The Opposition to Homeopathy I
In the first couple of posts dedicated to The History of Homeopathy I gave you a brief introduction to this great medical system first introduced and then perfected by Samuel Hahnemann. In the next couple of posts I will focus on the opposition to homeopathy.
Homeopathy was a serious threat to orthodox medicine. Despite the fact that historians and scientists today consider medicine of the 18th and 19th century as unscientific, and barbaric, allopaths of the time had the impudence to criticize herbalists, midwives, and other “non-regular” practitioners because of their lack of “medical training,” and call these practitioners “quacks,” “unscientific,” “cultish,” and “devilish.”
Homeopaths could not be called unlearned, since many of them graduated from many of the same medical institutions as “mainstream” physicians. It should come to no surprise that many of the early practitioners of homeopathy were graduates from Harvard, Dartmouth, and other established medical schools. (1)
Mainstream medicine was also on the defense because homeopathy offered an integrated, coherent, and systematic basis for its practice. Because homeopathy was simultaneously philosophical and experimental, it seemed to many people to be more rather than less scientific than orthodox medicine. (2)
The primary reason why allopaths and drug companies had and aversion to homeopathy was because homeopathy was criticizing sharply the use of conventional drugs. Homeopaths were very critical of the suppressive nature of the mainstream drugs of the day. They rightly felt, that these drugs merely covered the symptoms, creating deeper, significantly more serious diseases. It also made it more difficult for homeopaths to find the correct medicine, since a persons symptoms a the foremost guide to the selection of medicine for the individual.
Maybe the most prevalent reason that allopaths disliked homeopaths and homeopathy was expressed at a 1903 AMA (American Medical Association) meeting by a distinguished orthodox physician. “We must,” he said, “admit that we never fought the homeopath on matters of principle; we fought him because he came into the community and got the business.” (3) Most physicians, even now, will not admit that economic factors play a chief role in what is practiced and what is allowed to be practiced. It only makes sense then that Hahnemann’s principles constituted a philosophical, clinical, and economic threat to orthodox medicine.
Our journey through the history of homeopathy continues in The Opposition of Homeopathy II.
Beste Gesundheit,
Werner
1. Coulter H. (1982) Divided Legacy vol. 3. Berkeley: North Atlantic Books. p.103
2. Starr P. (1984) The Social Transformation of American Medicine. New York: Basic. p 97
3. Kaufman M. (1971) Homeopathy in America : The Rise and Fall of a Medical Heresy Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. p.158
