5 ms·

Sorry, but you've been duped by supplement sellers' marketing material. Xlear is just a branded Xylitol nasal spray. You can go buy it right now if you want. T

Sorry, but you've been duped by supplement sellers' marketing material. Xlear is just a branded Xylitol nasal spray. You can go buy it right now if you want. The regulatory action only limited them from claiming that it was effective against COVID without evidence, which is a very good thing. Xylitol is a cheap, common ingredient that supplement makers have been trying to push as a wonder drug for a long time. Xylitol nasal spray does not appear to be an effective COVID treatment. COVID was a gold rush for supplement marketers. Everyone who wanted to sell more supplements was looking for an angle to suggest that their supplement might be helpful. Pushing press releases to Yahoo Finance and Business Wire is an easy way to get your name out there. The only hit for "xlear" and "covid" on PubMed is this one case report written by authors with financial ties to Xlear: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33173650/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33173650/ They only used 3 mild-moderate COVID patients and zero controls: > We present a series of three mild-moderate risks, symptomatic, COVID-19 patients, treated with the intranasal combination, as an adjuvant to their ongoing treatment, with rapid clinical improvement and shorten time to negativization on repeat intranasal swab test via PCR. Their claim that it shortened time to negativization doesn't make any sense because they didn't have a control group to compare against. This is junk supplement marketing material pretending to be science. Please don't promote it.

arcticfox 5y ago
Thank you for debunking that comment and spelling out the problems. Without this explanation I'd have no idea.
- PragmaticPulp 5y ago
  When something sounds too good to be true it's easy to visit https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ and run a search for published literature However, be careful! Savvy supplement companies will give large ownernship shares to doctors in exchange for essentially manufacturing positive-looking literature and pushing it to pay-to-publish journals. You have to read the conflict of interest sections and have a high degree of suspicion to make sure you're reading a real study instead of astroturfing
  - omginternets 5y ago
    At the end of the day, there is no substitute for reading a large amount of primary sources and really trying to understand what's going on.
    - azinman2 5y ago
      The problem with this is that you need expertise in the area of interest to know what’s good or bad research, what’s commonly known, and who generally is doing good work. This is too much to ask for the general public in areas like biology, which is why we have experts to filter the information. The collapse of trust in expertise only widens the possibility for junk to be pushed through, which will result in a terrible self-actualizing cycle. When you see on social media “I did the research and found…”, all that means is someone put something into google and read something that fit a confirmation bias with zero criticality or training on how to interpret what they read.
      - omginternets 5y ago
        A large (majority?) part of gaining an expertise is precisely through a large volume of meticulous reading. But I think we're saying the same thing: most people "doing their own research", are not doing meaningful research, partly because it's a herculean undertaking.
perardi 5y ago
I’m sorry, but, to be succinct about that study: lol Go and read the 3 patient studies they describe. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7645297/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7645297/ Not only was there not a control group, the 3 patients had almost nothing in common. Totally different ages, totally different medical histories. What an absolute garbage study.

arcticfox 5y ago

Thank you for debunking that comment and spelling out the problems. Without this explanation I'd have no idea.

PragmaticPulp 5y ago
When something sounds too good to be true it's easy to visit https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ and run a search for published literature However, be careful! Savvy supplement companies will give large ownernship shares to doctors in exchange for essentially manufacturing positive-looking literature and pushing it to pay-to-publish journals. You have to read the conflict of interest sections and have a high degree of suspicion to make sure you're reading a real study instead of astroturfing
- omginternets 5y ago
  At the end of the day, there is no substitute for reading a large amount of primary sources and really trying to understand what's going on.
  - azinman2 5y ago
    The problem with this is that you need expertise in the area of interest to know what’s good or bad research, what’s commonly known, and who generally is doing good work. This is too much to ask for the general public in areas like biology, which is why we have experts to filter the information. The collapse of trust in expertise only widens the possibility for junk to be pushed through, which will result in a terrible self-actualizing cycle. When you see on social media “I did the research and found…”, all that means is someone put something into google and read something that fit a confirmation bias with zero criticality or training on how to interpret what they read.
    - omginternets 5y ago
      A large (majority?) part of gaining an expertise is precisely through a large volume of meticulous reading. But I think we're saying the same thing: most people "doing their own research", are not doing meaningful research, partly because it's a herculean undertaking.

perardi 5y ago

I’m sorry, but, to be succinct about that study: lol Go and read the 3 patient studies they describe. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7645297/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7645297/ Not only was there not a control group, the 3 patients had almost nothing in common. Totally different ages, totally different medical histories. What an absolute garbage study.