7 ms·

The anonymous meta-analysis that’s convincing people to use ivermectin

12 points by CobaltFire 5y ago

smurfbunny 5y ago
Here's an article about a valid meta-analysis: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28605156 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28605156 and a URL of the valid meta-analysis: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8248252/#__ffn_sectitle https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8248252/#__ffn_...
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
avidiax 5y ago
If the people reading these meta-analyses spent equivalent time reading the meta-analyses for any of the three U.S. developed vaccines, maybe they could get an actually effective treatment. But these people are contrarian-first. They'd much rather delude themselves that self-administered nicotine enemas are proven effective by cargo cult science websites by anonymous "Q" types than believe anything served by a .gov domain.
- adminscoffee 5y ago
  why don't more of these people trust the government? were they wrong or perceived that they were wronged in some way? seems like a public relations image nightmare tbh.
  - Daishiman 5y ago
    Because an entire branch of political ideology is built around the notion that the state cannot ever be possibly useful, and has worked for decades doing PR work to get people to believe this. Unfortunately, this turns into a self-fulfilling prophecy, since people running on this platform tend to be the worst kind of bureaucrats you could have.
    - no-s 5y ago
      > an entire branch of political ideology is built around the notion that the state cannot ever be possibly useful, This of course is used to reject the reality that too much of the any sort of government can be very dangerous thing and it’s often difficult to see this until it’s too late - tyrants often rise to power propelled by popular appeal. Ergo grudging skepticism towards the expansion of government power is perfectly reasonable...
nradov 5y ago
There is a non-anonymous sort of meta-analysis in the form of a letter containing corrections to an earlier flawed meta-analysis. (I'm not endorsing this letter, just pointing out that it exists.) https://journals.lww.com/americantherapeutics/fulltext/2021/10000/ivermectin,_a_reanalysis_of_the_data.9.aspx https://journals.lww.com/americantherapeutics/fulltext/2021/... I think though that most people aren't asking the right question about ivermectin. From a population health standpoint it's clearly not a viable alternative to vaccination (and I encourage everyone to get vaccinated if they can). But vaccination isn't 100% effective so there will continue to be many symptomatic breakthrough cases. So the real question is whether ivermectin should be added to the treatment protocol along with other drugs including monoclonal antibodies? Is it clinically justified on a risk / reward basis? https://www.covid19treatmentguidelines.nih.gov/about-the-guidelines/whats-new/ https://www.covid19treatmentguidelines.nih.gov/about-the-gui... The NIH is currently sponsoring a large scale clinical trial of ivermectin and other drugs. https://www.nih.gov/research-training/medical-research-initiatives/activ/covid-19-therapeutics-prioritized-testing-clinical-trials https://www.nih.gov/research-training/medical-research-initi... While waiting for results from that study does it make sense to act based on lower quality research? There are at least some small studies which appear to show a significant clinical benefit with minimal risk. https://www.mdpi.com/1999-4915/13/6/989 https://www.mdpi.com/1999-4915/13/6/989 https://www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5370(21)00239-X/fulltext https://www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5... https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/03000605211013550 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/03000605211013550 It's unfortunate that the issue has been so heavily politicized. Decisions on off-label drug use should generally be left up to individual physicians.
- rubatuga 5y ago
  Of course it makes sense to act on low quality evidence, it’s called a risk benefit discussion and it’s done everyday in doctors offices. Risk of ivermectin is low. Possible benefit is high. Calling something contrarian doesn’t make it any less true. It’s nuts how the basics of medicine have also been thrown out the window. Get the vaccine. And do your best to stay safe, including staying up to date on potential treatments.
- chansiky 5y ago
raphlinus 5y ago
If people are looking for a real meta-analysis, currently the best one is from Cochrane. They recently put out an author interview[1] putting it into context. I find this whole topic fascinating, first the actual science, then the patterns of why people believe what they do. [1]: https://www.cochrane.org/news/ivermectin-cochranes-most-talked-about-review-so-far-ever-why https://www.cochrane.org/news/ivermectin-cochranes-most-talk...
- YossarianFrPrez 5y ago
  For anyone interested, here is the link to the review itself: https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD015017.pub2/full https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD...
spinny 5y ago
this is fascinating. while trump was president, all the leftards opposed getting the trump vax, as soon as the biden get installed and takes credit, the vax is pushed to the population with mandates on top. then of course, the issue becomes heavily politicized, and any deviation from leftard established course of action is an insurrection, worst than 9/11. the authors of whatever page on the internet are NOT your doctor, the author of this article is also NOT your doctor, the people pushing qtard crap are NOT you doctor, the people on facebook writing stupid comments are NOT your doctor. STOP TAKING MEDICAL ADVICE FROM INTERNET AND TALK TO A DOCTOR YOU TRUST.
- Cyril_HN 5y ago
  That's the issue. With healthcare being so expensive and strained, and especially young and poor (and the young are often poor) people not seeing doctors as often, people are less likely to have a doctor they trust.
- lurquer 5y ago
  Many doctors prescribe ivermectin. Many pharmacies refuse to fill the prescription. What then?
  - spinny 5y ago
    if your doctor prescribes it to you and you have doubts about it, ask the doctor for clarification. pharmacies should not be refusing to fill a prescription, unless there is a doubt around the authenticity of the prescription (and the pharmacy probably has a procedure to report it). if it's possible to file some sort of complaint, that definitely should be done. the people at the pharmacy don't know more about your health than your doctor.
    - lurquer 5y ago
      File a complaint? What good is that? Every day that passes is vital when you have a fever and are getting increasingly ill by the hour. If only ivermectin was available without a prescription...
ipspam 5y ago
So interesting. They basically admit that Ivermectin might be effective, has low toxicity, is cheap, BUT, the science community has spent 18 months pushing vaccines and refuse to seriously look into Ivermectin. This is serious, serious malfeasance. The amount of effort out into destroying the doctor patient relationship and taking ivermectin out of the doctors toolbox is too great. That energy should have instead been spent answering the question. "One very large trial in humans appeared to show that ivermectin was effective against COVID-19, but it was later withdrawn following accusations of plagiarism and manipulated data. Since then, a number of small, variable-quality trials have had varying results. An analysis of the state of the field published in late July indicated it wasn't possible to use these studies to determine if ivermectin was helpful or harmful. The situation doesn't seem to have changed dramatically since. Currently, most health authorities indicate that there is no evidence supporting ivermectin's use against COVID-19." "None of this is to say that more definitive studies won't eventually determine that ivermectin is effective against COVID-19. But experienced public health authorities have concluded that those studies haven't been done yet and that the studies that have been done don't collectively amount to evidence."
- credit_guy 5y ago
  > the science community has spent 18 months pushing vaccines and refuse to seriously look into Ivermectin. The thing is, vaccines just work. They don't "might be effective", "could be", "maybe, perhaps". They just work. Ivermectin, might work, with "might" the crucial word. Running randomized double blind trials is not cheap. The "science community" is not a monolith, and doesn't have infinite resources. > This is serious, serious malfeasance. Who exactly is guilty of that "malfeasance"? Who had the money and the mandate to run the trials for Ivermectin and didn't? The US Government had the money and the Congressional mandate to run the Warp Speed program, and some of the programs it has underwritten have ended up in success (Pfizer, Moderna, J&J), and some didn't. Ivermectin was not part of Warp Speed. Again, who was supposed to do the trials, and is therefore guilty of "malfeasance" ?
  - s1artibartfast 5y ago
    It would have been nice if the congress spent a few 10s of millions for a RCT. Funding could easily be through the NIH. Treatment options with even minor impact could have huge returns on investment given that we have seen 600k deaths and millions of severe cases. Treatment options are not a substitute for vaccination and are only framed as such out of political dogma. The government has an ethical mandate to overcome such dogma and act in the interests of saving lives, especially when the the cost is so low compared to trillions thrown around wildly in pandemic spending. People with public trust who are categorically opposed to treatment research are morally culpable for the deaths that could be prevented.
bob_neumann 5y ago
Utter Pradesh. 241 million mostly impoverished people. 13% of the population is vaccinated. But they're handing out prophylactic doses of ivermectin. And something has essentially eradicated Delta variant Covid. If it's not ivermectin, what is it?

12 points by CobaltFire 5y ago

Here's an article about a valid meta-analysis: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28605156 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28605156 and a URL of the valid meta-analysis: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8248252/#__ffn_sectitle https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8248252/#__ffn_...

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

avidiax 5y ago

If the people reading these meta-analyses spent equivalent time reading the meta-analyses for any of the three U.S. developed vaccines, maybe they could get an actually effective treatment. But these people are contrarian-first. They'd much rather delude themselves that self-administered nicotine enemas are proven effective by cargo cult science websites by anonymous "Q" types than believe anything served by a .gov domain.

adminscoffee 5y ago
why don't more of these people trust the government? were they wrong or perceived that they were wronged in some way? seems like a public relations image nightmare tbh.
- Daishiman 5y ago
  Because an entire branch of political ideology is built around the notion that the state cannot ever be possibly useful, and has worked for decades doing PR work to get people to believe this. Unfortunately, this turns into a self-fulfilling prophecy, since people running on this platform tend to be the worst kind of bureaucrats you could have.
  - no-s 5y ago
    > an entire branch of political ideology is built around the notion that the state cannot ever be possibly useful, This of course is used to reject the reality that too much of the any sort of government can be very dangerous thing and it’s often difficult to see this until it’s too late - tyrants often rise to power propelled by popular appeal. Ergo grudging skepticism towards the expansion of government power is perfectly reasonable...

nradov 5y ago

There is a non-anonymous sort of meta-analysis in the form of a letter containing corrections to an earlier flawed meta-analysis. (I'm not endorsing this letter, just pointing out that it exists.) https://journals.lww.com/americantherapeutics/fulltext/2021/10000/ivermectin,_a_reanalysis_of_the_data.9.aspx https://journals.lww.com/americantherapeutics/fulltext/2021/... I think though that most people aren't asking the right question about ivermectin. From a population health standpoint it's clearly not a viable alternative to vaccination (and I encourage everyone to get vaccinated if they can). But vaccination isn't 100% effective so there will continue to be many symptomatic breakthrough cases. So the real question is whether ivermectin should be added to the treatment protocol along with other drugs including monoclonal antibodies? Is it clinically justified on a risk / reward basis? https://www.covid19treatmentguidelines.nih.gov/about-the-guidelines/whats-new/ https://www.covid19treatmentguidelines.nih.gov/about-the-gui... The NIH is currently sponsoring a large scale clinical trial of ivermectin and other drugs. https://www.nih.gov/research-training/medical-research-initiatives/activ/covid-19-therapeutics-prioritized-testing-clinical-trials https://www.nih.gov/research-training/medical-research-initi... While waiting for results from that study does it make sense to act based on lower quality research? There are at least some small studies which appear to show a significant clinical benefit with minimal risk. https://www.mdpi.com/1999-4915/13/6/989 https://www.mdpi.com/1999-4915/13/6/989 https://www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5370(21)00239-X/fulltext https://www.thelancet.com/journals/eclinm/article/PIIS2589-5... https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/03000605211013550 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/03000605211013550 It's unfortunate that the issue has been so heavily politicized. Decisions on off-label drug use should generally be left up to individual physicians.

rubatuga 5y ago
Of course it makes sense to act on low quality evidence, it’s called a risk benefit discussion and it’s done everyday in doctors offices. Risk of ivermectin is low. Possible benefit is high. Calling something contrarian doesn’t make it any less true. It’s nuts how the basics of medicine have also been thrown out the window. Get the vaccine. And do your best to stay safe, including staying up to date on potential treatments.
chansiky 5y ago

raphlinus 5y ago

If people are looking for a real meta-analysis, currently the best one is from Cochrane. They recently put out an author interview[1] putting it into context. I find this whole topic fascinating, first the actual science, then the patterns of why people believe what they do. [1]: https://www.cochrane.org/news/ivermectin-cochranes-most-talked-about-review-so-far-ever-why https://www.cochrane.org/news/ivermectin-cochranes-most-talk...

YossarianFrPrez 5y ago
For anyone interested, here is the link to the review itself: https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD015017.pub2/full https://www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD...

spinny 5y ago

this is fascinating. while trump was president, all the leftards opposed getting the trump vax, as soon as the biden get installed and takes credit, the vax is pushed to the population with mandates on top. then of course, the issue becomes heavily politicized, and any deviation from leftard established course of action is an insurrection, worst than 9/11. the authors of whatever page on the internet are NOT your doctor, the author of this article is also NOT your doctor, the people pushing qtard crap are NOT you doctor, the people on facebook writing stupid comments are NOT your doctor. STOP TAKING MEDICAL ADVICE FROM INTERNET AND TALK TO A DOCTOR YOU TRUST.

Cyril_HN 5y ago
That's the issue. With healthcare being so expensive and strained, and especially young and poor (and the young are often poor) people not seeing doctors as often, people are less likely to have a doctor they trust.
lurquer 5y ago
Many doctors prescribe ivermectin. Many pharmacies refuse to fill the prescription. What then?
- spinny 5y ago
  if your doctor prescribes it to you and you have doubts about it, ask the doctor for clarification. pharmacies should not be refusing to fill a prescription, unless there is a doubt around the authenticity of the prescription (and the pharmacy probably has a procedure to report it). if it's possible to file some sort of complaint, that definitely should be done. the people at the pharmacy don't know more about your health than your doctor.
  - lurquer 5y ago
    File a complaint? What good is that? Every day that passes is vital when you have a fever and are getting increasingly ill by the hour. If only ivermectin was available without a prescription...

ipspam 5y ago

So interesting. They basically admit that Ivermectin might be effective, has low toxicity, is cheap, BUT, the science community has spent 18 months pushing vaccines and refuse to seriously look into Ivermectin. This is serious, serious malfeasance. The amount of effort out into destroying the doctor patient relationship and taking ivermectin out of the doctors toolbox is too great. That energy should have instead been spent answering the question. "One very large trial in humans appeared to show that ivermectin was effective against COVID-19, but it was later withdrawn following accusations of plagiarism and manipulated data. Since then, a number of small, variable-quality trials have had varying results. An analysis of the state of the field published in late July indicated it wasn't possible to use these studies to determine if ivermectin was helpful or harmful. The situation doesn't seem to have changed dramatically since. Currently, most health authorities indicate that there is no evidence supporting ivermectin's use against COVID-19." "None of this is to say that more definitive studies won't eventually determine that ivermectin is effective against COVID-19. But experienced public health authorities have concluded that those studies haven't been done yet and that the studies that have been done don't collectively amount to evidence."

credit_guy 5y ago
> the science community has spent 18 months pushing vaccines and refuse to seriously look into Ivermectin. The thing is, vaccines just work. They don't "might be effective", "could be", "maybe, perhaps". They just work. Ivermectin, might work, with "might" the crucial word. Running randomized double blind trials is not cheap. The "science community" is not a monolith, and doesn't have infinite resources. > This is serious, serious malfeasance. Who exactly is guilty of that "malfeasance"? Who had the money and the mandate to run the trials for Ivermectin and didn't? The US Government had the money and the Congressional mandate to run the Warp Speed program, and some of the programs it has underwritten have ended up in success (Pfizer, Moderna, J&J), and some didn't. Ivermectin was not part of Warp Speed. Again, who was supposed to do the trials, and is therefore guilty of "malfeasance" ?
- s1artibartfast 5y ago
  It would have been nice if the congress spent a few 10s of millions for a RCT. Funding could easily be through the NIH. Treatment options with even minor impact could have huge returns on investment given that we have seen 600k deaths and millions of severe cases. Treatment options are not a substitute for vaccination and are only framed as such out of political dogma. The government has an ethical mandate to overcome such dogma and act in the interests of saving lives, especially when the the cost is so low compared to trillions thrown around wildly in pandemic spending. People with public trust who are categorically opposed to treatment research are morally culpable for the deaths that could be prevented.

bob_neumann 5y ago

Utter Pradesh. 241 million mostly impoverished people. 13% of the population is vaccinated. But they're handing out prophylactic doses of ivermectin. And something has essentially eradicated Delta variant Covid. If it's not ivermectin, what is it?