Facebook Is Allowing Ivermectin Ads at a Time When It Shouldn’t

What's CBD?

Well my company took initiative to supply ivermectin to all of their employees, to the point where it feels like a requirement to take it.

I don't know whether it's bad or not or if the boss consult with medical personnel first, but the dosage is strictly applied.

I treated it as medicine against worm, since it's been years since I took one, so I don't really mind that. Otherwise, I wouldn't take it.

Ivermectin not IvermectRin.

If it's proven that Ivermectin causes more harm than good, shouldn't the authorities do test purchases, follow the money, and then charge whoever sells this with negligent bodily harm ot similar?

More controversial, maybe it should be just illegal to run misinformation campaigns that harm people in a crisis like this. I know people will say, what about free speech, but we already regulate health claims. And in a war it is/was illegal to spread misinformation that helps the enemy, so why not in a crisis like this?

> Wouldn't a good response be to publicize the recommended and "do not exceed" dosages of the various widely available formulations of ivermectrin? Is the problem that people are using this; or that they may have wrong beliefs?

The problem is that using Ivermectin is not without drawbacks. There are some potentially serious risks associated with it, which are likely heightened by people taking veterinary versions of it.

The doses I've seen in COVID trials are high too. Really high. In one of the in vitro studies that showed promise, the dose was so high that one of the key questions was whether it's even possible to get human blood serum levels that high, disregarding whether a person would even survive. Just purely in a "can we overload your liver enough to get the levels this high" kind of way.

So it's not just the use of ivermectin; the doses people want create a second issue.

> If this story was s/Ivermectrin/CBD/ would anyone's position on the issue stay the same?

There are 2 things that I think make Ivermectin worse.

Firstly, the risk. I'm not aware of any significant risk profile from CBD, at least at normal doses. Allergies are likely possible, but that's an omnipresent risk. Ivermectin can kill you, especially when using veterinary supplies, and double especially when you're aiming for heroic doses. The pattern of use is probably a greater risk than the drug itself, but if they won't listen to you telling them not to take it, they're probably not going to listen to you telling them to take reasonable doses from approved sources.

The second thing that makes Ivermectin work is that it is a miracle drug; it's on the WHO's list of essential medicines. We should not be messing with the supply/demand curve of an essential medicine if we can avoid it. Even if it's totally safe to use, raising demand can raise prices, and there are large parts of the world that are very poor and desperately need access to Ivermectin. They use it to treat parasitic diseases that can result in deformities, blindness, death, etc, etc.

At least in this case, I'm of the opinion that it's fine for Facebook to do nothing. I'd prefer they had a lighter touch in moderation than a heavy one. If the government doesn't like what's going, the onus is on them to pass and enforce a law that bans regular people advocating for off-label use of drugs, or one that forces social media platforms to monitor for it.

I don't think people should be doing it, but I also don't think it's Facebook's role to stop people from doing stupid things.

I used to think this, but there are some serious downsides. Too many bad actors who would take advantage of it. I don't use FB, so I'm not sure you can call it a utility anyhow.

which path is the least likely to enable society to self-destruct?

Perhaps covid could be a good analogy and inspiration for how to deal with social media. Social distancing, vaccines, try to get the transmission rate down...