31 July 2011
By Sukhdev Singh
London, UK
A project on 'Spiritual Healing', an ancient form of medication, under the aegis of an Indian consultant has bagged 205,000 pounds grant for research and the treatment will soon be offered to British patients.
National Lottery awarded the grant for the two-year study to healing charity Fresh Winds, which is working with Birmingham University and the National Health Service Good Hope Hospital in Sutton Coldfield.
Sukhdev Singh, an Indian consultant in gastroenterology who is co-ordinating the research, said he had been encouraged by the results so far, a daily reported.
He added: 'For many of the individuals we see, conventional treatments do not provide the complete answer. By being able to offer healing therapy, we are able to offer complementary methods of treatments which have been showing good results.'
However, critics of this healing form are calling it waste of money pumped into a "voodoo" technique of medication.
Simon Singh, the author of Trick or Treatment? Alternative Medicine on Trial, said, "The 200,000 pounds should have been spent on much better causes.
"There is no worthwhile evidence at all that spiritual healing works in any way, shape or form other than the placebo effect - when the patient feels better just because they are getting some attention."
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