well known, recognised by most people, and even the drug industry. These are (i) antimicrobial resistance, and (ii) the rise of new 'superbugs'. Fewer people are aware that (iii) antibiotics can, and do, kill 'good' as well as 'bad' bacteria, thus causing serious illness, and that (iv) antibiotic drugs have always been known to cause serious (but rarely mentioned) adverse effects.

1. Antimicrobial Resistance

There is no life-form that does not seek to protect itself when it comes under attack. The natural world in its entirety, always seeks to defend itself against attack. Survival is an important instinct, not only for humanity, but for plants, and other animals. Indeed, each life-form have adopted mechanisms, deeply embedded within them, for protection; and bacteria and 'germs' are part and parcel of this natural process. 

So it should be no surprise that when bacteria come into contact with antibiotic drugs they resist. It is what they are supposed to do!

The only surprise, perhaps, is that conventional medical science has never appeared to recognise that this universal response might happen as a result of their drugs - perhaps they have been too busy with their adulation of 'wonder drug'. Nor did conventional medical practitioners help themselves by selling antibiotics to patients, in ever-increasing quantities, including many who did neither needed them, or benefitted from them. Doctors have regularly prescribed antibiotics for "non-bacterial" illnesses for which they could not an effective!

Nor should it have been a surprise that patients increasingly demanded antibiotic drugs from their doctor. Over the decades antibiotics were sold as 'wonder drugs', 'miracle cures', and patients soon began to believe this constant drug promotion, reinforced as it was by government, conventional medicine, and the mainstream media - without question. Sick patients wanted to get better; and they insisted that they should be given antibiotics - regardless!

So resistance means that antibiotic drugs, that once had seemed helpful in overcoming the 'germs' associated with ill-health, have become increasingly ineffective, that no longer had even the most transitory beneficial effect of killing bacteria. Diseases once thought to be 'conquered' by them, are beginning to return. For instance, the return of tuberculosis (TB) after decades of medical claims that antibiotics had eradicated it, is now a reality. The return of this, and other diseases, confirms that any success antibiotic drugs may have had were little more than a (rather long-lasting but nonetheless) temporary illusion.

Even the conventional medical establishment began to realise that in time there would be no effective antibiotics left that would kill the germs they believed caused disease.

2. The Rise of Superbugs

A 'superbug' is a term for organisms that have developed the ability to resist commonly prescribed drugs, and have arisen entirely as the result of antibiotic drug treatment. The bugs were not just resistant, they have transformed themselves into germs that now causes serious illness. Many people will know about MRSA, Candida, and C-Difficile. But as this Healthline article reports, the USA's CDC now lists 18 bacteria that endangers human health. 

    Carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter

    Candida auris

    Clostridioides difficile

    Carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae

    Drug-resistant Neisseria gonorrhoeae

    Drug-resistant Campylobacter

    Drug-resistant Candida

    ESBL-producing Enterobacteriaceae

    Vancomycin-resistant Enterococci (VRE)

    Multidrug-resistant Pseudomonas aeruginosa

    Drug-resistant nontyphoidal Salmonella

    Drug-resistant Salmonella serotype Typhi

    Drug-resistant Shigella

    Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA)

    Drug-resistant Streptococcus pneumoniae

    Drug-resistant Tuberculosis

So in recent years conventional medicine has realised that it can no longer develop new antibiotic drugs, in part because the pharmaceutical industry now understands it cannot produce drugs that kill germs but do not lead to resistance; but mainly because doctors are now under pressure not to prescribe antibiotics, which reduces demand for them, and undermines the profitability of developing new antibiotic drugs.

3. Antibiotic drugs kill 'good' bacteria

Antibiotics are indiscriminate killers. They do no target the bacteria doctors want to destroy, they cause collateral damage which devastates the bacterial balance that exists normally within the body. Our bodies are made up of a multitude of so-called 'germs'; so when someone takes a course of antibiotics no-one (including drug companies and medical doctors) can be entirely sure which germs will be killed, which will survive, and how the bacterial balance will be compromised.

For instance, most antibiotics are taken by mouth, which means they pass quickly through to our stomach, and the digestive system. This immediately threatens the gut microbiome, which is a highly complex system of bacteria and other organisms that digests our food. So antibiotics interfere with the digestion of food, with serious implications for our health.

Recent research has linked the compromised microbiome with some of the most serious diseases. Notably, all these diseases have reached epidemic levels during the antibiotic 'bonanza' of the last 80 plus years, yet they have never before been associated with antibiotic drugs. This 2022 paper, "Impact of antibiotics on the human microbiome and consequences for host health" has investigated the long term effects of antibiotics on "the healthy state microbial composition problem" in some detail.

        "More recently, scientists have uncovered the detrimental impact of broad‐spectrum antibiotics on the gut microbiota. Home to bacteria, archaea, microeukaryotes, and viruses, the gut microbiota plays a fundamental role in human health. It prevents pathogen colonization, regulates gut immunity, provides essential nutrients and bioactive metabolites, and is involved in energy homeostasis (Mills et al., 2019). In infants, the gut microbiota is acquired during birth and thereafter plays an essential role in the development of infant gut immunity. Evidence to date strongly suggests that balanced microbiota composition and rich species diversity are essential to its optimal functioning (Heiman & Greenway, 2016), which can be compromised in disease states (Mosca et al., 2016). Likewise, reduced diversity and imbalanced microbiota composition in the infant's gut are associated with intestinal illnesses and a predisposition to certain diseases later in life (Milani et al., 2017; Volkova et al., 2021)

This seems to be one of those honest scientific papers that rarely (if ever) finds itself discussed, outside a small scientific medical elite within the conventional medical establishment. So the vast majority of people are not aware of what they describe, namely "the detrimental impact of broad-spectrum antibiotics on the gut microbiota". The usual wall of denial has greeted the paper: governments fails to inform us, the conventional medical establishment (as usual) continues to insist that antibiotics are "safe and effective"; and the mainstream media does not bother to investigate!

Chapter 5 of the paper outlines a multitude of studies that have linked antibiotic use with conditions such as obesity, diabetes, asthma, diarrhoea, allergy, atopic dermatitis and more. It outlines other studies which show how antibiotics, during pregnancy and infancy, can affect a child's immune system, and lead to "disease in later life, both directly and indirectly". Most serious, perhaps, is the section on 'Changes in the Immune System" which outlines several studies that "demonstrate the complex relationship between the microbiota and the host immune response, and the impact of antibiotics on this interaction which needs to be further studied. It can also impact the effectiveness of vaccines used postantibiotic treatment." 

The paper has this conclusion:

        "Antibiotics disrupt the microbial balance and hence the networking within the bacterial community, and that with the host. The resulting resistant bacteria make clinical treatment difficult. Due to this complex link between the host and microbiota, the current usage of antibiotics requires careful stewardship, with an emphasis on the application of antibiotic alternatives, while limiting collateral damage".

Obviously the paper is written by medical scientists who continue to believe that antibiotics, in some shape or form, will still have a part to play in conventional medical treatment. This is an honest position; but it is not one on which I can agree. Antibiotic drugs have been prescribed by conventional medical doctors for 80 years. They are still routinely described to patients as "safe and effective", and prescribed in ever-increasing quantities. And conventional medicine has continued to do so without any apparent awareness that antibiotic drugs could cause an increase in the diseases mentioned in the study. This makes drug-based medicine (not just antibiotics, but especially antibiotics) a inherently dangerous medical system, unaware of the dangers to which it is exposing patients. It is a medical system that can experiment with patient, giving them drugs whose 'side effects' can remain unknown 80 years!

This situation is getting worse. In a study published in October 2024, a link has been found between antibiotic drugs, the microbiome, and Parkinson's disease. Parkinson's has, to my knowledge, never been linked with antibiotic drugs before, and like most revelations about adverse drug reactions it is still being played down. 

        "In a large UK-representative population, the risk of PD was modestly lower among adults who had previously received multiple courses of penicillins in the last 15 years and modestly higher among those exposed to antifungal medicines in recent years".

I suspect the significance of this link between antibiotic drugs and serious illness and disease will only develop over time, and require many more studies. It is not possible to interfere with the human body, not least by compromising the gut microbiome which digests our food, and not cause serious damage to our health. And it is becoming clear that this is what antibiotics have been doing - for many decades.

This is probably one of the reasons that pharmaceutical companies are now talking about the development of more 'targeted' antibiotics - but again, this seems more to do with drug promotion than reality. Medical science has always proved itself to be less clever than its propaganda! And 'targeted antibiotics' would still be based upon the same failed understanding of health - that in order to be healthy we have to kill germs!

4. The other 'side effects' of antibiotic drugs

Conventional medicine still refuses to accept that antibiotic drugs have serious adverse reactions which are just as harmful as any other pharmaceutical drugs. But they do. For instance, the Drugs.com website outlines that they can commonly cause skin rash, allergic reactions, soft or watery stools, short-term diarrhoea, upset stomach, nausea, loss of appetite, Fungal (yeast) vaginal infections, oral thrush; and more seriously severe allergic reaction that results in difficulty breathing, facial swelling, severe watery or bloody diarrhoea; Clostridium difficile infection, stomach cramps, and yeast infections in the mouth or vagina. These 'side effects' have been known for decades, but they are routinely discounted.

The British NHS website says that "these side effects are usually mild and should pass once you finish your course of treatment". And even the Drugs.com website fails to list the side effects discussed in this blog. So even now the conventional medical establishment shows itself to be reluctant to disclose about weight gain, diabetes, et al, which they must know about, but clearly are not sufficiently honest to disclose. Informed patient choice is impossible within such secrecy, and lack of transparency.

So if we look at antibiotics from outside the closed walls of pharmaceutical propaganda, they cannot be described as a success. And as conventional medicine continues to describe them as "safe and effective" it is difficult for them to admit that their most acclaimed 'wonder drug' has failed. In the fullness of time, antibiotic drugs will be seen as a failure, not just because of resistance, or the development of superbugs, or serious adverse effects, but because most of the diseases they were supposed to have eradicated are now returning.

If we are to regain our health we need to revisit the Pasteur-Bechamp debate, and recognise that what is most important is the host, and its immune system; and that the body is not made well by attacking the bacteria that, far from being a threat, are an important part of staying healthy. 

Pharmaceutical medicine will refuse to do so; its enormous wealth, power and influence is based on pursuing the failed 'germ theory' of disease, and its belief in the need to control and kill the very things that keep us healthy.

This blog is one of a series of blogs that examines the myths of conventional medical success. Others in the series include:

    Eradicating Smallpox.

    Conquering Polio.

    Conquering Measles.

    Whooping Cough (Pertussin)

    The Covid-19 Pandemic

Has Medical Science Rediscovered the Immune System?

 "Scientists discover new part of the immune system"

These were the headlines of several British mainstream media outlets on 6 March 2025. The Israeli researchers said that what they had discovered "transforms our understanding of how we are protected against infection".

Of course, we have known that it is our immune system is what keeps us healthy for a very long time, although pharmaceutical medicine in recent years have been telling us that only their drugs and vaccines can keep us safe. But followers of natural medical therapies have always known about the importance of the immune system. This is how the BBC article on the discovery explains the new discovery.

        "A new part of the immune system has been discovered and it is a goldmine of potential antibiotics. (Scientists have) shown a part of the body known to recycle proteins has a secret mode that can spew out an arsenal of bacteria-killing chemicals. The researchers in Israel say it transforms our understanding of how we are protected against infection".

Well, this is brilliant! Isn't it? Perhaps we should all have known how special our immune system is in protecting us from illness and disease: but this discovery demonstrates just how clever the body is in achieving this remarkable feat, unaided, undirected. 

Apparently the discovery centres on the proteasome, described as "a tiny structure found in every cell of the body". Its main role is to "chop up old proteins into smaller chunks so they can be recycled to make new ones".  But now a series of scientific experiments (detailed in the Journal 'Nature') shows the proteasome detects when a cell has been infected by bacteria, and can then change its structure and role. "It begins to transform old proteins into weapons that can rip open the outer layer of bacteria to kill them".

The brilliance of our immune system is the reason why most people who follow natural medicine are content to rely on it to keep us fit and healthy. We certainly need to support and strengthen our immune system all the time but if we do this the secret of staying healthy, and recovering from sickness, is to rely upon it.

But this is not what conventional, drug-based medicine does. So the Guardian's article on the research adds to the headline: ... "and it could help solve our antibiotics crisis".

The antibiotic crisis to which they refer is, of course, that the pharmaceutical industry have been producing antibiotic drugs for nearly 100 years; and each one of them, in turn, has led to (i) resistance, and (ii) the development of superbugs. So pharmaceutical medicine has effectively stopped trying to replace the antibiotics as they no longer work. So an "Antibiotic Apocalypse" has been widely predicted within conventional medicine - the drugs on which they have relied for so long are no longer working, and are not going to be replaced.

So apparently medical 'science' sees this new scientific understanding of how the immune system works to be an opportunity to produce new and different antibiotic drugs! Prompted and assisted, of course, by this new knowledge about our immune system. Presumably the new drugs that might emerge can be patented by pharmaceutical companies (in order to ensure and boost profits), and to market them to an increasingly sick population.

But wait? Isn't the body already producing these 'new' antibiotics? Is it not doing so on the basis of the actual bacterial 'threat' to the health of each one of us as individuals? The research suggests that the proteasome, present in each cell, can detect a new 'problem', and reacts to it accordingly by producing a new and appropriately antibiotic? So if our body is capable of doing this for itself, why does conventional medicine need to intervene and produce its own?

This question represents the difference between pharmaceutical medicine and natural medical therapies (homeopathy, naturopathy, herbalism, acupuncture, et al). The latter seek, each in their different ways, to support and strengthen the functioning of the immune system. By contrast, conventional medicine seeks to interfere with the immune system with drugs - on the basis that 'it' knows best what our body needs.

And, in fact, this is the choice that we all have, as patients. 

    When we are fit and healthy do we have confidence in our immune system to keep us so? 

    When we are sick do we have confidence that our immune system is working to make us better? And that it needs to be supported, and left alone in order to do so?

If, as this research seems to demonstrate, that our body is capable of recognising a problem, and then can produce an 'antibiotic' capable of responding to it, why would we want a conventional doctor to 'second-guess' this natural process. 

Do we really believe that a doctor can do it better? 

Or should we not just leave well alone?

A new 'double selective' Antibiotic? Is this good news? Or a belated recognition of the patient harm caused by the 'old' antibiotics?

Most people, if asked to identify a pharmaceutical drug that was "safe and effective", would point to antibiotics. So is this announcement more good news for antibiotic drugs?

            "A new antibiotic uses a never-before-seen mechanism to deliver a direct hit on tough-to-treat infections while leaving beneficial microbes alone. The strategy could lead to a new class of antibiotics that attack dangerous bacteria in a powerful new way, overcoming current drug resistance while sparing the gut microbiome".

This is how it is presented in this Medscape article, New-Era Double Selective Antibiotic Spares Microbiome. But hold on, what is this about "sparing the gut microbiome"? What is the gut microbiome?

           " The gut microbiome refers to all the microorganisms living in the digestive system. The microbiome is individual to each person and is important to digestive health as well as to overall health. Studies of the gut microbiome are ongoing, but it’s becoming clear that certain types of bacteria, yeast, and other fungi are more or less beneficial for overall health. People may be able to affect their microbiome with diet and other lifestyle factors".

So it certainly does seem important to 'spare' the microorganisms of the gut microbiome. But wait, does that mean that all previous antibiotic drugs attacked it, harmed it? Rather than being 'good news' is this an admission that hitherto antibiotics have actually harmed something that was "important to digestive health as well as to overall health"?

Over 9 years ago, in 2015, I wrote a blog, "Antibiotics. Not as safe as we have been told?", which outlined just how harmful antibiotics drugs were to our health, outlining some of the known/accepted, and the suspected adverse reactions to antibiotics. 

• The blog touched on the fact that conventional medicine was aware of the harm antibiotics caused, as early as 1953 (4 years after their introduction).
• It talked about antibacterial resistance.
• It outlined how antibiotics were particularly harmful to the health of children.
• And antibiotics were discussed as the possible or known causes of a variety of diseases, such as obesity, irritable bowel disease, Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, liver disease, diabetes, asthma and eczema, heart disease, mental health, and HIV/Aids.
• All these diseases have risen to epidemic levels during the last 70 years, no doubt in large part to antibiotic drugs that have compromised our gut microbiome.
  
• And I asked this important question - did the conventional medical establishment know about the patient harm that was being caused by antibiotic drugs?
  

Clearly they did, and the development of this new 'double selective' antibiotic is proof of this. Why else would it have been developed, presumably at massive cost?

Yet during the last 9 years, the list of iatrogenic diseases now known to be/thought to be caused by antibiotic drugs have increased to many that seem to have little or no connection with the gut, like Parkinson's Disease. 

Suddenly, conventional medicine seems to have realised that killing microbes is not a path to health! Hence the new drug. As usual it is hailed as a breakthrough - but the 'bad' news underlying the 'good' news is being ignored, or censored - presumably for 'commercial' reasons!

The new 'double selective' antibiotics may, or may not be safer and more effective than the 'old' antibiotics (that is, those that are prescribed, and still being taken in huge quantities today). But we can be sure that if conventional medicine continues to operate with the secrecy, and lack of transparency, we have witnessed for the last 70 years, we will probably not be aware of this for yet another 70 years!

Natural medical therapies have known about the harm caused by antibiotics for a very long time. They do not believe in the 'germ' theory of illness. They do not set out to attack or kill anything! And this is why natural medicine focuses instead on supporting and strengthening our immune system - in the knowledge that it is our natural immunity that best protects us all from illness and disease.

ANTIBIOTIC DRUGS ARE FAILING. Drug companies know this, but they are cutting research on replacing them. So is Natural Medicine the only answer to the Antibiotic Apocalypse?

This blog is taken from the website of the Alliance for Natural Health, an excellent publication, and an excellently concise article on the failure of antibiotics, the antibiotic apocalypse that is predicted, and how natural medicine is stepping up to fill the void..

Big Pharma cuts research as antibiotics fail

The question is not if antibiotics fail, it’s when. 

Worse, there is no new breed of drugs to replace them. 

Compared to other potential blockbuster drugs there is relatively little money to be made from antibiotics, which is why Pharma is looking to significantly reduce or stop investment to find replacements or alternatives. 

Many people believe that they can’t heal from certain infections without taking a course of antibiotics and have come to expect to be given a prescription from their doctors. It’s this over- and misappropriate use of antibiotics that has led to the current situation where antimicrobial resistance is threatening our health again. 

Antibiotics are now failing, even the big guns held in reserve to combat the toughest of bacterial infections. In recognition of the warnings that by 2050, antimicrobial resistance is going to be responsible for the loss of around 10 million people a year, a new initiative has been launched. 

Aimed at overcoming antimicrobial resistance using natural medicine, environmentally responsible botanical company, Pukka Herbs, and The College of Medicine have come together to launch a new initiative.

This demonstrates two important differences between conventional, drug-based medicine, and natural medicines, such as homeopathy, naturopathy, herbalism, osteopathy, et al.

1. The pharmaceutical is more interested in profit than finding safe and effective treatments for patients.
2. Natural medicine, which works with, and alongside, are not failing; and as a result they are the future for anyone looking for health care.

Government plan to combat an "Urgent Global Threat. The failure of Antibiotics & the creation of Superbugs leads to the pharmaceutical industry being rewarded for a problem it has caused

The UK government has announced a 5-year plan, and 20-year 'vision', aimed at overcoming antimicrobial resistance, the British government's response to the growing problem of drug resistant bacteria, viruses, parasites infections, and infectious diseases. The Health Secretary, Matt Hancock has said that the situation is so serious that even a simple graze could be deadly:

               "Antimicrobial resistance is as big a danger to humanity as climate change or warfare."

This is the depth to which conventional medicine is failing. This dreadful new world, without effective antibiotic drugs, has previously been described by the government's Chief Medical Officer, Professor Dame Sally Davies, as 'an antibiotic apocalypse' in June 2015. Yet both the contents of the plan, its urgency, and the reasoning that underlays it, needs to be carefully examined.

We have been told for many years that the overuse of antibiotics is making infections harder to treat, with many thousands of deaths every year being caused by drug-resistant superbugs. And it has been pointed out elsewhere, including in this blog, that this problem is one exclusively for the conventional medical establishment.

The 'threat' is a threat to the conventional medicine, not to medicine. It is NOT a problem for natural medicine, including homeopathy. The government plan fails to recognise this. It makes the usual assumption that conventional medicine = medicine - the whole of medicine, medicine in its entirety, that there is not alternative to it.

The government plan also continues to attempt to reduce unnecessary antibiotic use, by 15% for humans in 5 years, and by 25% for animals over the next year. The problem is that drug companies do not like the idea of selling fewer drugs, and this is one of the main reasons they have decided not to develop new antibiotics. They are in the health business for profit, not for our good!

To counteract this problem the plan proposes to change how it funds pharmaceutical drug companies - to encourage them to develop new drugs, new antibiotics, to deal with conventional medicine's crisis.

The plan asks the drugs advisory body, NICE (the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence) and NHS England to trial a new payment arrangement which ensure that drug companies are paid for drugs on the basis of how valuable the drugs are rather than by the quantity sold. The government believes that paying drug companies for the amount of antibiotics sold has led to this "market failure". The new new payment method will encourage companies to invest in the development of new antibiotics.

For the drug companies it means the guarantee of a hugely increased price for selling fewer drugs. It is, in other words, a reward for failure. 

So although it is widely accepted that antibiotic drugs have caused the problem of superbugs, and the distress, illness and death they have cause, the plan's solution to the problem produce more, presumably more powerful antibiotics. Conventional medicine never learns!

The mainstream media should be (but aren't) asking an important question. Is the conventional medical establishment (of which the government and the NHS is an important part) able to recognise what has CAUSED the problem of antibiotic resistance, and the CREATION of superbugs?

More of the same failed medicine is NOT a new policy, nor is it a policy likely to have a different outcome, namely more drug resistance, more superbugs, more medical panic, more pharmaceutical profits.

Nor does the plan recognise that antibiotic drugs are now known to cause serious health problems for people who have taken them, often in large quantities over their lifetime. The plan fails to recognise that antibiotic drugs have caused significant patient harm over the 70 years of their existence. Antibiotic drugs are indiscriminate killers of bacteria that over the years have devastated the gut and its micro biome. As a result they are implicated in the rise of obesity, diarrhoea, constipation, asthma, eczema, diabetes, liver damage, heart disease and breast cancer. They are part of the reason for the increase, and even the creation of 'new' diseases like irritable bowel, Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, and much more.

But apparently none of this matters! None of this is ever mentioned by our doctors, the NHS, or the mainstream media. We are going to get more antibiotics, and drug companies are going to be rewarded for providing them, whether it is good for us or not!

ANTIBIOTIC DRUGS. More problems for these wonder drugs, on which conventional medicine depends so heavily

The reputation of conventional medicine depends largely on the success of antibiotic drugs during the last 70 years. I am old enough to remember them being described as 'wonder drugs', and that they were also 'completely safe'. It is the kind of rhetoric, and false promise, on which conventional medicine has based its apparent success.

I wrote about it back in 2012 that "Antibiotics. The failure of conventional medicine's wonder drug", and in 2013 that "Antibiotics - not such a wonder drug?"

The ongoing failure of antibiotics has been described as "an antibiotic apocalypse" - the drug is considered to be that important to the viability of conventional medicine. The problem with antibiotics, as presented in the mainstream media, has focused mainly on bacterial resistance. Doctors have few antibiotics that actually work now, and the lifespan of the remaining drugs is time-limited.

Yet, as I said back in 2015, "Antibiotics. Not as safe as we have been told", resistance is only one part of the problem. As the blog outlined, the drugs are, and always have been, harmful to patient health - more harmful than has ever been admitted.

Now there is further news about the harm they cause. It has come from MIMS in October 2018 which reported that the EMA, the European Drugs Agency, has said that the use of quinolone antibiotics should be restricted "owing to disabling and potentially long-lasting adverse effects reported with their use". This is what it said

              "The EMA's Pharmacovigilance Risk Assessment Committee made its recommendations following a review of serious adverse effects reported with the use of quinolone antibiotics given orally, parenterally or by inhalation. Such effects have been reported very rarely and mainly involve muscles, tendons and bones, and the nervous system."

As ever, with all dangerous pharmaceutical drugs, these antibiotics have NOT been withdrawn or banned. Instead, doctors have been asked to use them "with caution", and not to prescribe them for certain conditions.

• Have you read about this, then? No! Well, not a surprise as the mainstream media has not bothered to mention it, as far as I can see. Clearly they don't think we should know about drugs that cause "disabling and potentially long-last adverse effects".
• So is this the conventional medical establishment acting, in a timely way, to protect patients? Hardly, doctors have been prescribing quinolone antibiotics since the early 1960's, so they have been causing patient harm for over 50 years!
• Perhaps, then, it is just that doctors haven't noticed (or haven't accepted, or haven't reported) that they cause patient harm. Well, this does not stand scrutiny either - serious side effects have been known about for a long time. "The FDA first added a Boxed Warning to fluoroquinolones in July 2008 for the increased risk of tendinitis and tendon rupture."

The reality is that all pharmaceutical drugs are harmful, and that the conventional medical establishment just does not give a damn! 

Conventional medicine reacts to patient harm only when it can no longer continue to deny that they are causing patient harm!

And then, routinely, through censorship, or perhaps sheer embarrassment, patients are not told that they have been taking drugs that may have harmed them!

This is just one more example that demonstrates that the future of medicine does NOT lay with pharmaceutical drugs. They are all proving to be largely ineffective. They are all, without exception, dangerous. And drug companies are not even pretending, these days, to suggest they have new drugs coming through the pipeline.

Conventional Medicine - RIP - Quickly please

More antibiotic drugs have been banned. They have been used since the 1960's! How many patients have been damaged by them? Do doctors know? Do they care? Have you been damaged by them?

Quinolone and Fluoroquinolone antibiotics have been suspended by the EMA (The European Drug's Agency). They were first introduced in the 1960's. In June 2018, after over 50 years, conventional medicine has discovered that they cause "disabling and potentially permanent side effects". On 16th November 2018, the EMA suspended them. Their findings will now be forwarded to the European Commission "which will issue a final legally binding decision applicable in all EU countries".

The machinations of the conventional medical establishment are long and convoluted. 

The suffering and patient harm they have caused are lengthy and enduring.

Yesterday patients were told that these drugs were safe.

Tomorrow they will be told that they are unsafe.

These antibiotic drugs are the latest of a long line of pharmaceutical drugs doctors have given to patients over the years - safe, wonder drugs - that have eventually had to be banned. Over the years I have constructed a long, but probably incomplete list of banned pharmaceutical drugs and published them in my ebook, "The Failure of Conventional Medicine". They are all drugs that have been

• 'scientifically' tested
• approved by drug regulators as safe and effective
• given to patients
• caused patient harm over many years
• and were all, rather belatedly, banned

Even so, not all fluoroquinolone antibiotics have been suspended - their use has just been restricted, and will no longer be used:

• to treat infections that might get better without treatment or are not severe (such as throat infections);
• to treat non-bacterial infections, e.g. non-bacterial (chronic) prostatitis;
• for preventing traveller’s diarrhoea or recurring lower urinary tract infections (urine infections that do not extend beyond the bladder);
• to treat mild or moderate bacterial infections unless other antibacterial medicines commonly recommended for these infections cannot be used.

And the EMA says that they should be used only "with special caution" in the elderly, patients with kidney disease and those who have had an organ transplantation because these patients are at a higher risk of tendon injury.

I suggest that patients, all patients, might want to take even greater precautions, and say NO, not only to these drugs, but to all pharmaceutical drugs. This situation demonstrates that the conventional medical establishment is prepared to continue prescribing drugs long after they are known to be dangerous for patients.

The side-effects website has said this about these antibiotics - long before this rather belated suspension.

               "The newer Quinolone Antibiotics are considered 'safe' in most studies.... But this can be deceiving and the incidence of problems are often MUCH higher than the industry-sponsored drug trials say. Quinolone antibiotics have an VERY DARK history, and many of the problems people experience are disabling, long-term effects- and even death from these 'safe' drugs."

They went on to make the point I have now been making for many years, emphasising that all the serious and dangerous side effects of these (and other) drugs, were found 'post-marketing'.

               "What this means that these reactions occur AFTER the drug is on the market and is being taken by YOU. What this says is that they KNOW that quinolone antibiotics are dangerous and have side effects that could be disabling or deadly and yet they keep developing new ones in the hope that THIS one won't have those problems."

They went on to say that Quinolone Antibiotics were too dangerous to use, something that European drug regulators are only now prepared to accept. They said that medical science have shown them to be safe enough for FDA approval. I have no information yet about whether the FDA believe they are still safe enough for Americans to take. At this very moment, in the USA, a doctor may be telling one of his patients.

               "Take these antibiotics. They have been proven to be safe. They won't hurt you"

And that is the way with conventional medicine. Doctors are prepared to give their patients anything, harmful as the drug might be. They might change their mind in 50 years time. They might not. But even if they do they will give you another drugs that medical science has proven to be 'entirely safe'.

Anyone for natural medical therapies which actually believe in "first do no harm"?

Patients pressurising doctors to give them more drugs. Why? And is honesty with patients the best solution?

Public Health England (PHE) is concerned that patients are pressurising doctors to give them more antibiotic drugs (Pulse 18 October 2018). This is not a new phenomenon. Indeed, it has become a feature of the National Health Service in the UK. Patients, it seems, can never get quite enough of the pharmaceutical drugs and vaccines that are on offer to them - even when doctors do not think they need them.

Another recent post in Pulse may be relevant here, it suggested that if patients were aware of the cost of the treatments they received they would appreciate them more. So perhaps if patients were aware of the cost of antibiotic drugs they would appreciate them more? Unfortunately, antibiotics are not particularly expensive. And they are already too popular, in too much demand it seems, and PHE feels it needs to take action.

So PHE is going to reintroduce its 'Keep Antibiotics Working' campaign. In doing so it has the approval of doctors because "93% of those surveyed said that it supported them in refusing patient requests for antibiotics" - by informing the public about the risks of antibiotic resistance, and to urge them to take their clinicians advice on antibiotics.

As this blog has regularly reported, there are two major problems with antibiotic drugs. One of these is, indeed, resistance - the creation of superbugs - their inability to treat the conditions, illnesses and disease that once they were able to treat - an increasing number of patients no longer responding to them.

The other problem is the serious side effects they are known to cause. For my previous blogs on the dangers of antibiotic drugs, go to the top left-hand side of this page and search 'antibiotic drugs'. Alternatively, go to my webpage on the dangers of antibiotics drugs.

So why do patients continue to demand antibiotic drugs, given that they are now known to cause such serious side effects? The answer is, of course, patients are not told. To a large extent the conventional medical establishment does not accept that they cause harm, even though the evidence is there, published and available within their own information base. Certainly doctors do not admit, publically, the harm they cause. And the mainstream media does not ask questions about the dangers of antibiotic drugs. So how do we ever get to know?

Since the 1940's we have all been told that antibiotics are wonder drugs. Once we were told they were wonder drugs with no side effects! This is the information most people still understand and believe. They have never been told otherwise - so why should they know that they are dangerous?

So whether the '‘Keep Antibiotics Working' campaign works remains to be seen. Pulse states that in 2016 antibiotic prescribing decreased by 6% over three years, but that research continued to show that between 8% and 23% of antibiotic prescriptions are still inappropriate. They want to reduce this by half.

I believe that this is unlikely to happen. It will not happen until we are all told the real reason we should not pester doctors for drugs - that they are dangerous to our health.

As long as doctors tell us that the problem with antibiotics is a 'technical' one, concerning 'resistance', whilst we continue to believe they are effective and safe, patients will continue to demand them, and doctors will feel pressured into prescribe them. Patients need to be told that antibiotics are UNSAFE, and HARMFUL to our health.

So the solution to this particular problem is an easy one - HONESTY! 

But actually honesty is a problem for conventional medicine. Most of their drugs are largely ineffective. All of them are dangerous. And perhaps even more important, antibiotics are the very drugs upon which the reputation of conventional medicine has been built for the last 70 years. This base is becoming increasingly flimsy, at best, and it crumbles a bit more every time a doctor prescribes another drug to another patient.

Antibiotics are failing. Our Government and Conventional Medicine does not know what to do. This is the advice provided for government by the Alliance of Registered Homeopaths

Written evidence from the Alliance of Registered Homeopaths (ARH)

1. Declaration of interests
The Alliance of Registered Homeopaths (ARH) is the second largest voluntary registering and regulatory body for the homeopathy profession in the UK, and currently represents just under one thousand qualified homeopaths. ARH is set up as a Company Limited by Guarantee, and is a not for profit organisation. ARH has based its regulatory criteria on the UK National Occupational Standards for Homeopathy (NOS), which were developed and agreed across the profession. We are committed to supporting and promoting a high standard of safe, effective homeopathic practice, and to ensure that quality homeopathy is available to all who wish to use it.

2. An overview of antimicrobial resistance
In 2001 the World Health Organisation (WHO) published its global strategy for containment of antimicrobial resistance. (1) Acknowledging the urgent need for all countries to take effective action to reduce AMR, the WHO strategy included several important recommendations such as:

     * Encouraging more appropriate use of antimicrobials
     * Reducing antimicrobial use in food production animals
     * Reducing antimicrobial use by improving both public health and domestic hygiene routines
     * Developing knowledge and understanding of AMR
     * Developing new drugs to combat AMR

3. In 2012, the WHO published ‘The evolving threat of antimicrobial resistance; Options for action (2) is a book which re-emphasised the urgency of the situation, redefined the actions necessary to effectively manage AMR, and encouraged policy makers and the global community to commit to increasing their actions to combat AMR. A detailed account of the threat posed to public health by AMR is outlined in Volume II of the Chief Medical Officer’s Annual Report (2011), which was published in March 2013. (3) This report also makes a number of recommendations which broadly concur with the findings of the earlier WHO publication. The situation is clear; AMR has become a major threat to world health. Infectious diseases already place a social and economic burden on society, so an increase in AMR is likely to have a significant impact in three main areas:

     I. Loss of productivity due to absence from work as a result of minor illnesses (this cited as the cause for over one fifth of all lost work days in the UK during 20113).
     II. Increased need for hospitalisation as a result of unresolved infectious diseases (in the UK, it is estimated that the costs to the health service, labour market, and to individuals, amounts to £30 billion/year (3).
     III. Increased mortality resulting from infectious diseases, or routine interventions/surgical procedures, which respond to currently available antimicrobial drugs.

4. Research into other treatments
Although the development of new drugs is one of the recommendations listed to combat AMR, experience suggests that this may prove to be a self limiting approach. Microorganisms have the ability to modify over a relatively short period of time, leading to the development of new strains, which are resistant to antimicrobial drugs. An approach to AMR which focuses on improving general health and reducing the use of antimicrobial drugs, is more likely to produce long term benefits.

5. This observation is supported by the results from a recent retrospective cross-sectional analysis of national primary care prescribing data, undertaken by researchers from the University of Bristol in England during 2016 (4). In this study, a group of UK, German and Dutch researchers led by Bristol University, set out to examine if there was any difference between antibiotic prescription rates in conventional GP practices, and GP practices where doctors had an additional training in integrative approaches (ie, they had also been trained in a complementary/alternative (CAM) system of medicine). This study used NHS digital monthly prescribing data for 2016 and covered 7,274 surgeries. The data was then compared with results taken from nine surgeries where GPs had been trained in integrative medicine (IM). As well as looking at overall anti-biotic prescribing, the study also considered anti-biotic prescriptions made specifically for respiratory infections and urinary tract infections (UTI).

6. Analysis showed no significant difference between the two types of practice when it came to anti-biotic prescriptions for the treatment of UTIs. However, practices that employed GPs trained in IM has significantly lower anti-biotic prescribing rates overall, than those with GPs with a conventional training only. The treatment of respiratory infections also required less anti-biotic prescriptions in surgeries using an integrated approach.

7. It is acknowledged that the results of this study are limited by the lack of data in several areas, such as the number of consultations, individual GP characteristics, individual deprivation scores and continuum of care. Also, the number of practices which have GPs trained in IM is small because accessibility of IM/CAM within the NHS in general practice in England is very limited. Currently, IM/CAM provision is currently almost exclusively private in the UK.

8. Nevertheless, the authors of this study have concluded that the difference seen in antibiotic prescribing rates at practices with GPs trained in IM warranted further study. Significantly, the lower antibiotic prescription rates of practices with GPs trained in IM are in line with current national guidance aimed at reducing antibiotic usage and antimicrobial resistance.

9. The fight against antimicrobial resistance should include utilizing additional treatment strategies to manage infections commonly encountered in primary care. One such intervention is homeopathy, which has been successfully used to treat a wide range of medical conditions, since the early 1800’s. Some historical, and more recent, examples follow below:

10. Homeopathy and epidemics
Extensive medical records exist, recording the effectiveness of homeopathy in the treatment of epidemics. For example, in the pre antibiotic era, homeopathy was successfully used to treat the Spanish flu outbreak of 1918, a fact which has been well documented, especially in the US. The medical records of hospitals across the country consistently show a mortality rate of above 28% in sufferers treated allopathically, as opposed to a mortality rate of just over 1% of those treated with homeopathy. A more detailed account of homeopathy's efficacy in treating the Spanish flu outbreak in the US, is documented in a report to the Journal of the American Institute of Homeopathy, entitled 'Homeopathy in Influenza – A Chorus of Fifty in Harmony. (5)

11. In 2008, a groundbreaking research study was conducted in Cuba, where homeopathy was used to prevent an outbreak of leptospirosis in 2.4 million people during the hurricane season. The results of this remarkable experiment were first presented at a conference in Havana in December 2008. The Cuban based Finlay Institute, responsible for the production of allopathic vaccines, is also involved in the research and development of homeopathic products. They were responsible for the manufacture of a homeopathic Leptospira nosode, which was rapidly made available to populations in the three areas most affected by the hurricanes. The result was that following the intervention, a dramatic decrease in mortality was observed, with confirmed cases of Leptospirosis at lower levels than normally expected. (6) Furthermore, there were no fatalities in hospitalized cases. This compared to several thousand confirmed cases of Leptospirosis in previous years, including some fatalities, even in populations where the allopathic vaccine had been used. Another feature of this study was its cost efficiency. The Leptospirosis nosode programme had been delivered at a total cost of around US$200,000, whereas a 'normal' vaccination programme, which would only be delivered to the most 'at risk' population, would be expected to cost in the region of US$3,000,000. The implications of these findings to third world countries, struggling to provide effective health interventions at a price they can afford, are massive.

12. The Finlay Institute has continued to use a homeopathic prophylaxis against Leptospirosis since 2008, and the results have shown a significant reduction in the occurrence of this disease. The subsequent studies demonstrate the potential effectiveness of homeopathic prophylaxis in reducing the spread of an infectious disease which would normally be widespread, and would probably require antimicrobial drugs to be used as part of a treatment routine.

13. Homeopathy and infections
Respiratory disorders, such as pneumonia, have been identified as a leading cause of infectious disease related mortality, especially in our increasingly ageing population. Upper respiratory tract infections (URTIs) occur frequently in children, and in one study assessing morbidity in pre school children due to URTI (7), the authors observed that over 58% of the study cohort developed a common cold, and over a twelve month period, over 47% had more than two colds. There appears to be a link between a compromised immune system leading to recurrent infections, and the over prescription of antimicrobial drugs. For several decades, antibiotics have been used to treat common conditions such as upper respiratory tract disorders, even before they develop symptoms associated with bacteriological involvement, and now it is recognized that this intervention may lead to complications in addition to recurrent infections, such as disruption of pro bacteria in the colon, which can result in abdominal pain and diarrhoea. One outcomes based trial, originally intended as a cost evaluation of the effectiveness of homeopathy, demonstrates that homeopathy can provide a valuable treatment option for some respiratory disorders.

14. A cost evaluation of the treatment of respiratory disorders, was undertaken in the Campo di Marte Hospital, Tuscany, Italy, from 1998 – 2003. (8) The cost of conventional drug treatment given to a group of patients suffering from asthma and recurring respiratory disorders, was monitored for one year prior the introduction of homeopathic treatment, then compared to the conventional drug costs incurred over a two year period, following the introduction of homeopathic treatment. The analysis shows a reduction in drug costs specific to respiratory disorders of over 46%, and a reduction of general drug costs of over 42% in the patient group given homeopathy. Overall patient wellbeing also improved significantly, a fact which undoubtedly contributed to the reduction in drug requirements. For the patient group suffering from asthma specifically, conventional drug costs were reduced by 71% during the first year of homeopathic treatment, compared to the group receiving only conventional medication, whose drug requirements resulted in a 12% increase in overall costs. According to a news release from Asthma UK, dated 21 October 2009, the treatment of asthma in the UK costs an estimated £1 billion per year. The Italian study shows a cost saving on conventional drugs ranging from between 42% to 71% over a two year period. This makes the long term implications for delivering effective, cost efficient treatment of asthma with homeopathy, highly significant.

15. Evidence which shows the effectiveness of homeopathy
A number of scientists consider the randomised, double blind, placebo controlled trial (RCT) to represent a gold standard for determining the efficacy of a therapeutic intervention. However, RCT's have several inherent fundamental flaws: They are designed to support/enhance a particular outcome. The results they produce can, either intentionally or unintentionally, be interpreted to reflect the required outcomes. RCT protocols are founded on a number of broad generalisations and assumptions, making it difficult to take into account the reactions of each individual participant. RCT's were originally developed as an appraisal tool, and were intended to support and augment evidence acquired through other, more observation based means. Because homeopathy is a system of medicine in which individualisation is key to a successful prescription, gathering evidence via RCT's presents a significant challenge. However, a number of RCT's looking for quantitative evidence to support the efficacy of homeopathy, have been undertaken. For example, in 1997, a meta analysis of data extracted from 89 clinical trials was published in The Lancet, (9) and concluded that the results showed the beneficial action of homeopathy could not be attributed to the placebo affect alone. Two subsequent reviews, analysing trials from the same data set, corroborated this conclusion, (10, 11) though less strikingly than the original systematic review. This highlights a problem associated with meta analyses in general, which is that the quality of the reviews under consideration determines the usefulness of the information extracted via systematic analysis. Another problem may arise when the researcher selects the reviews to be analysed, via criteria likely to influence the outcome. Undoubtedly there is a valuable place for the RCT within scientific research, providing its limitations are fully acknowledged when interpreting the resulting data.

16. Most RCTs in homeopathy are small scale when compared to RCTs in conventional medicine, however they consistently indicate a positive outcome. For example, a study undertaken between 2002-2004 in Trondheim, Norway, (12) investigated whether individualized homeopathic treatment could be effective in preventing URTIs in children. One hundred and sixty nine children under the age of ten, who all had a history of URTIs, were selected, and randomly assigned to either receive individualized homeopathic treatment, or conventional care, over a twelve week period. This was a pragmatic trial, designed to measure the effectiveness of homeopathic treatment under everyday ‘real life’ circumstances. The children who received homeopathic treatment experienced fewer days suffering from URTIs (an average of eight days, compared to thirteen in the control group), and had significantly fewer symptoms, suggesting that homeopathy can be effective in both the prevention and treatment of URTIs in children.

17. Other RCTs have shown homeopathy to be effective in treating childhood infections such as glue ear, where antibiotics would normally otherwise be used. In 1999, a small scale study (13) concluded that the group of children treated with homeopathy required less antibiotics and less visits to the specialist, than the group receiving standard care. A different trial, which was comparative and non-randomized, showed that children suffering from acute otitis media14 experienced more rapid pain relief, and a reduction in recurrence of infection, following homeopathic treatment, when compared to the group of children treated conventionally. Undoubtedly, there is a need to undertake more RCTs in homeopathy in order to further develop our knowledge of the potential of homeopathy in reducing AMR. Further research is also required in the fields of outcomes-based evidence, (which can either be clinically sourced, or patient generated in the form of a 'measure yourself medical outcome profile' (MYMOP)), and empirical evidence, which is data acquired through direct observation, usually under controlled circumstances, where results are reported according to previously agreed protocols. There may be some overlap with outcomes-based evidence.

18. The overuse of antibiotics in production animals
In April 2011, the Director General of the WHO, Dr Margaret Chan, issued a stark warning about the imminent dangers presented by antibiotic resistance. As part of a panel discussion entitled ‘Antibiotic resistance. No action today, no cure tomorrow’, Dr Chan presented some of the facts currently being considered in this investigation. In the European Union, Norway and Iceland, an estimated twenty five thousand people die each year from common resistant bacterial infections. This figure is taken from about half of the fifty three member states within the WHO European Region, and the death toll from all of Europe in unknown, but without question, antibiotic resistance is increasing at an alarming rate. All this carries financial costs as well as human costs, with the EU alone paying out an estimated €1.5 billion on dealing with the consequences of antibiotic resistant organisms.

19. Dr Chan was also critical of the overuse of antibiotics in production animals, warning that resistant bacteria can easily spread via the food chain. It appears that outside of the EU, low doses of antibiotics are routinely used to aid growth promotion, a practice which carries health implications for all of us. Globally, it is estimated that about 80% of antibiotic use, is in production animals, including fish, meat, dairy and egg production. Tetracycline has been added to a paint applied to the hulls of ships, in order to reduce accumulations of barnacles and algae. This is certainly an area where alternatives to antibiotics need to be considered.

20. Homeopathy has been used to treat both domestic and farm animals for many decades, and although most of the literature supporting its effectiveness is empirical, a number of RCTs involving veterinary homeopathy have been conducted. In 2012, the first full study of RCTs in veterinary homeopathy was published (15). Out of one hundred and fifty published trials, just thirty-eight met the researchers rigorous criteria of representing a ‘substantive report of a clinical treatment or prophylaxis trial in veterinary homeopathic medicine randomised and controlled and published in a peer-reviewed journal’, and only three trials focused on individualised homeopathy (the remainder using a non-individualised approach, such as homeopathic prophylaxis). A full and systematic review of all the selected studies is currently being undertaken, and the results will further develop our knowledge and understanding of the effectiveness of homeopathy in enhancing the general health of production animals.

21. In the UK, an increasing number of farmers are becoming aware of the role homeopathy has to play in improving general levels of health and wellbeing in their production animals.
Just over nine years ago, a small group of homeopaths and homeopathic vets, established a course designed to help farmers learn how to use homeopathy safely and effectively. This teaching course developed into Homeopathy at Wellie Level (HAWL), and has since taught over five hundred farmers about the use homeopathy as an additional tool within their normal health management strategy. Farmers who have completed a HAWL course have consistently observed an improvement in the overall health of their animals, and have found themselves better able to take immediate and appropriate action in a range of emergency situations.

22. In conclusion
This submission has been an attempt to demonstrate the breadth and range of homeopathy as an effective treatment option for a number of conditions where antibiotics might otherwise be used. It focuses mainly on section two of this investigation’s terms of reference; ‘What should be the key actions and priorities Government’s next AMR strategy?’ AMR is a problem which will prove challenging to resolve, but it is to be hoped that increased awareness of the health crisis we currently face, will encourage policy makers and healthcare providers, to invest in developing our knowledge and understanding of how homeopathy, and other CAM interventions, can be used instead of anti-biotics, to effectively treat infectious diseases.

23. In the Netherlands, the Dutch Research Consortium (16) was established in 2015 to explore CAM’s potential role in the future treatment of common infectious diseases. The objective of this consortium is to investigate and further develop effective CAM treatments for infectious diseases affecting both humans and animals. Perhaps the time is now right for the UK to consider establishing its own consortium, with similar objectives.

Karin Mont, on behalf of the Alliance of Registered Homeopaths
28 June 2018


Bibliography
1/ WHO Global Strategy for Containment of Antimicrobial Resistance – WHO/CDS/CSR/DRS/2001.2

2/ The evolving threat of antimicrobial resistance; Options for action - WHO Patient Safety Programme, 2012

3/ Annual Report of the Chief Medical Officer; Volume II, 2011 – Infections and the rise of antimicrobial resistance (DoH, March 2013)

4/ van der Werf ET, Duncan LJ, von Flotow P, Baars EW (BMJ Open, March 2018) - Do NHS GP surgeries employing GPs additionally trained in integrative or complementary medicine have lower antibiotic prescribing rates? Retrospective cross-sectional analysis of national primary care prescribing data in England in 2016

5/ Dewey, WA. Homeopathy in Influenza – A Chorus of Fifty in Harmony. Journal of the American Institute of Homeopathy, 1921

6/ Bracho, G, et al - Large-scale application of highly-diluted bacteria for Leptospirosis epidemic control –- Homeopathy (2010) 99, 156e166 (Faculty of Homeopathy)

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8/ Rossi E, Crudeli L, Endrizzi C, Garibaldi D - Cost-benefit evaluation of homeopathic versus conventional therapy in respiratory diseases. 2009

9/ Linde K, Clausius N, Ramirez G, et al. - Are the clinical effects of homoeopathy placebo effects? A meta- analysis of placebo-controlled trials. Lancet, 1997; 350: 834–843

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11/ Ernst E. - A systematic review of systematic reviews of homeopathy. British Journal of Clinical Pharmacology, 2002; 54: 577–582

12/ Steinsbekk, A. Fønnebø, V. Lewith, G. Bentzen, N. - Homeopathic care for the prevention of upper respiratory tract infections in children: A pragmatic, randomised, controlled trial comparing
individualised homeopathic care and waiting-list controls – Elsevier Publications - Complementary Therapies in Medicine (2005) 13, 231—238

13/ Harrison H, Fixsen A, Vickers A. - A randomized comparison of homoeopathic and standard care for the treatment of glue ear in children. Complement Ther Med 1999;7(3):132—5

14/ Friese KH, Kruse S, Ludtke R, Moeller H. The homoeopathic treatment of otitis media in children—– comparisons with conventional therapy. Int J Clin Pharmacol Ther1997;35(7):296—301

15/ Mathie RT, Hacke D, Clausen J. Randomised controlled trials of veterinary homeopathy: Characterising the peer-reviewed research literature for systematic review. Homeopathy 2012; 101: 196–203. [doi: 10.1016/j.homp.2012.05.009]

16/ Kok, E.T et al (2015) - Resistance to Antibiotics and Antifungal Medicinal Products: Can Complementary and Alternative Medicine Help Solve the Problem in Common Infection Diseases? The Introduction of a Dutch Research Consortium. Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine 2015, Article ID 521584