Another Ivermectin Study Shows Benefit
Another Ivermectin Study Shows Benefit
Reduced chances of hospitalization and death by 27%
Warning: this article is BORING and discusses confusing scientific studies lacking statistical power, with poorly defined outcomes, whose conclusions lack statistical significance. If you are looking for a viral shareable article with incredibly exciting and well-founded conclusions, this one is not of that kind and you can stop reading right now.
For those brave enough to continue, I will include a bonus personal tidbit about Ivermectin working against Ba.5 last week, at the end. So let’s go.
Another study of Ivermectin is out.
In this study, scientists tried THREE repurposed drugs — ivermectin, metformin, and fluvoxamine — to see if they reduce the chances of severe outcomes (such as hospitalization, death, ER visit, or low blood oxygen). The results were mixed: they found that metformin and ivermectin reduced the chances of hospitalization or death, while fluvoxamine slightly increased the chances.
Unfortunately, due to the small size of the trial, all three outcomes were not statistically significantly different from zero. This is a problem that plagues all repurposed drug trials: they are not well financed and therefore small and underpowered. As a result of a small number of participants, the outcomes lack statistical power to prove the statistical significance of an outcome. Nevertheless, the outcomes do show the same trend as most other studies: the fact that Ivermectin-treated groups have better outcomes when it comes to severe events like hospitalization and death.
The design of the study was extremely confusing: they gave patients different combinations of drugs, not just one drug like ivermectin:
The groups received the trial drugs according to the following doses: immediate-release metformin administered with an increase in dose over 6 days to 1500 mg per day for 14 days, ivermectin at a dose of 390 to 470 μg per kilogram per day for 3 days, and fluvoxamine at a dose of 50 mg twice daily for 14 days. For the analysis, the metformin group included the patients who had received metformin alone or metformin in combination with either fluvoxamine or ivermectin. The metformin control group included the patients who had received placebo, fluvoxamine alone, or ivermectin alone. The ivermectin group included the patients who had received ivermectin alone or ivermectin in combination with metformin. Patients in the ivermectin control group were randomly assigned to receive either placebo or metformin alone. The fluvoxamine and fluvoxamine control groups were constructed similarly. The control groups that were used in the comparisons with the active-drug groups included only concurrently randomly assigned patients.
Did you understand the above from the first reading? I did not.
The dose of Ivermectin was along the lines of FLCCC recommendations (390 to 470 μg per kg), but the duration was shorter, only 3 days of Ivermectin as opposed to FLCCC’s recommended 5.
So we have a confusing study design, with possible “low blood oxygen readings” being one of the primary outcomes. This is what the authors have to say about oxygen readings:
The FDA later issued a safety communication on the accuracy of pulse oximeters after the trial began. In addition, numerous patients recorded apparently spurious readings.
They also made part of the ivermectin group affected by the previously-unexplored interaction of ivermectin and metformin.
So all of this gives us a very complicated statistical picture, muddled by drug interactions, “spurious oxygen readings” causing ER visits, numerous subgroups, one drug being a control for another, and so on.
Nevertheless, the Ivermectin-treated group had 27% lower chance of hospitalization or death, compared to the control group.
The adjusted odds ratio for hospitalization or death was 0.47 (95% CI, 0.20 to 1.11) with metformin, 0.73 (95% CI, 0.19 to 2.77) with ivermectin, and 1.11 (95% CI, 0.33 to 3.76) with fluvoxamine.
If emergency department visits were included in the picture (some were caused by “spurious oxygen readings”), the results change:
In prespecified secondary analyses, the adjusted odds ratio for emergency department visit, hospitalization, or death was 0.58 (95% CI, 0.35 to 0.94) with metformin, 1.39 (95% CI, 0.72 to 2.69) with ivermectin, and 1.17 (95% CI, 0.57 to 2.40) with fluvoxamine.
None of the above results is statistically significant because of a small number of participants and a small number of outcomes.
Overall, this is a study with
Small number of participants and outcomes
Very confusing factorial design of mixing drugs and control groups
“Spurious readings” of blood oxygen likely affecting counts of predefined “low blood oxygen outcomes” that likely made people make trips to ER for nothing but spurious oximeter readings
Does not conclusively prove that Ivermectin reduces hospitalization and death, even though there is a 27% reduction, because of the lack of statistical significance
I am not a scientist, but in my own mind, I would prefer that studies such as this one were designed with simplicity in mind and without outcomes affected by “spurious readings”.
The takeaway is: this strangely designed study shows 27% reduction of hospitalization or death with Ivermectin, with the reduction NOT rising to the level of statistical significance.
Small and Confusing Studies are the Bane of “COVID Research”
Remember my recent article about reinfections occurring more frequently in vaccinated people?
Unfortunately, the Iceland study that I reported, had the same exact problems as the Ivermectin study above: it had a confusing selection of participants (vaccinated with “two or more doses” vs “one or zero doses”), study conclusions that flip depending on what adjustments to apply, short study period, etc. What it did have, however, was a statistically significant difference favoring the unvaccinated.
Two important people weighed in. El Gato Malo looked at it also and found the study to be relatively lacking in quality, but providing a conclusion that is in line with other sources of information about greater reinfections in vaccinated vs unvaccinated people:
Modern Discontent also looked at this same study and his conclusion was that the study was so bad that it should be totally disregarded. I do not personally agree with him about that; the Iceland study still provides useful, although limited evidence, and has statistical significance. Nevertheless, his opinion deserves the light of day and I feel that we should welcome robust discussion, so here’s his article:
Recent Personal Experience with Ivermectin
A family of a friend had two young adult persons with Covid that started on Thursday last week; both given 0.3 mg/kg for 5 days, one starting Thursday and another Friday. Both fully recovered on Monday with negative tests. Did Ivermectin help these two specific individuals? I obviously cannot know that. All I know is that their previous infection in January was worse than this one. Make of this what you want.
Because this article is boring, I am not including a SHARE button. Share it if you want, but it is clearly not a viral bombshell.
Me and my husband both got covid 2 weeks ago. First time! I’m unvaxxed. I started ivermectin wed. Felt sick in tues night. I knew it was bad. My lungs hurt. The cough hurt. Got a fever. I did 2 doses a day of 18 mg. And by day 3 fever gone. Day 5. Good to go. Husband. He was worse. He had the J&J. His first covid. He did the 18mg twice a day. Fever gone by day 5. He still has a lingering cough but he is good. Yes. It works ! I also took some HCQ but only a few doses. Didn’t feel I needed both drugs.
my boyfriend started taking a small weekly prophylactic dose of ivermectin in jan 2021. he desperately wanted me to take it but my feeling on drugs is the same as my feeling on vaccines- i really don't want either unless absolutely necessary.
1) in june of 2021, my moderna trial subject friend came to stay with her staunchly unvaccinated childhood best friend. after leaving us and going back to their respective homes, they both got covid (delta). my moderna friend called me for advice as moderna merely took her blood. she also asked me to help her friend. they were both having a hard time of it but the moderna friend is affluent, has a solid husband and insurance. her friend is divorced, uninsured and lives alone on a hobby farm. i gave them both a list of supplements and instructed the hobby farmer to go out to her barn to get her tube of ivermectin. she protested that it was for animals; i countered that she was an animal.
she had been spending nights with such extreme body aches and spiking fevers that she was sitting up crying. eventually her desperation overcame her resistance and we figured out a safe dose which she took around 4:00 pm her time.
i suddenly started to worry; i had convinced this woman who i had only recently met, to take this medication that i had never tried. my BF had been on it for half a year but he took the human version and at a much smaller dose. what if rachel madcow was correct and this woman died?
to my great relief she called me the next morning to say that she had been able to sleep through the night with only a mild fever and no body aches. she now stock piles the stuff whenever she can get it at her local feed and seed store and tells me the price has doubled (still cheap).
2) in july 2021 i went to what was meant to be an outdoor pool party driven indoors by torrential rains. the 50 or so freshly vaccinated women packed around the dining room table hadn't seen each other in a year and were full of the fresh blush of confidence in their jabs. there was all the clucking, cooing and air kissing that you might imagine at a party of women.
i stood outside in the rain and called my BF to come pick me up. that night as we went to bed, i announced that i would start on IVM the next day. he was happy.
3) my moderna friend's unvaccinated mother then got covid and my friend called me for help. since her mother lives near her farm friend, i called her and sent her over with all the supplements i had suggested to her plus her horse paste. the mother recovered just fine and avoided hospital.
4) a local DOD subcontractor (who insists that the covid shots are a depopulation scheme and contain a kill switch) got covid. his doctor refused to prescribe IVM and he got so bad that he was preparing to go to the ER when another medical friend got him some. he was 50% better after his first dose and 100% better after his second.
5) another friend tests often for work and had just tested negative (jan 2022) even though she was feeling sick. she waited 5 days before getting another test, this time positive, at which point she called me. she had gotten so bad that she collapsed and hit her head on the floor. we raced over with some IVM for her. after one dose, she felt much better and only went to the hospital to have her head checked. she says from now on, she won't wait. if she feels a flu of any kind coming on, she'll take some IVM.
5) my moderna friend and her moderna/pfizer husband (he had two moderna shots in the trial and promptly got himself two pfizer shots) came over for new years dinner 2022 with her horse paste mother, and their son and his girlfriend from the UK. they stayed for a few days and then returned to their respective homes. all got omicron EXCEPT me, my BF and the mother- the 3 unvaccinated people- who all were taking preventative IVM.
6) in june of 2022, a double vaxxed and boosted friend called to ask if she could use my sauna as she was feeling sick. i said of course. that was a friday. on monday, i woke up feeling stiff and sore with a bad headache and a temperature of 100. i immediately took a full therapeutic dose of IVM. the next day i tested positive and on wednesday i felt perfectly normal again.
7) my BF then started to feel bad and upped his IVM dose to the full value. he had a very sore throat but no fever. his doctor suggested he come right over for some paxlovid. no way. i had him nebulize a 1% H2O2 saline solution, 1 teaspoon every hour, which made him feel better almost immediately. he continued to nebulize at greater intervals for the next two days and then was fine.
we both stopped taking weekly IVM, assuming we had some natural defense and not wanting to deplete our stock unnecessarily.
8) recently, our unvaccinated house guests both had covid (july 2022). we treated them with IVM and supplements. we didn't do anything special to isolate from them and we didn't get sick even though we ate our meals together and were in the same house with 2 covid positive people.
my boyfriend has resumed his once a week small dose of IVM; i have not.
my strong feeling after these experiences is that i will always keep IVM as a basic in my medicine cabinet and will take it immediately upon having any flu symptoms no matter what kind of flu i have. if the clinical trials don't show efficacy, i can only think that is because the trial designers don't want to find efficacy. i do believe that the entire "pandemic" could have quickly and quietly been brought to it's knees if this cheap, simple and harmless medication had been widely deployed. that it wasn't constitutes willful murder.