Unlike in the 1950s and 1960s, homeopathy is no longer an unfamiliar word in Pakistan today. However, only a small percentage of its users are aware that the way homoeopathic products are advertised and marketed in the country reflects successive governments’ lack of regulation and oversight, especially when compared to the policies and approaches of the governments in other parts of the world, including the United States and the European Union.

This lack of regulation has led to two major issues: on the one hand, it has encouraged quackery among homoeopathic practitioners; on the other, it has fueled self-medication among users. Ultimately, this situation benefits only the manufacturing companies.

A survey of any of the markets selling homoeopathic medicines in any major city would show all types of nostrums with wide-ranging claims being sold in homoeopathic medical stores. Name any disease, and the free booklets available with these stores recommend two or three “remedies.” 

According to conservative estimates, 80% of locally produced and 25% of imported homoeopathic medicines deviate from standard homoeopathic principles. These products often combine multiple low-strength ingredients, despite homoeopathy’s foundational rule of using  one single remedy at a time. 

Almost all homoeopathic manufacturing companies, both local and foreign, produce disease-specific “remedies” by combining four to ten single homoeopathic remedies in low strengths. Marketed as “Number Series” or “Combination Numbers”, these products are promoted through booklets that oversimplify diseases and their treatments. 

The problem with these homoeopathic numbers is that while they contain homoeopathic ingredients, their preparation does not follow proper homoeopathic pharmacy methods. They fail to meet the strength, quality, and purity criteria outlined in recognized homoeopathic pharmacopoeias. Moreover, there is no reliable scientific study to support the claims about the efficacy and safety of these Numbers.