Swiss study throws cold water on homeopathic treatments

THE power of homeopathic remedies came under fresh challenge yesterday with a team of scientists describing them as weak and producing nothing more than a placebo effect.

The study at Switzerland’s University of Berne, published in The Lancet, throws further doubt on the effectiveness of alternative medicines. Researchers ran comparisons between 110 randomised placebo-controlled trials of homeopathy with 110 conventional-medicine trials.

They covered a range of illnesses and treatments from respiratory infections to surgery to anaesthesiology.