Spirituality and Healing.

[Admin]

http://chat.dailymail.co.uk/dailymail/threadnonInd.jsp?forum=276&thread=9734396&message=11412446

It looks like Chey has used up too much of his Qi and has to go to a healing centre to...well....top up his Qi. ;D

[Jessie]

I think the second paragraph from the first post by Chey is very accurate..... Self diagnosis - go with your gut instinct ...

::) ::) ;D

[Admin]

Hre's another one from the Daily Mail forum: http://chat.dailymail.co.uk/dailymail/threadnonInd.jsp?forum=21&thread=9739453&message=11475408

Is someone getting suspicious as to the nature of homeopathy?

I love the explanation that the remedy is on the outside of the sugar pill. ;D

[Mojo]

If the remedy is present, even if only on the outside of the pill, then the manufacturers are using a false description on their product.

[Eddiesilence]

...Or perhaps not. I have a condition where I have to eat a strictly gluten-free diet. However, some manufacturers claim that their product is gluten-free when in fact it still has a tiny bit of gluten in it. For example, Pringles crisps are used with de-glutenised wheat flour, which is called 'Codex Alimentarius.' The manufacturers are permitted to describe Pringles as 'gluten-free' for labelling purposes, but, according to the Food Standards Agency:

"...it is impossible to remove all the gluten from wheat, foods that claim to be 'gluten free' will have small amounts of gluten in them... ...The law doesn't say how much gluten is allowed in these foods."


That is from: http://www.eatwell.gov.uk/foodlabels/labellingterms/glutenfree/


So, despite the labelling of many products as 'gluten free', many will cause a reaction in me because they're not completely gluten free. Due to the exponential dilution of homeopathic 'remedies', the amount of the original substance either in, or coated onto, a homeopathic pill will be much smaller than the amount of gluten which causes me a severe immunological reaction. Therefore, if the labelling of foodstuffs and 'medicines' is consistent, the ingredients listed would not necessarily have to include the original substance.

[Mojo]

That's astonishing! I would have thought that the whole point of labelling foods as "gluten free" would be to enable people sensitive to gluten to avoid it.

To add to the confusion, the FAO/WHO Codex Alimentarius standard (http://www.codexalimentarius.net/download/standards/291/CXS_118e.pdf) for gluten free foods appears to say that foods which naturally contain no gluten cannot be described as "gluten-free". The maize products mentioned in the Food Standards Agency page you linked to would presumably fall foul of that.

The Codex Alimentarius standard seems to apply only to grains that normally contain gluten but have had it (mostly) removed. It expresses gluten content in terms of nitrogen content, and allows grains which would normally contain gluten to be described as "gluten free" if they have a nitrogen content of no more than 0.05g per 100g.

[Mojo]

The labelling requirements for medicines are different to those for foods. The legislation (http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si1992/Uksi_19923273_en_1.htm) governing labelling of medicines in the UK states that the label must include:
A statement of the active ingredients of the product expressed qualitatively and quantitatively per dosage unit or according to the form of administration for a given volume or weight, using the common names of the ingredients. So if an active ingredient is present, the label must not only state that it is present, but also how much there is.

[Eddiesilence]

Excellent! I am glad to learn that 'medicines' at least have to state exact quantities.

With that in mind, I now recall that this difference is why the charlatans who were flogging the quack cancer-cure 'laetrile' in the USA decided that it should be called 'Vitamin B17.' They called it 'food' rather than 'medicine' to escape stricter medical standards. This is quite in spite of the active ingredient in laetrile being cyanide. Yeah, that's right - they would have us believe cyanide=food.

Thankfully, this is not the case any more in the USA, because people get flung into prison for selling this oarticularly deadly form of snake-oil. These days, if you get seduced by such charlatans you have to go all the way to Mexico to get your lethal quackery.

Alarmingly, there are no restrictions on the use of laetrile here in the UK. In fact, the laetrile industry is doing nicely - I know of at least one of these nasty salesmen currently active and preying on British cancer sufferers, by the name of Phillip Day. He's recently been doing seminars around the UK, perpetrating the usual hatchet-job on medical science, and conspiracy-theorising all over the place... These bloody people don't half infuriate me...