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Early clinical trial shows anti-depressant prevents hospitalization from Covid

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Re: Early clinical trial shows anti-depressant prevents hospitalization from Covid

#51

Post by amelius »

cinntaile wrote: post #33
amelius wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but are governments recommending it? Are doctors recommending it? Is WHO recommending it? I didn't hear anything about it except from that one post on HN, which I think is quite strange. If this works, then shouldn't there be a nation-wide plan to introduce more vitamin D in the diets of people?

The NHS recommends it for example. https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/vitamins-and-minerals/vitamin-... https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/coronavirus-covid-19/people-at...

The UK's health services are struggling at the moment.

So can the conclusion be that vitamin D does not work as expected? Or is the conclusion that still not enough people are taking vitamin D, and its usefulness should be better communicated?

Re: Early clinical trial shows anti-depressant prevents hospitalization from Covid

#52

Post by DoreenMichele »

amelius wrote: post #10

Several months ago there was a post about vitamin D supposedly being effective in preventing hospitalization. What happened to that idea?

Vitamin D is still being discussed quite a lot on HN. My understanding is that it boils down to "It helps those who are deficient but doesn't do much, if anything, if you aren't deficient."

Now, a lot of people are deficient -- probably more now than usual due to the lock down because people aren't getting out much, so people are getting less sun exposure. So I tend to get downvoted when I say things like "If you are deficient, you should redress that. If you are not, extra Vitamin D seems to do nothing and is potentially bad for you (because it is fat soluble and you can hit toxic levels in your system if you overconsume)."

I think there may somewhat less excitement about it because it helps if you are deficient but not if you are not, so it fails to serve as a drug substitute. People tend to not get excited about the idea that treating nutritional deficiencies helps shore up your body's ability to fight disease, even in cases where that deficiency is fairly widespread and the disease in question is fairly deadly.

Hoomans: Not the most logical species.

Re: Early clinical trial shows anti-depressant prevents hospitalization from Covid

#53

Post by medntech »

lldbg wrote: post #45
LatteLazy wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pfizers stage 3 vaccine trial have 41,000 participants. I'm not sure how you got 200, have I misunderstood you? https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-deta... .

Yes, you have. The efficacy estimate was based on roughly ~200 confirmed cases, which your link confirms for the Pfizer vaccine.

The problem is the confirmed cases are the primary part of determining efficacy. The people who do not get the virus have a smaller impact on that statistic at higher numbers. EDIT: User runamok explains it well.

[1] https://www.cdc.gov/chickenpox/outbreaks/downloads/appx-f-in...

Re: Early clinical trial shows anti-depressant prevents hospitalization from Covid

#54

Post by wolco5 »

amelius wrote: post #51
cinntaile wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The NHS recommends it for example. https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/vitamins-and-minerals/vitamin-... https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/coronavirus-covid-19/people-at...

The UK's health services are struggling at the moment. So can the conclusion be that vitamin D does not work as expected? Or is the conclusion that still not enough people are taking vitamin D, and its usefulness should be better communicated?

The reasons for UK health services failing have little or no connection to vitamin D.

Vitamin D has shown signs that it slows down / makes covid less deadly.

Because we don't understand: who is taking it, in what amounts, local weather, what the numbers would be without it we can't assume anything from them struggling.

Re: Early clinical trial shows anti-depressant prevents hospitalization from Covid

#55

Post by runamok »

lldbg wrote: post #45
LatteLazy wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pfizers stage 3 vaccine trial have 41,000 participants. I'm not sure how you got 200, have I misunderstood you? https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-deta... .

Yes, you have. The efficacy estimate was based on roughly ~200 confirmed cases, which your link confirms for the Pfizer vaccine.

The relevant passage is below. Basically it's a funnel, so It takes testing a large amount of people to tease out just a handful of infections. 162 cases for placebo vs. 8 in the vaccine group.

Analysis of the data indicates a vaccine efficacy rate of 95% (p<0.0001) in participants without prior SARS-CoV-2 infection (first primary objective) and also in participants with and without prior SARS-CoV-2 infection (second primary objective), in each case measured from 7 days after the second dose. The first primary objective analysis is based on 170 cases of COVID-19, as specified in the study protocol, of which 162 cases of COVID-19 were observed in the placebo group versus 8 cases in the BNT162b2 group. Efficacy was consistent across age, gender, race and ethnicity demographics. The observed efficacy in adults over 65 years of age was over 94%.

Re: Early clinical trial shows anti-depressant prevents hospitalization from Covid

#56

Post by Herodotus38 »

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #4

To be clear, this isn't saying that any anti-depressant is effective for COVID. It appears to be a unique side-effect of Fluvoxamine. There are several existing drugs which have been found to have modulatory effects on early COVID infections. The key word here is "early", as most of them only have a significant impact before the infection gets out of control. Keep in mind that Hydroxychloroquine is one of the existin…

“ Keep in mind that Hydroxychloroquine is one of the existing drugs discovered to have some effect on early infections, but it clearly failed to have much impact on late-stage infections”

Do you mind sharing your evidence that HCQ helps with early infections? Because I know many studies that showed no benefit, for example:

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmoa2016638

That is one of many studies.

Re: Early clinical trial shows anti-depressant prevents hospitalization from Covid

#57

Post by phaemon »

lldbg wrote: post #45
LatteLazy wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pfizers stage 3 vaccine trial have 41,000 participants. I'm not sure how you got 200, have I misunderstood you? https://www.pfizer.com/news/press-release/press-release-deta... .

Yes, you have. The efficacy estimate was based on roughly ~200 confirmed cases, which your link confirms for the Pfizer vaccine.

The 200 you mention are comparable to the 6 in the comment above, not the 152.

Re: Early clinical trial shows anti-depressant prevents hospitalization from Covid

#58

Post by wolco5 »

amelius wrote: post #40
JoshTko wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doctors (and basically any degreed professional) aren't interested in recommending anything that doesn't involve them.

The pandemic concerns the work and lives of just about any doctor at the moment.

Doctors want things to get better as much as anyone. The timelag between new science and what a doctor recommends can take a generation.

Re: Early clinical trial shows anti-depressant prevents hospitalization from Covid

#59

Post by beerandt »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #52
amelius wrote: post #10

Several months ago there was a post about vitamin D supposedly being effective in preventing hospitalization. What happened to that idea?

Vitamin D is still being discussed quite a lot on HN. My understanding is that it boils down to "It helps those who are deficient but doesn't do much, if anything, if you aren't deficient." Now, a lot of people are deficient -- probably more now than usual due to the lock down because people aren't getting out much, so people are getting less sun exposure. So I tend to get downvoted when I say things like "If you are…

Is it not any different than suggesting obese people get in shape to reduce their risk?

Low-hanging, non-risky fruit first.

Re: Early clinical trial shows anti-depressant prevents hospitalization from Covid

#60

Post by metiscus »

colossal wrote: post #19
JoshTko wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Vitamin D has been shown to reduce severity in several different studies. Everyone should consider taking it. https://www.reddit.com/r/COVID19/search?q=vitamin+D&restrict... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vN30emwcNS4

It has shown to be correlated with better outcomes. It is also correlated with being healthier, being active, and eating better. As far as I understand there is no strong evidence for a causal relationship. To be clear, if you live in the northern hemisphere, you should be taking vitamin D. It's cheap and at worst harmless. But that's not the same as saying it will improve the outcome of covid patients.

I will say, I've been regularly taking Vitamin D for a while and recently started having some low back pain. Talked to the doctor and was told to take some magnesium. Apparently it is used along with Vitamin D. So if you find yourself in my situation, talk to your doctor.
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