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Ebola Is Now Curable

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Re: Ebola Is Now Curable

#101

Post by nindalf »

eitland wrote: post #77
WhitneyLand wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> the sort of hair-brained schemes HN believes would fool them Is there much value in an ad-hominem reply? Or in generalizing it to an entire community? The irony seems hard to avoid when such a generalization is made without mentioning any statistical foundation, while pontificating about statistics.

> Is there much value in an ad-hominem reply? > Or in generalizing it to an entire community? I don't like this style either but sometimes I think we deserve it for being a smug echo chamber. Basically, much the same thing could have been said in a different way and I would have upvoted it.

> we deserve it for being a smug echo chamber.

This and more. Almost every comment here is made with absolute confidence and authority, much more than is warranted. The tone of the person who said that "it's a great way to commit statistical fraud" without a caveat sounded like a know-it-all who knows better than the FDA and the scientists who made this cure in the first place or that they're outright unethical.

Most times such comments get upvoted. Sometimes they get downvoted when they're called out on their BS. So there's some balance.

Re: Ebola Is Now Curable

#102

Post by the_seraphim »

Simon_says wrote: post #74
IfOnlyYouKnew wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's only a "great way to create statistical fraud" if you assume that the statisticians, and the FDA, are either stupid or corrupt. And contrary to popular belief, they tend to be competent enough to at least cope with the sort of hair-brained schemes HN believes would fool them.[0] Stopping a trial early and it's statistical implications should, by the way, be somewhat familiar with web developers: it's commonly do…

The word is harebrained unless you think hair has a brain.

surely it means to have a brain made of hair?

Re: Ebola Is Now Curable

#103

Post by conjectures »

jcranmer wrote: post #43
dankohn1 wrote: post #29

There is no news I enjoy reading more than that a clinical trial had to be ended early because the treatment was so effective that it would be unethical to continue with alternative treatments (or a placebo).

Actually, it's quite terrifying when you remember that stopping a clinical trial early is a great way to create statistical fraud. https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2019/08/08/st... cites an example of a drug whose clinical trial was stopped early due to obviously effective success... only to discover later on that the "obviously effective" was a statistically spurious event, and the drug did not confer…

FYI people design trials with breakpoints, bandits etc. The issue isn't early stopping, the issue is inappropriate analysis of early stopping.

Re: Ebola Is Now Curable

#104

Post by jraph »

bigend wrote: post #68

So how many people ebola ever killed? Compared to, for instance, cancer or traffic accidents?

If you are making the point that we'd better address cancer or traffic accidents, then your argument falls under the false dichotomy fallacy. This is probably why you've been downvoted.

If your were not making this point, then I don't have the answer. :-)

Re: Ebola Is Now Curable

#105

Post by tempguy9999 »

eridius wrote: post #46
jcranmer wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, it's quite terrifying when you remember that stopping a clinical trial early is a great way to create statistical fraud. https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2019/08/08/st... cites an example of a drug whose clinical trial was stopped early due to obviously effective success... only to discover later on that the "obviously effective" was a statistically spurious event, and the drug did not confer…

That trial wasn't a "statistically spurious event", it was a flawed trial > the reason the first trial came to an exaggerated impression seemed to be the number of patients who might not have fully progressed to SPMS Stopping early can lead to statistical fraud, which is why the bar is so high on doing so. But it has to be balanced with the recognition that, if the interim results are correct, continuing the trial wi…

Having worked in clinical trialling, what I saw made me realise that the final stats may be worth much less because of mismanagement of data.

I can give some hare-raising examples[0] but for obvious reasons... The one I can give is it was known that docs who prescribed this to multiple patients and saw an apparent improvement the attributed to the new drug, would switch the patients on the old drug to the new and not inform us. Obviously they couldn't or they'd invalidate the trial and they knew it. And it was done entirely with the patient's best interests at heart. Docs care about their lives.

That may have been rare and a flaw in the trial protocol, but much worse stuff was done via utter incompetence. And I mean including at the top of these giant drug companies. Run by idiots, really.

Wider lesson: just cos you hand over a process to a third party does not mean it's going to be done right.

[0] tribute to the thread elsewhere

Re: Ebola Is Now Curable

#107

Post by tigershark »

Iv wrote: post #72

A fact that many people miss about Ebola is that while its survival rate is very low when untreated, it becomes relatively high (I think in the 80%) with simple things like IV hydration. Basically you are going to lose a LOT of water through that infection. Feeding you water (and minerals) directly in the veins gives a surprisingly high survival rate. What makes Ebola so dangerous is the ease at which infection sprea…

Then why in the article says that when untreated the mortality is over 75%?

Re: Ebola Is Now Curable

#108

Post by Iv »

tigershark wrote: post #107
Iv wrote: post #72

A fact that many people miss about Ebola is that while its survival rate is very low when untreated, it becomes relatively high (I think in the 80%) with simple things like IV hydration. Basically you are going to lose a LOT of water through that infection. Feeding you water (and minerals) directly in the veins gives a surprisingly high survival rate. What makes Ebola so dangerous is the ease at which infection sprea…

Then why in the article says that when untreated the mortality is over 75%?

That's what I am saying:untreated it is very high, treated (even without a cure against the infection) it is much lower.
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