Book description
'Alternative' medicine is now used by one in three of us. In the UK
we spend an estimated £4. 5 billion a year on it and its
practitioners are now insinuating themselves into the mainstream.
There are methods based on ancient or far-eastern medicine, as well as
ones invented in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Many are
promoted as natural treatments. What they have in common is that there
is no hard evidence that any of them work.
Treatments like homeopathy, acupuncture and chiropractic are widely
available and considered reputable by many. Ever more bizarre
therapies, from naturopathy to nutraceuticals, ear candling to
ergogenics, are increasingly favoured. Endorsed by celebrities and
embraced by the middle classes, alternative medicine's appeal is based
on the spurious rediscovery of ancient wisdom and the supposedly
benign quality of nature. Surrounded by an aura of unquestioning
respect and promoted through uncritical airtime and column inches,
alternative medicine has become a lifestyle choice. Its global market
is predicted to be worth trillion by 2050.
Suckers reveals how alternative medicine can jeopardise the
health of those it claims to treat, leaches resources from treatments
of proven efficacy and is largely unaccountable and unregulated. In
short, it is an industry that preys on human vulnerability and makes
fools of us all.
Suckers is a calling to account of a social and intellectual
fraud; a bracing, funny and popular take on a global delusion.
Rose Shapiro has written for newspapers, magazines and medical
journals including the
Independent
, the
Observer
,
Time Out
,
Good Housekeeping
and the
Health Service Journal
. She lives in Bristol.
