Homeopathy faces tough promotional limitations in draft bill by Russian senator

The draft document submitted to the Lower House by Senator Andrey Belyakov reads that homeopathic remedies should not be advertised outside specializes medical or pharmaceutical events, like shows or conferences. Printed advertising of homeopathy is allowed only in specialized medical media.

Apart from this the bill obliges producers of homeopathic remedies to mark their products with a warning reading that they have no clinically proven healing properties.

An explanatory note attached to the bill reads that homeopathy is popular among ordinary Russians and, due to advertising on television and in other mass media, this popularity is increasing. At the same time, homeopathy was recognized as “pseudoscience” by the Russian Academy of Sciences in February this year and can be harmful to citizens who attempt to use it to treat real illnesses and conditions.

Belyakov also pointed out in the note that many foreign nations had already banned the use of homeopathic remedies in state-sponsored healthcare programs.

The existing Russian law on advertising only regulates the promotion of prescribed drugs and thus the advertising of homeopathy is not restricted in any way.

Homeopathy, a system of alternative medicine, was created back in 1796 by Samuel Hahnemann, and is based on his principle that a substance that causes symptoms of an illness in healthy people would cure similar symptoms of this illness in sick people.

The Russian Academy of Sciences also ruled that homeopathy contradicts the basic laws of chemistry, physics and biology. However, the Russian academicians noted in their statement that homeopathy should not be confused with phytotherapy or herbalism.