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Pfizer's oral Covid-19 antiviral cuts hospitalization, death by 85%

fiercebiotech.com

911–920 of 1001 posts

Re: Pfizer's oral Covid-19 antiviral cuts hospitalization, death by 85%

#911

That's great news! But remember that lowering the death rate has a linear effect, while the R0 has an exponential one.

> remember that lowering the death rate has a linear effect

Intuitively you would expect that the treatment also lowers the rate of spread.

Re: Pfizer's oral Covid-19 antiviral cuts hospitalization, death by 85%

#912
post #636

Earlier quoted context omitted.

10 deaths in 600 is not quite a death sentence, in my opinion. And yes, placebo group always gets current standard treatment, it would be rather wrong to do otherwise.

Not a chance I'd like to take

The alternative is not being in the trial at all.

Re: Pfizer's oral Covid-19 antiviral cuts hospitalization, death by 85%

#913
post #144

I am thinking: if and when this is approved, we have to think about distribution. This drug is fantastically effective at preventing hospitalisation and death, if administered within three days of symptom onset. That gives quite a long time! But we still need to make it easy to take. Do pharmacies give it out? ER rooms? We don't want to wait until people are hospitalised; we are trying to avoid that. So when you test…

COVID-19 is not the only coronavirus!

If this drug is safe and can be made sufficiently cheap, it could be a great treatment for most kinds of common cold.

Why suffer for weeks with cold symptoms if you can simply spray this up your nose and feel better?

It could (potentially) be used similarly to Tamiflu.

Re: Pfizer's oral Covid-19 antiviral cuts hospitalization, death by 85%

#914
post #886

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pharma companies in the US spend about twice as much on advertising as they do on R&D [1]. Recent data compiled by the House Oversight Committee shows the biggest pharma companies spent $56 billion more on stock buybacks and dividends than they did on R&D over the past five years [2]. Very little of the ridiculous prices that US citizens pay for medicine (directly or via insurance) actually goes towards R&D. [1] http…

Terrible take. Your first source vaguely tries to estimate promotional spending (not advertising as you deceitfully claim). Promotional spend has a positive ROI (or you wouldn’t do it). So spending $1B in promotion gets your $1B+ in sales (it’s self funding). Plus stock buybacks and dividends are being criticized? Returning money to investors is “bad”? Who do you think provides capital for drug development? The Grena…

But does it really increase sales? We’re talking drugs that are prescribed by a doctor. Or do people not buy and take their statins unless they see a tv ad?

Re: Pfizer's oral Covid-19 antiviral cuts hospitalization, death by 85%

#915
post #886

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pharma companies in the US spend about twice as much on advertising as they do on R&D [1]. Recent data compiled by the House Oversight Committee shows the biggest pharma companies spent $56 billion more on stock buybacks and dividends than they did on R&D over the past five years [2]. Very little of the ridiculous prices that US citizens pay for medicine (directly or via insurance) actually goes towards R&D. [1] http…

Terrible take. Your first source vaguely tries to estimate promotional spending (not advertising as you deceitfully claim). Promotional spend has a positive ROI (or you wouldn’t do it). So spending $1B in promotion gets your $1B+ in sales (it’s self funding). Plus stock buybacks and dividends are being criticized? Returning money to investors is “bad”? Who do you think provides capital for drug development? The Grena…

A positive ROI in isolation for one company doesn't necessarily mean anything useful is gained across the whole industry. Consider what would happen if promotional spend was just taking market share from other pharma companies - it'd be wasted money, but everyone would have to do it to preserve market share.

Re: Pfizer's oral Covid-19 antiviral cuts hospitalization, death by 85%

#916

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yet, with the COVID vaccine, you still spread it, too: https://theexpose.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Pierpont-Why... https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/pdfs/mm7031e2-H.pdf https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3897733 So, how could the outcome at the societal level be worse?

Do you have a source for R0 being _absolutely equal_ in vaccinated vs unvaccinated?

Give them time.

Re: Pfizer's oral Covid-19 antiviral cuts hospitalization, death by 85%

#917

So no we have the Pfizer vaccine (which I got) who cuts the risk of both catching the virus and the risk of severe complication by a lot (forgot the number but it's big) and in addition to that we now have Pfizer oral medication that can be given to positive cases and which reduces both hospitalization and death risk by 85%. When can life go back to normal?

If the majority of the population is willing to use either, than I expect so.

Re: Pfizer's oral Covid-19 antiviral cuts hospitalization, death by 85%

#918
post #843

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The antiviral mechanism of Ivermectin involves the inhibition of nuclear transport by importin α/β1 in the host. It can and has lead to death when improperly dosed.

The size of dose you are talking about would be only possible to take if you were contemplating suicide. You left a lot out in regards to the mechanisms of action: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8203399/

This article has been retracted 5 months ago. So basically right after publication [1] .

[1] https://pubpeer.com/publications/EDF9109EE29DF2340379B562365...

Re: Pfizer's oral Covid-19 antiviral cuts hospitalization, death by 85%

#919
post #445

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say that this will appeal to people who are covid vaccine skeptical. If you're skeptical of the mRNA vaccines, you'd probably be in favor of this treatment than the vaccines.

Because _absolutely_ _anything_ is less dangerous than mRNA.

I have bad news for you (unless it was irony, which I can't rule out): the SARS-CoV2 virus contains its genome as RNA that is used directly (IIRC) as mRNA. Because it's needed for the protein synthesis to build new virus particles. This is true for every virus, BTW: they either contain RNA that can be used by the cell for protein synthesis (i.e. mRNA) or they do synthesize (or make the cell synthesize) the mRNA based on their genome, one way or another.

So no matter what, you'll get the viral mRNA in your body. Either through infection or through the vaccine. The vaccine just contains a small fragment and it does not proliferate. Unlike the virus.

Re: Pfizer's oral Covid-19 antiviral cuts hospitalization, death by 85%

#920
post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ivermectin isn't a protease inhibitor though?

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7996102/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7996102/ Almost as if after clinical evidence (sure, arguably week) and a promising mechanism of action (yeah, in silico) a widespread, double blind RCT should have been conducted a year ago...

My question/comment was not intended to spark discussion about the efficacy of ivermectin for covid-19, just confused at the classification of ivermectin as a protease inhibitor. I don't think most doctors, pharmacists, or epidemiologists would think of ivermectin as a protease inhibitor, even with a few in silica studies suggesting protease activity in certain circumstances.

There have been at least 14 RCTs, including double blinded studies. In meta-analysis, "ivermectin was not efficacious at managing COVID-19"[1]. I won't engage further in that discussion.

[1]: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8500108/

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