The American Institute of Homeopathy defines homeopathy, or Homeopathic Medicine, as the practice of medicine that embraces a holistic, natural approach to the treatment of the sick.  Homeopathy is holistic because it treats the person as a whole, rather than focusing on a diseased part or a labeled sickness.  Homeopathy is natural because its remedies are produced according to the U.S. FDA-recognized Homeopathic Pharmacopoeia of the United States from natural sources, whether vegetable, mineral, or animal in nature.

Image/the3cats
Image/the3cats

The word Homeopathy, which comes from the Greek, through Latin into English, literally means “like disease”.  This means that the medicine given is like the disease that the person is expressing, in his totality, not like a specific disease category or medical diagnosis.

Jill Stein is a retired Harvard-trained physician and the presumptive nominee for President for the Green Party.

A couple of months ago on a Reddit AMA, Dr Stein was asked about her campaign’s officials stance on homeopathy, and she replied:

For homeopathy, just because something is untested doesn’t mean it’s safe. By the same token, being “tested” and “reviewed” by agencies tied to big pharma and the chemical industry is also problematic. There’s a lot of snake-oil in this system. We need research and licensing boards that are protected from conflicts of interest. They should not be limited by arbitrary definitions of what is “natural” or not.

Her not-so-lucid answer compares to the definitive statement in the Green Party platform which states:

Greens support a wide range of health care services, not just traditional medicine, which too often emphasizes “a medical arms race” that relies upon high-tech intervention, surgical techniques and costly pharmaceuticals. Chronic conditions are often best cured by alternative medicine. We support the teaching, funding and practice of holistic health approaches and, as appropriate, the use of complementary and alternative therapies such as herbal medicines, homeopathy, naturopathy, traditional Chinese medicine and other healing approaches.

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