It certainly seems to fit into recent converations on this board. From the article:
Anecdotes and Human Nature
How, then, does the existence of MS result in the American Apitherapy Society, which claims to be tracking over 6,000 patients receiving regular bee-sting therapy (for MS and arthritis). Often times such a phenomenon begins with a single observation, one patient who, for example, receives bee sting for another ailment, or even accidentally, and then experiences a remission of their symptoms. Human psychology does the rest.
It is human nature to associate two events which are temporally related and assume cause and effect. Eat a roast beef sandwich and then get sick, and most people will assume that the roast beef was bad, even though they may be sick from a virus they were exposed to a day earlier. It is important to realize that coincidences are much more common than one would naively believe, and that the assumption of cause and effect is perhaps the most common logical mistake that people make.
So, once the story that a person was cured, or even helped, by bee venom gets around, many MS patients will seek out this new therapy out of desperation and hope. This is a reasonable and, one might even argue, rational response. Out of this self-selected (not random) assortment of MS sufferers who will try apitherapy, many are destined to have spontaneous remissions. Those that do are likely to spread the praises of this new therapy at MS support group meeting and other public venues and will give stunning testimonials at apitherapy meetings. The rare patient with a dramatic remission is likely to become a crusader for their miracle savior. Those without a response are likely to abandon therapy and not be heard from. They will probably move onto the next potential cure, and will not spend their time spreading the word that apitherapy did not work for them.
In fact this is exactly what I see in my practice. Patients with chronic neurological diseases with often try many therapies, even unconventional ones. If these treatments did not work, they do not talk about them much, and often will only report them if I directly ask about specific prior treatments. If, however, they feel they were helped by a treatment, they will shout it from the roof tops.
This process described above is the essence of anecdotal evidence, and is the reason why it is unreliable - because it is not controlled. The waxing and waning potential of MS symptoms makes it especially difficult to draw conclusions from uncontrolled observations.
It is also possible, although unlikely, that apitherapy is effective in the treatment of MS. Bee venom contains many biologically active chemicals. One or more may have anti-inflammatory or immune modulating effects. We will never learn this from anecdotal clinical evidence alone, however.