Now Tory MP wants homeopathy for animals

We know David Tredinnick, the Conservative MP for Bosworth in Leicestershire, believes in astrology and homeopathy.

It now appears that he believes in homeopathy for animals.

Tredinnick has put down an early day motion at Westminster that praises a Yorkshire farmer for using homeopathy with his flock and ends by calling on the government to:

carry out a study into the level of homeopathic usage by farmers, what results have been achieved and what potential homeopathy offers for prevention of disease amongst livestock.

He has been attacked for this, says the Leicester Mercury, by Michael Mullaney, the Liberal Democrat PPC for Bosworth:

"I have not heard the National Farmers' Union or large numbers of farmers clamouring for the use of homeopathy. 

"People in Bosworth want an MP who will campaign all year round on the issues that matter to people, jobs and local services. 

"Instead of endlessly obsessing about homeopathy, he should be concentrating on the real issues – creating jobs and delivering quality services."

But there is nothing wrong with MPs having esoteric interests. The real problem here is that homeopathy is a load of nonsense.

As the NHS Choices page on it says:

A 2010 House of Commons Science and Technology Committee report on homeopathy said that homeopathic remedies perform no better than placebos, and that the principles on which homeopathy is based are 'scientifically implausible'. This is also the view of the Chief Medical Officer, Professor Dame Sally Davies.

If would be interesting if homeopathy did work with animals, because the placebo effect is not be a factor in veterinary medicine.

So let's leave the last word to the Australian Veterinary Association:

Australian Veterinary Association ... resources will not be used to promote therapies that, in the Board’s opinion, are not compatible with current understanding of physiology and pathophysiology and have been demonstrated to be ineffective by the current accumulated body of knowledge.