An interesting comment I read somewhere else was that the realpolitik case for discrediting treatments is that deploying the fast tracked vaccines is predicated on a legal emergency measure, for which the key requirement is there are no other viable treatments.

I don't think there is serious controversy that the vaccine rollout is being used as leverage for imposing digital identity schemes and for establishing a variety of other ostensibly temporary powers that will not be rolled back, and so it is difficult to "trust the science" on this as the question has become 90%+ political. The consequences of a non-vaccine treatment being available would obviate the need for all the supporting systems for it, and derail a large co-ordinated effort that has been some years in the making. If you know anything about digital identity, you know what's been going on in that space right now and who/what is driving it. Conspiracy theories about mere pharma profits are distracting and don't think nearly big enough.

If we really want to get everyone vaccinated for c19, we need to commit to no domestic vaccine passports. If we require the passports, the rollout is going to stall, you're going to mass-disenfranchise 20%+ of the middle class, and when we have to deal with a threat with a more serious fataility rate, there will be no institutional credibility left to respond to it.

I'm not sure we should be haggling the details of chemistry and biology we aren't equipped to reason about when the real policy issue of passports is something we all have a stake in.