| Aren't there many (>60) published studies showing varying positive effects of early treatment with Ivermectin though? (Despite a couple having been retracted for obvious fraud). YouTube's policy specifically bans mention of Ivermectin as a possible treatment. Combined with the safety profile and cost of Ivermectin, I'd have thought that it'd at least be worth a try in an emergency - the worst possible case being that it doesn't work (unless you have idiots taking horse-size doses). Compared with the quality of data surrounding remdesivir, molnupiravir etc, there seems to be a significant bias towards novelty (and therefore $$$). Similarly, it's been known for decades that vitamin D deficiency increases susceptibility to respiratory diseases, and most people in Europe/North America are deficient in winter. Why not hand it out? Worst case, it doesn't work. |
There are a number of low-quality (low numbers, methodological issue) studies with varying results. The primary "evidence" that got people excited about Ivermectin was a meta-analysis of these studies, but the meta-analysis itself pointed out that the largest amount of data and strongest evidence in their dataset came from one very large study – the study that was later withdrawn for having faked its data.
Since then, there's been no real compelling evidence at all that Ivermectin has any real impact beyond placebo.
> Compared with the quality of data surrounding remdesivir, molnupiravir etc, there seems to be a significant bias towards novelty (and therefore $$$).
There's a bias towards using treatments for which: 1) there is a reasonable expectation, based on understood science, that the treatment should impact the course of the virus
(preferably) and
2) there is some non-fraudulent, non-obscure and tiny dataset, indicating an effect.
The lack of strong data in support of Ivermectin is coupled with the fact that there's no particular reason to expect Ivermectin should have any impact on any particular virus.
> Similarly, it's been known for decades that vitamin D deficiency increases susceptibility to respiratory diseases, and most people in Europe/North America are deficient in winter. Why not hand it out? Worst case, it doesn't work.
This is mistaking correlation with causation. We know that many people who suffer serious respiratory illnesses, and who die from COVID-19, have low vitamin D levels. This is not believed to imply that low vitamin D levels cause death from COVID-19; rather it's simply the natural outcome of many old people having low vitamin D levels and age being a significant factor in COVID-19 deaths. People who die of old age also have low vitamin D levels; would you argue we should hand out vitamin D in an attempt to cure aging?
The idea that because these things are relatively safe we might as well just do them seems, in whole, silly. Sugar pills and crystals have a great safety profile too, but we don't expect physicians to use those on the theory of "well there's no real downside" either.
Science, not superstition, is the goal here.