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Behind me is the
Royal London Homeopathic Hospital.

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And I'm here because it's been an interesting
week for alternative medicine in Britain.

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This week, Noel Edmonds, television star,
and promoter of mid-90s fever dream Mr Blobby,

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endorsed something called the EMP Pad.
It’s a yoga mat,

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and its inventors claim that its very low
intensity electromagnetic fields

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help cells in the body function.

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Now, I’m not going to go into loads of detail
about the evidence for the Pad.

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I’m very skeptical, but there are early
studies that say

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carefully applied, specific electromagnetic
fields may actually do some good.

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I know, I was surprised too.

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Okay, a yoga mat probably isn’t going to
work like that,

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but there are devices using EM fields that
are working well enough

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that insurers are starting to pay for them.

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I’ll also skip over the insulting reaction
that Noel Edmonds got from people on Twitter,

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particularly after he told someone
suffering from cancer

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that it might be because of their
“negative attitude”.

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Instead, let’s look at the reaction of the
folks who make the EMP Pad.

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Because, okay, the skeptics won’t like them
whatever they do,

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but there are plenty of
alternative medicine believers out there.

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Surely the company would welcome
a celebrity endorsement?

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No. At the top of their web site, in big letters,
they disavowed Noel Edmonds entirely.

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Nothing to do with us, they said.

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And the reason was: he’d claimed
they could help cure cancer.

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Now across Europe, advertising prescription
drugs and medical treatments to the public is banned.

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They can advertise to doctors, sure, but those
American drug adverts

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with their list of side effects just don’t
happen here.

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"Serious, sometimes fatal events
such as infections, lymphoma,

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"or other types of cancer have happened.

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"Blood, liver and nervous system problems,
serious allergic reactions,

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"and new or worsening heart failure have occurred."

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But in Britain, there are even stricter laws
about cancer treatments.

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You can’t get away with saying, "oh, it’s
not really a medical device",

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or, "oh, it’s just some herbs".

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If you sell something to the public,
saying it can help or cure cancer,

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you can be prosecuted.

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Even if it does cure cancer.

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The idea, back in 1939 when the law was passed,
still holds true today.

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Sell your cure to doctors. If you give them
an alternative medicine that works,

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with evidence to convince them,
they’ll start prescribing it,

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and you, the person who discovered it,
you’re probably in line for a Nobel Prize.

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And if they don’t start prescribing it:
well, it probably doesn’t cure cancer, does it?

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If you’re selling your cure directly to
the public,

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it's almost certainly not a cure.

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And it’s probably going to hurt people that
would otherwise go to the doctor.

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With this law, no-one has to prove
that your cure doesn’t work:

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they just have to prove you’re selling it
without going through someone qualified.

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Noel Edmonds was in the clear when he said
“this cures cancer”.

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I think he’s irresponsible,
but he can believe that,

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and he’s not selling any yoga mats himself.

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"I then had my tumor destroyed by sound waves,

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"proving yet again that energy
is at the heart of this issue."

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But the folks who do sell them:

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they needed to shut down that claim
right away,

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or risk an investigation that
they would really want to avoid.

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