FDA Finally Grants Full Approval to Pfizer Vaccine
Jeffrey A. SingerAftercalls from members of the scientific, public health, and medical community —myself included —the Food and Drug Administration finally overcame bureaucratic inertia and granted full approval to the Pfizer‐BioNTech mRNA COVID-19 vaccine—ahead of its self‐imposed deadline of January 2022. This is good news. Pfizer will now market the vaccine under the brand nameComirnaty.Hundreds of millions of doses have been administered over the course of nearly a year and the safety profiles of these vaccines have been remarkably good. Now the FDA should move quickly on the other mRNA vaccin...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - August 23, 2021 Category: American Health Authors: Jeffrey A. Singer Source Type: blogs
Respect for Science
I vaguely remember discussing some of this before, but anyway . . . Throughout most of the 19th Century, despite the dramatic advances of science in many areas, nobody gained any useful understanding of human health and disease, and effective therapies were largely lacking. In fact, physicians -- medical school graduates -- advocated bloodletting and violent purging with mercury based emetics and laxatives. For obvious reasons, most people preferred other healing methods, which didn ' t work either but at least didn ' t kill you. Hospitals were just places where poor people went to die. So what happened to ...
Source: Stayin' Alive - July 5, 2021 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs
The Ivermectin and Covid-19 conundrum
In conclusion, the above implications are basically saying there is lack of good evidence for IVM in Covid-19.
There is evidence also that IVM does not work for Covid-19. See this recent paper, highlighted by a Dobber:
Ivermectin for the treatment of COVID-19: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials
This analysis concluded “…in comparison to SOC or placebo, IVM did not reduce all-cause mortality, length of stay, respiratory viral clearance, adverse events and serious adverse events in RCTs of patients with mild to moderate COVID-19. We did not find data about IVM effects on clinica...
Source: Malaysian Medical Resources - July 4, 2021 Category: International Medicine & Public Health Authors: Editor Tags: Miscellaneous covid-19 ivermectin SARS-cov-2 Source Type: blogs
Correlative Adventures with COVID
By ANISH KOKA
“The patient in room 1 should be a quick one, its an addon, they just need a prescription for ivermectin”
I’m a bit puzzled by this sentence from my assistant doing his best to help me through a very busy day in the clinic that I’m already behind in. I walk into the room, a script pad stuffed into my hand as I enter the room, to meet a very nice couple. The wife sits patiently with hands crossed on the exam table.
“So, you’re here for Ivermectin?”, I ask.
Why yes, a trip to Texas is planned.. COVID is in the air, the internet, and some important people who have ‘inside ...
Source: The Health Care Blog - March 5, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Christina Liu Tags: COVID-19 Health Policy Anish Koka COVID vaccine COVID-19 vaccine Ivermectin Source Type: blogs
Commenting policy
It is not the case -- it is never the case -- that I reject comments merely because I disagree with them. I do not publish comments that are irrelevant, uninterpretable, offensive, or false.For example, it is irrelevant to my recent post about hydroxychloroquine that there are other treatments that people have tried or are trying that have not been demonstrated in randomized controlled trials. Just asserting that well-known fact -- i.e., I do agree with it, that is true -- does not make any point that pertains to the post. It is not somehow an objection to what I wrote.As I have said very often, one goal I have here is to ...
Source: Stayin' Alive - February 14, 2021 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs
A primer on the evaluation of therapeutics
I ' m actually going to talk here mostly about how we decide that medications are effective, but the basic principles apply to other kinds of interventions such as surgery, physical therapy, or devices. However, those do present some additional difficulties, which I won ' t go into right now. Conventionally, we speak of a hierarchy of evidence, from least to most persuasive. The weakest form of evidence is anecdote. Dr. Fell says he gave eye of newt to several of his patients with crotch rot and they got better. (This is essentially what started the hydroxychloroquine madness.) There are many reasons why do...
Source: Stayin' Alive - February 13, 2021 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs
An antiviral to prevent or treat SARS-CoV-2 infection
Vaccine development has far outpaced antiviral discovery for COVID-19. Hydroxychloroquine was a disaster, and the repurposed remdesivir, which must be administered intravenously, has modest effect when given to hospitalized patients. The situation is unfortunate because antiviral drugs may be used to either prevent infection (prophylactic) or treat infection (therapeutic). A promising antiviral drug candidate is […] (Source: virology blog)
Source: virology blog - February 12, 2021 Category: Virology Authors: Vincent Racaniello Tags: Basic virology antiviral coronavirus COVID-19 EIDD-2801 pandemic SARS-CoV-2 viruses Source Type: blogs
A final, conclusive, incontrovertible answer
Since cultists are still required to believe in the magic power of hydroxychloroquine:No, it is completely ineffective against Covid-19.For the statistically unsophisticated, I ' ll give you the actual results and then the authors ' explanation:The report provides rate ratios for death over a 28-day period for each regimen as compared with standard care: remdesivir, 0.95 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.81 to 1.11); hydroxychloroquine, 1.19 (95% CI, 0.89 to 1.59); lopinavir, 1.00 (95% CI, 0.79 to 1.25); and interferon beta-1a, 1.16 (95% CI, 0.96 to 1.39). The data show no evidence of a meaningful benefit on in-h...
Source: Stayin' Alive - February 11, 2021 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs
This is not " conservative "
Let me digress from the discussion of what conservatism is and why it ' s not good for people, and talk a little bit about the Republican party. The party doesn ' t actually have a platform at the moment -- as you may recall they voted to make the platform be " whatever Dear Leader says " -- but we do know that generally they stand for rich people not paying taxes, eliminating environmental, workplace safety and consumer protection regulations, not letting non-white people vote, and other stuff that probably does fit the definition of conservative.However, they also have room for stuff that ' s just loony tunes. There ' s ...
Source: Stayin' Alive - December 8, 2020 Category: American Health Source Type: blogs
It ’s still true: Not all the news about COVID-19 is bad
I thought the pandemic would be over by now. And I’m not alone; there were sophisticated models predicting a dramatic drop in the number of infections by the summer. And while there was understandable worry about the second wave, re-infection, and the coming flu season, there was good reason to believe we’d have the worst of the first wave well behind us.
Now, that all seems like wishful thinking. Here we are, over nine months into the pandemic, with more than 224,000 deaths, and more than 70,000 new cases and 800 deaths every day in this country as of late October. There are new hot spots popping up in the US and all ...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - November 4, 2020 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Robert H. Shmerling, MD Tags: Coronavirus and COVID-19 Health Infectious diseases Source Type: blogs
The President ’s Remedy: Taking Another Look at Off-Label Prescribing in the Context of President Trump’s Relentless Promotion of Hydroxychloroquine
Jennifer Bard (University of Florida), The President ’s Remedy: Taking Another Look at Off-Label Prescribing in the Context of President Trump’s Relentless Promotion of Hydroxychloroquine, SSRN: In the spring of 2020 the world watched as the President of the United States... (Source: HealthLawProf Blog)
Source: HealthLawProf Blog - September 14, 2020 Category: Medical Law Authors: Katharine Van Tassel Source Type: blogs
How Did We Screw A Pandemic Up So Bad?
We’re still in the thick of things when it comes to the coronavirus pandemic. Countries are bracing themselves for a second wave. Scientists are still racing to find a vaccine. We wrote a whole e-book with resources to help you in the fight against COVID-19 while indoors. And we even had to tackle the conspiracy theories that captured way too many people’s imagination.
Thankfully, those conspiracy theories represented the thoughts and actions of an irrational minority. But even the slow and misguided actions of the rational majority further escalated and worsened the crisis. In our tech-aided, always-connected and i...
Source: The Medical Futurist - September 9, 2020 Category: Information Technology Authors: Prans Tags: Artificial Intelligence Future of Pharma Healthcare Policy Video china leadership Fauci Trump pandemic second wave covid-19 Bolsonaro U.S. vaccine new normal Source Type: blogs
FDA Determined Convalescent Plasma Is Safe, Leaves Decisions on Efficacy up to Clinicians/ Patients. That’s the Way It Should Always Be
Jeffrey A. SingerYesterday the Food and Drug Administration released a clinical memorandum giving Emergency Use Authorization for COVID-19 Convalescent Plasma (CCP) therapy, a previously unapproved biological product. Forseveral months clinicians treating severely ill COVID-19 patients have transfused plasma donated by convalescing COVID-19 patients, rich with the antibodies to the virus produced by their immune system, hoping that these same antibodies can help patients suffering from active infection. Early results have been promising but, as somecritics of the FDA decision have stated, more data is needed befo...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - August 24, 2020 Category: American Health Authors: Jeffrey A. Singer Source Type: blogs
Don't Believe Mr. Pillow Guy
I ' m rather disappointed that I even need to write this blog. But this is the age of " Anti-Science " and it seems there are a lot of impressionable people - people who would believe a Mr. Pillow huckster- about how to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic. So let me spare you reading and give you the cliff notes to this blog:DO NOT TAKE OLEANDRIN TO PREVENT OR CURE COVID-19.Nerium Oleanderis a highly toxic plant. I grew up with Oleander bushes as yardscapes because they produced lovely flowers, could be trimmed into hedges and grew like weeds. But even I knew, as a child, that they were poisonous and all pa...
Source: EverythingHealth - August 19, 2020 Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: blogs
Don't Believe Mr. Pillow Guy
I'm rather disappointed that I even need to write this blog. But this is the age of "Anti-Science" and it seems there are a lot of impressionable people - people who would believe a Mr. Pillow huckster- about how to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic. So let me spare you reading and give you the cliff notes to this blog:DO NOT TAKE OLEANDRIN TO PREVENT OR CURE COVID-19.Nerium Oleanderis a highly toxic plant. I grew up with Oleander bushes as yardscapes because they produced lovely flowers, could be trimmed into hedges and grew like weeds. But even I knew, as a child, that they were poisonous and all parts ...
Source: EverythingHealth - August 19, 2020 Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: blogs
