10 ms·

If the consequence of not taking it is death, I think people would run to the front of the queue, though.

blackbear_ 5y ago
Soo, kinda like for a vaccine? (And to clarify what I am saying, even though the vaccine does prevent death, there is still considerable push back. Not sure why it will be different for this drug)
- pell 5y ago
  From what I understand it's taken once an infection is already established. Maybe it's easier to convince the "skeptics" under those circumstances to take potentially life-saving medicine.
  - roywiggins 5y ago
    Sure, those same skeptics, once they're sick, happily line up for an hourlong infusion of experimental monoclonal antibodies, which have similarly unknown "long-term side effects" or whatever they're worried about. It turns out that long-term side effects (which are a possibility with every livesaving medical intervention- what are the long-term side effects of CPR?) are a lot less scary compared to short-term death.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
  - foolfoolz 5y ago
    this drug (and all covid medicine) at this point is no longer about people hesitant to take the vaccine. this is about going back to a pre covid life. the vaccine does not protect you fully from covid 19. states in the u. s. and some eu countries have very high vaccination rates and still saw a wave of covid go through them, examples: vt, nh, de, nl. in all these places roughly 70% vaccination rate and many vaccinated people testing positive, some vaccinated dying. when this happens governments get scared. they start doing mask and vaccine mandates. things shut down. what if you could still have these waves but nearly eliminate the chance of anyone dying? then we could start treating this like an endemic cold or flu. i think these waves in high vaccine areas show convincing “vaccine skeptics” is not the gate to get there. we could be 100% vaccinated in areas and still see covid waves. the question is can we make it less risky to the point where we can go back to where we were
- mostertoaster 5y ago
  Oh I think it will be gladly accepted by unvaccinated folk. The reason being is most unvaccinated people don’t believe it isn’t effective, they don’t like being forced to protect themselves by a bunch of moral busybodies. I just accepted as soon as we saw that covid was spreading so quickly, welp I’m gonna get that. I figured I wouldn’t be that affected by it and wasn’t. Our parents said, well if I get it I get it, and if I die, I die, now let me see my grandkids. When the vaccine came out they were like sweet I’ll get it, can we stop these stupid mask wearing and social distancing crap. No, we can’t. So now us younger folk who aren’t afraid of covid aren’t getting vaccinated because we’re being forced to, and they’re going to keep up all the stupid rules like wearing masks everywhere anyways. An anti viral drug that is this effective gives even less reason to have any mandates around vaccines, so unvaccinated people will cheer this.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - TheOtherHobbes 5y ago
    Nice story. Meanwhile at least 5 million are dead - 750,000 in the US alone. How does your story help their families?
    - mostertoaster 5y ago
      I don’t think it helps their families. You know what does though, vaccines and this new anti-viral. So can I live my life and worry about own family and not someone’s I don’t know?
      - imajoredinecon 5y ago
        > So can I live my life and worry about own family and not someone’s I don’t know? Unfortunately, no. We live in a society where sometimes we have to take collective action to prevent collective harm. Taking personally inconvenient measures to help fight an epidemic is a prime example.
- tomatocracy 5y ago
  Away from the debate about who will or won't take the vaccines and why, isn't this is a huge positive for the small (but not tiny) number of people for whom vaccines don't provoke immune response (severely immunocompromised, etc)? That group are also more vulnerable to bad outcomes from Covid.
  - greedo 5y ago
    That's one of my hopes. I don't know if this would have an adverse reaction for immunocompromised patients, but if not that would be fantastic.
- thehappypm 5y ago
  It’s not really like a vaccine. A vaccine is almost more abstract. You’re not sick, and to continue not being sick, take these shots. With this treatment, you ARE sick. To become well, take these pills.
- HWR_14 5y ago
  There are a lot of hospital bed requests for the vaccine(1) from people who thought COVID wasn't a big deal. I'm fairly sure they'll take this drug once they experience the alternative. 1) Obviously, it's too late then. So it's only the most ignorant of people who changed their minds we have anecdotes of.
djrogers 5y ago
Sounds like the consequence of not taking it is a 0.5% chance of death, so probably not a lot of running for those who understand COVID death rates.
- johnday 5y ago
  If the drug has got this far into testing, there is no chance in hell that it has >0.5% chance of death (or other awful side-effects) on ingestion. So it's an upgrade either way.
- matsemann 5y ago
  It seems to me that you're one of those not understanding COVID death rates, though. Firstly, even though I doubt your number a bit, even a 1/200 chance of death is mighty high enough for most people to seek treatment for something. Secondly, if you're already infected, the pill is probably less risky than those 1/200. Thirdly, the chance of death isn't equal for everyone. A healthy young person might have a 10x reduced risk, while an older person with an existing condition a 10x increased risk. So at least for one of them the new medicine is clearly worth trying.
  - aj7 5y ago
    A 1/200 chance of death is gigantic.
    - xanaxagoras 5y ago
      So are the people who land in that numerator - a correlation that's not permitted in the public discourse apparently.
    - ddingus 5y ago
      Right! It floors me to see so many not internalizing what that means.
  - bellyfullofbac 5y ago
    People think 0.5% is low, but e.g. JFK airport has about 500 takeoffs a day, if on average every day 2 or 3 planes that flew out of JFK crashed, how would they feel about air travel?
dontcare007 5y ago
But that's just it, there's less than a 2% chance of dying even if you get COVID.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- s_dev 5y ago
  A 2% chance of death is actually very high risk for most people. Obviously with a name like dontcare007 I'm sure you've a huge appetite for risk that others don't.
  - bena 5y ago
    If 2% of domestic flights in the US crashed, that would be about 100 plane crashes. Per day. An accident rate of less than 1% grounded the Boeing 737 MAX. In a study of the aircraft, the FAA estimated there would have been 15 crashes over 30 years. This was seen as unacceptable.
  - tinco 5y ago
    There's a 40% chance Mr. Bond here would have died before his latest film "No Time To Die", if he had a 2% chance of death in each movie ;)
- adrianN 5y ago
  There is a much higher chance of dying when you're in the ICU with Covid and a doctor thinks it's appropriate to prescribe this new medication.
  - makomk 5y ago
    The trouble is that the new medications probably don't work by the time you're in the ICU with Covid. I'm not sure it was tested with this one specifically, but at least one of the recently-approved medications was previously trialled on ICU patients and showed no benefit - they had to do another study giving it to people who hadn't been hospitalized yet to get any useful reduction in deaths, and there's some reason to think this is an inherent limitation of drugs that try and reduce viral replication. This study only seems to cover patients who haven't been hospitalized at the point when they start the treatment.
peakaboo 5y ago
If you watch the mass media, that's the impression they love to give, yup. :)

Soo, kinda like for a vaccine? (And to clarify what I am saying, even though the vaccine does prevent death, there is still considerable push back. Not sure why it will be different for this drug)

pell 5y ago
From what I understand it's taken once an infection is already established. Maybe it's easier to convince the "skeptics" under those circumstances to take potentially life-saving medicine.
- roywiggins 5y ago
  Sure, those same skeptics, once they're sick, happily line up for an hourlong infusion of experimental monoclonal antibodies, which have similarly unknown "long-term side effects" or whatever they're worried about. It turns out that long-term side effects (which are a possibility with every livesaving medical intervention- what are the long-term side effects of CPR?) are a lot less scary compared to short-term death.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- foolfoolz 5y ago
  this drug (and all covid medicine) at this point is no longer about people hesitant to take the vaccine. this is about going back to a pre covid life. the vaccine does not protect you fully from covid 19. states in the u. s. and some eu countries have very high vaccination rates and still saw a wave of covid go through them, examples: vt, nh, de, nl. in all these places roughly 70% vaccination rate and many vaccinated people testing positive, some vaccinated dying. when this happens governments get scared. they start doing mask and vaccine mandates. things shut down. what if you could still have these waves but nearly eliminate the chance of anyone dying? then we could start treating this like an endemic cold or flu. i think these waves in high vaccine areas show convincing “vaccine skeptics” is not the gate to get there. we could be 100% vaccinated in areas and still see covid waves. the question is can we make it less risky to the point where we can go back to where we were
mostertoaster 5y ago
Oh I think it will be gladly accepted by unvaccinated folk. The reason being is most unvaccinated people don’t believe it isn’t effective, they don’t like being forced to protect themselves by a bunch of moral busybodies. I just accepted as soon as we saw that covid was spreading so quickly, welp I’m gonna get that. I figured I wouldn’t be that affected by it and wasn’t. Our parents said, well if I get it I get it, and if I die, I die, now let me see my grandkids. When the vaccine came out they were like sweet I’ll get it, can we stop these stupid mask wearing and social distancing crap. No, we can’t. So now us younger folk who aren’t afraid of covid aren’t getting vaccinated because we’re being forced to, and they’re going to keep up all the stupid rules like wearing masks everywhere anyways. An anti viral drug that is this effective gives even less reason to have any mandates around vaccines, so unvaccinated people will cheer this.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- TheOtherHobbes 5y ago
  Nice story. Meanwhile at least 5 million are dead - 750,000 in the US alone. How does your story help their families?
  - mostertoaster 5y ago
    I don’t think it helps their families. You know what does though, vaccines and this new anti-viral. So can I live my life and worry about own family and not someone’s I don’t know?
    - imajoredinecon 5y ago
      > So can I live my life and worry about own family and not someone’s I don’t know? Unfortunately, no. We live in a society where sometimes we have to take collective action to prevent collective harm. Taking personally inconvenient measures to help fight an epidemic is a prime example.
tomatocracy 5y ago
Away from the debate about who will or won't take the vaccines and why, isn't this is a huge positive for the small (but not tiny) number of people for whom vaccines don't provoke immune response (severely immunocompromised, etc)? That group are also more vulnerable to bad outcomes from Covid.
- greedo 5y ago
  That's one of my hopes. I don't know if this would have an adverse reaction for immunocompromised patients, but if not that would be fantastic.
thehappypm 5y ago
It’s not really like a vaccine. A vaccine is almost more abstract. You’re not sick, and to continue not being sick, take these shots. With this treatment, you ARE sick. To become well, take these pills.
HWR_14 5y ago
There are a lot of hospital bed requests for the vaccine(1) from people who thought COVID wasn't a big deal. I'm fairly sure they'll take this drug once they experience the alternative. 1) Obviously, it's too late then. So it's only the most ignorant of people who changed their minds we have anecdotes of.

djrogers 5y ago

Sounds like the consequence of not taking it is a 0.5% chance of death, so probably not a lot of running for those who understand COVID death rates.

johnday 5y ago
If the drug has got this far into testing, there is no chance in hell that it has >0.5% chance of death (or other awful side-effects) on ingestion. So it's an upgrade either way.
matsemann 5y ago
It seems to me that you're one of those not understanding COVID death rates, though. Firstly, even though I doubt your number a bit, even a 1/200 chance of death is mighty high enough for most people to seek treatment for something. Secondly, if you're already infected, the pill is probably less risky than those 1/200. Thirdly, the chance of death isn't equal for everyone. A healthy young person might have a 10x reduced risk, while an older person with an existing condition a 10x increased risk. So at least for one of them the new medicine is clearly worth trying.
- aj7 5y ago
  A 1/200 chance of death is gigantic.
  - xanaxagoras 5y ago
    So are the people who land in that numerator - a correlation that's not permitted in the public discourse apparently.
  - ddingus 5y ago
    Right! It floors me to see so many not internalizing what that means.
- bellyfullofbac 5y ago
  People think 0.5% is low, but e.g. JFK airport has about 500 takeoffs a day, if on average every day 2 or 3 planes that flew out of JFK crashed, how would they feel about air travel?

dontcare007 5y ago

But that's just it, there's less than a 2% chance of dying even if you get COVID.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
s_dev 5y ago
A 2% chance of death is actually very high risk for most people. Obviously with a name like dontcare007 I'm sure you've a huge appetite for risk that others don't.
- bena 5y ago
  If 2% of domestic flights in the US crashed, that would be about 100 plane crashes. Per day. An accident rate of less than 1% grounded the Boeing 737 MAX. In a study of the aircraft, the FAA estimated there would have been 15 crashes over 30 years. This was seen as unacceptable.
- tinco 5y ago
  There's a 40% chance Mr. Bond here would have died before his latest film "No Time To Die", if he had a 2% chance of death in each movie ;)
adrianN 5y ago
There is a much higher chance of dying when you're in the ICU with Covid and a doctor thinks it's appropriate to prescribe this new medication.
- makomk 5y ago
  The trouble is that the new medications probably don't work by the time you're in the ICU with Covid. I'm not sure it was tested with this one specifically, but at least one of the recently-approved medications was previously trialled on ICU patients and showed no benefit - they had to do another study giving it to people who hadn't been hospitalized yet to get any useful reduction in deaths, and there's some reason to think this is an inherent limitation of drugs that try and reduce viral replication. This study only seems to cover patients who haven't been hospitalized at the point when they start the treatment.

peakaboo 5y ago

If you watch the mass media, that's the impression they love to give, yup. :)