The Alternative Medicine Racket: How the Feds Fund Quacks

The NIH has spent $5.5 billion on bringing quackery—from faith healing to homeopathy—right into the heart of the American medical establishment. 

By Todd Krainin of Reason. Excerpts:

"Twenty-three years ago, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) began to investigate a wide variety of unconventional medical practices from around the world. Five-and-a-half billion dollars later, the NIH has found no cures for disease. But it has succeeded in bringing every kind of quackery—from faith healing to homeopathy—out of the shadows and into the heart of the American medical establishment.

The National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH), a part of the NIH, is largely the brainchild of a single person. In the 1980s, Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) was convinced that bee pollen extract cured his hay fever. As the chairman of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee overseeing NIH funding, Harkin set aside $2 million to establish the NCCIH's forerunner, the Office of Alternative Medicine (OAM)."

"Almost any kind of unusual therapy could be considered "alternative", spanning dozens of widely differing cultural traditions and historical eras. Everything from homeopathic remedies for arthritis to acupuncture for back pain to remote prayer for HIV/AIDS to coffee enemas for fighting cancer was in its purview."

"The OAM's charter mandated that its 18-member advisory council be heavily weighted to favor experts and practitioners of alternative medicine. As a result, many on the council were unfamiliar with the rigors of scientific research. "Many things that seem to be effective don't stand up to scientific research but they still cure people," Rep. Berkley Bedell (D-Iowa) told the Journal of the American Medical Association, shortly after his appointment to the advisory council by Harkin in 1992."

"Others had incentives to validate alternative therapies that were at odds with the OAM's stated mission of impartiality and objectivity. An original member of the advisory council, Deepak Chopra benefited from the imprimatur of the NIH"

" Over the objections of NIH director Harold Varmus, Harkin elevated the Office of Alternative Medicine to the status of a "national center." Rechristened as the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM), it enjoyed independent control of a skyrocketing budget.

By 2010, total yearly spending at the NIH on alternative medicine reached $521 million. The bloated budget funded long-term studies of dozens of remedies, such as shark cartilage for cancer, St. John's Wort for depression, and acupuncture for pain. At the time, a few treatments seemed to hold reasonable promise. Many others had no plausible biological mechanism behind their hoped-for effects and would have to violate fundamental laws of physics in order to work. Today, after billions spent investigating alternative treatments, no cures have been found."

"Even though NCCIH's own studies suggest that Reiki is useless, it hasn't stopped Dr. Oz from introducing the "energy medicine" to a new generation of surgeons at Columbia University, which is a major recipient of NCCIH funds."

" Numerous reports of death and injury from alternative treatments have been documented at Whatstheharm.net. To be sure, even the best medical treatment comes with serious risks. But unlike standard medical care, the dangers associated with alternative treatments come with virtually no possibility of a health outcome better than a placebo.

Although Harkin has retired from the Senate, state support for alternative medicine seems secure. States license chiropractors while opening up the Medicaid coffers to naturopaths. Alternative medicine has been written into the Affordable Care Act,"

"And what about that bee pollen extract that inspired Harkin to start the Office of Alternative Medicine to begin with? As with much of the rest of alternative medicine, scientific studies have long since debunked bee pollen's alleged power to minimize hay fever or any other illness."