 |
HOME | BEAUTY | ENVIRONMENT | FITNESS | FOOD + NUTRITION | HOLISTIC HEALING | RECIPES |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
 |
by author Rhody Lake
The practice of homeopathy may seem new in North America, but it’s not. It’s been here for 175 years, ever since the Danish homeopath, Hans Gram, emigrated to the United states. That was in 1825. Homeopathy captured the American people so much that practicing homeopaths decided to create their own medical society.
The American Institute of Homeopathy was born in 1844, the first medical society organized in the United States, predating the American Medical Association (AMA) by two years. By that time the European pharmaceutical companies were gaining power in the United States. The attack on homeopathic practitioners and on any practicing medical doctor who made use of homeopathic preparations was relentless, in almost every state.
The turf war was on. The fight became so petty that when the advocates of homeopathy convinced the Michigan legislature that they should establish a professorship of homeopathy in the department of medicine at the University of Michigan, the AMA refused to recognize a graduation diploma if one of the homeopath professors signed it! But towards the end of that century homeopathy began a slow rise, chiefly because of endorsement by some famous figures. America could not ignore the opinion of its beloved humorist, Mark Twain, for instance.
In an article in 1890 he was quoted as saying that homeopathy "forced the old-school doctor to stir around and learn something of a rational nature about his business. . . . You may honestly feel grateful that homeopathy survived the attempts of the allopathists to destroy it."
By the turn of the next century there were 22 homeopathic medical schools, more than 100 homeopathic hospitals and over 1,000 homeopathic pharmacies in the United States. The first women’s medical college in the world was the homeopathic Boston Female Medical College, founded in 1848. In 1873 it merged with Boston University, another homeopathic college.
Death Rates Reduced
Source: alive #219, January 2001
