Ivermectin, for the interested

[Alistair]

If you were 'a healthy' 54 year old, would you let someone give you covid , on the chance you would slough it off in a week ?
Because I wouldnt.

Literally no one said that.

Lets be straight here , the thread is called Ivermectin - FOR THE INTERESTED, and yet we have a constant stream of detractors, who have NO EVIDENCE that it doesnt help fight and prevent covid, lining up to take a swipe at those who ARE interested.
They are fully prepared to back the various vaccines , that swerved the usual testing regime, and are still only licenced to use under emergency measures, yet a tried and tested drug, that has been used on humans for decades, and recently used , and continues to be used with success, on covid sufferers.
What is it about it that offends you so much ?

Is it because you have such hatred for anything that drifts from the norm ?
Is it because you trust the government and pharma without doubt , they wouldnt sell you something harmful surely, despite having done so time and time again.....*

*Google ranitidine (zantac) , and why a common , much used drug for 40 years , suddenly disappeared off the shelves overnight, or look at the debacle of thalidomide ?

To your first point, weren't you one of the folks who was shouting very loudly that COVID was a trivial disease, hardly worth worrying about and certainly not one that justifies lockdowns, or vaccination or whatever? Yet now you're concerned to catch it?

In any case, nobody said that directly (except Joe Rogan) sure, but certainly that was the implication? If not, why mention it in the Ivermectin thead at all?

As to your second point, I'd suggest that a part of being 'interested' in a potential course of teatment is to objectively review all the data on it, not jut that which supports your pre-established conclusion.

I'm fully aware that nothing I say will persuade you or Zambezi or Freeforester, but there's plenty of others on this thread who are also interested, and I think it's only fair to them that both sides are presented in an objective light.

Also, you'll forgive me, but I have plenty of evidence to support my position. It is afterall, in line with the vast majority of the medical field. If you wish to espouse Ivermectin then that's fine. It's perfectly valid, it is in trials, I'd like to see your evidence. But if you're to promote an idea that goes against the established body of work, then I would suggest that the burden of proof lies with you to support your position, not with me to prove you're wrong (plus you can't ever categorically prove a negative).

As I've said throughout, I'm not saying it doesn't work. I'm merely saying that there is very little high quality evidence to suggest that it does. Hence why it's still in trials and not approved. I also suggest that until we are conident that it works, it may not be the best idea to take it or rely on it. I don't think that's an unreasonable position to take.

 

[zambezi]

I also suggest that until we are confident that it works, it may not be the best idea to take it or rely on it. I don't think that's an unreasonable position to take.

For clarity, is that cautious approach to be reserved for a 40-year-old safe drug or should it also encompass novel and part-tested new medicines too?

 

[Alistair]

For clarity, is that cautious approach to be reserved for a 40-year-old safe drug or should it also encompass novel and part-tested new medicines too?

I think a degree of caution is advisable in the approval of any and all medicines. Certainly I did (and to be honest still do) have some misgivings about the vaccines that you are presumably alluding to, especially the elimination of any long term observation from the stage 3 and 4 trials.

However, the difference with the vaccines is that the fact that they do offer therapeutic benefit is no longer in doubt. Your risk of exhibiting serious symptoms is reduced with the vaccines, something that's been borne out across numerous markets and something that (crucially) has proven to be readily replicable under controlled conditions.

I would concede that there are still quesitons to be answered around how long they're effective for and the exact magnitude of this protection, but only time can give us those answers.

The safety profile is also proving to be pretty good. Not perfect and there are side effects (as there are with most treatments), but not too bad. It also seems to be improving with every new trial that's complete, to the point where I did choose, after a couple months of reading the trial data and observing the roll out to go get my jabs. Would I have done so in the first wave of roll outs? Honestly, perhaps not. But then I'm 26 and in good health. I gain a lot less benefit from them than a 75 year old with underlying conditions, so my assessment of the risk/reward profile is different.

The fact of the matter is that the data associated with the vaccines has been assessed by the medical communities of the world and lead to almost universal acceptance. Should you take that as an absolute endorsement of their safety and efficacy? No, you shouldn't. But it does give a degree of confidence. By contrast, Ivermectin is not in that position. Maybe it will be in 6 months. Who knows. But it isn't now.

And so, just like I did with the vaccines, I watch, I assess, and I wait.

 

[Rewulf]

To your first point, weren't you one of the folks who was shouting very loudly that COVID was a trivial disease, hardly worth worrying about and certainly not one that justifies lockdowns, or vaccination or whatever? Yet now you're concerned to catch it?

Nope , Ive had covid , it wasnt pleasant.

In any case, nobody said that directly (except Joe Rogan) sure, but certainly that was the implication?

Nope , Joe Rogan didnt even say it directly, so it wasnt the implication. . . at all.

As to your second point, I'd suggest that a part of being 'interested' in a potential course of teatment is to objectively review all the data on it, not jut that which supports your pre-established conclusion.

So why dont you objectively review ivermectin, rather than ridicule everyone who does ?

I'm fully aware that nothing I say will persuade you or Zambezi or Freeforester, but there's plenty of others on this thread who are also interested, and I think it's only fair to them that both sides are presented in an objective light.

I am not touting ivermectin, I am not taking ivermectin or encouraging its use for covid, I am interested in looking at it objectively.
I am not anti vax , I am vaxxed up myself, but again ,I am looking at the roll out and application VERY critically, but without a built in bias.
Ridiculing and flatly refusing to engage with the possibilities, is not making sure both sides are fairly represented.
Practice what you preach.

Also, you'll forgive me, but I have plenty of evidence to support my position. It is afterall, in line with the vast majority of the medical field.

YOU dont have any evidence to support your position, you are agreeing with the evidence of the 'vast majority' of the 'medical field' and as I said previously , the medical profession are notorious followers of fashionable thinking, and are far from infallible.

 

[Alistair]

Nope , Ive had covid , it wasnt pleasant.


Nope , Joe Rogan didnt even say it directly, so it wasnt the implication. . . at all.

So why dont you objectively review ivermectin, rather than ridicule everyone who does ?

I am not touting ivermectin, I am not taking ivermectin or encouraging its use for covid, I am interested in looking at it objectively.
I am not anti vax , I am vaxxed up myself, but again ,I am looking at the roll out and application VERY critically, but without a built in bias.
Ridiculing and flatly refusing to engage with the possibilities, is not making sure both sides are fairly represented.
Practice what you preach.


YOU dont have any evidence to support your position, you are agreeing with the evidence of the 'vast majority' of the 'medical field' and as I said previously , the medical profession are notorious followers of fashionable thinking, and are far from infallible.

To you're first point, Zambezi stated: "Unvaccinated Joe Rogan [12 million followers] recently caught and sloughed covid in three days by using a treatment pack that included Ivermectin." Now I'm no grammatical expert but that certainly seems as if he's stating that he sloughed covid in three days by using a treatment pack that included Ivermectin. So yes, someone is stating that directly or at the least heavily inferring a causative link. As for Joe himself, I've not seen his statements or interviews, so I can't comment. I had rather assumed that he must have for there to be such a lot of condemnation of him and his actions for doing precisely that, but perhaps not. Mea culpa on that I guess.

As for the rest of your post. I am objectively reviewing. I'd note that just because I don't agree blindly with your viewpoint, it doesn't make me biased. i've never once stated it absolutey doesn't work.

I've read the FLCCC papers shared, I've assessed the BIRD data, I've watched several of the many, many people that Freeforester has linked. Of course I've also read the more mainstream trials and many of the widely cited review papers. The only difference is that I have very little confidence in the papers that you so clearly take as gospel, mostly due to inadequacies in trial design or statistical rigour as discussed extensively in the Cochrane review that I shared earlier as well as in many other places.

As such, my objective opinion is that, on the balance of evidence, it's not worth taking (at last not until we have better data). I'm not ridiculing anyone. I'm simply disagreeing based on what's actually published, just the same as the vast majority of academics, doctors, heath agencies and drug manufacturers have done upon review these results.

As for practise what you preach, well right back at you. The FLCCC is far from the only (or even the most reputable) source of information on COVID management, have a look at what everyone else is saying as well.

As to your last point, well forgive me, but what clinical research have you done personally? Not a lot I'm betting. We're both doing the same thing here. Reading the published data, assessing what we can and drawing conclusions. Our conclusions differ, which is hardly a new occurence in drug development and research, but we're both assessing the same or similar evidence, it's just that there's a lot more of it published to support my view, than there is yours, hence why Ivermectin is not widely adopted or accepted.

 

[Rewulf]

As such, my objective opinion is that, on the balance of evidence, it's not worth taking (at last not until we have better data). I'm not ridiculing anyone. I'm simply disagreeing based on what's actually published, just the same as the vast majority of academics, doctors, heath agencies and drug manufacturers have done upon review these results.

Thats just the point though, they havnt tested it, there are no results , so they havnt reviewed anything, they just state quite clearly . 'DO NOT USE IVERMECTIN YOU WILL DIE , USE OUR VACCINES INSTEAD (forever) AND YOU WILL LIVE (mostly)

hence why Ivermectin is not widely adopted or accepted.

Maybe not in the richer western countries, but its used extensively in Latin America , Africa, India , Czech republic and Slovakia, and many more , are all these countries backward and stupid ?
Researching ivermectin has become extremely problematic of late though , as most search engines will not show ivermectin use in any positive light, strange no ?

Put it to the test , try and find positive pages about ivermectin, plus try and buy some, it seems most pages are removed or stuffed to the back of the pile.

 

[Alistair]

There's at least 60 trials that have been completed on Ivermectin in the last 12 months, 10s more ongoing, the most comprehensive of which is (arguably) the PRINCIPLE study at Oxford.

There is plenty of attention being paid to Ivermectin, there's plenty of work going on, there' plenty of funding beig spent. This thing isn't being swept under the carpet. A quick search on Web of Science throws up loads, many of them extensively cited in other papers. Every month there seems to be a new review paper on this, ironically the political and mass media attention makes it a hot topic for research. It's clearly a hot topic on mass media outlets such as youtube as well.

There is no massive conspiracy to turn people away from this, it's not being carefully hidden. In fact, it's getting loads of attention, even in comparison to all the other COVId stuff that's in trials right now.

However, the broad consensus as of today seems to equate to:

"Based on the current experimental evidence, there is little reliable data to support taking it."

That's all.

As for Latin America, Africa, India, well it's a decision for each local medical supervisory authority, and they can only assess the evidence, just the same as us. They obviously feel it's worth a try based on the data, possibly backed with political pressure to do something in nations where there might be limitations on supply of the vaccine. Maybe they're right.

I certainly wouldn't ever suggest that they're in any way stupid to try, nor that they don't hve the best interest of their respective populations in mind. But nonetheless, they are rather bucking the overall consensus for now, and only history will allow us to judge them or laud their bravery in that respect.

 

[Freeforester]

“I certainly wouldn't ever suggest that they're in any way stupid to try, nor that they don't hve the best interest of their respective populations in mind. But nonetheless, they are rather bucking the overall consensus for now, and only history will allow us to judge them or laud their bravery in that respect.”

- It might be an interesting exercise to look from the other end of the spyglass - are you certain that the overall consensus is in favour of the ’vaccines’, given the numbers involved ( some countries are considerable larger than ours, eg the state of Uttar Pradesh has three times the population of Gt. Britain, and quite a number of other high population countries also use ivermectin)?

Do you give any credence whatsoever to the meta analyses (2) which have been undertaken, both of which demonstrate overwhelming benefit of use of ivermectin, then?

Im not so certain that the ‘broad consensus’ you mention covers the majority of global population, nor am I convinced that the pandemic can be tamed by virtue of use of leaky vaccines, vaccine passports for same and other nonsenses, and as yet unproven booster shots - it would appear to me that the broad consensus is in fact that simply put, ivermectin reduces reproduction and thus availability of virus, which is not the case with a vaccine which only partially works, and especially not at all convincingly against the now almost ubiquitous delta variant. Continued pressure applied by such unsuccessful means can only hasten the evolution of the next variant, which will similarly outplay the vaccine, much in the same way that over-reliance on not wholly lethal antibiotics has led to resistant strains of other nasties, or eg rodenticide-resistant rats and mice.



Nor can I personally see the benefit of trying to treat patients no longer creating virus with a treatment which prevents it reproducing, which is exactly what is happening in latter part of the ‘PRINCIPLE’ study; to give ivermectin to patients in the second week of their illness, knowing full well as anyone who has studied the virus’s m.o. that the virus has ceased reproducing by then seems quite pointless and in fact ignoble, when it clearly serves no purpose, other than confirming that the ‘stable door’ should perhaps be closed, in the event of the ‘loss of the horse’ the week previously. Designed to fail?

 

[zambezi]

Designed to fail?

Redolent of the fiasco of letting tobacco companies [money] investigate smoking links to cancer in decades past.

 

[Freeforester]

Redolent of the fiasco of letting tobacco companies [money] investigate smoking links to cancer in decades past.

A PATHOLOGIST SUMMARY OF WHAT THESE JABS DO TO THE BRAIN AND OTHER ORGANS

Ryan Cole MD AFLDS PHYSICIAN A scientific clarification of what these injections do in the head and other organs of the vaccinated people

rumble.com

 

[Alistair]

“I certainly wouldn't ever suggest that they're in any way stupid to try, nor that they don't hve the best interest of their respective populations in mind. But nonetheless, they are rather bucking the overall consensus for now, and only history will allow us to judge them or laud their bravery in that respect.”

- It might be an interesting exercise to look from the other end of the spyglass - are you certain that the overall consensus is in favour of the ’vaccines’, given the numbers involved ( some countries are considerable larger than ours, eg the state of Uttar Pradesh has three times the population of Gt. Britain, and quite a number of other high population countries also use ivermectin)?

Do you give any credence whatsoever to the meta analyses (2) which have been undertaken, both of which demonstrate overwhelming benefit of use of ivermectin, then?

Im not so certain that the ‘broad consensus’ you mention covers the majority of global population, nor am I convinced that the pandemic can be tamed by virtue of use of leaky vaccines, vaccine passports for same and other nonsenses, and as yet unproven booster shots - it would appear to me that the broad consensus is in fact that simply put, ivermectin reduces reproduction and thus availability of virus, which is not the case with a vaccine which only partially works, and especially not at all convincingly against the now almost ubiquitous delta variant. Continued pressure applied by such unsuccessful means can only hasten the evolution of the next variant, which will similarly outplay the vaccine, much in the same way that over-reliance on not wholly lethal antibiotics has led to resistant strains of other nasties, or eg rodenticide-resistant rats and mice.

View attachment 220605

Nor can I personally see the benefit of trying to treat patients no longer creating virus with a treatment which prevents it reproducing, which is exactly what is happening in latter part of the ‘PRINCIPLE’ study; to give ivermectin to patients in the second week of their illness, knowing full well as anyone who has studied the virus’s m.o. that the virus has ceased reproducing by then seems quite pointless and in fact ignoble, when it clearly serves no purpose, other than confirming that the ‘stable door’ should perhaps be closed, in the event of the ‘loss of the horse’ the week previously. Designed to fail?

I would define 'consensus' in terms of advisory bodies, countries and academic consensus. ie, consensus amongst experts and decision makers, not recipients of any given treatment. After all its extremely hard to tell if the population as a whole has an opinion one way or another, because in the case of Africa or India their choices aren't 'vaccines or Ivermectin' they're Ivermectin or nothing. India for example has approved basically all the vaccines (russian, chinese, american, european, the lot) and have also developed their own. They'd happily go for vaccination, clearly, but they simply can't get many doses or at least can't get them in peoples arms quick enough. Under these circumstances can you say that Indians aren't aligned with vaccination as a viable strategy? I wonder how many in India would take a vaccine if offered to them, today? It's the same situation for Africa.

There's also the question of expertise and engagement. I expect that in India, as in Britain, most are happy to listen to the advice of their doctor, or their government or their healthcare provider. If those sources say vaccination, most will go along with it. If they say Ivermectin, most will go along with that as well. The question of if the advice of a given government impacts 1 million or 1 billion people is rather secondary to the level of consensus if none of those folks have much of a personal opinion one way or the other and will just take the recommendation.

Oh, and as of this morning, 5.6 billion vaccines have been administered, with 2.3Billion people having had at least one dose. Even if every single person in India, all of Latin America and all of Sub-Saharan Africa were taking Ivermectin for COVID, they'd still struggle to form a majority vs the number of people who are vaccinated. And of course, the uptake even in the countries that have approved Ivermectin is probably way les than 50%.

As for the meta analyses you mention, I'm assuming you're talking about the ones on the FLCCC (and BIRD) websites. If so, then yes I've read them, and no I don't give them much credence. The reasons why are thus:

Hill, 2021 merged a load of other treatments (doxycycline, hydroxychloroquinine etc) in with Ivermectin muddying the results, gave no clear analysis of experimental certainty, and I have serious doubts about the reliability of the results and the level of bias in 5 out of the 6 key studies he cited as data sources due to unclear experimental endpoints, poor selection of cohorts to include folks without covid at all, and inclusion of combination therapies or incorrectly defined controls.

Kory, 2021 on the other hand was even worse. Half the trials he cited as RCTs weren't RCTs at all, they again had only poorly defined experimental outcomes, several included hydroxychloroquinine either as a co-therapy or even worse as a control masquerading as a standard treatment regime (despite it's proven risks and lack of demonstrable effectiveness). Oh, and he didn't even give any data on how he picked the original studies he assessed from the literature.

Then there's the most recent review by Bryant (2021). Again, the trials analysed were not selected using any recognized search methodology (it could have just been cherry picked data), two of the studies included cohorts with significant levels of folks with no covid at all, they again muddied the waters by including studies using other unproven therapies such as doxycycline as controls and drew mortality conclusions despite 2 of the trials assessed not even publishing mortality figures or elegible time points. There's a serious suggestion that the Elgazzar, 2020 trial, which was the one which both listed the largest trial cohort and reported the most significant benefit (and therefore served to increase the confidence intervals most significantly), is entirely fraudulent. It's since been withdrawn. This was the best of the bunch though, to be fair.

Notably all three of them continued to cite the same small group of studies throughout, despite there being plenty of other trials with equivalent size and experimental design to draw on being published over the period between the 3 publications. Again, I'm not saying that's a deliberate selection of cherry picked studies, but I question the continued reliance on such a small group of trials, especially as none of them bothered to publish their literature search methodology or selection criteria.

Or perhaps you're talking about the studies on ivnmeta.com? The ones citing data on relative benefit in percentage terms, but that don't publish any trial protocols and lump in a load of other inelegible treatments into the data without declaring them? Oh, and that have no assessment of confidence intervals or declaration of bias?

Any others I've missed?

Anyway, having given my reasons, I shall ask in turn; do you give any credence whatsoever to the many, many meta analyses undertaken which demonstrate no benefit to the use of Ivermectin? If so, why not?

Then there's your comment on the consensus of ivermectin effectively inhibiting viral replication (in a therapeutic setting as opposed to in a test tube). Far as I can tell, there's no such consensus at all, at least not outside BIRD and the FLCCC (again, they're the same group of people). The question of if Ivermectin can effectively inhibit viral reproduction in vivo sufficiently to deliver therapeutic benefits and improve patient outcomes without toxicity from the dose required is a question the trials are trying to answer, so far with no compelling evidence to support it.

I will agree that COVID is unlikely to be eradicated through vaccination (or indeed any other intervention) at this stage though. It's endemic and will likely remain so.

 

[nick.308]

I would define 'consensus' in terms of advisory bodies, countries and academic consensus. ie, consensus amongst experts and decision makers, not recipients of any given treatment. After all its extremely hard to tell if the population as a whole has an opinion one way or another, because in the case of Africa or India their choices aren't 'vaccines or Ivermectin' they're Ivermectin or nothing. India for example has approved basically all the vaccines (russian, chinese, american, european, the lot) and have also developed their own. They'd happily go for vaccination, clearly, but they simply can't get many doses or at least can't get them in peoples arms quick enough. Under these circumstances can you say that Indians aren't aligned with vaccination as a viable strategy? I wonder how many in India would take a vaccine if offered to them, today? It's the same situation for Africa.

There's also the question of expertise and engagement. I expect that in India, as in Britain, most are happy to listen to the advice of their doctor, or their government or their healthcare provider. If those sources say vaccination, most will go along with it. If they say Ivermectin, most will go along with that as well. The question of if the advice of a given government impacts 1 million or 1 billion people is rather secondary to the level of consensus if none of those folks have much of a personal opinion one way or the other and will just take the recommendation.

Oh, and as of this morning, 5.6 billion vaccines have been administered, with 2.3Billion people having had at least one dose. Even if every single person in India, all of Latin America and all of Sub-Saharan Africa were taking Ivermectin for COVID, they'd still struggle to form a majority vs the number of people who are vaccinated. And of course, the uptake even in the countries that have approved Ivermectin is probably way les than 50%.

As for the meta analyses you mention, I'm assuming you're talking about the ones on the FLCCC (and BIRD) websites. If so, then yes I've read them, and no I don't give them much credence. The reasons why are thus:

Hill, 2021 merged a load of other treatments (doxycycline, hydroxychloroquinine etc) in with Ivermectin muddying the results, gave no clear analysis of experimental certainty, and I have serious doubts about the reliability of the results and the level of bias in 5 out of the 6 key studies he cited as data sources due to unclear experimental endpoints, poor selection of cohorts to include folks without covid at all, and inclusion of combination therapies or incorrectly defined controls.

Kory, 2021 on the other hand was even worse. Half the trials he cited as RCTs weren't RCTs at all, they again had only poorly defined experimental outcomes, several included hydroxychloroquinine either as a co-therapy or even worse as a control masquerading as a standard treatment regime (despite it's proven risks and lack of demonstrable effectiveness). Oh, and he didn't even give any data on how he picked the original studies he assessed from the literature.

Then there's the most recent review by Bryant (2021). Again, the trials analysed were not selected using any recognized search methodology (it could have just been cherry picked data), two of the studies included cohorts with significant levels of folks with no covid at all, they again muddied the waters by including studies using other unproven therapies such as doxycycline as controls and drew mortality conclusions despite 2 of the trials assessed not even publishing mortality figures or elegible time points. There's a serious suggestion that the Elgazzar, 2020 trial, which was the one which both listed the largest trial cohort and reported the most significant benefit (and therefore served to increase the confidence intervals most significantly), is entirely fraudulent. It's since been withdrawn. This was the best of the bunch though, to be fair.

Notably all three of them continued to cite the same small group of studies throughout, despite there being plenty of other trials with equivalent size and experimental design to draw on being published over the period between the 3 publications. Again, I'm not saying that's a deliberate selection of cherry picked studies, but I question the continued reliance on such a small group of trials, especially as none of them bothered to publish their literature search methodology or selection criteria.

Or perhaps you're talking about the studies on ivnmeta.com? The ones citing data on relative benefit in percentage terms, but that don't publish any trial protocols and lump in a load of other inelegible treatments into the data without declaring them? Oh, and that have no assessment of confidence intervals or declaration of bias?

Any others I've missed?

Anyway, having given my reasons, I shall ask in turn; do you give any credence whatsoever to the many, many meta analyses undertaken which demonstrate no benefit to the use of Ivermectin? If so, why not?

Then there's your comment on the consensus of ivermectin effectively inhibiting viral replication (in a therapeutic setting as opposed to in a test tube). Far as I can tell, there's no such consensus at all, at least not outside BIRD and the FLCCC (again, they're the same group of people). The question of if Ivermectin can effectively inhibit viral reproduction in vivo sufficiently to deliver therapeutic benefits and improve patient outcomes without toxicity from the dose required is a question the trials are trying to answer, so far with no compelling evidence to support it.

I will agree that COVID is unlikely to be eradicated through vaccination (or indeed any other intervention) at this stage though. It's endemic and will likely remain so.

You are obviously an intelligent person, I wouldn't waste any more of your time trying educate non scientists to think like scientists on this thread. I think they just want to be argumentative for the sake of it.

 

[Freeforester]

I suppose we will have to agree to differ as to the cost:benefit and efficacy:risk aspects, and agree on respective risks of confirmation bias.

Maybe we can ascribe the precipitous declines of daily cases and low levels of infection in places like India, Mexico, etc to luck, or coincidence rather than serendipity.

Speaking of mortality rates, I understand the ‘reluctance’ of those of a claimed ‘more scientific’ leaning to address this aspect in respect of the vaccines, not wishing to ‘spook the horses’, but isn’t this equally a form of confirmation bias, or even anti-science? Or are the pathologists wrong in flagging up the obvious concerns of those who are or remain unconvinced of the safety of these treatments?

You may well feel that the ’science is settled’ by consensus among ‘experts’; this is not the same as saying much less demonstrating that the vaccines are safe in the longer term, any more than proving that ivermectin is not effective, we seem to be in the ‘we don’t know’ sphere. Thus, in the absence of objective proof free of bias we can take our pick. The Indian guinea pigs on ivermectin seem to be doing reasonably well, along with those elsewhere where the choice has been ivermectin, and confidence in its safety is provable and high. The same cannot really be said, though it is repeatedly claimed, of either the safety or efficacy of the vaccines in comparable terms at this point in time.

The science is in danger of being distorted in the absence of full disclosure of the findings, and tends to give rise suspicion among those who are labelled non-scientists by those who style themselves as the ‘real deal’. Perhaps they may wish to address, for example the 16% reduction in fertility observed in lab rats, or the apparent mobility of the constituent parts of a supposedly ‘fixed’ or immobile constituent component of the vaccines. For my part, I know two persons who have suffered badly from the after effects of their vaccine jabs, both having recovered from the illness itself - hardly reassuring. I know health professionals who are troubled by the incidences of similar instances among people who I do not directly know. Should I be concerned? Is it wrong to have a care for these matters simply because the community here is perhaps more cohesive owing to its smaller numbers, ie do we simply ignore these ‘outliers’, these ‘statistical anomalies’?


Nick is doubtless right in his assessment of your intellect. I’d also go as far as to approve his advice of not trying to educate non-scientists to think like one, but the rub is to whom should this apply, those glossing over the anomalies in the science, yet who claim to hold the scientific high ground, or those who have as yet to be convinced of the science, based upon the obvious gaps and lack of disclosure of all the facts.

First, do no harm.

 

[nick.308]

non scientist= believes bullsh1t before its proven to be bullsh1t
scientist = doesnt believe any bullsh1t until its properly proven.

 

[plonker]

No doctor has ever prescribed "approved" medication over the years only for it to be removed years later after it leading to issues

 

[Sinistral]

Just keeping everyone up to date.

Ivermectin: Australian regulator bans drug as Covid treatment after sharp rise in prescriptions

Therapeutic Goods Administration concerned people taking controversial medication instead of seeking proper treatment or vaccine

www.theguardian.com

 

[Freeforester]

Just keeping everyone up to date.

Ivermectin: Australian regulator bans drug as Covid treatment after sharp rise in prescriptions

Therapeutic Goods Administration concerned people taking controversial medication instead of seeking proper treatment or vaccine

www.theguardian.com

Maybe they should ask Professor Thomas Borody, eh?

 

[Freeforester]

non scientist= believes bullsh1t before its proven to be bullsh1t
scientist = doesnt believe any bullsh1t until its properly proven.

Facts trump opinions, omissions and misinformation too.

 

[Alistair]

You are obviously an intelligent person, I wouldn't waste any more of your time trying educate non scientists to think like scientists on this thread. I think they just want to be argumentative for the sake of it.

As I noted, I'm not debating the issue to persuade Freeforester. I'm merely presenting an opposing view on this thread so that those who are interested, but have not yet established a strong bias either way can see an understand why the stuff that's being posted is not universally accepted by the wider scientific community and is not objectively, unassailably 'correct'.

Again, I'm not saying it's wrong. I'm merely sharing the other side of this argument so that at least third parties can get exposure to both the sources that say that Ivermectin is good, and those that say it isn't.

In fairness to Freeforester, whilst we disagree, he does appear to be presenting his data in good faith. I'm not saying by that that he is correct of course, but someone who is posting in that vein is presumably open to challenge and questioning, something that was (IMHO) quite lacking in this thread. Now, perhaps, it's slightly less so. I do not presume to tell anyone what to do, but I would like to represent, as far as I'm able, a more 'mainstream' view on the treatment. Perhaps it persuades a few folks, perhaps it doesn't. But it will certainly allow people to make more informed decisions, which is of service to 'the interested' I'd hope.

 

[Freeforester]

Well, we will at least hopefully end up, if none the wiser, then at least better informed.
Just as an initial point in need of clarification, do you care to clarify whether you accept the modes of function of ivermectin at all, not at all, or partially, in respect of its ‘interaction’ with SARS COV 2?