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Hydroxychloroquine Probably Isn’t the Answer

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Re: Hydroxychloroquine Probably Isn’t the Answer

#41

Post by makomk »

brmgb wrote: post #11
mrfusion wrote: post #2

I think this drug has become too politicized to be able to have a factual scientific debate.

It's really a shame the whole world stops at the border of the USA so there is no other place this debate could happen.

Unfortunately, while the whole world doesn't stop at the borders of the USA, neither does the political bullshit eminating from it. All the claims about what's effective or ineffective as a solution to Covid-19 that politicians and journalists latch onto for political reasons leech out into the rest of the world and cause trouble there too.

Re: Hydroxychloroquine Probably Isn’t the Answer

#42

Post by Natsu »

jacquesm wrote: post #18
shripadk wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What's political about that? Then why does the title say that Hydroxychloroquine "probably" isn't the answer? It either works or it doesn't. If the drugs are ineffective just say so. Why beat around the bush with a "probably"?

Probably as in 'not yet 100% sure'. As a measure of probability based on available evidence.

To me, the headline reads like it's saying "this probably won't work" rather than "we don't yet have enough evidence to say that this works." If I had to headline this article, I probably would have written something like "Hydroxychloroquine data still inconclusive, don't get your hopes up yet" to better convey the meaning.

From reading it, what the article actually supports is that we have seen two trials that are inconclusive. This is the meat of it in my view -

==

A French study of HCQ suggested that it had was effective in decreasing the viral load from nasal secretions. When azithromycin was added the magnitude of the effect was larger.

[...]

And a Chinese study of 30 patients doesn't prove that HCQ worked. Or that it doesn't. But the two groups, control and treated, showed no difference in the amount of virus in the throat on day seven, the length of time for the fever to go away. There was an apparent difference in the progression of the infection (determined by x-ray), in the two groups but this means little since 5/15 treated patients got worse vs. 7/15 in the control group. This effect could easily be by chance and nothing to do to the drug. Furthermore, this trial did not include azithromycin, so it cannot be compared to the French trial.

Re: Hydroxychloroquine Probably Isn’t the Answer

#43

Post by cjbprime »

gonational wrote: post #19

Has anyone noticed that the CDC’s reported deaths by week from ordinary flu and pneumonia have been plummeting while COVID-19 death rise? They are down from the normal 4.5k+ per week during this period to around 2.3k per week and they are falling parabolically as COVID-19 expands. What could cause this?

Social distancing, of course. How do you think people get the flu?

Re: Hydroxychloroquine Probably Isn’t the Answer

#44

Post by Terretta »

logicbombr wrote: post #10

Prevent Senior in Brazil, an health operator with mosts of its patients on risk groups (60+ yo) are using hydroxychloroquine on all its COVID-19 patients with tremendous success. Right now I choose to believe on MD in front line rather then in Health Societies, FDA, WHO and those bureaucrats who let the virus spread all around due to its incompetence

Doctors and clinicians on front lines in NYC and greater NYC area say it's not helping at all, that they've by and large given up on using it.

So I could reply that right now I choose to believe these MDs and ARNPs on front lines rather than commenters on HN. But that's not helpful compared to research.

This one is a mess, and the tiny sampling of articles we have are not definitive.

// Disclaimer: Lived in Africa for a decade, took anti-malarials. These and others can be nasty for a lot of people, some folks have to hunt to find things that aren't worse than the occasional bout of malaria. In fact, while my family took them, I never found anything tolerable. Curiously, the rest of the family got malaria, I did not.

Re: Hydroxychloroquine Probably Isn’t the Answer

#45

Post by ucha »

This morning we had:

France ex-IHU Marseille/AP-HP: 79160 cases, 7527 dead, mortality rate 9.5%

IHU Marseille/AP-HP: 3005 cases, 33 dead, mortality rate 1.1%

France doesn't use HCQ consistently yet. Didier Raoult who heads the IHU in Marseille has been using it systematically on all cases, even mild ones for more than 2 weeks. I doubt such a difference in mortality rate could be explained by a difference in number of tests performed or other parameters.

Everyone can have all sorts of opinions on the efficacy of the treatment but in the end, mortality rates don't lie. And no, differences in the level of care, health or other smaller factors cannot explain an 8x difference.

In addition to that, most patients seem to have elevated ferritin which would be a side effect of consuming too much iron. In this case, it is theorized that when the virus replicates, it creates non-essential proteins that take place of the iron in hemoglobin thus preventing red blood cell from carrying O2 and CO2 from and back to the lungs. Based on molecular simulations, it seems that HCQ can bond to those viral proteins preventing them from expelling iron from hemoglobin. It would also explain why it's useful to treat someone early on rather than later when their hemoglobin lost their iron... Source here: https://chemrxiv.org/articles/COVID-19_Disease_ORF8_and_Surf...

Re: Hydroxychloroquine Probably Isn’t the Answer

#47

Post by jjeaff »

gonational wrote: post #19

Has anyone noticed that the CDC’s reported deaths by week from ordinary flu and pneumonia have been plummeting while COVID-19 death rise? They are down from the normal 4.5k+ per week during this period to around 2.3k per week and they are falling parabolically as COVID-19 expands. What could cause this?

Probably partly social distancing. And part misdiagnoses of cause of death from flu to coronavirus.

Re: Hydroxychloroquine Probably Isn’t the Answer

#48

Post by gpm »

shripadk wrote: post #8
mrfusion wrote: post #2

I think this drug has become too politicized to be able to have a factual scientific debate.

Exactly! On one hand some scientists swear by these drugs and on the other hand other scientists are opposing it. It is science after all. It either works or it doesn't. There is no "probably isn't the answer" in this. It is almost like Big Pharma is fighting out their battles through these scientists.

> It either works or it doesn't.

No, not really. What the criteria for starting/stopping treatment are (e.g. is it being given to early or late stage patients), what other treatments/drugs are also used, what dosage is used, etc can all effect this.

Re: Hydroxychloroquine Probably Isn’t the Answer

#49

Post by podgaj »

Can someone explain the dearth of research looking out how zinc deficiency might explain variations in outcome after SARS-CoV-2 infection?

Both ADAM17, which helps ACE2 shed from the cell, and ACE2 itself, are zinc finger proteins and use zinc as a cofactor.

Re: Hydroxychloroquine Probably Isn’t the Answer

#50

Post by snapetom »

“ There is absolutely no evidence that HCQ or HCQ/azithromycin would have any effect on seriously ill patients with viral pneumonia.”

Correct. that’s against the thought right now. HCQ is great at preventing patients from getting to the serious pneumonia stage. Once they’re on a vent, they should be on another cocktail.

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