Lionel R. Milgrom
Gold Standards, Golden Calves, and Random Reproducibility: Why Homeopaths at Last Have Something to Smile About
JACM, 2009, 15 (3), 205-207

The Chinese have a saying: May you live in interesting times! Such ancient prescience from our recently lavish Olympic hosts could well indicate further trouble ahead for established governance, finance, and health care systems as they experience greater scrutiny, and the public grows wary (if not weary) of calming official measures. In this editorial, I will consider two fascinating developmentsa controversial statement from the Chair of the UKs National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) on the status of randomized controlled trials (RCTs), and the paper in this issue of The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine by Dr. Otto Weingärtner on reproducibility in experiments on homeopathic potencyboth of which clearly demonstrate that science also is not immune to this turbulence.