No Ordinary Issue

The presence of just some of the main articles in the current content would have ensured a “stand-out” issue of the journal. The individual and collective impact of this issue's ten assembled articles is truly exceptional—a fitting reflection perhaps of the extraordinary times the world is facing in 2020. Untypically therefore for an editorial, the first contribution highlighted is not a Review or a Research article, but a Clinical Case Series. And what a timely and remarkable series it is, by Aaron To and Yvonne Fok, who report the homeopathic symptom pictures of 18 consecutive coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients who consulted them in Hong Kong during the early months of 2020.[1] The article will be of keen interest to homeopathy practitioners internationally.

Aiming also to assist the journal's readership in a practical way, Michael Teut and colleagues provide homeopathy-specific advice and recommendations that supplement standard quality guidelines for designing, conducting, and reporting clinical observational studies.[2] In an elegant study on a system of natural lakes in Brazil, Ana Carla Aparicio and co-workers used a solvatochromic dye as a tracking method to discover that Phos 30c can propagate itself through large volumes of water.[3] The individual experience of participating in a “provings” trial is the focus of the paper by Zofia Dymitr et al, with the important conclusion that ethical approval processes and robust support mechanisms should be securely in place for all such studies.[4] And novel findings from an in-vitro experiment by Marta Marzotto and colleagues support the possibility that homeopathic Arnica exerts a biological action on tissue formation and repair via the expression of genes that code for certain regulatory proteins of the extracellular matrix.[5]

With the COVID-19 pandemic dominating our daily attention and concern, it is timely to read Domenick Masiello's Commentary article on his clinical experience of working in New York City in the first few months of 2020 as the COVID-19 pandemic began to take hold in the United States.[6] Elio Rossi's clinical contribution in a public homeopathy clinic in Italy, another country especially ravaged by the coronavirus, features in a second compelling Commentary.[7] This issue of the journal is completed by three Debate articles: from Deputy Editor Menachem Oberbaum, who sees the pandemic as a critical opportunity to research homeopathy's effectiveness in COVID-19 via the conduct of randomized controlled trials[8]; from Silvia Waisse and co-authors, who emphasize COVID-19's presentation as a complex systemic disease with manifestations of viral-induced inflammation and hypercoagulation[9]; and from George Vithoulkas, who agonizes over homeopathy's future in a world where violence readily seems to prevail.[10] Time will tell whether an alarming global pandemic has affected such prevalence, and with any perceived impact on homeopathy's prospects. The articles published in this most extraordinary issue tempt an optimistic viewpoint.

• References

• 1 To KLA, Fok YYY. Homeopathic clinical features of 18 patients in COVID-19 outbreaks in Hong Kong. Homeopathy 2020; 109: 146-162
• 2 Teut M, Walach H, Varanasi R. , et al. Recommendations for designing, conducting and reporting observational studies in homeopathy. Homeopathy 2020; 109: 114-125
• 3 Aparicio ACC, de Oliveira LHS, Silva JS. , et al. Interaction between solvatochromic dyes and water sampled from a natural source treated with high dilutions of phosphorus. Homeopathy 2020; 109: 126-132
• 4 Dymitr Z, Partington H, Duckworth J. A qualitative investigation of provers' experiences of participation in homeopathic pathogenetic trials. Homeopathy 2020; 109: 133-139
• 5 Marzotto M, Arruda-Silva F, Bellavite P. Fibronectin gene up-regulation by Arnica montana in human macrophages. Validation by real-time polymerase chain reaction assay. Homeopathy 2020; 109: 140-145
• 6 Masiello DJ. The COVID-19 pandemic: a view from New York City. Homeopathy 2020; 109: 163-166
• 7 Rossi EG. The experience of an Italian public homeopathy clinic during the COVID-19 epidemic, March–May 2020. Homeopathy 2020; 109: 167-168
• 8 Oberbaum M. Will we miss the opportunity again?. Homeopathy 2020; 109: 176-178
• 9 Waisse S, Oberbaum M, Frass M. The Hydra-headed coronaviruses: COVID-19 implications for homeopathy. Homeopathy 2020; 109: 169-175
• 10 Vithoulkas G. Can homeopathy, a particularly mild therapeutic approach, survive and grow in a world of violence?. Homeopathy 2020; 109: 179-181