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It is good news indeed that our king has appointed a fan of homeopathy as his head medical honcho.
According to The Times of London, for the past year, Dr Michael Dixon has "served as the head of the royal medical household, a role founded by the Elizabeth II in 1973 and which until his appointment was fused with the role of monarch's physician, which has existed since the 1540s".
Dr Dixon who has argued that "traditional remedies" can play an important role in patient care is respected in the homeopathic field but somewhat less distinguished (despite wearing a bow tie) than his predecessors, all of them knights of the British realm. They are: Sir Huw Thomas, professor of gastrointestinal genetics at Imperial College London; Sir John Cunningham, a professor of nephrology at University College London; and Sir Richard Thompson, former president of the Royal College of Physicians.
Still, we shouldn't carp. King Charles has a welcome track record of thinking outside the flower box. In 2010, he said, you may remember: "I happily talk to plants and trees and listen to them. I think it's absolutely crucial."
He was later said to shake hands (should that be branches? Editor) with each tree he plants. In the interests of truth, it should be said that his formal greetings with oaks and elms have not been verified. (I like to think that a eucalypt would have been equally friendly).
Either way, you can't accuse him of barking up the wrong tree.
I do though wonder if the royal embrace of homeopathy has come too late. The worst of the pandemic has been and gone. The mind boggles to think how much money we could have saved on vaccines if a bit of foraging for special herbs in the bush might have done the trick.
There will be sneerers and nay-sayers. There always are.
Even the scientists are sceptical of "homeopathic medicines" which the government-funded Healthdirect says "are prepared by taking a substance (generally a plant, animal material or a chemical) and diluting that substance in water or alcohol repeatedly, often so that none of the original substance remains in the solution. These highly diluted preparations can be found in several forms, including tablets, liquids and creams".
The government advice site adds bluntly: "There is currently no evidence to support the effectiveness of homeopathy to prevent or treat any disease."
That is what the scientists believe - though not, it seems, what King Charles believes.
But a memory niggles my mind.
Many years ago, I had a wart on a knuckle. My girlfriend of the time lived in a very backward, superstitious part of Britain. Her mother told me: "Don't worry. I'll cure it. I'll steal some meat from the butcher and bury it in the garden".
I declined her kind offer and went to the country's top skin hospital instead.
But the top specialist in conventional medicine there said: "Put it this way: their track record is no worse than ours."
HAVE YOUR SAY: Do you have any views on natural remedies for ailments? Is King Charles barking up the wrong tree? Is King Charles barking? Email your (polite) response to echidna@theechidna.com.au.
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IN CASE YOU MISSED IT:
- Interest payments have eclipsed the National Disability Insurance Scheme as the fastest-growing area of Commonwealth spending, new government figures show. Higher interest rates are making debt more expensive to service and are likely to cost the federal budget tens of billion extra in the coming years. Releasing the data ahead of the mid-year budget update on Wednesday, Treasurer Jim Chalmers said higher interest rates were not only hurting households but federal finances as well.
- New COVID-19 vaccines targeting the current Omicron variant of the virus are available in community pharmacies throughout Australia. The XBB 1.5 shots were approved by the Therapeutic Goods Administration in October and can be used as a primary immunisation dosage as well a booster.
- International students and exploitative employers will face greater scrutiny as the government tries to rein in migration levels from historic highs and reform a broken system. Overseas net migration peaked during the last financial year as 500,000 people arrived in Australia, hundreds of thousands more than past years.
THEY SAID IT: "Nature itself is the best physician" - Hippocrates.
YOU SAID IT: John Hanscombe opined on what he called his "fondness" for the flat pack (and the assembly thereof). But added about mazes in IKEA: "They distress me, the same way a stockyard terrifies cattle."
Wendy immediately took him up: "I'm not sure whether to feel sorry for your cattle if they are so distressed by visiting your yards. Or less sympathy for you if (like most of our cattle) you walk calmly through the gate, have a drink and lie down before passing through a few more gates and heading back out."
On assembling flat packs, Robert said: "The assembly was OK, apart from the burn marks from the swear words."
Lorraine said: "My husband always does the flat packs. He does 1000-piece jigsaw puzzles on a regular basis, so he's the expert."
Susan said: "I consider myself very fortunate to be old enough, and to have collected enough furniture, not to have the need to visit IKEA."
Steve Evans is a reporter on The Canberra Times. He's been a BBC correspondent in New York, London, Berlin and Seoul and the sole reporter/photographer/paper deliverer on The Glen Innes Examiner in country New South Wales. "All the jobs have been fascinating - and so it continues."
Steve Evans is a reporter on The Canberra Times. He's been a BBC correspondent in New York, London, Berlin and Seoul and the sole reporter/photographer/paper deliverer on The Glen Innes Examiner in country New South Wales. "All the jobs have been fascinating - and so it continues."
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