Law of Similars

Michael Frass et al. (2026) · Supportive care in cancer : official journal of the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer

This three-arm, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial (98 randomized patients plus 52 observed controls) examined whether add-on homeopathy — an individualized complementary treatment using highly diluted plant-, mineral-, or animal-derived preparations chosen for each patient's overall symptom picture — could improve quality of life and survival in people with advanced non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC, the most common form of lung cancer) already receiving standard chemotherapy. An earlier report of this exact same trial dataset was published in The Oncologist in 2020 and was retracted by that journal in November 2025 after two corrections, a decision most of the trial's own co-authors disagreed with; this article is an independently re-analyzed, more conservative account of the same underlying data. Ninety-eight adults (mean age 63, most with stage IV NSCLC) at four Austrian hospitals were randomly assigned, double-blind, to individualized homeopathic remedies or an identical-looking placebo alongside their usual chemotherapy, while a further 52 patients who declined randomization were tracked as an untreated comparison group. Quality of life was measured with the EORTC QLQ-C30 cancer questionnaire, the SF-36 health survey, and a visual-analogue well-being scale at the start of treatment and again at 9 and 18 weeks, while survival was followed for up to two years. Patients receiving homeopathy reported markedly better global health status than the placebo group at both 9 and 18 weeks (p<0.001, a difference well above the 10-point size doctors consider clinically meaningful), and nearly every functioning and symptom score — physical, emotional, and social functioning, fatigue, pain, and appetite among them — favored homeopathy by 18 weeks; results from the SF-36 health survey and the well-being scale pointed the same direction. Survival differed too: median survival was 435 days with homeopathy versus 257 days with placebo (p=0.010) and 228 days in the untreated comparison group, translating to 2-year survival rates of 45.1%, 23.4%, and 13.5% respectively (homeopathy vs. placebo p=0.020; homeopathy vs. control p<0.001). No side effects were attributed to either the homeopathic remedy or the placebo, and every death in the trial was confirmed to be a direct result of the cancer itself rather than a treatment complication. The authors are careful to note that their design cannot tell whether the benefit came from the remedy itself or from the long, attentive homeopathic consultation both randomized groups received; that the untreated comparison group was not randomized and may differ from the treated groups in ways beyond homeopathy; and that the trial ran before modern immunotherapy became standard NSCLC care. Combined with the dataset's retraction history, these findings should be read as encouraging but preliminary, awaiting independent replication by researchers not previously involved in homeopathy research before they influence clinical decisions.

Ubiratan Cardinalli Adler et al. (2022) · Journal of integrative medicine

This randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial with 86 analyzed participants explored whether a homeopathic remedy could help people recover faster from mild COVID-19 while isolating at home in Brazil. Homeopathy is a medical system built on the "principle of similars" - the idea that a highly diluted substance capable of causing symptoms in a healthy person can treat similar symptoms in someone who is sick. The remedy tested, Natrum muriaticum (a homeopathic preparation of sodium chloride, common salt), was prepared using Samuel Hahnemann's fifty-millesimal (LM) method: repeated 1:50,000 dilutions with vigorous shaking (succussion) between steps, governing how homeopaths believe a remedy's potency rises as its material dose falls. Adults with a positive PCR test for SARS-CoV-2 and flu-like symptoms were randomly assigned to take drops of Natrum muriaticum LM2 or an identical-looking placebo every six hours (more often if symptoms were severe) during home isolation. Researchers tracked recovery by phone and WhatsApp, asking participants to rate 15 to 17 symptoms - including cough, fatigue, and loss of smell or taste - on a 0-to-3 severity scale, then combined these into a daily symptom score analyzed with Kaplan-Meier survival curves, the statistical method used to track time-to-event outcomes like recovery. The main result was a null one: time to full symptom recovery did not differ significantly between the homeopathy and placebo groups (P = 0.56 overall, P = 0.06 among the most symptomatic participants) - homeopathy showed a numerically shorter median recovery time (3 days versus 6 days) in the sicker subgroup, but the gap was not statistically reliable. A secondary analysis told a more encouraging, though still tentative, story: among participants who started with a high symptom burden, those taking homeopathy reached a 50% reduction in symptoms significantly faster than those on placebo (P = 0.04), improving roughly 0.9 days sooner over the first five days (P = 0.022) - though this edge disappeared by day 7 and day 10, suggesting it may reflect the natural course of a self-limiting illness rather than a true treatment effect. Hospitalization was numerically lower with homeopathy (2.4% versus 6.8%) but not statistically significant, and side effects were mild and similar between groups. For patients and clinicians, this trial does not provide evidence to recommend homeopathic Natrum muriaticum LM2 as a COVID-19 treatment - the confidence intervals around the promising secondary findings were too wide to draw firm conclusions, and the study fell short of its planned 90-participant sample after dropouts left 86. Baseline differences between groups, including more respiratory disease in the homeopathy arm, add further uncertainty. The authors frame this as a pioneering but inconclusive first step, calling for larger, more targeted trials - particularly in patients with more severe symptoms at enrollment - before homeopathy's role in COVID-19 care can be assessed.