4 ms·
I don't mean and disrespect to you as a physician, but there appear to be many experts who disagree with you to the point of acting out their disagreement at sc
by blhack 7y ago
I don't mean and disrespect to you as a physician, but there appear to be many experts who disagree with you to the point of acting out their disagreement at scale. Chloroquine has become a standard part of treatment for this disease in several countries, and its continued use seems to imply its efficacy.
- endtime 7y agoI don't think he said no one is using (or should use) it, just that the results aren't "miraculous".
- SpikeDad 7y agoHaha. Continued use seems to imply it's efficacy. This might be the most illogical post on Hacker News in some time. I think we could have a whole website of things that were continued to be used without a shred of evidence of effectiveness.
- prostheticvamp 7y agoWe could also have a whole website of things people strongly believed were effective that RCTs absolutely demolished.
- krona 7y agoMiracle (noun): an extraordinary and welcome event that is not explicable by natural or scientific laws and is therefore attributed to a divine agency.
- jshevek 7y ago>there appear to be many experts who disagree with you to the point of acting out their disagreement at scale. Chloroquine has become a standard part of treatment for this disease in several countries, and its continued use seems to imply its efficacy. The fact that experts agree that this drug should be used doesn't mean they agree that it is miraculous. And this certainly doesn't suggest they disagree with the parent MD/statistician.
- blhack 7y agoIt seems like such a strange nit to pick here over my use of the term miraculous. I don’t know what else you would call the results of the study I linked (supported by the reaction of many national health orgs). Yeah, maybe this isn’t the cure to this disease, and of course we need more testing, but the result as reported are incredibly hopeful. It seems to have hit a nerve with some people that I used the term “miraculous”, but I will continue to defend that term. We are looking at a virus that has disrupted the global order. Here is a study claiming incredible efficacy. That isn’t a miracle in the divine sense, but if definitely reports as being extremely helpful during a dire need.
- jshevek 7y agoYou were wrong when you presented alleged evidence/argument that experts must necessarily disagree with the MD/statistician, above.
- blhack 7y agoIf doctors are using this, and not seeing an effect, why do they continue using it? Doctors are humans, and prone to irrationality of course, but they're also scientists. Maybe my faith in the collective ability of the world medical professionals to evaluate their treatment techniques is misplaced, but I still have faith that these people are acting in accordance with their scientific training. Maybe that's wrong, and I shouldn't be trusting these people. But if I'm not trusting doctors (and especially infectious disease experts who are writing papers about their findings), then who should I trust? I think a lot of this distrust in institutions and doctors is going to get us into a lot of trouble. I wish people would start listening to these orgs.
- prostheticvamp 7y agoIts use in the presence of a plausible mechanism, and in the absence of any good supporting data, does not indicate efficacy. It indicates that when a patient is circling the drain you throw things at the wall that could plausibly have some benefit.