One thing that deeply offends me is when members of the officialdom lie, even when it is the artful sort of lying that is narrowly true. The case study today is the FDA (and joined at the CDC) position on Ivermectin as a Covid treatment and possibly prophylactic.1 As readers may recall, official opposition was ferocious, to the degree that we had to curtail discussion in comments due to concerns about becoming the target of an effort to discredit the site generally. See this page on the FDA site:
As you can see below, the FDA is trying to act as if it never opposed the use of the anti-parasitic drug Ivermectin for Covid by now saying doctors could prescribe it for so-called off label use, as they can any other approved medication. For instance, most of the prescriptions for Botox are for off label uses.
IM Doc blasted this claim in an e-mail we are hoisting as a post below. Not only were doctors risking their licenses if they recommended Ivermectin, but one reader reported he asked about Ivermectin at his local pharmacy, to see if he could get it quickly if he could get a doctor to prescribe it. He was told the pharmacy would refuse to fill an Rx of Ivermectin for Covid.2
The tweet below seems to confirm that reader’s claim, that pharmacies were actually refusing to fill Ivermectin scrips:
Straight from the horse’s mouth. Now time for @US_FDA to issue a statement so my patients can get their prescriptions filled at @cvspharmacy and @Walgreens.https://t.co/r5khovfAfe
— Mary Talley Bowden MD (@MdBreathe) August 11, 2023
I am first posting an e-mail from KLG with key facts about Ivermectin (including pointing out, contra skeptics’ claims, that there is a mechanism by which Ivermectin could blunt Covid cases):
My comment on Ivermectin:
- The drug was discovered/developed by William Campbell and Satoshi Ōmura as an antiparasitic drug.
- They won the Nobel Prize in 2015 for the discovery.
- The data that show IVM interferes with viral RNA replication are solid even if they have been ignored; the argument that IVM is not bioavailable at high enough concentrations to work in humans is reasonable but not necessarily correct. What happens in the animal is not always what happens in animal cells in a tissue culture dish. If IVM does have this activity, that will explain why it works best when used very early in the course of a COVID infection.
- IVM is exceedingly safe at high doses in humans. This has been known for a long time.
- Yes, “horse paste” (Thanks, Rachel!) for de-worming horses and other livestock is just that, sold at Tractor Supply and other similar businesses; you can also buy animal-grade antibiotics without a prescription at these supply houses AFAIK.
- Pharmaceutical grade IVM is not “horse paste,” but it is cheap at a few cents per dose. Therefore, the profits to be made on IVM are small.
- IVM will not harm those who take it at high doses and may work, so why not?
- The repurposing of drugs has a long tradition in medicine. Thalidomide is now a treatment of choice for lymphoma IIRC.
- That the exact mechanism for any drug is unknown is a nonsensical argument argument against its use. The mechanism of aspirin as a cyclooxygenase suicide inhibitor was identified fairly recently (1970s) compared how long aspirin has been used as a pain reliever. Bayer patented aspirin (acetylsalicylic acid, acetylsalicylate with dissolved in water) at the end of the 19th century. The legend that willow bark tea (which is loaded with salicylates) was used by the ancients as an analgesic might be only that, however.
I wonder if we have any vets or animal breeders in the house. The “animal-grade” I suspect is not accurate. The FDA points out that pharmaceutical grade is pharmaceutical grade, whether for veterinary or human use; I have specifically had doctors say that veterinary grade injectable hyaluronic acid was the same as human injectable hyaluronic acid and more generally that veterinary grade was pharmaceutical grade (injectable hyaluronic acid was commonly used in sports circles for injuries until Big Pharma cracked down and made it pretty much impossible for mere mortals to buy it online). So if the “horse paste” was veterinary grade, the Ivermectin would have been of the same standard as Ivermectin sold for human use. The issues with the veterinary product would be the other ingredients to make it palatable for animals (as in some human digestive tracts might not like them) and dosing (particularly since many Americans are bad at math)..
Now to IM Doc:
The reputation of both my profession of medicine and medical science in general is in complete tatters.
I am a medical doctor. I have trained students to be a medical doctor for decades. I am very familiar with what all has happened in my own lifetime and I have studied relentlessly what has happened in previous eras.
At some point, the fundamental issue is that medicine is itself a science – but it is also an art. The art mainly has to do with dealing with the most complex creature on Earth – the human brain and the human soul. Our forebears recognized long ago that as a PHYSICIAN – you cannot deal with one and not the other. It is simply impossible.
Part of that is laying down a groundwork of basic rules that must be followed. Rules that have stood the test of time to help patients where they are, with what is going on in their lives and bodies, and to be able to deal with them as human beings, no matter what their personality type or mental issues are. No matter where their soul is at any given time. It is not easy and it takes years to get used to – but it is the only way. There are fundamental precepts that must be followed on every single encounter. You must include the patient and their family in every decision. You must be honest and truthful with them in every way. You must realize that everything we do has a possible benefit and a possible risk and you must include them in your decision making and make sure they understand all of this all of the time. Medicine is about the individual and what is best for them. Public health has exactly the same precepts, but the organism is the entire population – not just one person.
We have failed in almost every aspect in the past 3 years.
There have been two issues this week, this Ivermectin thing is one of them, that have demonstrated to me the complete moral failure of our entire apparatus. I have completely lost faith in the whole system. My faith is gone and will never return.
You simply cannot with a straight face get up in front of the country that has seen what has happened the past 3 years and announce that doctors were always allowed to prescribe Ivermectin. That we did nothing to impede this. What a total crock.
We have multiple MDs across the country to this day still dealing with board issues and hospital privileging issues because of this.
The other knee slapper going around this week is “we never forced anyone to take this vaccine.” First of all, that commentary, it seems to me, would not be a defense posture emanating from a safe vaccine. It seems to me that you would not have to be verbalizing that if everything was A-OK.
But more importantly, I have had to deal with the human tragedies the mandates have caused over the past few years. Not the least of which is the continuing dumpster fire that our hospitals and clinics have become from sea to shining sea after the mass resignations they caused. But I have looked too many young fathers in the eye in my exam room to let this lie slide. As Klemperer said about European Jewry – I WILL BEAR WITNESS. They can lie all they want, the truth will out – and it will very soon be very obvious to every American what has happened.
We are currently experiencing yet another wave of COVID where I am. A previous one went through about a month or so ago. It is the exact same story – I have heard not a word from any unvaccinated patients. The ones seeming to be infected and calling for illness are the multiply vaxxed and boosted. The only ones getting admitted, as rare as it is, are the multiply vaxxed. I have had a feeling for a long time that this is selection bias as they are more likely to be baseline ill.
I continue to have the very wealthy and the very connected demanding IVM for themselves when sick. And I continue to see the same results – mostly they seem to get better much quicker.
And back to the comment above – the risk of this med is ZERO. It seems to have some benefit. I explain this graphically every time I give it to someone. They are often using all kinds of other supplements as well. Their family members who take Paxlovid seem to take longer to get better. I have been doing this for 30 years – I am able to make patterns in my practice like this and act accordingly. I will assure you, I am not a lunatic. I am doing my best to help the people in my care.
The past few months I have had multiple med students from coastal elite universities here. True believers in the “safe and effective” mantra, and the “IVM is horsepaste” mantra.
But now they are out in flyover in the real country, uncloistered from all the Pharma reps and shills back home in Big Med. Twice now, they have been in rooms with me with parents and young male patients with disabling myocarditis. Stunned that this was “like a real issue, man”. I have implored them every month to keep their eyes out for any unvaxxed COVID positive patient. At the end of the month, they are mystified that they are not to be found. But most importantly, they are the ones who follow up with phone calls on all the COVID patients – and can clearly see that the few who are on the horse paste do seem to be getting better much more solidly than others.
I would love to have trials for this drug and COVID. Real trials that were unbiased and helpful. No such trials exist – other than multiple positive ones from all over the world that our authorities have dismissed. The TOGETHER trial that was heralded as the nail in the coffin was horrendously done. It did not really answer any of the questions. Most importantly, they have refused to release the raw data. That is a bright burning red flag. But the nuclear red flag is the sponsorship of the study by FTX and SBF. What the hell is a corrupt political money laundering unit doing sponsoring a trial of this import?
The critics argue – YOU DO NOT HAVE A MECHANISM – HOW DOES THIS EVEN WORK – WHAT A JOKE. HOW CAN A WORM PILL WORK OF A VIRUS? Excuse me, how is this any different than countless other drugs in my lifetime – and why is Ivermectin being singled out for ridicule in this way?
Just this week – trumpeted by our MSM for days – was the somewhat flimsy study showing the “blockbuster” effects that ozempic like drugs may have on CAD. Why are the media not demanding an exact mechanism like they did for ivermectin? Why are they not ridiculing the fact that a DM med is being used for heart disease? Why indeed?
The most damaging aspect of Ivermectin though is the ridicule and derision directed at those families who wanted it used at the end of life. After 30 years of dealing with these families, you realize how important it is for a majority of people that everything possible be done for their loved ones. And done by a trusted physician explaining everything. There are so many times in medicine that we do ALL KINDS of things at the end of life that we know are completely futile – but we are mainly treating the family members. In my entire life, this has been accepted as treating the family and their ongoing mental health more than the patient.
And here we have had all these families all over the country wanting this completely safe intervention given as a last resort. And met with derision and ridicule and even the health system getting the authorities involved. Shame on us all………how much better would it have been to sit the family down in a conference room – “Guys, we have no evidence this Ivermectin will work… none at all….but we will give it to Grandma just to see what happens…..it is a completely safe drug and who knows – it may help – it is the least we can do.” But no – we shat all over years of lived experience and threw rationality out the window. We made literal enemies of so many across this country – I hear from them a lot – their families and their church families, etc.
I am not sure the profession will survive intact from what is about to happen. This kind of stuff from the FDA this week is like pouring salt on wounds. They just cannot help themselves.
____
1 My NYC MD was willing to write one scrip before the anti-Ivermectin campaign really got rolling, in the spirit, “It has a great safety profile, can’t hurt, so why not?” But I didn’t bother asking a second time.
I am not going to litigate the issue of efficacy here. Generally speaking, the studies on Ivermectin have been seriously underpowered due to there being no money to test for uses of old, cheap, off patent drugs. The studies that found no results for active Covid cases were criticized by Ivermectin fans for administering the drug late compared to when it had been found to be beneficial (shortly after symptom onset, while the studies were typically at least a day after a case had been confirmed by PCR test, which for most patients would be at the very fastest 48 hours after symptom onset…..You have to feel bad, then rouse yourself to get a PCR test, then get results).
2 US pharmacy-knowledgable readers are encouraged to pipe up. When I get prescriptions filled, the scrip does not show the diagnosis, so I do not see how in the normal course of events a pharmacy could determine the intended use for a medication. But I am not in a pharmacy plan. Is the diagnosis shared in those cases? In other words, this pharmacist may have been way out over his skis in trying to prevent Ivermectin use.
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>I do not see how in the normal course of events a pharmacy could determine the intended use for a medication
I’m guessing it’s the number of prescriptions that would be a flag, not any particular diagnosis code. Same as during the opioid crisis when you could tell who was corrupt by the number/proportion a certain doctor was responsible for. Only difference now is how we’ve changed the concept of “corrupt”
Or how the soon replacement Presidential candidate to be, Governor Gavin Newsom, warned every single licensed medical professional, from M.D.s to Nurses in the state that they could lose their license and their livelyhood for even mentioning Ivermectin. More of his “California Freedoms” he crows about.
https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2022-10-06/spreading-lies-about-covid-19-could-get-doctors-disciplined-in-california
Going to print multiple copies of IM Doc’s note, rubber cement the edge of sheets of of paper and tear one off to hand to everyone working and post it in every breakroom in our establishment. Thank you Yves.
I have a couple of old (non-Covid) prescription meds sitting around. The labels describe the symptoms the medicines are for but not the diagnosis.
I called to fill an IVM script here in Medford OR. the Pharmacist said “Is that for COVID? We won’t fill it.”
For a while there was noise that the OR pharmacy board was going to crak down on pharms filling IVM COVID scripts. But I eventually got it filled in Roseburg OR.
The GP who wrote the script got called on the carpet for writing it…..
Enuf said…
From the beginning of covid, I read everything I could about it. I’m not connected to the medical field at all, but I was skeptical of what I saw happening. (My dad got cancer and died from Agent Orange and my brother-in-law got brain tumors from the water at Camp Lejune) Thanks in great part to IM Doc. I didn’t trust the MRNA vaccines, but the place I worked mandated vaccines. I went with the J&J. My nephew got the MRNA and he had facial paralysis that lasted a few weeks. I then read about IVM. I looked online and ordered some from India. I ordered enough for my extended family. When they got covid, they had IVM to take. (Noting to be careful about if you take other drugs) I recently had been concerned about possible bird flu spreading to humans. I looked into flu medicines in India. Something has changed and I can not order from India anymore.
I got some via local C-V ess. Pharmacist looked at me cross-eyed, but filled it. Scrip was from an online doc.
Spent twice as much to get 10x the pills from India.
B*******! Double B*******! Do they think that people don’t remember? Here is a tweet about Ivermectin from 2021-
https://twitter.com/TNAgriculture/status/1432747015507779586
And here is the CDC advisory from August of 2021 linked to that tweet-
https://emergency.cdc.gov/han/2021/pdf/CDC_HAN_449.pdf
And it wasn’t just the American medical establishment that was corrupted by this. Here are some headlines from 2021 here in Oz regarding Ivermectin – or as we use to call it, the drug that cannot be named-
“New restrictions on prescribing Ivermectin for COVID-19”
“Restrictions placed on Ivermectin use in general practice’
“Melbourne clinic offers Ivermectin despite it not being approved as a Covid treatment’
“Thinking of trying Ivermectin for COVID? Here’s what can happen with this controversial drug”
“Ivermectin is not being given to COVID-19 patients in Australia”
“Doctors concerned by Melbourne medical group selling controversial drug to fight COVID-19 ”
Doctors here were threatened if they prescribed this drug and it was made illegal to have doctors prescribe it for Covid at all. I didn’t bother asking my own doctor at the time. But now since June 1st of this year, ‘the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) has removed the restriction through its scheduling in the Poisons Standard because there is sufficient evidence that the safety risks to individuals and public health is low when prescribed by a general practitioner in the current health climate.’
https://www.tga.gov.au/news/media-releases/removal-prescribing-restrictions-ivermectin
Though this Australian Associated Press Fact Check page said it is not really so-
https://www.aap.com.au/factcheck/no-ivermectin-has-not-been-ruled-safe-and-effective-against-covid/
So why the turnaround? I would guess that it has sunk in to our Overlords that Long Covid is getting the general population sicker and sicker over time. And that will have an effect on the economy, god forbid. Now that Big Phrama had their massive profits locked in, they will now allow stuff like Ivermectin to get a look in or else there be a giant drag on the economy by having too many sick workers. But I remain convinced to this day that as part of negotiations, countries had to ban stuff like Ivermectin or else they would not be allowed to buy any “miracle” vaccines.
Thanks for all the supporting detail. Shortly after the post went live, I ran down an article on the FDA site recommending strongly against Ivermectin as a Covid treatment and added the screenshot.
Why the turnaround?
One part pressure from below, can’t suppress stories about Ivermectin forever.
Another part pressure from the side, meaning fellow pharma companies and their followers.
They want to get out in front of the inevitable backlash against the FDA and pharma, counting on short memories among patients and among the public in general. Too much riding on cashflow streams to allow much disruption. Nobody wants another Vioxx situation, for example.
“Do they think that people don’t remember?”
Yes, they do. Or that people can be made to un-remember. It’s all about narrative control: change the story and change the world. Or so they think. Ukraine, the trans industry, the economy, public health, whateves….
Of course, reality is undeterred by these efforts.
This is why I rant on about the trans industry. It’s not just about mutilating children for profit. It’s about dictating how we interpret reality. Here is a really interesting talk about it and why it’s so hard to fight:
Woke Subjectivism: Feelings Over Facts | Peter Boghossian & Mark Goldblatt
Mark Goldblatt is an author, essayist, and theologian. In his recent book “I Feel, Therefore I Am: The Triumph of Woke Subjectivism,” Goldblatt examines the tension between subjective belief and the inescapable demands of reality.
Goldblatt is an education professor at SUNY’s Fashion Institute of Technology. His other books include “Might as Well Be Dead,” the “Twerp” series, and “Bumper Sticker Liberalism.” Goldblatt’s essays can be found in The New York Times, Newsday, The New York Post, USA Today, Reason Magazine, and many other publications.
https://www.youtube.com/live/I8SmOXdhlEY?feature=share
https://www.tracesofwar.com/articles/4896/Extermination-camp-Sobibor.htm
“…….Meanwhile the prisoners were standing outside again, on a field in the center of Lager I, where they were spoken to by SS-Oberscharführer Hermann Michel….He was wearing a white coat to give the impression that he was a doctor. The victims still had no idea what was in store for them. They saw neatly laid out gardens with flowerbeds and freshly painted placards with signs like “canteen” and “shower rooms.” ……..
Former prisoner Ada Lichtmann remembers:
“We heard word by word how SS-Oberscharführer Michel, standing on a small table put the people at ease in a convincing and soft voice. He promised them, all of their belongings would be given back to them after the shower ….”
Survivor Jules Schelvis remembers the words of the speech as follows:
“As you have been on the train for a long time, sanitary methods are necessary. Therefore you will have to undress in order to take a shower in the bathhouse further away. Your clothes will be guarded. You will hand over gold and jewelry at the desk. You will have to remember the number you have been given in order to easily retrieve your belongings later. There is soap and a towel for two…..”
Heck, this was just a few weeks ago:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2023/07/26/covid-misinformation-doctor-discipline/
Completely oblivious hit piece on IVM.
I have been very skeptical of the use of ivermectin as an anti-viral, especially because the data are not particularly convincing. But I keep reading more and more people say that it helped them with Covid, so who knows. This is the type of thing that needs to be investigated thoroughly, but there is too much emotion on both sides of the issue, and that doesn’t answer any questions. I personally use ivermectin to treat wild animals such as fox in my neighborhood, because some of them have terrible mange. It is definitely a miracle drug when it comes to worming and treating mange. To my knowledge, the animal grade ivermectin is very similar, if not identical, to the human grade drug.
the stinky part is the withholding of the raw data—that is the essence of the scientific method: step 1, “show me the data!”
step 2, let me replicate that.
Barring extraordinary circumstances, anyone who withholds data for “proprietary” reasons should have a presumption of being dodgy.
The real problem is that there are very few good research studies that even hint that ivermectin is of any use and I think we are talking literally 1,000s of studies from countries all over the world. IIRC, some of the papers that show good results for ivermectin come from countries where internal parasites are common, suggesting that the results “could” be due to treating a parasite problem. I don’t remember if anyone has followed up on this.
There are some bad, and almost certainly fraudulent, papers showing great results.
Up until roughly the middle or late 19th C bleeding was felt to be a great treatment.
The “they are in countries with parasites’ is a nonsensical argument. That would imply the baseline level of health was lower. In addition, the poor countries with widespread parasites have been administering ivermectin 2x a month for decades, so any ivermectin for Covid would be over and above an anti-parasitic dose.
And you are incorrect in your assertion about study results. There are tons of studies with positive findings but they are dismissed for not being RCTs.
The “good” studies administer IVM typically 5 days or later after symptom onset, which is way way later than the what those who have found it to be helpful administer it.
As I said, the reason there have been no “good” studies is that clinical trials cost hundreds of millions of dollars, and no one will spend that on a cheap off patent drug that is legal to prescribe anyhow.
But I sure can tell you the “good” studies with negative findings were crap. And the fact that they were not done honestly should tell you something.
One of the possible reasons that there were no “good studies” on IVM, is that a positive result showing it was a good prophylactic or early treatment drug might threaten the vaccines EUA. If you were of the conspiracy-minded sort, of course.
From what I understand Ivermectin has anti-viral qualities – this is from the NIH –
“Ivermectin as a Broad-Spectrum Host-Directed Antiviral: The Real Deal?”
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32942671/
Interestingly, this article was from September 2020, just before the plague.
Last year after being turned down tying to get IVM at local pharmacies I finally found one who would sell it, but it was $150 for 10 days worth. This is a med that sells for about 10 cents a pill worldwide.
A friend of mine who boards horses and is familiar with the veterinary version told me that he figured the “horse paste” was perfectly safe as it is given to some very expensive horses.
I took “horse paste” as a prophylactic during the Delta wave. I’m still here. The only thing to watch out for is it is often mixed with other drugs. Don’t do that.
Readers also seem to be ignoring KLG pointing out that Ivermectin has RNA effects that could impede Covid replication
Absolutely correct. There is not a single well conducted study from any country demonstrating beneficial effects of ivermectin in treating COVID-19. There is no coverup. The drug does not work for this disease, despite all the anecdotes and apocryphal stories to the contrary. Frankly, I have no idea why we are litigating this again. Whether or not the FDA discouraged or blocked the prescribing of IM does not alter the greater truth that no one was harmed by not having received the drug.
If and when a large scale properly designed and executed study showing benefit is published in a peer-reviewed journal, then I will change my view, but not until then.
You are making an unwarranted logical leap. The fact that there are no good studies does not prove lack of efficacy.
The studies with negative findings on Covid were not well conducted, as IM Doc indicated The studies with positive findings were underpowered, because doing a large scale study to the standard you want because they are costly and there is no money to be made for that on an old, cheap, off patent drug.
There are PLENTY of off label uses of medications done based on studies far too small to be considered “good”. My father was given one for his autoimmune disease on a study of eight. This by the top med school in the South by its top rheumatologist.
So don’t pretend your personal standard is the prevailing standard.
will a ‘good study” ,really change your mind?
I can only guess you haven’t been paying attention to the rampant doublespeak that has been associated with ivermectin and the honest attempt by well meaning care givers for the last couple of years, like at FLCCC; who were literally attacked for TRYING to help people.
To not see that people’s whose actions were reprehensible(the academic/media/institutional/corporate powers that be),and obviously done in bad faith , would exclude someone from being able to pretend they were competent, and really anyone who should be given any weight to their opinion.
Ivermectin seemed to work for a bunch of people I know… some anecdata
Thanks for clearing this up for all of us Rob. I am in part envious of your omniscience.
No actually the medical community undermined the studies and dismissed people who did studies that showed good results from Ivermectin. A doctor and WHO consultant who specialty is collating and interpreting data has been smeared for their work showing the efficacy of Invermectin and shunning the vaccines. I’m so tired of being gaslit and lied to. It’s sickening, devious and probably downright criminal if not murderous.
The thing that struck me at the time was the ‘horse paste’ slur, warfarin, which is a ‘rat paste’, has kept my mother’s vascular system pretty clear for the last 5 years.
The more modern substitute, anababclym (or something scientitious like that) had two side effects,
1. there was no need to monitor,
2..it wrecks digestive functions.
Admittedly this n=1, but I would happily share my experience in any ‘meta sudy’*
* a beuractatic effort to find some vague consensus
The ‘horse paste’ line was like a PMC catch phrase that could caricature IVM advocates as non-urban, and probably thus deplorable Trump-voting racists. They live nearer to a feed store than a Starbucks… nuff said. It is one of the tells that can alert you to zombies.
“Horse paste” and the audacity to go online and do your own research. These were the cardinal sins and a sure sign of belonging to the basket of deplorables after Bidenistas assumed power.
Yeah. It’s actually an oil based liquid, massaged into the skin of the patient, generally the inner thighs if you are hominoid. Nothing pasty about it at all, I got a bottle from the local farmers co-op, said bottle is always by my side.
I have also had the pleasure of taking the veternarian tablets – at a dosage fit for a horse, (we misread the instructions on the prescription, alas it was in French and govt issue too boot). Quite possibly the biggest tablet that I have ever had the pleasure of swallowing. Survived though.
The ivermectin horse paste is approved for pregnant and nursing horses, some of whom could be worth millions of dollars. That’s all I needed to know. Ivermectin kept me out of the hospital when I had Covid pneumonia.
The vaccine EUA required that there be no other treatment.
Yep that was my reasoning too.
Told my partner a couple of years ago that while in the “real” world we have little to no worth, race horses otoh are worth a fortune. And they are given Ivermectin.
Game, set and match to Ivermectin. imho
And then there was also Tess Lawrie and her assessment of ivermectin. It was funny how world expert doctors suddenly became ‘nutcases’ and charlatans after supporting the possibility that ivm had anti-viral properties.
Our leaders, our bureaucrats and the rest should be hanging their heads in shame. But at least we now have a real insight into their morals and intelligence. When the next thing strikes, nobody is going to heed a thing they say.
I’ve a complicated and conflicted response to this remarkable epistle and may comment further about it later. For now I’ll say this – I too have completely lost faith in the whole system and fear it will never return. Whatever vindication I might feel for having consistently and from the beginning voiced strong, contrarian opinions against the corrupt narratives we were all subjected to, is nothing to celebrate. It’s like a speedball of cocaine and heroin, stimulant and depressant, the deadly combination that has dispatched my trust in too many things and in too many people while at the same time creating an enormous gratitude for those who have risked so much in writing/publishing it, especially IM Doc. Thank you.
that truly is depressing that erstwhile credentialed and supposedly “scientific” people had the reptile part of their brain hijacked by social media-traditional media; and behaved no different than the anti-Copernican Establishment.
History repeating.
My hero, a trip to Hungary is worth just to visit his museum. He pioneered the hand washing in hospitals and saved thousands of lives but could not explain the process to his peers so he was sent into an asylum and died there.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis
And now hand washing is the One True Specific to prevent all ills. Covid is airborne? Not according to the Gods of Science.
We’re early days in this mess; there is still the ongoing health disaster and its social and economic effects. I never had any faith in the system to lose, but I am very disconcerted by what I think is coming.
Personally I have also completely lost all confidence in the “medical system”. I no longer believe there is any evidence that it has my best interests at heart.
Therefore I have come to the conclusion that all medication should be over the counter: if someone knows that IVM would help him, it’s not up to some nanny state, or eugenics supporting state, to prevent him from accessing it.
As I see it, the prescription system has now been corrupted into only giving some people power, self-appointed high priests of scientism. They lie when they say they only wish to improve safety, because they actually endanger people who are able to understand science, and do so to empower and enrich themselves.
The obvious retort is that eliminating prescriptions might result in some people killing themselves. But that is nothing new. It’s how Darwinian selection works, and it’s happening anyway with street drugs such as Fentanyl.
So making all medicines over the counter seems to me would be beneficial, putting power back into the hands of the competent. Have I missed any important consideration that would change this conclusion?
Seems that just the other day Lambert posted a Youtube clip of RFK Jr. answering a question about pandemic protocols. Among his other comments, he compared Nigeria, which had been using Ivermection and Hydrochloroquine in great quantities to treat other diseases and embraced it as a therapeutic for Covid, as having a Covid death rate 200 times lower than the “United States of Amnesia.”
Of course, he could be lying, or I could be dreaming.
I too immediately thought of that video when doc stated: “They can lie all they want, the truth will out – and it will very soon be very obvious to every American what has happened.”
For different reasons than doc, I lost all and any faith that I once may have had in The System long ago. But I also have no faith in the American public, except for some rare glimmers of hope and resistance out in flyover and other hinderlands, embers to be scattered and dashed…
I appreciate what doc and other commentators have done to bear witness. Someday someone somewhere will learn from this.
You can’t rely on anything out of Africa health information wise. And RFK, Jr. is not an honest reporter on this topic.
From our GM last December on Covid in Africa:
That does not mean Ivermectin was not beneficial. But that simply can’t even remotely be established from what did or didn’t happen in West Africa. There are way too many confounders, such as likely much less time indoors, much lower average population age (median of 19!), MUCH lower rate of diabetes, high Vitamin D levels due to sun exposure.
I wish I had a transcript to work from, but one thing I’ll note is that RFK jr does break from the vax-only mantra and is another voice that is critical of the official response(s) to this virus.
As you well illustrate, the figures that he cites need a more solid grounding in fact, although his delivery is a compelling one. The subject of our governments response to the virus needs public discussion, but I really don’t see other candidates even broaching this topic, except for maybe in statements made in passing.
Could you imagine Biden and Trump standing at their respective podiums in an auditorium before an audience and debating this subject, their administrations responses to the pandemic?
I do not like that RFK Jr brings up Nigeria and other African states when discussing COVID deaths BUT it is an good rhetorical device. RFK Jr is attacking a medical establishment that is lying about everything but he is not lying about Nogeria’s #s.
I am in favor of using data from India. I don’t know the states off the top of my head but two states in India are compared. One used IVM and HCQ while the other used a Western approach. The state that used IVM and HCQ had a lower death rate. He should stick with that story. If anyone responds, I’ll hunt down a YouTube video of him talking about this natural experiment.
I’m supposed to forget the FDA and other public health agencies and medical certification boards threatened doctors with losing their licenses and certifications to practice medicine because they prescribed Iver and Hydroxy ? Medicines that saved lives? Pharmacists were advised by their boards not to fill such prescriptions or lose their licenses.
To be blunt: f*ck the FDA, and f*ck the CDC. I will never trust anything they say or drug they in future approve or advice they give ever again. The last 3 years they put us through hell for no good reason; no public health good reason.
And what prompted this sudden change of mind at the FDA? Maybe this….
Lawsuits can do wonders, even before the case is settled.
https://www.courthousenews.com/ivermectin-proponents-ask-fifth-circuit-to-revive-lawsuit-against-fda/
Thanks for this post.
an aside: boy, I can’t wait to see the reception this WHO initiative gets in the US. / ;)
https://www.who.int/news/item/05-06-2023-the-european-commission-and-who-launch-landmark-digital-health-initiative-to-strengthen-global-health-security
Methinks that the US reception will involve the 2nd Amendment. Just putting that out there.
And, as for the dreaded horse paste, I have some on hand. Just in case.
I would also like to thank NC for providing me with the information that kept me away from those shots. I am enjoying excellent health, and, yes, I’m rocking that Medicare card.
I remember reading the big study results about ivermectin there was a group of doctors that were championing it. I believe they even testified in front of congress about it.
I went out and stocked up on ivermectin paste. I am pretty sure I caught covid and that the paste knocked it right out.
I’m in the exact same camp, flora. Zero trust — in fact, negative, thanks to their incestuous relationship with the megalithic pharmaceutical industry. Public trust, once lost, is impossible to regain, at least on time scales less than generations.
As said before, it’s not just the lying and deception, but the clear telegram that they just don’t care if caught out or graphically contradicted. Their public announcements are for MSM recitals, not for useful consumption by the public. It will take shuttering these houses, along with many other arms of the state. Until then, those in control of the US government remain convinced that there is no such thing as a public good.
Flora / Rolf thank you for stating my feelings exactly so i didnt have to type it all . We moved from NJ to FL in 2021 in disgust of the national covid response, which was especially heavy-handed in Democrat-run areas. Thank you to the NC community for helping me and my family with 2 small children navigate the maze. I will do my own due diligence in all matters going forward, trust is gone completely.
Amen. Trust in the FDA/Medical Industrial Complex is much less than zero.
But the FDA isn’t pretending that they didn’t recommend Ivermectin, as the article itself in The Epoch Times explicates. They admit that they didn’t recommend it, most memorably in the form of the public-facing and colloquial ‘You ain’t a horse, you ain’t a cow. Stop it.’ which also included a link to a longer form, more technical description of the drug which reiterated the fact that they don’t recommend it. So they couldn’t possibly be arguing in the revisionist style that they never opposed its use against covid because they obviously and undeniably did.
Their argument from what I can tell is that they, the FDA, did not forbid doctors from prescribing it, which as far as I can tell is also true. Prescriptions may not have been filled deliberately by pharmacists taking matters into their own hands, and some doctors may have been censured for prescribing the drug, but that’s not a direct consequence of any specific and legally binding FDA decree, is it? You might argue it was downstream of the anti-ivermectin hysteria which you might in turn argue the FDA contributed to, but, legally speaking, I can’t imagine it being easy to pin the legal responsibility for that, which seems to partly be the point of the lawsuit in the article in question. Speculating, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s a deep-pocketed lawsuit backed by rich Koch-types to broadly undermine a federal regulator because the central claim (that the FDA specifically precluded these doctors from freely practicing medicine) seems to be quite spurious (because if the doctors had their licenses revoked or some other punishment, surely that would have come from some other regulatory body than the FDA itself? So why not sue them instead of the FDA?) but there might be an argument (which the appellate judges seem to be amenable to) that the (in)famous tweet itself went beyond the FDA’s remit.
FTX didn’t contribute to the Ivermectin component of the TOGETHER trials, which were completed and published before FTX was attached (which was itself before FTX went tits-up)
So then, the very day that I went to the TOGETHER trial web page when it first was publicized in the New York Times and saw a banner of corporate logos as sponsors and The FTX Foundation was the very top one listed……never happened? And then within days of the SBF implosion, the FTX Foundation sponsorship went POOF from the website? If everything was on the up and up, why the sudden POOF? And is still gone to this day……and then within another few days, an army of fact checkers was all over Twitter stating that FTX Foundation was never involved?
It is quite literally taken from the pages of 1984 – especially the parts about the Ministry of Truth.
Sorry. At this point, if this were an issue on any IRB I was ever part of, a complete and total ACCOUNTING LEDGER submission from the TOGETHER trial would be required to demonstrate exactly where the funding was coming from. Especially, when so quick to discontinue corporate logos on the website. Statements to the press are just not going to cut it when people’s lives are at risk.
And again, please answer the question, why is a political money laundering unit involved in drug studies? Again as part of the accounting ledger disclosure that would be required by a functional IRB, would be a disclosure of exactly what other entities were being funded by FTX and what other drug trials they funded…..
There was a time and day when everyone involved in medical research had the underlying realization of the importance of ethics. Human lives are at stake.
‘why is a political money laundering unit involved in drug studies?’
Another pertinent question is how a computer software billionaire with zero medical qualifications got to be put in charge of not only the present global Covid response but future ones as well-
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/09/14/global-covid-pandemic-response-bill-gates-partners-00053969
This question was addressed in Owning the Sun: A People’s History of Monopoly Medicine from Aspirin to COVID-19, which will keep it out of the memory hole.
It hasn’t been completely memory-holed just yet, Doc. Here’s a link to a press release celebrating not only the FTX Foundation’s generous support (more than $18 million) for the TOGETHER trial but also the fact that in 2022 the TOGETHER trial picked up the “prestigious” Trial of the Year Award from the Society for Clinical Trials (SCT) in San Diego.
https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/the-ftx-foundation-supports-the-global-expansion-of-the-trial-of-the-year-award-winning-together-trial-301547995.html
Here’s a well-researched article from Alexandros Marinos strongly suggesting that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s funding of the TOGETHER trial may also have been memory-holed:
https://doyourownresearch.substack.com/p/together-trial-on-ivermectin-did
It truly is an Orwellian world we now live in.
Touché, Doc
Just a quick and heartfelt thank you to IM Doc, to Yves, and the NC commentariat for bringing clarity on this whole issue.
OT, but the wayback machine at archive DOT org can often be used to find older versions of web pages, and in that way help to expose this insidious process of memory holing “inconvenient” facts.
Yep, IM Doc (and Nick C) are correct. The Wayback Machine’s 08-10-2022 snapshot of “https://www.togethertrial.com/who-we-are” (still) shows FTX as a sponsor.
https://web.archive.org/web/20220810191522/https://www.togethertrial.com/who-we-are
I think when the FDA makes a recommendation that the NIH adopts as standard of care,( and any docs going against standard of care guidelines can face professional jeopardy), well… the if FDA didn’t advise doctors directly, they did it through the NIH and other reg agencies downstream. / my 2 cents.
https://www.fda.gov/science-research/advancing-regulatory-science/fda-nih-joint-leadership-council-charter
Well Basil, I recall you & I disagreeing on the subject with you siding with the glyphosate loving & the vax is as safe as Mother’s milk Health Nerd, so your response is of no surprise whatsoever to me.
“…as the article itself in The Epoch Times explicates”
“…which seems to partly be the point of the lawsuit in the article in question.”
I appreciate your careful take on what the FDA did or did not do. But what is the reference to the Epoch Times article? I’ve been through the post several times (and tried to find the word “Epoch” in the post itself) and I can’t find it.
(There’s also this from the post: “As you can see below, the FDA is trying to act as if it never opposed the use of the anti-fungal drug Ivermectin for Covid…” but I don’t see anything below that indicates the FDA is trying to do, well, anything, aside from IM Doc’s email message “blast[ing] this claim,” which is to say not the underlying claim itself. Am I missing something?)
One of the tweets in the post links to an image of the Epoch Times headline… which was more accurate than the explosion of “FDA now approves of Ivermectin” false depictions.
Oh, I see! I was expecting an embedded link within the post and took the tweet as just confirming that that pharmacies were actually refusing to fill the Ivermectin prescriptions. (And Find on the Brave browser won’t display or count the string epoch, regardless of the case of the initial E, within theepochtimes.com when cycling through the various instances, although it will highlight it, which is strange Find behavior, I think.) My oversight.
Thanks! I appreciate the clarification!
No, that was not from Epoch Times.
It was an MD who retweeted the Epoch Times tweet, so the Epoch Times described the FDA now (bizarrely) pointing out that doctors could prescribe Ivermectin for Covid when they had fought that tooth and nail.
The MD comment was that maybe Walgrens et al would start filling her Ivermectin scrips. That implies she had been prescribing Ivermectin and the pharmacies were refusing to fill it, consistent with the reader datapoint mentioned in the post.
I wonder if California will quietly back down on using the new COVID Misinformation Law to threaten providers and pharmacies who prescribe IVM for Covid.
https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2023-03-17/californias-covid-misinformation-law-is-entangled-in-lawsuits-conflicting-rulings
(3rd post attempt)
I think the answer is in the headline (though I haven’t read your link). “Entangled in lawsuits” is what’s happening to that poorly written and stupidly approved law. Same thing is starting to happen with these IVM lawsuits. The process is slow and that plays to the hands of the propagandists. People get convinced regarding a subject (IVM, vax, Ukraine, H. Biden, Jan 6, 9-11) but it takes a long time for facts to break through. By then millions of people are dead, rights are nonexistent, and we’ve all just “moved along”.
Considering the trend to verification of worst possible assumptions, we can expect to learn that IVM was known to be effective at preventing covid, but admitting it would have invalidated any possible Emergency Use Authorization for experimental vaccines.
Call for Dr. Hollander… Buzz Hollander, please pick up the courtesy phone
Here in Mexico, Ivermectin is cheap and readily available at any pharmacy over the counter. We thankfully, have managed to avoid being infected with covid, but have many friends here who were, and immediately started taking ivermectin, with most reporting having had mild symptoms of a short duration. Does that mean it was because of Ivermectin? Who knows, but considering that there appears to be zero downsides to taking it, and based solely on anecdotal evidence of it’s effectiveness, I wouldn’t even think twice about using at the first signs of a covid infection. Seriously, for me it would be like taking vitamin C at the first sign of a cold, there may be little evidence that it’s effective, but taking it sure ain’t gonna hurt you.
What was shared widely by doctors willing to risk it was that a multi-pronged approach – not a single drug or supplement – was more effective. I read often regarding zinc being a gateway to allow the IVM or HCQ to enter the sell and perform as intended. Alone, either drug was less effective.
C, D etc also was beneficial.
The other thing I recall was the dearth of recommendations for what to do. It was over and over again “come back when you can’t breathe ang more” which was intolerable for me back then.
We can’t forget. We must remember when the next occasion arises.
We were in a conversation the other night, somehow about ‘marketing’ and ‘brands,’ and a participant threw in the offhand comment that their department had just gone through a ‘rebranding’ campaign. ‘
After CoVid, everybody hates us,‘ they remarked. Their department? The Chautauqua (NY) County Health Department. They no longer brand themselves as ‘health and human services,’ or as ‘public health.’
An aside, Chautauqua County ranks 56 (out of 61) in health outcomes. Healthiest counties are Putnam, Suffolk, Westchester, Saratoga, New York. And, wow, who coulda guessed, health and wealth correlate! Chautauqua County per capita income: $21K vs New York County per capita income of $111K.
Spot on! America (and the west in general) are way into brands and marketing as opposed to facts and results…… and people fall for it. I taught public school for years and the focus on brands such as Nike or Puma is off the charts. I remember when having an alligator shirt was high livin’. I was never convinced that wearing an advertisement for something, without due compensation, was a positive thing. Would a person walk around with a placard on (“eat at Joe’s” for example) – for free? Remember basic T-shirts or blouses without ads on them?
The again, a John Coltrane T-shirt is acceptable.
That’s one reason why I love Lands’ End and L.L. Bean clothes: no logos.
In the past I worked for a road racing team. We had sharp looking uniforms with the sponsors for the team embroidered on the shirts. In later racing seasons as sponsors came and went we would cover the former sponsors logos with tape since we were no longer receiving a benefit for advertising for them. (Stickers on the vehicles were only for paying sponsors.)
After that I only wore something with a logo or name if I received it for free.
No one here or in most discussions answers the question that if it actually worked and was safe why would the government try so hard to keep people from using it?
Answer is – they wouldn’t. Covid has cost the economy billions – wouldn’t they be shoving ivermectin down everyone’s throat if it got them back to work?
Studies have been done multiple times now showing no positive effect on the course of Covid19
It’s pathetic the level of distrust people have in science and who think somehow the majority of the medical community is actively trying to kill them
Good grief
For the record I am 66, fully vaxed, boosted multiple times with Pfizer to no ill effects so far, mask everywhere indoors I need to be, don’t eat at indoor restaurants or attend large gatherings at all like films, concerts et al
I have also flown all over the world for holidays and for spouse’s work in the last two years
And have not had Covid that I know of and have not been ill at all.
That masks, crowd avoidance and properly used air cleaners are proven ways to prevent covid infection Vermifuges are a panacea for the conspiracy prone
We are lost as a species if this irrationality continues
You miss many critical points, the most important of which was that the administration of the vaccines depended on them being legal under what is called an Emergency Use Authorization. The use of an EUA REQUIRES that no effective treatments exits. Otherwise the drug company has to go through the much more lengthy standard clinical trial and approval process.
IM Doc has pointed out that even though Pfizer did get approval for its Covid vaccine, under the brand name Comirnaty, and it is biologically identical to the one administered under the EUA, well after the approval, no pharmacy chain was carrying Comirnaty or even showed it as scheduled to show up in inventory in the future.
That is because there is a second huge financial incentive to keep the EUA going: the vaccine makers and the various parties that administer them got liability waivers. That goes poof with a drug that has gone through the regular approval process.
On top of that, the search for treatment among existing medication (save antivirals) was quickly branded as Trumpian and right wing (even though IM Doc’s super rich patients who have been demanding ivermectin are in a super blue enclave). So that made it easy to dismiss it out of hand.
As we have also written at length, public health official prioritized the needs of business over the health of citizens. The Administration repeatedly pushed the lie that if you were vaccinated, you would not get Covid (both Biden and Walensky said that explicitly) and the related lie, that the vaccinated would not spread Covid (presupposed if they did not get it but there was the later falsehood that they would not transmit the disease; that was the basis, after all, for vaccine mandates).
Finally, your claim that Ivermerctin has been proven ineffective is false. As we in the post and IM Doc in comments above point out (and IM Doc was on an Institutional Review Board, which oversees clinical trials, and its chair for 5 years, so he is highly qualified to opine on the caliber of drug studies) the Ivermectin studies rubbishing it were crap.
I see your arguments Yves and they sound very possible for the USA.
I do not see that they are terribly valid anywhere else except for the prestige the FDA had at the start of the pandemic. I have the feeling the FDA & CDC like the FAA may have lost some of thier luster by now.
If ivermectin was so effective I would have thought that countries relatively impervious to Pfizer influence, China, Russia and perhaps India, come to mind, would have fast-tracked research on and use of the drug.
Even my own country of Canada is likely to have okayed it if someone could have shown Health Canada that it worked though Health Canada is likely to have been more influenced by the FDA.
I have the strong impression that around the world, the public health elite (ex perhaps in Russia and China) are very much influenced by the WHO, and the WHO was also in the anti-Ivermectin camp. On top of that, the US has a vastly disproportionate number of top-prestige schools for advanced education. They attract foreign students and again become a vehicle for propagating US views.
It was distributed, with much controversy, by 2 states in India: https://www.medpagetoday.com/special-reports/exclusives/92644
And in many countries, you don’t need an Rx so you don’t need medical establishment approval. One reader pointed out he can get it OTC in Mexico. I can get it from a pharmacist with no Rx and no explanation, along with a great Covid prophylactic that I do not understand why it is only in Thailand (Covid nasal antibodies, developed by a Thai med school and a US biotech, called CoviTrap). The lack of uptake anywhere outside Thailand proves that there is huge chauvinism in medical practice.
Medicine, another business advancing one death at a time. :(
WHO followers
take a safe routestay in their walled gardens, not wanting to be sacrificial tall poppies. That instinct for self- or organizational-preservation isn’t limited to NGOs or corporations, and is seen routinely in the media.Mexico actually included Ivermectin in the covid kits they handed out during the height of the pandemic.
Japan recommended it too.
So did the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.
There was also Mega-Operación Tayta in Peru.
Anyone know about use of ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine and similar meds in Cuba?
The Cuban public health system produced five (5) Covid vaccines, actually effective ones, and an effective vaccination program. Even a few quiet corners of the imperial “public health” establishment took notice: https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/hsph-in-the-news/cubas-covid-19-vaccine-success-could-serve-as-global-model-report/ Same for little pinpoints of light in the MSM: https://www.cnbc.com/2022/01/13/why-cubas-extraordinary-covid-vaccine-success-could-provide-the-best-hope-for-the-global-south.html
I don’t believe those Commies in Cuba asserted intellectual property claims to the processes and made them pretty widely available. So it’s pretty clear why the Vanguard of Medical Capitalism made no effort to import those remedies to the Land of Freedom ™ (c).
Is there any way out of the death spiral the Looters have forced us mopes into?
Replying to: jrkrideau, August 12, 2023 at 12:05 pm.
A fellow Canadian here. I think your last sentence is most relevant: “though Health Canada is likely to have been more influenced by the FDA.”
I highly doubt that Health Canada would ever never do anything regarding Covid 19 that would put them out of step with the FDA and the rest of the USA regulatory agencies. I think that the reality of today is that the independence of Canada from the USA (not only in public health matters) is negligible, if it ever exists. With regard to Covid, I saw the Canadian federal government and many provincial governments following the USA official line and policies, sooner or later, from masking directives to rules for flying to the pressure on people to get the shot.
“No one here or in most discussions answers the question that if it actually worked and was safe why would the government try so hard to keep people from using it?
Answer is – they wouldn’t.”
I always go back to Agatha Christie’s admonition in one of her mystery books:
“Where large sums of money are concerned, it is advisable to trust nobody.” – Endless Night
Bill Gates offered that he’d received a 20-to-1 return on his pharma investments. (I can fish up the video if anyone is interested.) For a few very wealthy people the situation was very rational.
“No one here or in most discussions answers the question that if it actually worked and was safe why would the government try so hard to keep people from using it?
Answer is – they wouldn’t. ”
The answer is:
Follow.The. Money.
Didnt see your response before I posted.
You. Said. It.
I am 75. Before COVID I needed no prescriptions. I was triple inoculated wit the Phiser vaccines, and then was infected by COVID because I stupidly agreed to go on a cruse with by y wife.
Since COVID I have very high blood pressure Bells Palsy and continual light-hardheadedness,
Cause and effect, or coincidence?
Egads. Follow the money. Of the donor class. And their servants in government.
And just because someone drives drunk and does not die does not mean drunk driving is safe.
I can’t speak for the American pharmacy situation but here in British Columbia it took me 6 months to get my 16 3mg ivermectin tablets at a cost of $180 C. My doctor when asked for prescription in March 2021 had no reservations concerning giving me my request saying “ I have heard it may be beneficial”. My pharmacy when asked told me for the six months I waited it was on “back order”. Finally received it in September 2021 and got Covid in January 2022 from one of two vaccinated guests. Upon my positive test two days after symptom onset I took my first dose on the third day. Fever, aches, and others issues started getting better within 8hrs. Here is the BCCDC treatment information page http://www.bccdc.ca/health-info/diseases-conditions/covid-19/treatments
They still have Remdesivir as potential treatment, and also a warning about using ivermectin.
Just yesterday I was in hospital visiting a friend and made comment to nurse at entrance about already having had Covid-19 previously. Her response was that she had Covid-19 twice yet was fully vaccinated.
In the summer of 2020 I ordered Ivermectin from India through what struck me as a fairly shady online pharmacy. At the time, of course, there were no vaccines and no generally acknowledged effective treatments. I did this based on the information I gathered here at NC. Knowing that I risked being thought a kook, I let a few close friends know I had a stash that I would share if they needed it.
The ivermectin witch hunt was one of the weirdest and scariest things I’d ever seen. Now it seems like that kind of phenomenon happens almost weekly.
My husband and I still haven’t had COVID. My friends have had it twice because they have a school age daughter who brought it home. They went with the standard treatments and fortunately have avoided long COVID. I’m convinced my sister got it in January 2020: she is a nurse in a major city. She was very sick at the time but also appears to have fully recovered.
We are all vaccinated to the hilt, but still waiting for the sterilizing nasal vaccine that will probably never come because Pfizer. We still mask in stores. We still have our Ivermectin stash. We are taking a “all of the above” approach to continuing to avoid COVID, primarily because we are terrified of long COVID. This is not over and I can’t imagine it ever being over.
First, thanks to Naked Capitalism for this article, and also for talking about it long ago on these very pages. Also, thanks so much for the wisdom and words from IM DOC. A few random things;
Disclosure: I first learned about IVM here on this very site. I then read a book about it, along with every article I could find. When COVID hit I was teaching school at two locations, one a college, and the other a high school. The high school classrooms were small, locked, and no doubt had bad air circulation. I was scared.
To make it worse, I had retired and had about 6 months before I was eligible for Medicare. I had already decided before we know about COVID I was not going to spend $1000-$1200 a month for Obamacare – so I gambled with my life hoping not to get sick – until I could get on Medicare. When COVID hit I was offered the vaccines pretty early due to my age and because I was a teacher. I didn’t know what to do.
At the time I thought it was the thing to do, and I almost did – but what would happen if I had an adverse reaction? What if I ended up in the hospital due to the shot – with no insurance? It would no doubt bankrupt me. I didn’t know what to do.
Then I started reading about the vaccines injuring people and my mind was made up – no shot for me – but where can I find this IVM? I was really convinced when the FDA came out with the horse paste Tweet. My first thought was; it must work for some or this wouldn’t be happening.
I found a place to buy IVM, so I bought some. I also started taking vitamin D, zinc, wore a mask, and gargled with the iodine mix published here by Yves. I started IVM as a preventative in July of 2021 and have been on it since. I can say at this point I never had COVID. But I am only one person, and maybe lucky.
While one side demonized it, the other side made it sound like a miracle drug. That was a mistake IMO. Calling it a miracle drug made it too easy to target. What they should have called it is – and I think this is much more accurate anyway (and stated above as well) – they should have called it the “why not” drug, for obvious reasons.
But the propaganda worked, and worked well. Three people in my family got COVID at the same time, while two others got it at different times (they don’t live with me). All fully vaxxed and boosted when they got it. This is my family. Of course I was worried, especially since one had it pretty bad. I hadn’t told them what I was up to – but now I had to spill the beans. I fessed up on what I was taking and explained everything about IVM and the propaganda behind it. I then offered them pills. I had enough for everyone. They wanted no part of it and thought I was nuts. I wasn’t surprised. Propaganda works.
I never felt so helpless in my life, and this was my family sick with something I might be able to help with. They still think I’m nuts, but they all got better so there is that.
I will never forget the entire IVM thing, how it was demonized, and how those who even brought it up were considered crazy, out of touch, pigeon holed as Trumpers, and worse, just because they didn’t tow the company line. What the hell happened to “my body, my choice.” So sad it all became. I lost friends over this.
At this point, I have no trust in our medical industry, our three letter agencies, grifters like Bill Gates, Fauci, and the rest. Heck, it might be easier to list the places I do trust. It would be a very short list.
Again, a huge thanks to Naked Capitalism and our COVID brain trust here. This is one place I can put on the “trusted source” list. I have no doubt you saved some lives. Bravo!
Stay safe all
FWIW, while not a vet, I have worked with many in the Thoroughbred racing industry, over decades, and to my knowledge, there is no meaningful, if any pharmacological difference between the Ivermectin used for horses, and humans.
I seem to recall about a year plus back someone here with ranching experience relaying how the paste is oftentimes used by farmhands and such as a basic antibiotic.
I have never seen it described in the med literature as an antibiotic. I’ve seen it described as an antiparasite with antiviral properties and as an antivirus treatment, yes, but not as an antibiotic. I don’t think I’d take it for a sinus infection. But what do I know.
Ah, sorry, it must be my mistake.
Scott Alexander slogged through all of the published Ivermectin studies and concluded that the few that showed efficacy were in populations with high exposure to parasitic illness, thus skewing the results. Absent solid, consistent efficacy evidence, the Ivermectin story remains one of a post-hoc ergo proper hoc fallacy of medicine-induced recovery.
There seems to be a transference mechanism at work in the public reaction to the COVID calamity. Rage and frustration are channeled away from an inanimate virus toward a hunt for human villains – in this case advocates for and against Ivermectin and pro or anti Vaxer’s. It’s irrational, but it provides targets for punishment. At least we have stopped burning witches.
That is false. IM Doc has maintained detailed independent records of every patient he ever had. He also pressed his hospital to meticulously track patient Covid vaccinations (as in which ones and how many). His sample may be small but you are way way out of line in questioning his bona fides.
And I do not see why “high exposure to parasitic illness” would increase Ivermectin efficacy. That is a bizarre claim.
The best study which suggested ivermectin was effective was in a population where parasitic illness was prevalent. (Egypt if memory serves.) People with parasitic illness AND covid who are treated with ivermectin are going to be healthier and more able to fight the covid infection if their parasitic illness is treated than if it is not. Thus the treated population would be expected to do better than the controls.
There are studies showing its antiviral properties, as well. Published in 2020.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32533071/
Sorry, they are base line less healthy if they have parasitic illnesses. That makes them more susceptible to Covid and baseline less healthy. And as indicated, swathes of the world with high levels of parasites actually do administer Ivermectin on a population-wide basis.
And saying parasitic infections are common does not establish that the study subjects had parasites.
On a quick pass, parasitic infections appear to have a variety of immune system effects. Some evade the immune system, meaning they would not trigger an immune system response that would interfere with a response to an infection (although the patient would presumably be less robust, which might make them more likely to have bad Covid outcomes).
I knew two people in college who had picked up parasites while in college. Both were unable to eradicate them but had them controlled somehow. They seemed no different health wise than any other student, save one has lost all the hair on his heat! So I also have the impression that mild parasitic infections may not be all that significant health-wise, although experts please pipe up.
In other words, this is a sloppy argument.
Parasite / immune system interaction is a funny one. Auto-immune disorders are lower in populations with more parasite exposure. The discussion is that parasitic infections somehow train / regulate the immune system. As Yves points out, the hypothesis that parasite infection could be a proxy for lower baseline immune health and there confounding the IVM data is, ironically, not without its own confounders!
If I remember that article correctly (posted here in NC by Lambert) the reasoning was Ivermectin killed parasites allowing for the body’s immune system to focus on the covid infection. The argument as presented in that article was pretty convincing (a study of studies IIRC) but I also thought “why not” during the height of the pandemic and found a pharmacy focused on homeopathic treatments that sold pills 2.5 euro per 3mg pill.
I appreciate and trust IMDoc’s perspective more than any agency IVM it will be if and when an infection comes along.
Here is a forest plot for 99 studies, all showing benefit for IVM. Mostly small, and not from the US (surprise!).
But unless you think Bayes was a joker, this is evidence. And strong at that
(Shows Vit D is important and useful too. Check out the other tabs)
https://c19ivm.org/
And here’s a link to an extensive look at studies on IVM that show it does indeed provide a benefit for treating COVID: Ivermectin for COVID-19: real-time meta analysis of 99 studies
The public health establishment in the United States is a complete, rotten failure at preserving public health.
Also, every drug I’ve ever gotten comes with a mandatory insert about it, and I’ve never found one that states they have any idea what the mechanism is for the drug… yet hilariously all these drugs are legal. Baffling.
I am adding my comment to JB’s as I think everyone should look at that 99 study meta analysis. 44 out of 44 studies show efficacy as a prophylactic?
Long time horse paste user. I have bred coonhounds (as a hobbyist) for 25 years. I always keep at least 3 around. The cost of heartguard from a vet is too high for keepers of multiple dogs. EVERY hound owner that I know uses either the horsepaste version or the swine (injectable)version. $10-30$ per year to treat multiple dogs rather than 100$ per year to treat one. Yes, Heartguard is IVM. 25 years of use and no known issues. I have farmer friends that run sow operations that might treat 1000 sows in a single day with IVM. If vet grade products had any quality control issues they would know it. Never heard any stories that it is not consistently a safe product.
I have used IVM, in the horse paste version, on myself for 2 years now. Since I got a blood clot 12 days after a vaccination I decided to err on the side of caution and use a proven safe product. I use it weekly in a fairly low dose. I did have a scratchy throat late last summer that was probably C19. I am professionally a hairstylist so I have lots of human interactions and arguably high risk of contraction.
The cost benefit analysis looks good to me.
My neighbor is a retired nurse. She bought the horse version at Rural King, did the math conversions, and treated herself as a preventative. No issues with COVID.
As I said in a post above, I’ve been on it since July 2021. I just got another 100 pills yesterday. Took 10 days from time of order. $104 including shipping.
To the FDA; Hey Y’all maybe someone is full of ‘it.
In the UK the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence website states that for humans Ivermectin is used to treat, Strongyloides, and other ‘worm’ infections and Papulopustular rosacea.
These are indications with on-label use.
Vitamin C is widely bought off-label. Its on-label uses are practically nil – possibly treatment of methylglobinaemia (“blue blood ” disease) but even that may be off label as it is a tiny patient population.
Methylene blue is also, ironically, used to treat this condition. It is also in late stage trials for Alzheimer’s disease. But its on label uses are treating UTI’s and it is sold to aquarium owners for cleaning!
But… but… but… https://www.factcheck.org/2022/11/fda-did-not-change-position-on-ivermectin-use-contrary-to-online-claims/
I like the last sentence:
Just one more reason to avoid FactCheck.org and do your own research. Places like this are no more immune from Confirmation Bias than anyone else, particularly when it comes to supporting the now untrusted-for-good-reasons “party line”.
I would say that now trying to have it both ways is changing your position.
If I was misunderstood, I apologize. I probably should have added a sarc tag or two. I wish we had an “irony” tag.
I’ve always followed NC and IM Doc’s comments and have greatly appreciated both. My point was that a lot of people will point at sites like FactCheck.org and say “See. They say IVM is a waste of time and money and the FDA was never against IVM.” Technically, I suppose, they weren’t, but actually they fostered not a little professional damage to local medical communities and their patients.
I think we all know differently, whether it’s about the efficacy (and safety) of mRNA vaccines for too many in preventing covid, or whether it’s possible to reduce the damage of covid by other means… thanks to articles covering a lot of this here on NC.
And, to put it kindly, I think that that FactCheck is just as susceptible to confirmation bias and not being 100% honest about their take on various Institutional proclamations as a lot of others are.
More than a few of my friends, after I forwarded articles from NC regarding all this, have pushed back with sites like FactCheck, wondering whether I was promoting “horse paste” (I wasn’t – I was just pointing out other possible ways to fight covid), and also reminding me that the mRNA vaccines prevented covid.
This is also a straw man argument, as the recommendation is for prophylactic use.
My own experience with ivermectin: I got a script from a licensed doctor who was listed on a site as being willing to prescribe it. When I called a local pharmacy to see if they would fill the script, they wanted to know why I wanted it filled, and when I said it was for covid, they refused, so I got it filled by this pharmacy that was specifically recommended by the doctor who wrote the script.
Since this was a couple years ago by now I have completely forgotten the names of the website, doctor, and pharnacy.
I am in a “clinical trial” of re-purposed drugs for cancer. Mebendazole, an anti-helminthic like Ivermectin, is one of the repurposed drugs used. Do we fully understand the pharmacologic mechanism of action? No, but it is very safe and has enough evidence that it falls into the ‘do no harm’ category. Another thought I had is if the much higher usage of anti-helminthics throughout Africa might account for their apparently lower pervasiveness of Covid infection.
We need all-new institutions, not the same compromised gaslighting bureaucratic snakes merely shedding their skins. Apologies to actual snakes and their important work.
On the upside, science still works if you can do it and it is still kinda fun to get things right the first time, though it will destroy your career advancement potential amongst the thought police and those they serve. Downside is that intellectual and moral integrity has to be its own reward as there is no longer any non-theatrical institutional context for such behavior.
A Revolution would possibley give us a whole new set of institutions.
@JEHR – you skipped a step. All a Revolution would give us is a chance. Then it would be up to us to build a whole new set of institutions… not a particularly easy task, but a piece of cake compared to trying to make the current institutions work for us.
I recall the earliest days of the Wuhan outbreak for the simple reason that in the 1990s I was briefly in Wuhan (to catch a Yangtzee River cruise to the 3 Gorges before they were inundated by the dam) and thus anytime a story hit the MSM that mentioned Wuhan, it caught my ear. So when in mid January 2020 I started to read stories about a possible respiratory outbreak in Wuhan, I went to YT to see who was commenting on this. Two names among the very few who were doing so were a financial planner who had earned in Ph.D in Pathology from Duke a decade before leaving academia and an obscure English Ph.D in nursing named John Campbell. Both these took the reports seriously. Both embraced all the recommended non-pharmaceutical interventions like masking and both embraced the vaccines when they came in late 2020.
However, both came to consider the potential efficacy of Invermectin and HCL with open minds. That was enough for the PMC/Public Health and Medicine divisions to start campaigns to discredit them. John Campbell’s Wikipedia page now denounces him as a crank and peddler of conspiracy theories. It has been the epitome of Orwellian.
I’m not easily shocked but I was surprised nonetheless at how vicious it has been for heterodox views on these matters. The fact that Trump embraced some of these did not help; in fact, it upped the virulence of the establishment voices. As a life-long loather of Donald Trump dating to the days of The Art of the Deal and Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, it pained me to point out to people that some things are true if DJT says them.
The same thing happened with the lab leak conjectures. I posted on NC a comment about a report from a China watcher who posts under YT as LaoWhy69 about reports on Chinese social media in 2020 concerning reports of a woman post-doc in the WIV corona virus lab who had been identified as the potential patient 0 and in return received a fair amount of ridicule here, not least IIRC from Ignacio, if he’s the professional epidemiologist who posts here; apologies if I’m misidentifying the individual, but I still recall his sneering “everyone has a theory in an epidemic”. Thanks. That qualifies for a giant BGO award (brilliant glimpse of the obvious). LaoWhy69’s post had about 50 hyperlinks in Chinese to WIV pages, to Weibo messages, etc. I doubt my interlocutor here had read them (Google translate works wonders). Whatever, this isn’t my day job so I moved on but the memory has come back as the consensus on Lab Leak has moved.
Now Campbell and many other perspicacious, non-Trump affiliated, observers are beating the tocsin about excess deaths due to vaccinations and myocarditis. I’m not qualified to judge but I’m deeply worried they may be correct (again). Apparently a study in Australia documented a 2.7% complication rate (1 in 34) which is very troubling and well beyond what is acceptable in normal vaccines. I’m vaccinated but if there turns out to be some serious side effects to the mRNA vaccines it may set back public health efforts by decades when the general public learns about this and come to feel they were deceived. My biggest fear about the whole Covid19 epidemic (including the politicization of what to name the damn thing and when the WHO should declare a global crisis) was that, with the incredible level of distrust in the publics of many advanced countries since the GFC, the Iraq WMD fiasco, 9/11, etc, that if this was handled badly the stage would be set for a disaster if/when the next pandemic (eg, bird flu) hit the world. Nothing has allayed my fears.
The capper is that there is still an effort to punish MDs who used HCL and Ivermectin during the pandemic. The PBS Newshour (an increasing oxymoron since MacNeil and Lehrer left the show in the incapable hands of Judy Woodruff and now her chosen successors) had a segment a few days ago devoted to the topic of ‘why haven’t these doctors lost their right to practice medicine’. The thesis is that these doctors had killed their patients by heterodox approaches and deserve to lose their licenses.
BTW, I have a prescription for my dog for heartworm medicine. A few months ago I looked at the package and its active ingredient is Ivermectin. I’m keeping that handy. I told my dog ‘sauve qui peut’.
two corrections: first, “it pained me to point out to people that some things are true if DJT says them.” should have read “it pained me to point out to people that some things are true even if DJT says them.” it’s amazing how one little word makes all the difference ; and second, it’s laowhy86, not laowhy69. i have to get my mind out of the gutter ;-)
P
This was a pretty triggering post. I hate to say that word but… yeah. Salt on the wound.
When are we sending people off to the hague? You can’t get away with killing hundreds of thousands of Americans.
” You can’t get away with killing hundreds of thousands of Americans. You can’t get away with killing hundreds of thousands of Americans.”
Just you watch. I bet you can. Fauci has moved on to a prestigious university. (still making money off “run death is near). Gates made 50X on his Moderna stock.
I don’t know if I was the reader who mentioned being told that even with a valid prescription for ivermectin for covid I could not get my prescription filled–I might have been, I was very very angry about it when it happened to me–but if not, count me as one more to whom this happened. It happened to my mother too, at a totally different pharmacy in a totally different state.
I live in a rural/semi-rural area where a lot of people figured out quickly that Vitamin I was the way to go for treatment after symptoms or testing. (Myself included. Worked as claimed.)
While I admire how NC worked very hard to make sense out of the nonsense that was published, think about how many people saw the world around them and realized the government and media were wrong? Granted, sixty/seventy years ago the government was trying to say thyroid cancer was random downwind of above ground nuclear weapon testing.
Wanted to add some speculation about Novavax, which has now apparently been pulled from circulation — by the time I began to look for a Novavax shot last month it was already unobtainium. I had heard that Costco was giving shots of it, but not any longer.
I asked a local pharmacist about it (they advertised on their website that they offered Novavax) and she told me that monovalent vaccines were no longer FDA approved, only bivalent versions. This seemed strange to me as I had heard that Novavax had efficacy to prevent serious illness from different variants. I told the pharmacist that I found that a little suspicious and she smiled. She also told me that this fall it was likely that flu shots would be bundled with a COVID vaccine. This does not fly with me as I have heard that it is better for your immune system to not take the flu shot annually, but rather every three years or so.
I would not be at all surprised if Pfizer worked very hard to eliminate competition, especially if the product was more effective than their own vaccine. Does anyone have any info about why Novavax was discontinued?
It is marginally less effective than the mRNA vaccines but still plenty effective (90% efficacy v. 95%, particularly now that the efficacy of the mRNA vaccines on boosters is very short lived and becomes negative efficacy after three months). It is also a more traditional vaccine technology and hence took longer to develop.
I have no idea why the authorities worked so hard to restrict it. They initially wanted to limit it only to those who were unvaxxed, as in explicitly rejected mRNA. Of course given the crappy records on vaccinations (paper CDC cards that patients can withhold) it appears that may have been too easy to evade.
I will trade lower efficacy for less risk of recurrence all day. I would be particularly keen to take a killed virus vaccine.
But many, it seems most, make those tradeoffs differently.
At the emergence of Covid, we were informed: it’s not that bad; it’s very bad; don’t get ventilated, you’ll need to be ventilated; stay indoors; it’s better outdoors; use the masks; the masks might make you sick; the masks don’t work; use rubber gloves; there were no rubber gloves, and if you found them the price had been increased exponentially (convenient pretext for gouging?); we used Ivermectin – in the form of horse-paste – (other than a mild whinny, no other problems to report, as compared to the jab and its adverse effects…); then the horse-paste was removed from shelves (except random supplies that exponentially increased in cost, and scarcity.)
To assist the American public through these challenges, the establishment provided incessant supplies of hypocrisy, subterfuge, and malicious behavior (e.g., you’ll lose your job if you don’t take the jab; the likelihood of mental illness – through mandated lock-downs, social-isolation, and financial calamity, etc.)
All one must do is consider the action taken by the establishment. The fact that Ivermectin was intentionally rendered difficult to obtain, suggests that it is a product that has actually been proven “Safe and Effective”. Moreover, the deliberate removal of this product facilitated the maintenance of establishment agenda (e.g., depopulation, repression, and great-reset.)
Has the CDC changed their stance on immunity benefits of Vitamin D? Thank goodness I grew up in the Canaryville neighborhood (Shameless!) of Chicago and run around without a shirt half the year, no prob.
Hadn’t the opioid crisis already killed the credibility of the FDA and the medical establishment? And for Americans over a certain age, there was the trans fat/margarine debacle long before that. For years, I heard older relatives bragging about having refused margarine. And before that there were killer birth control pills, reckless prescribing of narcotics and amphetamines, lobotomies…
Vioxx and other drugs that were found to be harmful, but kept in the market for years or decades should have killed the credibility of the FDA. But seriously how could everyone in the health agencies just sit back and watch as OxyContin was killing and addicting millions and do nothing about it?
One good thing that has come from the Covid era is that people are waking up and seeing how the agencies have been captured by the industries that they are supposed to be regulating and overseeing. Anyone remember when some DEA agents were caught snorting cocaine off other agent’s body parts during the Bush 2 administration? That was the first sign for me that they were captured.
I was thinking a few weeks ago that I hadn’t heard anything about IVM lately. I figgered it was dead, done and no longer of interest, essentially that it must have been proved to be not useful. Thanks for bringing it up, again, and thanks to KLG and IM Doc for their comments.
If I were to try to say something critical of Ivermectin, it would be that the desperate stopgap measure first used against a new disease is seldom the proven treatment for it many years later. However, looking quickly at NIH’s website, it seems that most potential treatments are not recommended except as part of a clinical trial. Not sure what they like other than Paxlovid, and (sort of) remdesivir. Looks like there isn’t a solidly demonstrated treatment yet.
Note that NIH does spend time knocking down ivermectin (didn’t work here, there, or that other place, dose would have to be too high, etc.), FWIW. It’s hard to find institutional or academic support for IVM on the web in the last two years. I have no idea what to make of it.
My anti-Covid measures: I mask indoors and in crowds, take a few common supplements, and avoid the human species. I had the 2 dicks vaccine, then two Moderna boosters and finally a Pfizer last winter (may have had some negative reaction to that one). I looked for Novavax after that—no luck. I wouldn’t know where to get (human grade) IVM. I’ve not had a symptomatic case, nor a positive test, so far. I got fairly frequent PCR tests at public health facilities, but that’s gone now.
I’m going to sound like a shill for big pharma here, but I haven’t heard anything at all, much less something positive about Ivermectin in ages. I figured people realized it isn’t a life-saver. I have seen reports (in the Lancet no less) that Metformin helps reduce incidence of long-COVID, and of course we get crickets from the NIH / CDC about either investigating it’s use further or recommending it’s use. If I get COVID, I’m taking Paxlovid and Metformin.
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3099(23)00299-2/fulltext
Wife was a covid skeptic, took the one-jab vax (j&j?) early 2021, so as to resume vacationing, developed bruises all over soon after. Late 2022, she returned from week long family gathering, not feeling well. Went down hard in a few hours, was incapacitated for two days. Agreed to try husband’s magic juice, thinks it helped.
In 2020, I saw the reports that science had been working on coronavirus vaccines for decades, but couldn’t overcome the rapid mutations, and what solutions they tried caused immune disfunction. I was disturbed with the extremely rapid approval process for the covid vax in late 2020, so decided to wait n see.
To anyone paying attention, the early reports of serious adverse effects were dismal, while the early reports of ivm were promising (pre severe censorship).
May 2021, I bought some horse paste, and started using it as a prophylactic.
Some months later, my Kaiser PCP sent me a heartfelt missive to get the “very safe and effective” jab. Without responding directly, I requested a prescription for ivm. “No”. Not a surprise, but still laugh at my audacity for asking.
I’ve been using the FLCCC recommendation since. When wife came home sick, I did a deep search in my faith in whether I trusted my reading comprehension about c19 and ivm, to quarantine or not. Didn’t quarantine, didn’t get sick. Have not yet been sick. With any kind of bug since 2019.
For those questioning how ivm works, one of the studies I read credited it with enhancing immune response rather than having a direct effect requiring a high concentration in the blood, hence it’s effect on virus, cancer, and other pathogens.
Trofim Lysenko eat your heart out.
In the spirit of mutual aid, perhaps we could set a virtual meeting, via audio or even just instant messaging, and share best anti-COVID prophylactic best practices.
Possibly including a reliable Canad1an or other international pharmacy that a Murican can order the nasal spray Yves suggests, as well as the pharma tablet version of the I Vitamin.
I showed this article to a few of the most “trust the science” people I know. I suppose you can guess their reactions. Official pronouncements are way better than observations of reality