A cross party group of MPs says that the NHS should cease funding homoeopathy, which it says is a placebo treatment and involves deceiving the patient every time it is prescribed.

It is not sufficient to allow a treatment on the NHS just because it offers patients a choice—an argument often cited by the government for homoeopathy being provided by the health service. In their report the MPs claim that “when doctors prescribe placebos, they risk damaging the trust that exists between them and their patients.”

For its second report under a programme of work called “Evidence Check,” the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee looked at whether the government’s policies on …