Consumers Beware: FDA to Regulate Homeopathy Cures Practice Out of Existence

Despite the fact that people have turned to homeopathic remedies for hundreds of years and enjoy their health-boosting benefits to this day, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is coming down hard on such products, issuing safety alerts and encouraging people to report any side effects.

Wait a minute.

If anything, many people use these products to avoid the side effects they've incurred while ingesting or applying some physician-prescribed pill or cream in the first place. Homeopathic remedies improve conditions, rather than make them worse, which is far more than what can be said of many conventional approaches.

Still, the FDA forges on, adamant that anything other than what Big Pharma and mainstream head-nodders espouse to be life-improving must be heavily scrutinized and done away with. They're planting the "homeopathic is bad" seed in the minds of consumers and doctors using fear-based tactics such as the one in their safety alert about homeopathic products designed to help provide asthma sufferers with some relief.⁽¹⁾

What the FDA has to say in its alert about homeopathic remedies

"FDA is warning consumers not to rely on asthma products labeled as homeopathic that are sold over-the-counter (OTC)," the alert begins.⁽²⁾

What do they recommend? Surprise, surprise: prescriptions!

"Although there is no cure for asthma," the alert continues, "there are many prescription asthma
treatments approved by FDA as safe and effective, as well as some products that are marketed OTC in accordance with an FDA monograph."⁽²⁾

The alert uses the fact that the FDA has not evaluated homeopathic remedies for effectiveness and safety as reasoning behind why people should turn to what they have approved, which are, of course, costly and often ineffective pharmaceuticals.

They clearly outline an us-versus-them mentality in their explanation and subsequent recommendation.

OTC asthma products labeled as homeopathic are widely distributed through retail stores and via the internet. Many of these products are promoted as "natural," "safe and effective," and include indications that range from treatment for acute asthma symptoms, to temporary relief of minor asthma symptoms.⁽²⁾

The predictable, money-making FDA recommendation

Following is their suggestion:

RECOMMENDATION: Speak to your health care provider if you think you or your child may have asthma. Consumers with asthma can take an active role in managing their condition by making certain they have appropriate treatments on hand in the event they experience an asthma attack or a worsening of asthma symptoms, and by consulting with a health care provider when needed.⁽²⁾
From there, the FDA urges people to report any adverse reactions from homeopathic products, despite the mainstream media and medical establishment routinely claiming such products are "inert" due to dilution:

The FDA encourages health care professionals and consumers to report any adverse reactions related to OTC asthma care products labeled as homeopathic to the agency's MedWatch Safety Information and Adverse Event Reporting Program....⁽³⁾

http://www.naturalnews.com/049381_homeopathy_FDA_asthma_treatment.html

Holistic Health Philosophy and Practice: So How Does Acupuncture Work?

""I was raised, like most everybody else, on the idea that diseases are to be attacked, usually by drugs or surgery. The more serious the disease, the more aggressive the attack should be. If you follow this thinking, minimally aggressive treatment, such as acupuncture, should be helpful only for very minor problems, and most of its effects would be “in the patient’s head.”

But that hasn’t been my experience. I have seen acupuncture help patients with serious problems, including those who were resistant to drugs and surgery: problems ranging from disabling headaches, digestive problems, back pain and sciatica, anxiety and depression — a whole range of conditions. While acupuncture is not the first choice for medical emergencies, it is a very effective and safe treatment for many conditions.

The most common question I get about acupuncture is, how does it work? I usually try to dodge the question by replying, “It works great!” The truth is, while I know how to do acupuncture, the basic concepts are foreign to those of us raised with medical care.

Acupuncture uses a type of healing that we Westerners are not very familiar with: the concept of chi, or life energy. Instead of seeing a disease as an entity that needs to be attacked, acupuncturists see it as an imbalance or blockage of this energy flow. The energy flow then can be restored by treating special points in the body. When the energy flow is restored, the body can finally complete the healing process.

When I put a needle in an acupuncture point in the foot — which, according to ancient principles, is supposed to treat a muscle in the groin — and the chronic spasm in that muscle, which had been resistant to chiropractic care, deep tissue treatment and stretching, relaxes instantly, I recognize there is something going on that defies easy explanation. I have seen similar, sometimes instant results with abdominal pain, headache, even sinus congestion. I have to believe there is a flow of energy from the point in the foot to the muscle in the groin, that this energy flow is very fast and piercing the point restored it — quite similar to electricity, really. Score another point for the chi theory.""

Link to Main Article:

http://bangordailynews.com/2015/01/15/health/blogs-and-columns/how-does-acupuncture-work/

2015 Yoga: A Discipline that has Exploded in the Last 50 Years

As the new year begins, millions of Americans will start off 2015 in pursuit of some resolution, whether it’s quitting smoking, landing a better job, or getting in shape for warmer weather. Many will likely turn to some form of yoga, a discipline that has exploded across the country in the last few decades. Yoga not only increases strength and flexibility, it has been shown to improve outcomes for people with everything from arthritis to asthma. Now, a pioneering study by a researcher at UConn’s Center for Health, Intervention, and Prevention (CHIP) has shed new light on why people start practicing yoga, and what makes them likely to stick with it over the long haul. The results suggest that it’s less about fitness, and more about faith.

The paper, published last summer in the Journal of Health Psychology, grew out of the personal experience of Crystal Park, the study’s lead author. A professor of psychology who has extensively studied the role of spiritual belief in the psychological reactions of people to high-stress situations, Park has also practiced yoga for more than 10 years, and over that time she became interested in examining why people are drawn to the practice. The scientific literature clearly showed that there were health benefits to yoga, but no one had studied why people do it.

To help answer that question, Park enlisted the help of Dechen Zezulka, the owner of Mystic Yoga Shala, the studio where Park practices. With Zezulka’s help, the research team conducted a nationwide survey of more than 500 yoga practitioners, including both students and teachers, to try and tease out what brought people into a yoga studio for the first time, and what kept them coming back. The results of the study listed the primary reasons to start a practice as flexibility and getting into shape, a list Zezulka says echoes her experience as an instructor, with the vast majority of first-time students hoping to recover from an injury, or just looking to develop the “yoga body.” But for many, that interest shifts over time.

“In the beginning, you are doing yoga,” Zezulka says. “Eventually, the yoga starts doing you. People come in for a superficial reason, [but] they start to become aware of what’s going on in their minds. That’s what keeps them coming back.” Zezulka’s intuition was borne out by the results of the study, where participants reported precisely the same sort of shift.

More than 60 percent of the study’s participants reported that their primary motivation for practicing yoga had changed over time, and a change was more likely to have taken place for people who had been practicing longer. While most people reported starting yoga for purely physical reasons, the primary motivations for long-term practitioners were not just about the body. Participants listed stress relief, a sense of community, and self-discovery among the reasons they kept coming to yoga, with “spirituality” as the most common answer.

That shift, from yoga as exercise to yoga as spiritual practice was familiar to Park through her own experience. “I started taking yoga at the gym for fitness reasons,” says Park, “solely for exercise. But I slowly found my way to the spiritual side.” This shift was particularly pronounced among yoga teachers, with more than 85 percent reporting that their motivations had shifted since their introduction to yoga, and nearly half claiming a spiritual component as their primary reason for continuing.

Read More:

http://today.uconn.edu/blog/2015/01/from-resolution-to-ritual-why-people-start-and-stick-with-yoga/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+uconn-today+%28UConn+Today%29