> It has now been shown to reduce malaria transmission by killing the mosquitoes that feed on treated individuals.
That seems like it will interfere with careless randomized controlled trial design. If the drug kills mosquitos, it could easily do less well at preventing the user from getting infected by a mosquito, but it could potentially prevent an infected patient from spreading an infection via mosquito or even kill a mosquito that would otherwise subsequently spread an infection between two other people.
In any case, here’s a better article. It seems the authors are very much aware of this issue, and they randomized entire clusters of people:
Ivermectin has a surprisingly interesting origin, it was discovered in soil near a Japanese golf course and developed from a bacterium that kills parasites. It went on to treat diseases like river blindness and became widely used in both human and veterinary medicine. Despite all that, it’s definitely not some miracle drug or cure-all like some would have you believe. Though that didn’t stop my grandpa from stockpiling it after watching too many Fox News ads.
gus_massa · 33m ago
> it’s definitely not some miracle drug or cure-all like some would have you believe
> The drug is effective against a wide number of parasites and arthropods in general
> Its ion-channel mechanism of action against parasites has no application to viruses.
andy_ppp · 58m ago
Yes, I really am always shocked by the Joe Rogans et. al. who spout off about random fad pharmaceuticals like this (with microscopic grains of truth that’s been twisted), they don’t even understand the basics of what is done to prove anything at all works effectively but in complete stupidity there’s a certainty I don’t think I have about anything.
People are more likely to believe Mel Gibson than a scientist on this stuff, it’s going to lead to absolute disaster.
ImHereToVote · 45m ago
I believe it was a licensed MD who prescribed Ivermectin to him. It might be that we all have some parasites that worsen COVID immune reactions.
wat10000 · 14m ago
What do you call someone who graduates last in their class in medical school?
“Doctor.”
There’s no shortage of credentialed quacks out there.
smallerfish · 36m ago
Yes, and there are licensed MDs working for RFK specifically to demonize vaccines (while there are many other licensed MDs who see vaccines as being very positive and efficacious). A license doesn't make you right.
ImHereToVote · 24m ago
I would rather trust an MD over a rando on the Internet sorry.
kennywinker · 22m ago
Which licensed MD?
If there are 100 licensed MDs telling you it’s BS, and 1 telling you it’s a miracle cure…
bamboozled · 41m ago
Yet there was zero evidence to suggest it would work for COVID, and people like him going around saying it worked, or they had "good results", based on nothing. Then they caused a shortage of the drug in places it was needed. So he actually caused harm with his BS.
I also got a fairly early strain of COVID and didn't have Ivermectin and I got over it pretty easily too? I just thought I pushed it too hard in the gym and felt a bit tired. My cousin got it, ended up in hospital on Oxygen.
Joe Rogan is just a fool and a propagandist.
transcriptase · 33m ago
Versus the experts, politicians, and media who in the exact same time period were still confidently stressing the importance of achieving herd immunity because if you got vaccinated you couldn’t get COVID, and therefore couldn’t transmit it to others.
For which there was zero evidence, turned out not to be true, and was later retconned to “it reduces the severity of symptoms”.
Or earlier when health officials said masks were unnecessary because there was zero evidence they were effective.
Or earlier when the WHO refused to even call it a pandemic and maintaining little risk until there were dozens of confirmed cases in every country on the planet and China already had field hospitals built.
bamboozled · 27m ago
I didn't say the response was perfect and all advice was accurate, but neither is selling bullshit like Ivermectin for COVID with zero evidence it was effective.
It's wild to suggest the best way to deal with the next pandemic is less science, less experts. No it's more science and more experts, that's what's required to solve the next pandemic and climate change, and super bugs and more.
Your comment seems to suggest that we should throw away all knowledge and faith in institutions because the knowledge we had at the time of a very dynamic situation wasn't perfect or to your liking.
It's painful to read honestly.
Next pandemic, we should just try random off the shell treatments until we find something that sticks I guess. Screw the experts?
Gabriel54 · 14m ago
Not the author of the comment you replied to but I don’t believe that is the point. No one is saying that it is not important to listen to experts, but in fact many experts tried to say these things and were quickly shut down by the main stream media for not going along with what we were supposed to believe.
transcriptase · 21m ago
No. Next time people like yourself should listen to what he actually said about certain topics versus what you were told he said by those with an axe to grind. Then you might temper your language and accusations of propaganda, or at least properly aim them in the opposite direction.
bamboozled · 14m ago
Since 2016 I've listened to hundreds of hours of his podcast, maybe more. He is a useful idiot. At this point he has to know that, but continues doing what he does for the money. He is an entertainer and his show is entertaining, sure, but that is all it is. It's not factual, he does no journalism, he will repeat whatever nonsense suits his world view.
I now listen to it just to see what kind of BS I should expect to find in my daily interactions with other "bros. If you think he is offering some kind of alternative view point to the MSM, you've just not realized he is the MSM. He is the "swamp".
sharifhsn · 16m ago
When you talk about politicians… are you including Donald Trump in that, who said that if you stop testing, we would actually have very few cases?
Donald Trump, who talked about injecting bleach and sunlight into people to treat COVID, doing real time word association instead of educating the public during a pandemic?
Donald Trump, who promoted hydroxycholoroquine as the miracle cure for COVID despite no evidence that it was?
Donald Trump, who had his son-in-law run a team of unqualified volunteers for a “supply chain task force” during a pandemic, who announced that the federal stockpile of medical supplies (previously understood to be available for the states) was only to be used by the federal government?
The pandemic was ended by the vaccine. Donald Trump could take credit for that, but he won’t because his base of supporters is knee-deep in conspiracy theories about it. How sad.
transcriptase · 11m ago
Of course I’m including him. He’s an idiot.
bamboozled · 44m ago
Golf is awesome...I know that much for sure.
vnchr · 47m ago
The discoverers of ivermectin shared a Nobel Prize in 2015 [0] with a discoverer of a novel malaria treatment. Interesting coincidence.
That seems like it will interfere with careless randomized controlled trial design. If the drug kills mosquitos, it could easily do less well at preventing the user from getting infected by a mosquito, but it could potentially prevent an infected patient from spreading an infection via mosquito or even kill a mosquito that would otherwise subsequently spread an infection between two other people.
In any case, here’s a better article. It seems the authors are very much aware of this issue, and they randomized entire clusters of people:
https://www.science.org/content/article/well-known-drug-coul...
I agree. Anyway, there is a nice post about Ivermectin in 2020 by Derek Lowe (In the Pipeline) https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/what-s-ivermectin the most relevant quotes are:
> The drug is effective against a wide number of parasites and arthropods in general
> Its ion-channel mechanism of action against parasites has no application to viruses.
People are more likely to believe Mel Gibson than a scientist on this stuff, it’s going to lead to absolute disaster.
“Doctor.”
There’s no shortage of credentialed quacks out there.
If there are 100 licensed MDs telling you it’s BS, and 1 telling you it’s a miracle cure…
I also got a fairly early strain of COVID and didn't have Ivermectin and I got over it pretty easily too? I just thought I pushed it too hard in the gym and felt a bit tired. My cousin got it, ended up in hospital on Oxygen.
Joe Rogan is just a fool and a propagandist.
For which there was zero evidence, turned out not to be true, and was later retconned to “it reduces the severity of symptoms”.
Or earlier when health officials said masks were unnecessary because there was zero evidence they were effective.
Or earlier when the WHO refused to even call it a pandemic and maintaining little risk until there were dozens of confirmed cases in every country on the planet and China already had field hospitals built.
It's wild to suggest the best way to deal with the next pandemic is less science, less experts. No it's more science and more experts, that's what's required to solve the next pandemic and climate change, and super bugs and more.
Your comment seems to suggest that we should throw away all knowledge and faith in institutions because the knowledge we had at the time of a very dynamic situation wasn't perfect or to your liking.
It's painful to read honestly.
Next pandemic, we should just try random off the shell treatments until we find something that sticks I guess. Screw the experts?
I now listen to it just to see what kind of BS I should expect to find in my daily interactions with other "bros. If you think he is offering some kind of alternative view point to the MSM, you've just not realized he is the MSM. He is the "swamp".
Donald Trump, who talked about injecting bleach and sunlight into people to treat COVID, doing real time word association instead of educating the public during a pandemic?
Donald Trump, who promoted hydroxycholoroquine as the miracle cure for COVID despite no evidence that it was?
Donald Trump, who had his son-in-law run a team of unqualified volunteers for a “supply chain task force” during a pandemic, who announced that the federal stockpile of medical supplies (previously understood to be available for the states) was only to be used by the federal government?
The pandemic was ended by the vaccine. Donald Trump could take credit for that, but he won’t because his base of supporters is knee-deep in conspiracy theories about it. How sad.
[0] https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/medicine/2015/press-releas...
> Four states -- Tennessee, Arkansas, Idaho, and Louisiana -- have passed OTC ivermectin laws
> [Nine] other states have bills moving through their legislatures