Is this covered by insurance?

Time Magazine reports that a growing number of doctors are prescribing placebos. The placebo effect is simple: planting the idea that something will provide a healing effect often makes it so. There is an amazing capacity that our brains have to help us heal if we believe we will heal.

That said, doctors do prescribe placebos for people who demand drugs; they prescribe placebos for people when other options are gone; they prescribe placebos because they believe they are helping. But it begs the question: is it ethical?

Western medicine operates under the concept of informed consent. By deliberately misleading their patients, however well-intentioned, doctors are denying their patients the right to accept or refuse treatment. It is a dilema. But is it covered by insurance and what is the co-pay?