The placebo effect is a powerful influence in human perception.

Those familiar with my writings probably raised their eyebrows at the title of this article, so I will quickly get to the heart of the matter. I am an advocate of faith, but not in the common understanding of the word. I believe we should express faith in knowledge (or our very best guess at knowledge) rather than in ignorance. I have remarked that without faith one wouldn’t get out of bed to face a day that could in thousands of ways be detrimental to one’s health and welfare. But one does so to avail of the good things in life. A certain amount of optimism and hope is requisite.

Yet people often blindly accept on faith ideas that are based on hollow truths or just plain ignorance. The term “placebo effect” refers to how a purely symbolic medication (a placebo) can still be powerful medicine. Many studies have been conducted that prove not only the existence of this effect, but its efficacy for medical treatment. People have so much faith that their doctor is giving them something that will have a beneficial effect on their bodies that it does in fact, have some of that effect.

I subscribe to an e-mail health newsletter written by Dr. William Campbell Douglass II, MD that he calls “The Daily Dose.” The December 14^th issue contains information about the placebo effect that demonstrates just how powerful the placebo effect (faith) is. I have summarized his message here.  

A recent analysis conducted by Duke University staffers looked at the results of a 7600 patient clinical trial for a new hypertension drug and found that when taken regularly as part of a doctor-recommended regimen for heart health, a daily placebo works just as well as risky, expensive drugs. This supports other, smaller studies in the past, which have concluded almost exactly the same thing! The researchers found that those patients who took their pills every day — whether medication or placebo — in a regular and disciplined fashion slashed their risk of death during the study period by 50% when compared to those who did not.

To hammer the point home, a recent British Medical Journal report revealed that more than 60% of Israeli doctors and other health care providers regularly prescribe placebos to patients...and that 94% of these patients found them to be at least somewhat effective!

Why does the placebo effect work? Quite simply, because when people want to get better, they do. When people believe they're doing something pro-active that's going to help them be healthier, they become healthier. One has to think that at least some of the "benefits" of prescription drugs come from this powerful mind-over-body phenomenon.

But as strong a force as suggestion can be for bolstering health and wellness, it can also contribute to some pretty heavy negatives. According to a body of 2003 Israeli research, fear of terrorism can lead to an elevated risk of cardiovascular disease among women. A daily fact of life in Israel, (fear of) terrorist attacks and suicide bombings can raise levels of C-reactive protein (a chemical linked to elevated risk of heart attack and inflammation) in the blood of women in that perpetually war-torn nation.

Based on data from over 1000 subjects of both sexes aged 20-70, the research (published in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine) found that although "terror-stress" affected both sexes, it caused elevated levels of C-reactive protein only in women — nearly half of those surveyed. The study made no conclusions as to why men did not experience a similar increase in these terror-related killer proteins.

Oddly, whether the affected women lived in areas of the country known to suffer terror attacks or not seemed not to matter. Apparently, it is the overall fear that terrorism breeds, not the acute fear of a sudden attack that causes the spike in C-reactive protein levels. It makes one wonder if Israeli doctors regularly prescribed a placebo (not that they could ethically do such a thing) to these stressed patients would it help decrease this risk? One also wonders how many American women are suffering an increased risk of heart attack because of terror-related anxiety in the wake of September 11th...

(To start receiving your own copy of the Daily Dose, visit:

http://www.realhealthnews.com/dailydose/freecopy.html )

These studies show that faith not only can heal, it can also sicken a person if she has a certain amount of faith that something bad (e.g., terrorist act) is going to happen. (One might wonder if this is not the same negative phenomenon that is observed in the practice of VooDoo, where the placebo effect causes its cursed victim to experience physical pain or sickness.)

Are persons (and institutions) in whom we place our faith and trust handing us placebos due to a hidden agenda (as did the doctors in these studies) or doing so out of ignorance or simple tradition? One has to wonder about some of our other faiths that seem to work at times in lieu of verifiable connections to reality. Does prayer exhibit a placebo effect?

(If so, does a prayer’s placebo benefits extend any farther than its human awareness?) Is religion itself a placebo? Were Iraq’s Weapons of Mass Destruction a placebo?

Apparently some recipients are just as happy with placebos as with truth. So what is wrong with receiving a placebo if it does what it purports to do, even if it is a “sugar pill” with no inherent medical properties or bears none of its claimed attributes? By definition a placebo is given under false pretenses, and therefore is a lie, true only in the mind of its “victims.” The question is: Are we a people who will accept being lied to, even if a desirable outcome is possible?

Some won’t volunteer for guinea pig duty no matter who is handing out pills with claims that can’t be readily verified. But whether we swallow their pills or not, it is a scientific fact that the placebo effect is real — that faith works. It is also obvious that many in our society are swallowing these pills, hook, line and sinker.                     

© 2004 R. Leland Waldrip