New laws to govern alternative medicine

[vino]

Aromatherapy, homoeopathy and other popular complementary therapies are to be regulated for the first time under a government-backed scheme to be established this year.

The new Natural Healthcare Council – which is being backed by the Prince of Wales – will be able to strike off errant or incompetent practitioners. It will also set minimum standards for practitioners to ensure that therapists are properly qualified.

Patients will be able to complain to the council about practitioners and the new body will be modelled on the General Medical Council and other similar statutory bodies.

Millions of Britons currently spend £130 million a year on complementary treatments and it is estimated that this will reach £200 million over the next four years. Among the practices to be covered by the scheme would be aromatherapy, reflexology, massage, nutrition, shiatzu, reiki, naturopathy, yoga, homoeopathy, cranial osteopathy and the Alexander and Bowen techniques.


Research also shows that more than two thirds (68 per cent) of people in the UK believe that complementary medicine is as valid as conventional treatment.

However, there have been long-standing concerns over its regulation. At present anyone can set themselves up as an acupuncturist, homoeopath, herbalist, or other complementary therapist. However, a poll for The Times found that three quarters of people assumed that anyone practising complementary therapy is trained and registered by a professional body.

Although the scheme will initially be voluntary, it is hoped that all practitioners will be forced to join or lose business as the public will use the register as a guarantee of quality. The council will register only practitioners who are safe, have completed a recognised course, are insured and have signed up to codes of conduct. ...

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article3134337.ece

I don't know how useful this will be, but at least you can be confident the "therapist" knows something about the therapy they're offering (even if it is useless).

[TZ]

1. Oh noes...Its Big Brother....

If the woos in the UK are anything like those here...They will fight this tooth and nail. When the FDA started introducing legislation to regulate labelling on the herbs, supplements, and vitamins so that people were getting what they were supposed to get it was not viewed as a good thing but instead..THEY ARE TRYING TO BAN OUR VITAMINS, which was of course totally untrue. I think thats what I hate about the altie med crowd is their hypocrisy, they decry the lack of regulation on traditional meds (even though there is much mmore than they think) But any for their crap..Nooo.
I'm also not really encourgaged by making this voluntary. I doubt many will really comply, since this seems to be a word of mouth type industry, and I don't thing being "registered" will make a big difference.
IF this was mandatory at least that would help, but as it is, I think it will give this crackpot industry an undeserved air of legitimacy.I would like these frauds to at least have to demostate that their practices have actually work as well, but that won't happen
And I find this frightening.."that more than two thirds (68 per cent) of people in the UK believe that complementary medicine is as valid as conventional treatment". Oy. I wonder what the numbers are like here?

[moggie]

7. The funny thing

The "Prince of Wales" (we really ought to refuse to use these silly titles: the guy's just Charles Windsor) is a total woo himself. I know nothing about this Council, but if Mr Tampon is backing it, I suspect it'll be ineffectual.

[cosmik debris]

2. "Patients will be able to complain to the council..."

That's got to be one of the most fun jobs in the UK -- listening to people complain that the quack gave them medication that doesn't work.

But they should have a sign on the door to the complaint department that says:

YOU ASKED FOR IT,
NOW WHAT ARE YOU COMPLAINING ABOUT?
IF YOU WANTED REAL MEDICINE,
YOU SHOULD HAVE GONE TO A REAL DOCTOR.

[TZ]

3. I can just hear it now...

Hey my water with memory didn't work..That quack gave me amnesiac H2O!!!
:rofl:

[LeftishBrit]

4. This being Britain...

I just wonder when the NCLB-type evaluation scheme will come along. Probably by analogy with 'Ofsted', 'Ofcom', Offpissed, etc., they will call it 'Offquack' and people will have to fill in endless paperwork about whether they've met their targets: "If you don't increase your quota for colonic cleansing, and if you fail to create at least two glossy websites per month, you will be labelled as a Failing Witch Doctor and put on special measures!" If it has a similar effect on alternative medicine as it has on the NHS and education, we will soon see a serious and worrying decline in quackery!

[cosmik debris]

5. Do you suppose that Big Pharma

will get into the memory water if it is approved for use in the UK?

I want to be the QC inspector on that production line. It has to be the easiest job in the world.

:)

[moggie]

8. Perhaps you're unaware of the Royal London Homeopathic Hospital?

It's a National Health Service hospital. Publicly funded. As for Big Pharma, who makes the memory water and sugar pills at present? It's certainly not a cottage industry.

[vino]

6. That's all very well,

but a real doctor won't realign your chakras. There are some problems modern medicine just can't fix. ;-)