Samuele Riva, an Italian blogger, is being sued by Boiron, a France-based homeopathic “remedy” multinational. Riva dared to mock the company’s claim that its Ooscillococcinum has no “active ingredient.” The company claims that the product has been made by diluting “oscillococcinum” (a mythological substance said to be present in duck liver, though no evidence supports this claim) at 1:100 dilution 200 times, which “is the equivalent of diluting 1ml of original ingredient into a volume of water that is the size of the known universe.”
Writing at ScienceBasedMedicine.org, Steven Novella calls this “a pseudoscience trifecta”: Boiron claims that its imaginary element is present in its solution which has been diluted at farcical levels, and that the imaginary ingredient in question is effective at treating flu symptoms. “Essentially Boiron takes fairy dust and then dilutes it out of (non)existence.”
I hope Boiron does draw a line in the sand over their oscillococcinum product, and that it becomes the center piece of a broader public discussion about homeopathy. Most of the public does not understand what homeopathy actually is. They think it means “natural” or “herbal” medicine. They have no idea that homeopathy is about taking fanciful ingredients with a dubious connection to the symptoms in the first place, and then diluting them into oblivion, then placing a drop of the pure water that remains and placing it on a sugar pill. The resultant pill is then supposed to contain the magic vibrations of the original substance.
This rank pseudoscience, which has no place in 21st century medicine, is the business of Boiron. Let’s see them try to defend themselves and their products. Let’s see them harass bloggers and those who are just trying to expose the public to the truth. Let’s see them argue in public how air bubbles in duck liver fantastically diluted can treat the flu.
Boiron vs Blogzero (BlogZero.it)
Homeopathic Thuggery (Science Based Medicine)
(Thanks, Russell!)