Ivermectin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know • Hacker News Board

Re: Ivermectin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#321

Post by WhompingWindows » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 2:36 PM UTC

Joking_Phantom wrote: post #46

Love the final explanation for how ivermectin can be incidentally good for COVID-19 patients, even if it does nothing to COVID-19 directly. In fact, as the author cites from another researcher, the trials are a strong piece of evidence for "add[ing] ivermectin to mass drug administration programs." In other words, global medical welfare, where we just give everyone a bunch of a cheap and effective medications to coun…

I think you should clarify that Ivermectin works better in higher-worm-prevalence areas. It's not remotely true that 10% of Americans have undetected worms. The praised study in the post highlights 12.5% as "high" prevalence, so 10% would be nearly high -- not true in the developed world.

Re: Ivermectin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#322

Post by notafraudster » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 2:37 PM UTC

notafraudster wrote: post #228

csee wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why wait? Why not take ivermectin as a precautionary therapeutic given it is well tolerated with low risk of side effects? There's a chasm between the epistemic question of "does this drug really work?" and the pragmatic question of "does a risk-reward analysis under uncertainty say that I should take this mostly safe drug that might slightly reduce my covid severity?" FWIW, I wouldn't take ivermectin either as a pro…

What other prophylactic treatments do you take in your life before or after COVID? Because in my lifetime I can think of only a small number of classes of general prophylactic treatments I've ever seen a small number of groups of people take. - Silicon valley rationalist types taking stacks of vitamins despite having no evidence on bioavailability because they are generally without side effects and who knows, you mig…

It occurs to me that I didn't mention PReP for HIV, which is obviously effective in what it does. I do tend to think of the direct risk in a PReP context as more severe, and also PReP requires active management of a physician's care, so it is a bit different than the thing being discussed, but it's also a counterexample to my point and so in charity I decided to add it in this reply.

Re: Ivermectin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#323

Post by NikolaeVarius » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 2:39 PM UTC

naasking wrote: post #235

jacquesm wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The attacks on Fauci are despicable. Note that he's anything but a weaselly political hack, but he did get replaced by one during the Trump reign. The man has more integrity than the bulk of that particular administration.

I'm honestly baffled by this. The man literally lied to the public and openly admitted to lying. There are plenty of legitimate criticisms of Fauci, and plenty of reasons to be question whether public health officials should be lying to the public about public health.

> openly admitted to lying

Proof please

Re: Ivermectin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#324

Post by manwe150 » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 2:41 PM UTC

moduspol wrote: post #285

jacquesm wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Some people want to understand. So go study medicine, assuming you have 10 years to burn and are willing to take a massive pay cut. The average HN'er probably knows how to program a computer and some of them may even know how to program one well. If a guy that runs a fishing boat with not even the most basic idea about programming, hardware, software, satellite systems, general relativity and integrating all of the…

The experts involved in building / maintaining GPS haven't admitted to lying to him about it to preserve the use of GPS for people deemed more important, gone back and forth on whether or not he needs to use two GPS devices (instead of one) for the safety of others, and those experts' recommendations haven't led to policies that have destroyed the livelihoods of his or his friends' families--sometimes with unclear ti…

Not sure that’s the most comforting analogy to pick. GPS is maintained and controlled by the US military. They can shut it off, used to secretly make it intentionally inaccurate, have dual-band devices to protect against failures of GPS by using competitors, etc

Re: Ivermectin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#325

Post by NikolaeVarius » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 2:41 PM UTC

native_samples wrote: post #288

phreeza wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> However I think he misrepresent some anti-vaxxers: it's not a matter of trusting science, it's a matter of trusting scientists with heavy conflict of interest to tell the truth while most of us don't have the required scientific knowledge to evaluate if they're telling the truth. But you don't have to trust only scientists directly or indirectly employed by those companies. There are plenty of subject-matter expert…

Ah yes, academia, that famous bastion of free thought where success is totally unconnected to whether your colleagues like you and nobody ever gets cancelled. One where, as the fine article points out, 95% of biology professors vote Democrat. Academia is the last segment of society I trust on these topics.

Well, reality is well known to have a liberal bias.

Re: Ivermectin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#326

Post by jesterson » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 2:43 PM UTC

Nursie wrote: post #279

jesterson wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wasn't soliciting for an explanation why people are trying to mock - too much studying of psychology provided enough information to answer this question. The answer, as it may come at a surprise for you, is not related to plausibility of statements. But that's totally different matter. As for your question, let me give you a very simple answer. As a layman in certain area, I see few facts - several families who I k…

> several families who I know in person chose to take Ivermectin as part of their treatment when family member contracted covid. All of them successfully recovered from covid. Are you aware that this doesn't constitute any sort of evidence about ivermectin's effectiveness? > a person I know lost 2 legs shortly after "safe" jab due to blood cloths. Are you aware that coronavirus causes clotting much more frequently th…

My apologies for jumping into this discussion. Not going to tolerate arrogance and inability to listen. All the best in life and apologies once again. Dixi.

Re: Ivermectin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#327

Post by naasking » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 2:48 PM UTC

NikolaeVarius wrote: post #323

naasking wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm honestly baffled by this. The man literally lied to the public and openly admitted to lying. There are plenty of legitimate criticisms of Fauci, and plenty of reasons to be question whether public health officials should be lying to the public about public health.

> openly admitted to lying Proof please

Fauci admits to lying about masks and explains why: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kLXttHlUgK8

Maybe you think Fauci changed his mind based on new evidence on mask effectiveness, but he literally says he advised against masks due to a fear of PPE shortages, and not due to changing evidence. So either way he lied: either he lied about mask effectiveness thus spreading health misinformation, or he lied about why he advised against wearing masks thus undermining public trust in his advice.

Fauci admits to moving the goalposts on vaccination rates and explains it's because of his "gut feeling that the country is finally ready to hear what he really thinks":

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/24/health/herd-immunity-covi...

I could dissect these even further and point out numerous other instances, but these are egregious enough to undermine public trust IMO. Public health officials should not be deceiving the public, they should be above reproach.

Re: Ivermectin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#328

Post by WithinReason » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 2:49 PM UTC

mumblemumble wrote: post #311

WithinReason wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the downside of giving Ivermectin to livestock that don't have parasites?

Ivermectin stops working.

Through what mechanism?

Re: Ivermectin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#329

Post by dekhn » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 2:49 PM UTC

thaumaturgy wrote: post #51

roenxi wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is the first anti-Ivermectin argument that you want to believe... I discounted a highly biased echo chamber in social media and more traditional media and went with 30-odd studies that appear to have been assembled in good faith even now. I changed my mind immediately on seeing "Parasitic worms are a significant confounder in some ivermectin studies, such that they made them get a positive result even when hon…

May I ask, completely sincerely, what approach you would settle on for trying to discriminate truth from fiction if you believed you couldn't get reliable information from reading 30-odd studies?

In short: papers lie, and grad school teaches you to read around the lies. Papers lie because people are competitive (you lose your job if you aren't publishing), want their narrative to be true (don't we all), and the people reading the papers professionally know how to interpret them.

Pretty sad, but that's what we've ended up with. It was incentivized for.

Re: Ivermectin: Much More Than You Wanted to Know

#330

Post by jcranmer » Wed, Nov 17, 2021, 2:50 PM UTC

bobcostas55 wrote: post #104

beebmam wrote: post #8

"It feels right to me because it’s the most troll-ish possible solution. Everybody was wrong!" - I know this is said tongue-in-cheek, but this mischaracterizes the medical scientists who have been working themselves to the bone trying to understand this virus and disease. Actual medical science, and science in general, doesn't make claims beyond what we know for certain (or at least, we're very explicit about the cla…

>Actual medical science, and science in general, doesn't make claims beyond what we know for certain What would you say about the FDA's recent approval of aduhelm? Do we know that it works "for certain"? Or is the FDA not part of the medical science establishment?

The FDA's scientific committee nearly unanimously voted against aduhelm. The political side of the FDA overruled that consensus to give preliminary approval, which has been thoroughly panned by a large portion of the medical and scientific community, prompted three resignations from said committee, and has prompted a Congressional investigation.

Aduhelm's approval basically came about in violation of the FDA's processes, so it's hopefully merely a one-off example of corruption rather than a harbinger of the death of science at the FDA.