Rhetoric
Rhetoric. Funny how quickly people reach for it. Well, no it’s not, because it works, but you’d think people would have a little shame. But they don’t.
This ‘trustee and spokesman for the Prince’s Foundation for Integrated Health’ for instance. He’s not shy about it.
The row was stirred last night when the Prince of Wales made a groundbreaking speech to the World Health Assembly in Geneva, outlining his philosophy of holistic care to an audience of the world’s health ministers. He urged every country to develop a plan for integrating conventional and alternative medicine. “Many of today’s complementary therapies are rooted in ancient traditions that intuitively understood the need to maintain balance and harmony with our minds, bodies and the natural world,” he said. The prince argued that in “the ceaseless rush to modernise … many beneficial approaches, which have been tried and tested and have shown themselves to be effective, have been cast aside because they are deemed to be ‘old-fashioned’ or ‘irrelevant’ to today’s needs”.
His ‘philosophy’ of holistic care – meaning what? His woolly idea that it’s a good thing? Based on what? His training in medicine or biology or pathology or immunology or microbiology? No? His training in architecture? His training in botany? No? What, then? It’s kind of funny (I think) that no one bothers to ask! Not even the damn Guardian. If the Guardian can’t be bothered to ask, who is going to ask? The Guardian just said he made a ‘groundbreaking speech’ – there’s some rhetoric for you right there, before we even get to his spokesman fella. Why doesn’t anyone care that some guy who has no expert knowledge of a technical subject at all gets up at the World Health Assembly and tells the world’s health ministers what’s what? Why don’t they mind? Why do they think it’s okay that someone with zero training and zero expertise considers himself entitled and qualified to make a speech of that kind in that place to those people? I would really like to know.
Back to his spokesman.
If you look at them, they are surgeons, a pathologist, and none of them represent any GPs or anyone in primary care. It seems to me odd that these clinical barons should be telling those of us who have to deal with daily human suffering what to do. It is almost like some protectionist guild. They have a slightly old-fashioned view.
Well that won’t do. Old-fashioned? Away with it. Oh but wasn’t the Prince just saying…’many beneficial approaches, which have been tried and tested and have shown themselves to be effective, have been cast aside because they are deemed to be ‘old-fashioned’ or ‘irrelevant’ to today’s needs’? Yes, but never mind. Let’s not be slavish and sycophantic here. What we have to do here instead is cast these pesky interfering doctor types as ‘barons’ and a ‘protectionist guild’. They’re exclusive, that’s what it is! They’re excluding people. They’re barons, with a guild, and they’re excluding all the nice amateur doctors who want to help everyone. Terrible thing.
Dr Peter Fisher of the Royal London Homoeopathic Hospital also spoke up; he ‘described the letter as an attempt to introduce a form of “medical apartheid” into the NHS.’ There you go! Barons in a guild are attempting to introduce apartheid. Those bastards! Those exclusive, excluding, border-patrolling, complacent, elitist bastards. It’s an outrage.
The Prince’s lack of expertise is exactly what gives him expertise, when it comes to alternative medicine. Homeopathy and other pseudosciences use the subjective personal experiences of Common Folk as trump over objective scientific studies of Educated Experts. How flattering to have royalty on your side as just another Common Folk!
Coming soon to a skyscraper near you: Folkish Homeopathic Engineering. Wear your hard hat.
Ah, you have to see this then! An article on “Alternative Engineering” by the peerless Steven Novella of New England Skeptic Society:
http://www.theness.com/articles.asp?id=2
There was another choice quote from Terry Cullen, chairman of the British Complementary Medicine Association:
“It’s very frustrating that senior responsible people dismiss complementary medicine for the sole reason that it doesn’t have the definitive scientific proof that other drugs have.”
I have two words for this guy: “guillotine” and “Romanov.” How’s that for traditional?
Oh, I’d so much rather send him to live on a housing estate. In…let’s see…how about Camberwell.
“…us who have to deal with daily human suffering…”
I was just wondering how much “daily human suffering” the prince has to deal with?
‘He urged every country to develop a plan for integrating conventional and alternative medicine. “Many of today’s complementary therapies are ..”‘
Since when is “complementary” a synonym of “alternative” ?
It is very interesting how all alternative therapies suddenly became complementary. No one did any proper research to prove they gave any benefit as (stand-alone) alternatives, and then without any proper research that they were any good in conjunction with other treatments they suddenly became “complementary”. The lack of intellectual rigour is testament to a deep marketing-led dishonesty.
This ‘complementary’ thing is slippery, isn’t it? Rather dodges the point that very often the treatment is indeed ‘alternative’; an alternative to treatment that might actually work.
There are countless instances of sick people taking their ‘therapist’s’ advice to stop their meds to let the mojo work.
The placebo effect is well-known to be very effective in making people feel better. For instance, for many years the drugs used to cure ulcers did no better than placebos.
I think the question is, can, or should the NHS provide placebos, and is it cost effective?
Homeopathy, given it is just water and hocus pocus must be fairly cheap (I hope). If it works and it means some patients can be treated there, rather than occupying a proper hospital and real doctors, then I say fine.
There is another issue of giving the nutters any more legitimacy, but you have to beleive the magic will work to get any benefit. Maybe it’s a price worth paying?
Tim
I’d be interested to see Charlies’ list of what he counts as being acceptable as a ‘tried and tested’ ‘approach’. Tried and tested by whom? For how long. Where? What tool is used to discriminate.? Is Voodoo acceptable? Psychic Surgery? Witchcraft? Feng Shui?
Feng Shui on the NHS. The ‘doctor’ diagnoses your ills as being caused by your toilet facing the wrong way. I’m sure I’ve heard about that concern somewhere else recently. Perhaps there is a connection.
Tim
“I think the question is, can, or should the NHS provide placebos, and is it cost effective?” yes, but moreover would the money be better spent curing e.g. cancer patients than more trivial illnesses for the sake of some fashinable dogma?
And the fact is that an average homeopath will have a far less busy appointment calendar year than the average GP. This is frequently overlooked. Having someone who can pay attention to and listen to problems for a whole hour or more, instead of pitching you out of the surgery, prescription in your cold clammy hand, after a ten minute consultation will of course ensure that the patient feel s/he is being cared for more acutely, and thus up the positive feelings the patient has of the ‘treatment’ being offered. And no doubt this helps expedite the (perception of) recovery in lots of cases.
But hey – put homeopathy in the mainstream NHS, and you’ll end up with stressed, overworked, under-resourced, testy and frustrated homeopaths in a short period of time. Got those targets to meet, boxes to tick, stats to compile. Hurry along now. Tree bark, that’ll work. Now go. Would patients, ultimately, get the same value for money with a now twitchy, brusque new-ager as with a consultant or GP, given the same resources ? Keep it marginal, keep it private, that’s what I say, man.
Well, of course there’s rhetoric here. Rhetoric is about making people feel persuaded by means of presentation, rather than by arguments containing genuine evidence and reasoning.
In other words, it’s the placebo of the debating world. Natural, then, that supporters of homoeopathy should rely on it.
“But what is really needed is either a proiperly-conducted large double-blind trial, or the publication of the results of same, if already done (as I suspect has been done).”
Done, several times, and published, and showed homeopathy didn’t work. Therefore must be something to do with evil protectionist doctors/big pharma/failure to appreciate the ‘holistic’ approach.
“Homeopathy, given it is just water and hocus pocus must be fairly cheap (I hope). If it works and it means some patients can be treated there, rather than occupying a proper hospital and real doctors, then I say fine.”
Unfortunately there are well paid consultants in the NHS practicing this rubbish, whole hospitals dedicated to it, and other departments actually having their funding cut to pay for it! I heard the other day of a patient travelling via ambulance to a homeopathic hospital twice a week, on the NHS, for five years, for a trivial complaint, and with no success. That’s cost effectiveness for you.
I wonder how much herceptin you could get for the money we spend on homeopathy in the NHS?
“Tried and tested” is an interesting phrase: note it excludes the result of the test.
Tom, were you being rhetorical ?
“Tried and tested and found to be worthless” – doesn’t have quite the same ring to it, does it.
Not at all, Nick, that would make me a dirty hypocrite, and then how would I sleep at night?
Seriously, I think it’s only to be expected that when people speak in favour of things that aren’t supported by good arguments, then they have to employ methods of persuasion other than good argument. And the rhetoric/placebo analogy jumped at me as I was reading Ophelia’s post. (No great harm in a little rhetoric as long as you have the arguments as well.)
I understand that the NHS has just spent some £20 million refurbishing the Royal homeopathic hospital in London. Thats about 600 herceptrin patients for a year.
“Seriously, I think it’s only to be expected that when people speak in favour of things that aren’t supported by good arguments, then they have to employ methods of persuasion other than good argument.”
Well of course it’s only to be expected – not that they have to, but that they will. But that’s (obviously) exactly why it’s necessary to be sharply aware of rhetoric: because it persuades us in the absence of good arguments or evidence. We don’t want to be persuaded by those, so we need to detect rhetoric in order to resist it!
G. Tingey —
You are right, my comment was excessive. I think Ophelia’s suggestion was more compassionate. The Prince has the same right to err that I do.