What a tremendous relief it was to read that, in the face of strong opposition to homoeopathy from the Commons Science and Technology Committee, the NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde has confirmed its commitment to continue offering services at Glasgow Homeo-pathic Hospital (GHH) (“Homeopathy cut call ‘inhumane’ ”, The Herald, February 23).
Clearly, no MP can have been anywhere near the hospital, or met its many grateful patients who have been given the undoubted lifeline that the hospital offers. In my experience, the values of GHH are in stark contrast to the often mechanistic, organ-based, technical care meted out in larger general hospitals, where human beings are often reduced to the parts of their bodies that most hurt and offered expensive, pharmaceutically-based solutions to problems that require a much more sophisticated and holistic approach.
Ironically, at a fraction of the cost of so-called scientific medicine, homoeopathy can reach parts that other health services cannot, in part because it not only listens to but actually hears the voices of patients, many of whom struggle daily with pain and discomfort (both physically and mentally), in a world where they often feel powerless and lacking in the will to challenge common assumptions about their own predicaments and the care that they are offered.
The beauty of the integrated care approach advocated at GHH is that respect is given to all healing practices and physical therapies, including the delivery of wellness programmes that promote wellbeing, a sense of personal agency and autonomy, and yet at the same time which attempt to tackle the root of much chronic illness and physical and emotional incapacity.
GHH has particular expertise is caring for those with complex, long-term conditions and deserves its international reputation for coming to the aid of patients for whom mainstream health services have little to offer. The Commons Committee is ill-informed if it thinks that the approach of homoeopathy lies solely in its pills and remedies.
The paradox of modern scientific health care and the billion-dollar industry that goes with it, is that the more care we provide, and the more knowledge we acquire, the more demand we generate for professional health and welfare services. Clearly this is unsustainable in the long-term. Homeopathy is a humane and wholly appropriate (as well as value for money) response to many 21st-century health problems. I feel both proud and privileged to live in a country which both recognises and acknowledges its huge potential for healing.
A M Cooper, Castle Douglas.
I am glad to read that the Glasgow Homeopathic Hospital services will continue to be used by NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde for many people cannot afford to go privately.
I am 74 and my GP in Troon has treated me with homeopathic remedies since I was eight. I am allergic to many prescription medicines and have had great benefits from homeopathic treatment.
My late husband was a sceptic and, like many people, claimed it was only a placebo affect. He was a very keen golfer and when he couldn’t hold his golf clubs, even though they had been fitted with special grips, I talked him into visiting a doctor who was both a medical and homeopathic practitioner.
After the consultation, which lasted just under an hour, he came out sure that it had all been a complete waste of time. I nagged him into taking the pills prescribed, which cost under £4. A month later, on his return visit, the doctor asked him on a scale of one to 10 to rate any improvement. His reply was: 12.
Homeopathy had gained another believer.
I also believe homeopathic treatment has fewer side-effects and is much cheaper than drugs supplied by pharmaceutical companies.
A E Green, Johnstone.
Naive tactics and the use of airstrikes are counterproductive in fighting the Taliban
So 27 more civilians have been killed in Afghanistan, taking the week’s toll to 60, with an undisclosed number of wounded (“Nato chief apologises after airstrike kills 27 civilians”, The Herald, February 23). Airstrikes would be unnecessary if troops on the ground were adequate in number and training. Slower progress, operating in width and depth, picketing and dominating from high ground were successful mountain and urban tactics for centuries before modern artillery and airstrikes.
Infantry used them in various Arab countries such as Yemen’s predecessor states, the Trucial Oman etc, and there are many of us still who served in troubled areas for years without ever seeing civilian casualties. The need to use air strikes to save troops from annihilation such as was recently threatened for so long at Musa Qala in Afghanistan results from bad generalship exposing troops out on a limb to locally superior forces.
British troops have often had to be reined back by officers seconded to local armies when they set off into tribal areas with no previous preparation of public knowledge and local opinion. Any tribe approached by European men and armoured vehicles with guns pointing at them will fight to defend their territory, and a friendly peaceful tribal area will be stirred into apparent insurrection by such folly. Sending locally enlisted soldiers ahead on local leave to their family areas results in a safe and friendly greeting followed by haggling over the cost of goats, chickens, eggs and water. Dissidents are forced to leave or remain passive. Prolonged disregard of such traditional methods of operation and civilian casualties results in the dissidents taking control.
Afghanistan has known so much war for the past 30 years that it is clearly now a most difficult country in which to use military resources to prepare and protect civil development. But the recent relatively quick and easy advance of British troops into areas where traditional hearts and minds activities have been carried out as a preparation demonstrates that General Petraeus’s conversion to traditional tribal area tactics has been effective although perhaps too late. Such success demonstrates the need to learn from the tactics of 100 years ago.
It is unfortunate that so much practical knowledge and experience of counter-insurgency in India, the Middle East and South Asia seems never to have influenced course content at the School of Infantry. We knew how to do it but we neither taught nor practised it.
Major (Retd) Michael Hamilton, Kelso.
Leave religion out of the political process
It is a recognised fact that religion and politics make a lethal mixture. You just have to look at the recent history of the Bush and Blair years. So just what is Jim Murphy, Secretary of State for Scotland, playing at (“Murphy to target faith-based voters”, The Herald, February 23)? Is he afraid of losing his seat? With the strains between Christianity and Islam, I fear more oil will be put on the fire than troubled waters. The tactic of grabbing headlines reveals a lack of reflection and responsibility, and exposes Mr Murphy’s attempts to hold on to power. Let us leave religion in the churches, synagogues, mosques and temples, and spend our time making every endeavour to live in harmony with one another.
Hugh McLean, Newton Mearns.
Jim Murphy tries to tell us that he sees faith-based voters encompassing all religions, but his enthusiasm for the American model suggests he is setting his sights on Christians. Sadly, the American example shows this can be a dangerous manoeuvre. It is the Christian faith-based voter who has made the American right a vicious political animal. It is the Christian faith-based voter who has predominantly taught America to love to hate.
A B Robertson, Innellan.
The French were the first properly to colonise the Falkland Islands with settlement in 1764
Without wishing to appear pedantic, may I draw attention to the definition of the word “sovereignty” and thereby correct some points raised by Dr Alexander S Waugh (Letters, February 23)?
Sovereignty is defined as having supreme power or authority: a self-governing state.
Dr Waugh states that British claims to the Falkland Islands date back to the first settlers in 1592, when Captain John Davis landed. However, he then sailed away and did not leave settlers to establish a settlement. A landing does not constitute the rights to sovereignty.
Sovereignty was attained when Antoine de Bougainville sailed from St Malo in 1764 and established a proper French settlement on the islands, claiming them for the French and naming his settlement Port St Louis in honour of Louis XV of France.
The British hoisted a Union Jack in 1765 on the island, calling the spot Port Egmont and left without establishing a settlement. When Captain John McBride RN returned in 1766 to Port Egmont with orders to eject any who questioned British rights to the Falklands, the French at Port Louis pointed out to him that their settlement was well established with 250 settlers and that they had prior rights. Captain McBride then left.
Spain paid de Bougainville £603,000 to cede his colony to the Spanish crown. The colony was settled with Spaniards and named Puerto Soledad.
In 1771, Spain permitted Britain to return to Port Egmont as long as they recognised Spanish sovereignty over the islands.
In 1774, Britain abandoned Port Egmont.
At no time prior to 1883 did Britain have sovereignty over the islands.
After America had sacked the islands in 1831, declaring them “free of all government”, the return of the British in two warships in 1833 was actually an invasion of the sovereignty of the displaced Argentine settlers from Puerto Soledad.
If Dr Waugh wishes to go further back in history than 1592, regarding claims to the islands, may I draw his attention to the Treaty of Tordesillas of 1493, when Pope Alexander VI gave Spain a mandate to “colonise, civilise and Christianise the inhabitants of the New World”? This mandate included the area of the Falkland Islands.
Bruce Lindsay, Pittenweem.
It costs British taxpayers £110m a year to defend the Falklands. Unfortunately, resources must be put on the line because international law affords little protection; the rules allow states to use force to resolve territorial disputes. Some concerns may be finally resolved this year at international conferences, starting with the nuclear non-proliferation convention in May.
Ian R Jenkins, Hamilton.
Economic realities of the film industry
I can see where Odeon Cinemas are coming from in boycotting the screening of Disney’s film Alice In Wonderland. The cutting of screening times, from 17 to 12 weeks, due to official Disney DVDs being launched even earlier, does seem excessively greedy.
Realistically, the way the film industry is so heavily commercialised means there will always be losers. Unless we can curb people’s desire for PC downloads and pirate DVDs, as well as cutting the spiralling price of a trip to the cinema, this may sadly be the cost of progress for all cinema companies, not just Odeon.
Jill Ferguson, Partick.
Educational irony
there was irony in your report “Glasgow’s formula to become centre of scientific excellence” (February 23). I wish it well. The irony is that the campaign leaders are Lord Provost Bob Winter and Sir Kenneth Calman, both former pupils of Allan Glen’s School, which produced many notable engineers and scientists, until it was squeezed to death by the then Glasgow Corporation in its drive to make all schools in its control comprehensive.
Jim MacRitchie, Barrhead.
Obesity is not a cause of death
It may be the case in leafy Bothwell that obesity “has overtaken problems such as malnutrition and infectious diseases as the biggest causes of morbidity and mortality”, but Susanne’s Morrison’s assertion (Letters, February 23) that this is the situation globally cannot go unchallenged.
The World Health Organisation’s mortality figures do not support this claim. Obesity is not a recognised cause of death and, while its increase is of serious concern, such “inflation” of the data is unhelpful.
It is interesting also to note that obesity is really another form of malnutrition.
Dr David Carvel Biggar.
Will those who propose to limit portion sizes in restaurants next want to ban three-course meals, and allow us only to have with our main course either a starter or a sweet but not both?
Douglas Miller, Glasgow.
The Scottish Parliament is turning its attention to our language. Soon to go if it has its way is the phrase: “Anyone for second helpings?”
Tom Reilly, Edinburgh.
Radioactive waste is the big problem
Professors Colin McInnes and Ken Ledingham make a strong case for nuclear power, but argue that unspent fuel is perhaps the most contentious issue (“A solution to the power struggle”, The Herald, February 23).
Residents of Chernobyl might beg to differ. Nuclear fission brings with it the risk of catastrophic failure and the problem of safe disposal of radioactive waste.
Nuclear reactors are relatively safe; they rarely fail. But when they do fail, the results can be devastating.
If safety is put above all else, if financial considerations are not allowed to impact on design and operation, engineers can surely minimise the risk of catastrophic failure.
Some may believe that we can trust politicians and regulators to ensure that the public good is put before profit and loss accounts. But there is not yet any solution to the problem of toxic waste. Future generations will not thank us for leaving them a legacy of highly radioactive isotopes that will remain dangerous for hundreds of millenniums to come.
Proponents of nuclear power must first answer the question: what will be done with the waste?
Dr Geraint Bevan, Glasgow.
Growing numbers fear a Tory victory
Iain Macwhirter wonders why Labour is gaining in the run-up to the elections (“Could it really be that Brown might still win the election?”, Comment, February 22). Voters must ask themselves two basic questions when deciding how to vote. Which party will best look after my interests? From whom will I benefit most?
This is not sardonically altruistic but profoundly consumerist. We can’t blame the public for reacting as customers in a hyper market-driven culture.
State pensioners, the unemployed, retirees, students, immigrants, government workers, the sick and working women … all are afraid of a Conservative government. The longer the public have to wait for Tory policies, the more voters hear of possible Tory policies (especially from George Osborne), the more there is a public conversation of concern.
Thom Cross, Carluke.
Pity about Iraq
It is a great pity nobody tried to bully Tony Blair out of his decision to attack Iraq.
Ruth Marr, Stirling.
