Quote:
Originally Posted by AnalogMan
Or, another possible explanation might be that some doctors will prescribe anything for money or give patients whatever they want, medically justified or not (but of course that never happens, and especially not in Florida).
https://www.healthline.com/health-ne...pioid-epidemic
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3030470/
This is a recently published meta-analysis of 29 randomized, controlled clinical trials of ivermectin in the treatment of COVID-19. The authors conclude, "The certainty of the evidence was very low to low."
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1....19.21262304v1
This is another meta-analysis of 10 ivermectin clinical trials. The authors conclude "IVM did not reduce all-cause mortality, length of stay or viral clearance in RCTs in COVID-19 patients with mostly mild disease. IVM did not have effect on AEs or SAEs. IVM is not a viable option to treat COVID-19 patients."
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1....21.21257595v2
Yet one more meta-analysis of 12 clinical trials of ivermectin in the treatment of COVID-19. The authors conclude, "Ivermectin was not associated with reduced mortality, or reduced patient recovery. All studies had a high risk of bias, and showed a very low certainty of the evidence."
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1....26.21250420v1
Over the past 35 years, I've overseen or worked on clinical programs for 16 different therapeutic drugs. One can always torture data, play statistical games, or inadvertently (or intentionally) introduce bias that can skew outcomes. Desperation to find treatments for dire conditions can also be a factor. Which is why the above meta-analyses examining all of the trials to date are particularly interesting.
Your mileage may vary. |
I appreciate the reply. When I first looked into the studies about ivermectin, I did find more negative "hits" rather than positive, although there were enough studies showing some promise that, coupled with the WHO's view that clinical trial usage may still be warranted, completely discounting any usage or effectiveness of ivermectin appears premature.
The homepage to the medrxiv site to which you linked can he found here...
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/about-medrxiv
In the first paragraph on that page, it states,
"medRxiv (pronounced "med-archive") is a free online archive and distribution server for complete but unpublished manuscripts (preprints) in the medical, clinical, and related health sciences.
Preprints are preliminary reports of work that have not been certified by peer review. They should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information."
The bold emphasis is theirs, on the site, not mine. I'm not suggesting that the points you made should not be considered....they definitely should be, and you are correct that there are more easily accessible studies questioning the usage of ivermectin than touting it...but there have been studies showing positive results.
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/e...464-8/fulltext
"Among patients with non-severe COVID-19 and no risk factors for severe disease receiving a single 400 mcg/kg dose of ivermectin within 72 h of fever or cough onset there was no difference in the proportion of PCR positives. There was however a marked reduction of self-reported anosmia/hyposmia, a reduction of cough and a tendency to lower viral loads and lower IgG titers which warrants assessment in larger trials."
https://ivmmeta.com/
The data gathered from the metadata on that site appears to be quite definitively positive in favor of ivermectin efficacy in certain usages.
https://journals.lww.com/americanthe...ment_of.7.aspx
"Meta-analysis of 15 trials found that ivermectin reduced risk of death compared with no ivermectin (average risk ratio 0.38, 95% confidence interval 0.19–0.73; n = 2438; I2 = 49%; moderate-certainty evidence). This result was confirmed in a trial sequential analysis using the same DerSimonian–Laird method that underpinned the unadjusted analysis. This was also robust against a trial sequential analysis using the Biggerstaff–Tweedie method. Low-certainty evidence found that ivermectin prophylaxis reduced COVID-19 infection by an average 86% (95% confidence interval 79%–91%). Secondary outcomes provided less certain evidence. Low-certainty evidence suggested that there may be no benefit with ivermectin for “need for mechanical ventilation,” whereas effect estimates for “improvement” and “deterioration” clearly favored ivermectin use. Severe adverse events were rare among treatment trials and evidence of no difference was assessed as low certainty. Evidence on other secondary outcomes was very low certainty.
Conclusions:
Moderate-certainty evidence finds that large reductions in COVID-19 deaths are possible using ivermectin. Using ivermectin early in the clinical course may reduce numbers progressing to severe disease. The apparent safety and low cost suggest that ivermectin is likely to have a significant impact on the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic globally."
Just another quick sampling of some of the positive findings. I have no idea where the dust will settle, and I'm not a physician, chemist, epidemiologist, or biologist. To piggybck on your point about "some doctors will prescribe anything for money," perhaps the fact that ivermectin is inexpensive and not very profitable could make it less attractive to certain parts of the healthcare and pharmaceutical industries. I'm NOT sceptical enough to believe that's the case, but who knows.