[roenxi]

> because COVID misinformation was largely a right-wing phenomenon.

That isn't really a fair assessment; it is true that large groups of people generate more wild theories but there was a lot of misinformation everywhere. Most of it inconsequential.

But weighting by consequence it is hard to overlook things like:

- "Plague of the unvaccinated" and the tide of misinformation saying that the vaccine would halt COVID. A lot of people believed that. They were wrong. And a lot of the blatant human rights violations through the COVID era were probably driven by that particular mistake. It wasn't a right-wing phenomenon.

- "14 Days to Flatten the Curve", which turned out to be critical misinformation that derailed any debate over the wisdom of lockdowns. Certainly a forgivable move given the urgency and confusion in the first few months, but the fact that it was material and misinformation stands out in hindsight.

- Dismissing a lot of legitimate studies related to Ivermectin. It turned out that they were showing that people who had parasites + COVID had a much better response to COVID if they took an anti-parasite drug so, y'know, fair enough but not that useful in the west. But there was a lot of misinformation that the studies themselves were fake that undermined trust that the responders were looking at evidence. That dismissal was also certainly not coming from the right wing.

[defrost]

> Dismissing a lot of legitimate studies related to Ivermectin. It turned out that they were showing that people who had parasites + COVID had a much better response to COVID if they took an anti-parasite drug

I read along from Australia during that period and I saw little evidence that people who knew what they were talking about "[Dismissed] a lot of legitimate studies related to Ivermectin".

It was clear cut at the time that meta-studies from "the Global South" showed that Ivermectin greatly improved M&M stats (recovery from infection, death rates) across the board for the cold, the flu, COVID, .. everything really.

No great suprise there, when parasites are killed off the host has more resources to fight off infection.

What was repeatedly dismissed, perhaps not always clearly, was the great leap being put about that Ivermectin would magically cure COVID in G20 coutries with little to no general parasite problems.

The big deal was that social media meta study that sourced 80% of COVID bullshit back to 12 "people" | groups that were all snake oil sales types peddling miracle cures on the vack of sowing fear doubt and uncertainty.

It was an endless sisyphean task pushing back against the amplification of bullshit in US social media.

[roenxi]

There were a large body of studies showing that Ivermectin helped with COVID. Some people said that evidence should be dismissed and, fair enough. I get to be consistent in my belief that people should be able to ignore evidence because sometimes it is misleading. In this case it was a good move.

But there was also a large crowd of people spreading misinformation that the reason the evidence was misleading was because it was fake or the studies were faulty and that only crazy people would want to take Ivermectin. It turned out not only were the studies were fine but also that there are many people who should probably take Ivermectin immediately upon recognising COVID symptoms. That large crowd were, in a pretty clear-cut way, spreading misinformation. Not right wingers, they tended to be more of a pure-play authoritarian variety based on the arguments I had.

> I read along from Australia during that period and I saw little evidence that people who knew what they were talking about "[Dismissed] a lot of legitimate studies related to Ivermectin".

Bit of a tautology there, we'd expect the people who got things right to know what they were talking about in hindsight and vice versa. People who spread misinformation have a fairly particular profile, it just isn't partisan.

[vkou]

Those studies have consistently shown that Invermectin (a de-wormer) helped people with COVID when those people lived in countries where people have a lot of worms.

The studies were not faulty, but any meta-analysis of the studies that did not take this into account was.

[numpad0]

In case this was needed to be said, Ivermectin is an antiparasitic substance. If used to a player with parasite infection debuff, it may remove the effect and restore small amounts of hit points.

It is not established, but a player's hit points remaining and parasite infection status may negatively affect COVID survivability dice roll.

Just add those up in your head. dc am not a doc.

[Blot2882]

> There were a large body of studies showing that Ivermectin helped with COVID

No, there wasn't.

[roenxi]

Yes there were. Still are, I suppose. Scott Alexander had a great round up back in 2021: https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/ivermectin-much-more-than-y...

[kaba0]

Correlation doesn’t equal causation. It’s the typical case, there are studies showing the former, yet it absolutely does nothing for COVID, it was a “hidden” third variable all along (having parasites).

[roenxi]

You're presenting evidence that it is causative. The chain of causation is: take ivermectin -> kill parasites -> better COVID outcomes.

This would be correlation not causation if it were something like parasites caused better COVID outcomes and people in the global south were being given sugar-water. Then there'd be studies showing that sugar water caused better COVID outcomes but it'd be correlation not causation.

In this case though the correlation was because of causation.

[kaba0]

In a study, you are usually interested in the relation of two things — here, ivermectin intake and COVID morbidity. The two variables do correlate in countries where parasites are a commonly infecting people. What can we claim from such a study? That the two correlate, that’s it. To conclude causation, you would have to make a double-blind study with control groups, where both have COVID (and neither have parasites) and one are given sugar pill, the other ivermectin. If that showed a significant difference between the two groups we could say that ivermectin causes decreased morbidity. But no such evidence has been shown.

What the actual studies show is simply a correlation, and we can do some educated guesses based on prior knowledge: ivermectin is an effective dewormer, the human body can produce anti-bodies against COVID, and that the immunesystem is better fighting a single thing, than multiple ones. Putting these together, we get a reasonable hypothesis showing a third variable that explains the measured correlation, through a causative mechanism (parasite hindering healing and parasite getting killed).

[roenxi]

But surely you'll have to admit that if we do a double-blind study where all the participants have parasites we would probably get a significant difference between the two groups? Then we could also say that ivermectin caused decreased morbidity. We'd probably even say "it caused a decreased morbidity in populations with parasites, as expected". You can't just pretend people without parasites don't exist, they do. There are countries where the base rate is really high. That is where the results that show ivermectin as causing better COVID outcomes are coming from.

You've misunderstood the correlation-causation complaint. We have a pretty clear theory of causation here and the results back it up. Just because causality depends on specific conditions doesn't stop it being causal. Any medical treatment that isn't 100% effective (ie, most of them) depend on specific conditions being present - otherwise they'd be perfectly effective. Of course since the chain of causality is quite clear on this one we can conclude from the base rates of parasite infections there isn't much point taking ivermectin for COVID in the west.

[defrost]

> There were a large body of studies showing that Ivermectin helped with COVID.

Nope. Not now, not then, and not in the absence of parasites.

The early pandemic studies you "recall" were real studies, meta studies that looked at the use of Ivermectin in "the Global South" in countries with high incidence of worms | parasites | etc.

These studies showed a distinct improvement in the face of COVID for treated groups .. eg: those untreated that had parasites and caught COVID Vs. those treated and caught COVID but now had immune responses uncomprimised by parasites.

more recent studies, in G20 type countries,

    A Cochrane meta-analysis of 11 eligible trials examining the efficacy of ivermectin for the treatment of COVID-19 published through April 2022 concluded that ivermectin has no beneficial effect for people with COVID-19.1

    Since May 2022, an additional 3 large randomized clinical trials including several thousand participants have been published, each reaching a similar conclusion.

    Today JAMA publishes a new trial of ivermectin treatment for mild to moderate COVID-19 that addresses the possibility that the existing literature may have missed the efficacy of ivermectin because the previously tested dose (approximately 400 μg/kg daily for 3 days) was insufficient.

    At a higher treatment dose (600 μg/kg daily) and longer treatment duration (6 days), Naggie and colleagues again conclude that ivermectin is not beneficial for the treatment of COVID-19.

~ https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2801828

and,

New study shows ivermectin lacks meaningful benefits in COVID-19 treatment (March, 2024)

    New research led by the University of Oxford has concluded that the antiparasitic drug ivermectin does not provide clinically meaningful benefits for treating COVID-19 in a largely vaccinated population.

~ https://www.phc.ox.ac.uk/news/new-study-shows-ivermectin-lac...

Damn- no effect in any trial in the absence of worms.

> Bit of a tautology there, we'd expect the people who got things right to know what they were talking about in hindsight

whereas I'm talking about qualified epidemiologists who were correct then (2020) and still correct today .. the likes of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiona_Stanley (who I worked with in the 1980s) et al.

[roenxi]

That is a powerful response against someone who I suspect you're imagining. Maybe try assuming I more or less agree with all that re-read my comment? I don't see any points of disagreement.

[somewhat_drunk]

>There were a large body of studies showing that Ivermectin helped with COVID.

No, there wasn't. I haven't kept up with the science, so there may be such studies now, but there certainly wasn't back in late 2020, when the ivermectin craze spread like wildfire among right wingers.

[Blot2882]

> But there was a lot of misinformation that the studies themselves were fake

That was not misinformation. The idea that Ivermectin was helpful in dealing with CoVID was determined from a meta analysis that included a fake study that nobody can confirm happened and even used dead people. It was pushed by grifting doctors who sell Ivermectin.

Yes, if you have parasites and take an anti-parasite drug you're gonna feel better, whether you have CoVID or not.

> the tide of misinformation saying that the vaccine would halt COVID

It halted it as much as it could considering 30% of people didn't complete vaccination. I finished and have had every booster and never got CoVID despite all of my family members getting it (who refused to get vaccinated).