Homeopathy is often ridiculed because of the extreme dilutions of the active substance. How can less than one molecule have any chemical effect? By conventional chemical modeling it cannot, but perhaps there is some effect in physics that cannot yet be modeled. Physicists know that matter cannot be destroyed, so homeopaths postulate that an extreme dilution can change the physical properties of the carrier solution and somehow trigger or stimulate the body’s own defence mechanism against disease.

Whatever one’s views on homeopathy, it has to be said that it cannot do harm, and there are many positive anecdotal reports which it would be unwise to ignore just because we do not understand the mechanism. For example Amy Lansky, a computer science researcher at NASA, used homeopathy on her autistic son and documented the results in her book The Impossible Cure. It is surely not correct to dismiss such a credible scientist as a crackpot. It is possible that the results are due to the placebo effect, but this is unlikely since the functioning of many ASD children is so low that they have no idea whether they are taking a medicine or just water.

As well as being 100% safe, homeopathy is also very cheap and is even covered by some UK health insurance schemes such as Simply Health. A reputable practitioner who has experience in ASD is Julian Foulkes who practices at the Green Parrot centre in Swaffham, Norfolk.

A variant on homepathy is Field Control Therapy or FCT. This administers an extreme dilution of a “good” substance to reinforce, rather than the “bad” to trigger a defence. Pioneered by Dr Yurkovsky, the idea of FCT is to strengthen weak tissues with homeopathic remedies, causing them to expel mercury and other toxins. Although we cannot vouch for its efficacy, practitioner Jonathan Frewing is enthusiastic.

The homeopath who does appear to have made a difference to Jamie is Natasha Lindeman. She uses the classical approach, testing for low-lever infections with equipment from the big homeopathic suppliers in Germany. This is the birthplace of homeopathy, where it is integrated with GP practice to this day and which has better patient outcomes than the UK. First-hand anecdotal reports of Natasha’s own patient outcomes are extremely positive, and as a consequence waiting lists for her Tree of Life clinic are long.