Last year, we reported that our Judicial Review challenging the accreditation of the Society of Homeopaths would be heard by the High Court. We have now been given a date for our full hearing: March 18th-19th.
Supporters of ours will remember that Good Thinking challenged the Professional Standards Authority (PSA), the government body which overseas healthcare regulators, over their failure to protect vulnerable autistic children from anti-vaccine proponents and potentially harmful ‘cures’. The PSA accredited the Society of Homeopaths, despite registrants of the Society of Homeopaths offering CEASE therapy – an anti-vaccine ‘cure’ for autism.
That challenge has now been scheduled to be heard by the High Court on March 18th-19th, where we will have the opportunity to make our full case before a judge, and to explain why we feel the PSA acted unlawfully in their decision to lend credibility to the Society of Homeopaths and their members, some of whom offer CEASE therapy.
If our challenge is successful, it could see the accreditation decision ‘quashed’ (annulled) by the court, meaning that the PSA could be ordered to make a new decision, this time properly taking into account the harms associated with CEASE therapy when considering whether to reaccredit the Society of Homeopaths.
We hope our case will result in the Society of Homeopaths being required by the PSA to take action to protect autistic children from the harmful therapies these homeopaths promote, or lose their accredited status.
When we took on this case, we asked for your support to help us fundraise to meet the legal costs involved in bringing our Judicial Review to court. You helped us raise over £10k, for which we are extremely grateful.
Now that we have a hearing date confirmed, we need your help again.
Preparing the case for court and attending the two-day hearing will require time with our solicitors and our barristers, and that time comes at a cost to our charity. Any donation you’re able to make to our crowdfunding campaign at crowdjustice.com/case/gts-cease-psa/ will help ensure our charity can cover the costs of our legal case, without impacting the rest of our projects and the rest of our work.
Since 2015, we have made a huge amount of progress on some of our most high-profile projects – including effectively ensuring NHS funds are not wasted on ineffective homeopathic services, working to end the prescription of homeopathic remedies on the NHS, and working with the Charity Commission to prevent charitable organisations from promoting misleading or dangerous therapies.
With your help, we can complete this Judicial Review, and hopefully the ruling will ensure that homeopaths are not able to spread anti-vaccine misinformation with the tacit endorsement of the PSA, a public body set up to oversee and regulate healthcare providers.
