6 ms·

> News broadcasters are denouncing it as dangerous It is dangerous. Proper dosage and monitoring are necessary to guard against risk of QT prolongation and re

> News broadcasters are denouncing it as dangerous It is dangerous. Proper dosage and monitoring are necessary to guard against risk of QT prolongation and retinopathy. It's possible for it to be true both that it saves millions of lives and that it's dangerous to take unsupervised. > A drug with a 10-50% success rate will still save a lot of lives. There is zero evidence that it has anywhere near that level of effectiveness, even when combined with zinc and azithromycin for the most favorable population and conditions. It might have some effect, but touting it as a miracle cure when other treatments are already known with greater effect and lower risk is irresponsible.

DudeInBasement 6y ago
Genius level here.... Drugs are dangerous. www.henryford.com/news/2020/07/hydro-treatment-study
- wlesieutre 6y ago
  See also: https://www.statnews.com/2020/07/08/a-flawed-covid-19-study-gets-the-white-houses-attention-and-the-fda-may-pay-the-price/ https://www.statnews.com/2020/07/08/a-flawed-covid-19-study-... >The study that sparked the latest controversy was anything but randomized. Not only was it not randomized, outside experts noted, but patients who received hydroxychloroquine were also more likely to get steroids, which appear to help very sick patients with Covid-19. That is likely to have influenced the central finding of the Henry Ford study: that death rates were 50% lower among patients in hospitals treated with hydroxychloroquine. >One study, the RECOVERY study conducted in the U.K., compared 1,542 patients on a particularly high dose of the drug to 3,132 control patients and found no difference in how long patients lived. A second, conducted by the National Institutes of Health, also found no benefit from hydroxychloroquine at higher doses.
- salasrod 6y ago
  It is dangerous, and the organization you linked to has been under heavy scrutiny for their so called "study". https://www.deadlinedetroit.com/articles/25726/controversial_detroit_study_helps_fuel_white_house_s_renewed_push_for_hydroxychloroquine https://www.deadlinedetroit.com/articles/25726/controversial...
spaginal 6y ago
Every drug is dangerous at improper dosage. It’s a fickle argument. It’s like trying to argue that people shouldn’t drink water, because if they had too much of it they’d drown or choke. We prescribe drugs everyday with a proper dosage on the bottle, and people handle it just fine. This is no different. Either way, HCQ is widely available and inexpensive, zinc is widely available and inexpensive, and I believe that is the crux of the real issue. Even if it worked for a small percentage of people, it’s still a significant tool in the fight. The problem is, there is a coordinated push towards expensive patented drugs and vaccines on the population, we are watching marketing, propaganda, and censorship at this point. Can’t have a $10 solution to a $10,000,000,000,000 problem.
- ColanR 6y ago
  I'm not sure why you're being downvoted. You're making a reasonable observation. Seems like when it comes to big drug manufacturers, suddenly big business and overgrown capitalists can do no wrong.
  - non-entity 6y ago
    > I'm not sure why you're being downvoted. Easy. It's a highly politicized thread, and in those sort of thread, driveby downvoting isnt uncommon, even on HN.
    - luckylion 6y ago
      Dare I say: especially on HN? There's a lot of flagging for anything that may be construed as political. Some of it then gets restored by a mod overriding community moderation. I have no idea about the amount that gets flagged, but I notice it quite a bit just by going to the front page and seeing something and if I happened to go back to it a minute later, poof, it's gone.
    - perl4ever 6y ago
      The opinion is a very stereotyped one, that has been very widely expressed all my life and probably far longer. The conspiracy theory about the drug industry has been common forever, but it fits a more general pattern, like the Miracle Carburetor. Obviously nobody can answer why something is downvoted, and discussing voting is discouraged, but personally, I'd like to see a controversial opinion that is original and interesting, not cliched. Me, I wouldn't downvote something for only being wrong (IMO) or weird.
ColanR 6y ago
> dangerous to take unsupervised That's not what anyone is suggesting, and it seems disingenuous for you to suggest that it is. The drug is well-known, and it's reasonable to attempt its use when there's the potential for a large success rate. The people "hoarding" it are doctors who can get prescriptions for it - and who I imagine know more about the drug than you or I do. Based on the Ford study [1], the 10-50% success rate might be a confusion with the hazard ratio reduction, which was 66%. The actual in-hospital mortality rates in that study were 20% with hydroxychloroquine + azithromycin vs. 26% with neither. I'd say a 6 percentage point difference in lives saved is enough to warrant further investigation. [1] https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(20)30534-8/fulltext https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(20)30534-8/ful...
- fabian2k 6y ago
  The Ford study is one of the weaker ones, it's a retrospective study and not a randomized controlled trial. There are better studies available, so it doesn't make sense to focus on this specific one that is inherently weaker and subject to more confounding factors than a randomized trial.
  - ColanR 6y ago
    I'd love to hear about the better ones.
    - fabian2k 6y ago
      UK RECOVERY trial: https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m2263?ijkey=355d5085a0aeed4493a778233d1ae2127edd2cc4&keytype2=tf_ipsecsha https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m2263?ijkey=355d5085a0ae... WHO SOLIDARITY trial (aborted due to lack of efficiency for hospital patients, still running for prophylaxis) https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/global-research-on-novel-coronavirus-2019-ncov/solidarity-clinical-trial-for-covid-19-treatments https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2... HCQ as prophylaxis trial: https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m2242?ijkey=2811796ab15e2b1f6ecc0a1fd760c6540ff0b04d&keytype2=tf_ipsecsha https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m2242?ijkey=2811796ab15e...
treeman79 6y ago
It’s a prescription medication. Dosage is monitored. Side effects are monitored. Personal experience 200mg and my rashes stop. My joint pain goes away. Lymph nodes stop swelling. My energy increases. Organ damage slows down. 400mg my hair gets really dry, and my blood pressure gets too high. Unless I skip caffeine. Yearly eye tests are a thing. Some people go decades on it. Have to stop. And immediately all the old symptoms come back. “a flare” This is a risk vs reward decision. One issue is that its not a take a pill, cured tomorrow. It builds up in the system over time. It’s changing immune system behavior... slowly... I was 30 days in before I noticed anything. 3 months until I was sure it was working. Doctor was shocked by my turn around after six months. Lots of people say a year for full effectiveness.
- croutonwagon 6y ago
  The principle difference here is you are taking it for an autoimmune disease. Where the relative benefits outweigh the risks. Equating that to using it “off label” for covid, either as a preventative (Like the president did)or treatment post infection, where there is little, if any, evidence of its effectiveness/benefits (but still with the same risks, and possibly more depending on the patient and their history) are two entirely different things. They are in no way equal
  - treeman79 6y ago
    Covid is an autoimmune disease. The Over active immune response is what is killing people. The virus is a trigger. It also attacks exact same receptor that hydroxychloroquine targets. I think it’s complete nonsense that has no effect. Maybe the effect is trivial. Maybe it’s too little too late. But it is way too early to shutdown talk on it down. I desperately wanna see studies on Covid death rates for people that have been taking it long term.
    - irishjohnnie 6y ago
      > Covid is an autoimmune disease. The Over active immune response is what is killing people. The virus triggers an acute immune response. This is not the same as an autoimmune disease, it may be the opposite. Also, people with certain blood types that have better clotting ability seem to be at a disadvantage.
jeffreyrogers 6y ago
I've taken it for malaria prevention when traveling as have millions of other people. You're acting like this is some super novel new compound that we have no experience with. It's not. You get a prescription for it and you talk to your doctor. Most medications have side effects, the medical system is designed to deal with that. Maybe it's not effective at treating COVID, but that's really irrelevant to the point the person was making.

DudeInBasement 6y ago

Genius level here.... Drugs are dangerous. www.henryford.com/news/2020/07/hydro-treatment-study

wlesieutre 6y ago
See also: https://www.statnews.com/2020/07/08/a-flawed-covid-19-study-gets-the-white-houses-attention-and-the-fda-may-pay-the-price/ https://www.statnews.com/2020/07/08/a-flawed-covid-19-study-... >The study that sparked the latest controversy was anything but randomized. Not only was it not randomized, outside experts noted, but patients who received hydroxychloroquine were also more likely to get steroids, which appear to help very sick patients with Covid-19. That is likely to have influenced the central finding of the Henry Ford study: that death rates were 50% lower among patients in hospitals treated with hydroxychloroquine. >One study, the RECOVERY study conducted in the U.K., compared 1,542 patients on a particularly high dose of the drug to 3,132 control patients and found no difference in how long patients lived. A second, conducted by the National Institutes of Health, also found no benefit from hydroxychloroquine at higher doses.
salasrod 6y ago
It is dangerous, and the organization you linked to has been under heavy scrutiny for their so called "study". https://www.deadlinedetroit.com/articles/25726/controversial_detroit_study_helps_fuel_white_house_s_renewed_push_for_hydroxychloroquine https://www.deadlinedetroit.com/articles/25726/controversial...

spaginal 6y ago

Every drug is dangerous at improper dosage. It’s a fickle argument. It’s like trying to argue that people shouldn’t drink water, because if they had too much of it they’d drown or choke. We prescribe drugs everyday with a proper dosage on the bottle, and people handle it just fine. This is no different. Either way, HCQ is widely available and inexpensive, zinc is widely available and inexpensive, and I believe that is the crux of the real issue. Even if it worked for a small percentage of people, it’s still a significant tool in the fight. The problem is, there is a coordinated push towards expensive patented drugs and vaccines on the population, we are watching marketing, propaganda, and censorship at this point. Can’t have a $10 solution to a $10,000,000,000,000 problem.

ColanR 6y ago
I'm not sure why you're being downvoted. You're making a reasonable observation. Seems like when it comes to big drug manufacturers, suddenly big business and overgrown capitalists can do no wrong.
- non-entity 6y ago
  > I'm not sure why you're being downvoted. Easy. It's a highly politicized thread, and in those sort of thread, driveby downvoting isnt uncommon, even on HN.
  - luckylion 6y ago
    Dare I say: especially on HN? There's a lot of flagging for anything that may be construed as political. Some of it then gets restored by a mod overriding community moderation. I have no idea about the amount that gets flagged, but I notice it quite a bit just by going to the front page and seeing something and if I happened to go back to it a minute later, poof, it's gone.
  - perl4ever 6y ago
    The opinion is a very stereotyped one, that has been very widely expressed all my life and probably far longer. The conspiracy theory about the drug industry has been common forever, but it fits a more general pattern, like the Miracle Carburetor. Obviously nobody can answer why something is downvoted, and discussing voting is discouraged, but personally, I'd like to see a controversial opinion that is original and interesting, not cliched. Me, I wouldn't downvote something for only being wrong (IMO) or weird.

ColanR 6y ago

> dangerous to take unsupervised That's not what anyone is suggesting, and it seems disingenuous for you to suggest that it is. The drug is well-known, and it's reasonable to attempt its use when there's the potential for a large success rate. The people "hoarding" it are doctors who can get prescriptions for it - and who I imagine know more about the drug than you or I do. Based on the Ford study [1], the 10-50% success rate might be a confusion with the hazard ratio reduction, which was 66%. The actual in-hospital mortality rates in that study were 20% with hydroxychloroquine + azithromycin vs. 26% with neither. I'd say a 6 percentage point difference in lives saved is enough to warrant further investigation. [1] https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(20)30534-8/fulltext https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(20)30534-8/ful...

fabian2k 6y ago
The Ford study is one of the weaker ones, it's a retrospective study and not a randomized controlled trial. There are better studies available, so it doesn't make sense to focus on this specific one that is inherently weaker and subject to more confounding factors than a randomized trial.
- ColanR 6y ago
  I'd love to hear about the better ones.
  - fabian2k 6y ago
    UK RECOVERY trial: https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m2263?ijkey=355d5085a0aeed4493a778233d1ae2127edd2cc4&keytype2=tf_ipsecsha https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m2263?ijkey=355d5085a0ae... WHO SOLIDARITY trial (aborted due to lack of efficiency for hospital patients, still running for prophylaxis) https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2019/global-research-on-novel-coronavirus-2019-ncov/solidarity-clinical-trial-for-covid-19-treatments https://www.who.int/emergencies/diseases/novel-coronavirus-2... HCQ as prophylaxis trial: https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m2242?ijkey=2811796ab15e2b1f6ecc0a1fd760c6540ff0b04d&keytype2=tf_ipsecsha https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m2242?ijkey=2811796ab15e...

treeman79 6y ago

It’s a prescription medication. Dosage is monitored. Side effects are monitored. Personal experience 200mg and my rashes stop. My joint pain goes away. Lymph nodes stop swelling. My energy increases. Organ damage slows down. 400mg my hair gets really dry, and my blood pressure gets too high. Unless I skip caffeine. Yearly eye tests are a thing. Some people go decades on it. Have to stop. And immediately all the old symptoms come back. “a flare” This is a risk vs reward decision. One issue is that its not a take a pill, cured tomorrow. It builds up in the system over time. It’s changing immune system behavior... slowly... I was 30 days in before I noticed anything. 3 months until I was sure it was working. Doctor was shocked by my turn around after six months. Lots of people say a year for full effectiveness.

croutonwagon 6y ago
The principle difference here is you are taking it for an autoimmune disease. Where the relative benefits outweigh the risks. Equating that to using it “off label” for covid, either as a preventative (Like the president did)or treatment post infection, where there is little, if any, evidence of its effectiveness/benefits (but still with the same risks, and possibly more depending on the patient and their history) are two entirely different things. They are in no way equal
- treeman79 6y ago
  Covid is an autoimmune disease. The Over active immune response is what is killing people. The virus is a trigger. It also attacks exact same receptor that hydroxychloroquine targets. I think it’s complete nonsense that has no effect. Maybe the effect is trivial. Maybe it’s too little too late. But it is way too early to shutdown talk on it down. I desperately wanna see studies on Covid death rates for people that have been taking it long term.
  - irishjohnnie 6y ago
    > Covid is an autoimmune disease. The Over active immune response is what is killing people. The virus triggers an acute immune response. This is not the same as an autoimmune disease, it may be the opposite. Also, people with certain blood types that have better clotting ability seem to be at a disadvantage.

jeffreyrogers 6y ago

I've taken it for malaria prevention when traveling as have millions of other people. You're acting like this is some super novel new compound that we have no experience with. It's not. You get a prescription for it and you talk to your doctor. Most medications have side effects, the medical system is designed to deal with that. Maybe it's not effective at treating COVID, but that's really irrelevant to the point the person was making.