Homeopathy had No Place in Pharmacy: Canadian Pharmacist

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

203. And then there's digitalis, which comes from the foxglove plant

and in the form of the drug digoxin is used to treat some heart problems. Aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid) is a chemical, too. And so are opium, morphine and heroin, which come from the poppy plant. And cocaine (which does have some medicinal uses), from the coca plant. And penicillin, from the penicillium mold. All of these medicines are "natural," in the sense that they are directly derived from plants, and they are all chemicals. Water is a chemical: hydrogen dioxide. When you get right down to it, anything is a "chemical" if all samples of it have the same composition. Chemical substances created by an artificial process are not necessarily harmful, and natural chemicals are not necessarily harmless. It is absurd to say that if something is natural it must necessarily be good (cobra venom, amanita mushrooms and box jellyfish venom, for example, are not good things), and that if something is created in a laboratory it must be bad. Or to claim that "chemicals" are bad. Everything is chemicals.