Hacker News Reader

Comment by swader999 | Hacker News Reader

Ivermectin and HCQ sure got shut down hard even though recent studies are giving them some credit. If they had been a valid option, emergency use authorisation wouldn't have been granted.

I honestly don't know what to think about all of this. I've seen a lot of censorship and stifling of speech. Reading Fauci's emails also makes me hesitate. I think trust in the experts will really take a hit going forward.

I did get the AZ vaccine a few weeks ago. Yesterday I had a flame heme show up on a retina scan at the eye doc. Was it the vax? Perhaps, the Oxford UK study said these kinds of events are slightly more likely from what they've seen.

View on HN

Will you share your sources re: "recent studies giving [HCQ and ivermectin] credit"?

I haven't seen anything positive about those drugs in COVID-19 in human patients. For example, the RECOVERY trial showed no benefit (and non-significant numerical harm) for HCQ: https://www.nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMoa2022926

Here's a pre print from today. Credible authors so I do expect it to go the distance: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.05.28.21258012v...

This expose on the suppression of ivermectin is telling: https://covid19criticalcare.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/T...

Lots of studies referenced in it.

Thank you for sharing the link. I do note that this is an observational study of 255 people. It contradicts a randomized trial with 1,561 people in the HCQ-arm alone vs 3,155 receiving usual care (RECOVERY).

When they are studied as a prophylactic or at early stage, they really prove out. I think that trial you referenced was in late stage severe cases, almost feels like they gamed that design to fail.

The study you have cited was entirely confined to 255 patients, all of whom required mechanical ventilation, 70% of whom died by day 90. That's severe COVID, not "prophylaxis."

Yeah I know, and I didn't expect that. It's even better the earlier it's applied though.

There are a lot of studies of varying quality, some of which show benefit for IVM and HCQ. One place to find some of these compiled is https://hcqmeta.com. Beware that they don't say what their study inclusion criteria is, so one has to be more skeptical of studies that have a small N and/or high P value.

The RECOVERY results for HCQ were definitely negative. Personally I'm neutral on its effectiveness, but HCQ proponents would probably say that HCQ's postulated antiviral mechanism is not effective on already hospitalized patients, since most of them would have already cleared the virus by the time they showed up to the hospital.

It's interesting to look at the forest plots on that page and only focus on RCTs, which are labeled. I cannot understand why someone would try to meta-analyze RCTs with observational studies when dozens of each exist. But this really hammers home (despite their misleading summary statistics at the top) that the evidence does not support an effect of HCQ on COVID-19.

Regarding ivermectin, this twitter thread does a good job summarizing other studies and links to them all.

https://twitter.com/AbdenurFlavio/status/1398717229366235141

> Reading Fauci's emails also makes me hesitate.

Which ones, specifically?

I keep seeing people say this. There are thousands of pages in the PDF and no one seems to be able to quote anything actually concerning.

They are all over the web. But clearly if you take them all in, you come away from it with the impression that he really pushed gain of function research and hid the fact once this took off last spring. Most of what he said in hind sight and with these emails seems to be more about politics and less about science and educating the masses.

The messaging on masks should have been that only n95 or better are worth the time. One email to a friend pretty much said that.

> The messaging on masks should have been that only n95 or better are worth the time

Which is simply rubbish.

Masks of all kinds will prevent transmission albeit with varying levels of efficacy. And most importantly they impact human behaviour in ways which prevent transmission.

Not to mention that N95 masks are more expensive which would have reduced its use by people who are poorer and are far more likely to spread the virus i.e. they are more likely to have multiple jobs, travel further for their job, work longer hours etc.

Ones of all design do help with droplet suppression. They do sweet f all for airborne unless properly fit and of the right rating. Covid for all practical purposes behaves like it is airborne. If you haven't realized this by now, I don't know what to say to convince you.

Maybe these will help:

https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/26/5/19-0994_article

https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M20-6817

" In theory, transmission should be reduced the most if both infected members and other contacts wear masks"

Wish you had read the studies you posted

I did actually. That line you quoted was what they (and most all of us would expect).

The data didn't prove it out though, they report this in their analysis: "We did not find evidence that surgical-type face masks are effective in reducing laboratory-confirmed influenza transmission, either when worn by infected persons (source control) or by persons in the general community to reduce their susceptibility"

I already said that not all masks are the same.

But any mask is better than no mask. Which is what happens if you mandate a far more expensive and harder to get N95 variant.

See, there’s that dodge. No concerning quote. Not even a page number. Just dark, vague assertions.

I know it’s all over the web; I skimmed quite a few pages. You’re claiming concerning stuff lurks within - support the assertion.

They are all images of the emails that have been posted. Sorry, I'm not retyping them.

> worth the time

is completely relative to the observer. a piece of shitty fabric over your face won't stop n95 levels of transmission but it is better than nothing. To some of us, it's "worth the time" to be less likely to spread even if by a very small margin.

Actually no. A cloth mask can harbor dampness and increase flu transmission. It may give a false sense of security. See the two studies I posted.

" In theory, transmission should be reduced the most if both infected members and other contacts wear masks" from the very study you posted.

Don't you realize you are quoting the hypotheses or just the preamble?

Read the conclusion, what their study actually found: "We did not find evidence that surgical-type face masks are effective in reducing laboratory-confirmed influenza transmission, either when worn by infected persons (source control) or by persons in the general community to reduce their susceptibility"

>If they had been a valid option, emergency use authorisation wouldn't have been granted.

You don't want to treat a disease (especially with drugs that have their own problems), you want to prevent it from happening in the first place. Vaccines help prevent it, and so would still have gotten authorized.

Agree but these two options weren't given a fair chance by Fauci. He clearly had conflicts of interest. The emergency use authorisation wouldn't have been granted if he had. These are viable alternatives. Quercetin is another one and much more benign.

If a drug had an obvious benefit as you claim, why would the world care what Fauci thinks? I think you need to reconcile your skepticism with a bit more appreciation for the scientists around the world who are also trying to find the solution without intentionally harming people. Fauci is irrelevant in the larger scheme of things.

That being said, absolutely none of those medications you mentioned are targeted drugs. Its not a good idea to take those drugs for years as a prophylactic, especially broad-spectrum drugs. The only reason to use them is if the disease is worse than the side-effects. We know their mechanism of action, and they're well known to interfere with other functions in the body.

Our body already has a targeted defense mechanism and vaccines are the primary means to leverage it.

Ivermectin and HCQ were shut down because people were promoting as an alternative to a vaccine.

It's not. It is a supplement to the vaccine for people who are already hospitalised.

None of this is correct. Both of these drugs were part of the conversation long before a vaccine was available, and at least withe Ivermectin the proposed usage is as a prophylactic or as soon as you see any symptoms. Not once you are so sick that you need to go to the hospital. To be clear, I'm not giving any medical advice, just clearing up some incorrect statements.

People were promoting two things: (a) that the economy should be fully re-opened because Ivermetctin/HCQ would solve the problem of hospitalisations and (b) that vaccine development was as such unnecessary.

Both were completely wrong. Ivermetctin/HCQ has being actively used around the world for over a year and it has not "solved" the issue of deaths due to COVID.

Can you point to a specific email that makes you hesitant?

This article pretty much covers them all. It doesn't look good on him. Some of the redaections are due to ongoing investigations as well.

https://www.zerohedge.com/covid-19/fauci-emails-reveal-damag...

Hmmm. Gotta say I did not find that article convincing. It just seems like he's skeptical of a paper that makes some wild claims.

The article also assumes that the paper was withdrawn because of some sort of political pressure. But fails to actually point to any real evidence. I think it's more likely that they made extraordinary claims and failed to produce the extraordinary evidence.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com