On 30/09/2021 19:15, jim bell wrote:
On Thu, Sep 30, 2021 at 11:01 AM, professor rat <pro2rat@yahoo.com.au> wrote: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2021/09/covid-misinformation-ivermectin-shor... <https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2021/09/covid-misinformation-ivermectin-shortage>
If you’re not a consumer of conservative media and/or the audio offerings of conspiracy theorists, where the likes of Tucker Carlson, Joe Rogan, and Alex Jones have been pushing the drug as a miracle cure
I don't know how much of a 'miracle' it is, but see this:
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34145166/ <https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34145166/>
*"Conclusions: *Moderate-certainty evidence finds that large reductions in COVID-19 deaths are possible using ivermectin. Using ivermectin early in the clinical course may reduce numbers progressing to severe disease. The apparent safety and low cost suggest that ivermectin is likely to have a significant impact on the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic globally."
It sounds worth using. Don't forget Famotidine (Pepcid), some others.
Doesn't sound like 'misinformation'.
It is. It's a meta-analysis of previous meta-analyses, using disturbing methods. I have no idea whether ivermectin helps in Covid. I do think it does not significantly prevent death in established cases, see below, but it might have term-lessening or prophylactic effects. I do know crap science when I see it though, and this is. Here's my meta-analysis, for what it's worth (not much): There have been 5 reported completed dbrct's (double-blind randomised control trials) of ivermectin in Covid with death as outcome. They involved a total of 2,732 patients, exactly half of whom received some kind of treatment with ivermectin. 33 untreated control patients died. 22 treated patients died. This might suggest ivermectin helps a little against death. However in the the bigger, better run trials (>100 per cohort) 25 untreated control patients died and 22 treated patients died - a statistically insignificant difference. Personally I take vitamin C and D and zinc as possible Covid prophylaxes. I do not claim they work, though low levels of vitamin D do seem to make Covid worse and zinc and vit C have well-known if mild general antiviral properties. I might take ivermectin on the Hail-Mary it-does-no-harm principle if it was readily available, but probably not. Peter Fairbrother