Homeoprophylaxis for Influenza

Last year hundreds of families associated with our homeopathic clinic opted to use Influenzinum instead of the H1N1 vaccine or the regular flu vaccine to protect them from falling ill with the virus. This was very successful. Families reported their best winter ever in terms of infectious disease, in spite of media scares. For some this was new, others have utilized this safe, effective method of disease prevention over the 8+ years we have been in our NW Calgary location. We also see numerous families that use homeoprophylaxis for disease prevention in their children and for international travel. This has also been highly successful over the years. In addition to it being effective, homeoprophylaxis offers no side effects, no toxicity, no trauma. Delivered orally on lactose granules, it’s something that kids look forward to and adults rest easy giving. It’s inexpensive and therefore an excellent option for individual use as well as for the masses, as a large-scale trial in Cuba has shown us. I’ll reference that report later. First let’s look what it is and where it started.

What is it?

Homeoprophylaxis is a highly dilute preparation from a disease product i.e. from the sputum of an individual sick with the disease, or, in the case of Influenzinum, the four viruses selected by the World Health Organization for the annual flu vaccine. The dilution is 1:100 nine successive times in the case of Influenzinum to create 9CH. Some potencies used in homeoprophylaxis may be 30CH, 200CH, 1M (one thousand) or 10M (ten thousand). These liquid potencies are then soaked onto lactose granules to prepare them for administration. The puzzling part is that after 12CH there are statistically, according to Avogadro’s number, no molecules left of the original substance! Each dilution is accompanied by succussion, vigorous shaking, the kinetic energy of which “informs” the water of the energetic signature of the starting substance. So we need not fear infection or poisoning from these potencies. Over 200 years of clinical use has demonstrated that these highly dilute substances work. As our understanding of quantum physics and the effects of minute doses on the cell increases, modern science can finally understand this mechanism of action.

Who thought of it?

The use of homeopathic remedies for disease prevention dates back 209 years to the founder and early practitioners of Homeopathic Medicine. Dr. Samuel Hahnemann selected remedies, homeopathically prepared substances from Nature, that were the best match by the Law of Similars for the signs and symptoms of a disease and would administer it to those in contact with the ill patient as well as the patient to prevent them from falling ill. He used Belladonna for this in Scarlet Fever in 1801 and Cuprum for Cholera in 1831. Success of this practice in epidemics such as these is what made his new system of medicine famous throughout Europe and North America within his lifetime. This is termed ‘genus epidemicus’, the selection of a remedy that is similar to the symptoms found in patients with a particular infectious disease. Homeopaths look for that remedy in response to waves of infectious disease wherever possible.

Results of Homeoprophylaxis through the Centuries

When diseases like smallpox threatened large populations in the USA at the turn of the century, Hahnemann’s successors used a homeopathic dilution of the virus itself, a nosode as previously defined, for mass use. Variolinum against smallpox was one of the first to be used in this way, where it was found impractical to determine individualized treatment for everyone. Discussion of this early practice can be found in the journal “Medical Advance” 1904.

In 1907 Dr Eaton collated the results of several homeopathic doctors in Iowa during a smallpox epidemic and reported the result to a paper read at the American Institute of Homoeopathy. He reported that the number of persons given Variolinum 30c was 2806. Definite exposures to small-pox was 547. Smallpox cases after taking Variolinum was 14. Efficacy therefore 97%.

Homeoprophylaxis for whooping cough and tuberculosis were also used in boarding schools by Dorothy Shepherd and documented in her book, “Homeopathy and Epidemic Diseases.” C.H. Allen in his book “Allen’s Keynotes” discusses the efficacy of Variolinum for smallpox and C.M. Boger of Psorinum for “itch” diseases as reported in the journal “Homeopathic Recorder.”

— In The Collected Works of Arthur Hill Grimmer he states, “Lathyrus has given the most certain protection in thousands of exposed cases of polio through many epidemics in the last forty years”. It is said that his study included 30, 000 over the years.

— Dr. P Chavanon (Paris 1932) administered Diphtherinum 4M and 8M and after one to two months the antitoxins were measured in the blood. He noted that 45 children changed from Schick test +ve (no antibodies against diphtheria) to shick test ve (antibodies present) (Chavanon, P. La Dipterie, 4th edition. St. Denis, Niort: Imprimerie 1932.).

— Patterson and Boyd repeated this test in 1941, and 20 out of 33 children were observed to produce antibodies to diphtheria by Schick test (Patterson, J and Boyd WE. “Potency Action: A Preliminary Study of the Alteration of the Schick Test by a Homeopathic Potency.” British Homeopathic Journal 1941; 31: 301-309).

— Dr. Roux repeated the experiment in 1946. This nosode provided laboratory confirmation of lasting immunity. The blood antitoxins seemed to last up to 5 years with one dose. (Eizayaga, F. “Tratamiento Homeopatico de las Enfermedades Agudas y Su Prevension.” Homeopatia 1985; 51(342): 352-362.).