America’s Frontline Doctors traveled to Washington and gave a press conference.
UPDATE. Here’s a version that is still up
UPDATE 2. Squarespace has censored America’s Frontline Doctors website.
Give her a listen.
Several versions of this have been pulled off YouTube while I was preparing this post. I hope this FB version survives till the am. And now the FB has been pulled.
Here is a version of the complete news conference still on YouTube as of this moment. I’ve cued it to Dr Immanuel’s speaking.
From what I am seeing she is a Christian who is strongly opposed to the occult, satanism and witchcraft. Voodoo is still a thing . These do exist and are real to the people involved. It is clear that she is opposed to these beliefs.
That does not make her a nutter. She can be a Christian and a doctor at the same time.
She is not claiming a cure for CV, but an effective treatment. Not the same thing. Unless she is lying, her clinical experience is evidence.
If anything, the CDC and WHO are ignoring evidence and resorting to superstition. There is lots of evidence from studies that masks are ineffective against virus infection and transmission. They have limited usefulness against bacteria, that is why they are used by surgeons and dentists. We now have a great deal of evidence on covid, and it is not in line with the actions of the authorities.
She said over and over that it is a cure and “no one needs to die”.
How can you say she is not claiming it is a cure?
She did say it was a cure. To me she used the term “cure” correctly in that she is saying if you give HCQ and Zn to someone with an RNA virus, it will make you better. The term cure is not tortured in her usage, me thinks. From the research, not from opinion articles, I am convinced that she is correct.
Cure:
1. To heal, to make well, to restore to good health.
2. A time without recurrence of a disease so that the risk of recurrence is small.
3. Particularly in the past, a course of treatment. For example, take a cure at a spa.
The word cure comes from the Latin cura meaning care, concern or attention.
Billy, she must have said the word cure a couple of dozen times in the short part of her statement quoted here on this page by a few commenters.
How is it you claim to know what she said, but missed the part where she kept using the word cure over and over, and even elaborated on exactly what she meant by that?
My wife and I listened to Dr. Immanuel, and frankly, if this stunt had any veracity there would be mass demonstrations in Texas demanding the production and distribution of HCQ. Trump, while touting this drug checkered history has been careful not to openly embrace this scam. Who are the people standing behind her in DC? The whole thing is a stink bomb designed to confuse and cast doubt upon the work of real scientists and health professionals. I suppose she’s actually a doctor, otherwise she would be facing criminal charges.
What the heck is a “drug checkered history”?
Wrong. It is ludicrous to think that the lack of “mass demonstrations” means something is untrue. Use your brain, if you have one. You have been lied to, and prefer to go on believing the lies.
So you are saying it kills people? Just come right out and say what you mean, don’t dance around it. I have taken HQC in the past and will be taking it again beginning Friday. The fact politicians and “journalists” and the owners of IT companies are trying to block me from doing so should be what is concerning you.
I have known for years that cognitive dissonance causes people to have hallucinations, but it is still amazing to watch people talk about their hallucinations when the whole conversation is in print.
You have it so bad you are unable to read the actual words spoken.
Pot meet kettle. You’ve just described yourself to a T there Nicholas. The funny part is your so blinded you can’t even see it.
Ah, the “I know you are, but what am I” argument.
Peewee Herman called…he wants his schtick back.
Can anyone who has seen Peter Strzok in front of the Judiciary and Oversight Committee not get the feeling, for at least an instant, that demon possession is a thing?
Well, this article was a bust !
– JPP
There should be a law against providers of tech that says they can’t participate in fact checking, etc.
That would actually help these corporations by restricting their freedom. (Think poker. Think going all in.)
Unhinged anger doesn’t help to persuade people…rational people at least. I hope indeed she is correct, but anger and emotional pleas don’t make it so. Railing against medical studies is unhelpful as well. She should be pushing for more studies, in addition to advocating for prescribing it in the meantime.
Given that the death rate is 1% or so, 350 isn’t a huge sample size, so it’s entirely possible that her 0 deaths out of 350 is normal, and the HCQ did nothing…by my calculations there is about a 3% chance of 0 deaths out of 350 if the probability of death is 1%.
I thought the death rate among symptomatic patients is higher, like 3.5 percent.
Your “analysis” does not prove that it does not work. Doctors like her are being impeded by Fauci co, and the wackos at CNN.
The people she sees drive to a strip mall clinic from far away…according to what she herself says.
How does she know the status of each of them?
She says she treated 350 people.
And 10-15 a day at present.
So 50-75 of the 350 have been taking her treatment for less than a week.
100-150 have been taking it for less than two weeks.
And none of any of her patients have any obligation to let her know their status.
She could not even know if any of them are positive.
If they are positive, they are supposed to be quarantined, and any appointments should be by telehealth.
But it is impossible to know anything about the people she is speaking about…because she gave no documentation or data.
Neither have you. There have been posts here that HCQ works.
“Neither have you.”
On the contrary, I have throughout this entire episode been vigilant about providing documentation, as well as avoiding reaching unevidenced conclusions.
“There have been posts here that HCQ works.”
Indeed there have.
And there have been scientific studies using the gold standard of evaluating whether a given drug demonstrates efficacy against a given condition.
In all of these types of studies that have released results, no benefit has ben found.
I would have found Stella’s splendid rant more encouraging if she had taken a minute to clarify whether the only source of quinine available to the vast majority of Americans and Canadians – tonic water – is a viable replacement for hydroxychloroquine .
I’ve searched this subject online, and found total unanimity on the subject – tonic water doesn’t have enough quinine, and/or quinine is a deadly poison. Not very helpful. The only cheery report I found was that the Panama Canal got built despite the workers having been infused by 650mg of quinine three times daily on a continuous basis. When, strangely, they got sick from this treatment, the dosage was lowered to 650mg twice a day, every second day, for two weeks.
“Forty-thousand doses of quinine
were administered daily to canal employees, at a dose of 10 grains (650 mg) of quinine sulfate three times daily. Because of its bitter taste and adverse effects
such as hearing loss, blindness and cinchonism (headache, dizziness, ringing of the ears and vomiting), compliance was poor. To make quinine more palatable,
tonic water was made available to employees. Tonic water contained 10 grains of quinine in 2.5 ounces of solution and was given to new employees morning and
night three times a week for the first two weeks and once a week thereafter.”
The published treatment protocol for Covid-19 requires only 400mg per day for five days – only 60% of the reduced Panama dosage for a third of the treatment period. So the only questions remaining are:
1. is the nominal 83mg content per liter of tonic water reliably there?
President’s Choice Diet Tonic Water, the only diet tonic I’ve been able to obtain, shows “quinine hydrochloride” as the last item on the list of ingredients, without any quantification. The immediately preceding item listed, Acesulfame-potassium, is quantified as 30mg per 375mL, which equals 80mg/L. So the quinine content should not be higher than that. But how much lower might it be? If it contains 30mg per 375mL too, then 5L will still supply 400mg.
2. is 400mg of quinine taken over 24 hours with 5 litres of water effectively equivalent to 400mg of hydroxychloroquine taken in pill form?
3. what danger is there in daily consuming 267mg of sodium, 1.6g of aspartame(containing phenylalanine) and 3.33g of potassium dissolved in 5 liters of water for five consecutive days?(The non-diet version offers 466mg of sodium and 479grams! of sugar per day instead of potassium and aspartame)
Since none of the technical whizzes here have offered any answers to my questions above about tonic water, I offer as evidence the most detailed “debunking” of the only currently legal alternative source of quinine in Canada and the US for Covid-19 treatment:
https://www.snopes.com/news/2020/04/15/real-doctor-tonic-water/
In this lengthy post, the author proposes dangerously absurd amounts of Schweppes Tonic Water as necessary to match the hydroxychloroquine dosages for the same purpose. And I mean dangerous because of the total quinine this would provide. He does not address the effects of so much water and other constituents of the drink. Furthermore, he significantly contradicts himself on the amount of tonic water required, saying , at the beginning of his rant:
“You would need to drink more than 12 liters of Schweppes tonic water every eight hours to maintain those therapeutic levels of quinine (usually provided in pill form) from tonic water.”]
And at the end suggesting:
“unless you are planning on drinking around 25 liters of Schweppes tonic water a day, any claim that equates tonic water with any of these three treatments is meaningless.”
Well, according to seemingly much better documented clinical reports, the first recommendation (ie. 36 liters per day of tonic water), would provide a sickening, and possibly lethal dose of quinine at (83×36) 3grams per day). It is also (3000/400) 7.5 times the daily dosage reported to have resulted in recovery from Covid-19 in hundreds of patients.
The second suggestion (25 liters per day) of 2grams per day of quinine is still five times the recommended dose.
Ironically then, this post is the most supportive I have found of using tonic water as a source of quinine in treating Covid-19. All one has to do is throw out the egregiously (and dangerously) inflated dosages and substitute what corresponds to reports of clinically successful dosages of hydroxychloroquine, ie. 5L per day of tonic water for five days, providing 400mg of quinine per day. The author seems to be saying that quinine IS equivalent in effectiveness to hydroxychloroquine. At least he hasn’t offered any evidence or arguments to the contrary.
Whether one can trust anything this post says is another question altogether. Therefore I’ve searched on the possibility of distilling tonic water to obtain the quinine without having to drink all the water. Sadly, I’ve struck out there too. Anyone care to offer some technical advice? I do own a water distiller.
You want straight, unadulterated quinine? The find you some Jesuit’s Bark at your local arboretum. A little Fragrant Grease discreetly applied and you are good to go. How to process and use it you got to figure out on your own. I would suggest checking a 1900 or prior Encyclopedia Britannica, look in the Q volume.
Thanks for your suggestion, but I prefer to leave herbal extractions measured in milligrams to experienced biochemists when human health is at stake.
Having now found some credible information on the dangers of consuming large quantities of water, I hasten to share it, so that anyone finding my previous posts on the subject of tonic water encouraging will be better informed as to the risks. NB: this information does not address the risks of consuming too much potassium, aspertame, or sugar.
The most dangerous result of excessive water consumption is called hyponatremia, which can cause death by encephalopathy. There are numerous cases instances cited in the literature, especially involving athletes or soldiers and police in training. I haven’t followed up all of these citations, but found one that is suggestive, in which a man died after drinking “more than 5 liters of water over a few hours”. However, there is more involved than the amount of water ingested. There is a hormonal reaction, more prevalent in women than men, that causes water to be retained instead of eliminated normally. And this is a seriously complicating factor.
I searched on “maximum water intake” with duckduck.go to find the articles that led to the papers (free to download) linked below:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4470176/ (hyponatremia causes)
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5334560/#B38 (Exercise-associated hyponatremia)
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4529263/ (trial of 3.4L+ per day)
Here is my take-away from a cursory review of these papers:
A healthy adult can process between 500ml and 1L per hour of water. I presume that if one is passing water regularly while consuming half a liter or less per hour, there is little danger of acute hyponatremia. And even 250mL per hour will, over 16 hours, amount to 4L, so there’s plenty of wiggle room to get your 400mg of quinine (at 80mg/L) in one 24 hour period.
Sodium balance may be a problem, but at least one of the papers linked above warns that over-compensation with too much sodium has also caused serious problems.
The third report linked above is a trial of boosting hydration in two groups of healthy young women, divided into two groups, those who consumed less than 3.2L of water, and those who consumed more (from all sources – the researchers established that the subjects were at baseline getting 57% of their water froom food). Both groups were then made to drink 2L more of water per day, giving the second group more than 3.4L of water per day, in addition to the 1.8L they obtained from food.
I searched the text for “salt”, “sodium”, and “electrolytes”, and got a single hit for the last two terms, but only the the references. I assume from this that no electrolytes were added to the 2L of additional water intake. I take that as an encouraging sign for anyone considering (carefully) consuming 5L of water per day.
CORRECTION: above I quoted a news article that said “three soldiers died after drinking more than 5L of water over a few hours”, but I failed to provide the article’s source. I’ve now read the original (abstract only) and it says:
“All of these cases are associated with more than 5 L (usually 10-20 L) of water intake during a period of a few hours”. Quite a significant difference, I think.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12053855/
“Because of its bitter taste and adverse effects
such as hearing loss, blindness and cinchonism (headache, dizziness, ringing of the ears and vomiting), compliance was poor.”
Cowards!
I thought I could not lose any more faith and hope in humanity, but with this I have been proven wrong.
I don’t get all this focus on the personality, rather than the issue. Oh and “alien dna” doesn’t usually refer to little green men.
Umpteen studies show that hcq is effective against seasonal viruses as a prophylactic and in the early stages, less so in late stages, no surprise there. This is confirmed by this analysis of 65 studies: https://c19study.com/
The worry about this focus on hcq obscures the fact “covid19” presents little threat to the great majority of the population.
One you remember “Orange man bad” you’ll understand their mania. The Orange man said nice things about hcq so it has to be taken down, and anyone that suggests it might possibly be effective under any circumastance must be taken down too. As they say about lawyers: When the facts are on your side pounds the facts, when the law is on your side pound the law, when neither is on your side pound the table. You are witnessing world record table pounding in action.
Also on OAN as of 7.30.20
https://www.oann.com/hydroxychloroquine/
The 350 are clinical experience. Yet, it could have been, given the 80% chance of survival of even the medically compromised, that they might have gotten well anyway.
Still, it is evidence. Nothing else. Plaquenil is safe. Perhaps effective. It tips the scale a little.
And if we could just get people to admit as such at a minimum:
1) It’s safe
2) there is evidence of positive effect
Then there could be a meaningful discussion from that standpoint.
Instead, the conversation gets dishonestly dragged down to:
1) It kills people
2) It’s proven not to work.
While denying there is evidence at all that it does work [MEME], they then claim that [the evidence that does not exist] is actual actual evidence and proof of the opposite. You cannot make this stuff up!
There is a big difference between saying it is proven not to work, and saying that the studies that use the best methodology have shown the drugs to have no benefit.
Those of us who struggle to maintain objectivity try to be careful to speak of evidence, not proof.
The weight of the evidence is piling up on one side of the scale at this point.
Emphatic assertions are not evidence.
Medical science and evaluating the efficacy of disease treatment has never been conducted by means of doctors engaging in self promotion, or the making of internet videos replete with bombastic statements and emphatic dismissals of the very methods that have allowed scientific progress.
She scoffs at the notion of scientific evidence, and goes so far as to call anyone who speaks of double blind clinical trials “fake doctors”.
Here is a quote:
“And let me tell you something, all you fake doctors out there that tell me, “Yeah. I want a double blinded study.” I just tell you, quit sounding like a computer, double blinded, double blinded. I don’t know whether your chips are malfunctioning, but I’m a real doctor.”
What place has nonsense like this in a rational discussion of drug efficacy in a health emergency?
She proclaims herself the arbiter of who is a real doctor, and her standard is that anyone who seeks objective evidence, using the best means we know of to get it, is a fake doctor.
Then she makes some weird flippant remark about their “chips malfunctioning” as a lead in to declaring herself a real doctor.
Ok, sure.
I an sure I am on solid ground to say, anyone who is convinced by such remarks is a jackass.
And she is being obnoxious and unprofessional to make such statements.
What it amounts to is a complete dismissal of the scientific method as it applies to drugs for the treatment of disease.
Maybe instead, we could look at what people say if anyone can make up their own criteria for deciding who is a real doctor?
She cites a 2005 study that looked at using HCQ on the kidney cells of green monkeys as her proof, and backed that up with a remark about a single patient report about someone with hiccups as “proof” of the efficacy of HCQ, even though neither of those reports had any info at all on if HCQ had efficacy in sick people.
A few sentences later she claims no one needs to get sick, because this virus has a cure. Even if true that this drug combo was a cure, her equating a treatment with “no one need(ing) to get sick” is completely illogical. For no one to get sick we would need to have something that we could give to everyone that would prevent them from ever contracting the virus. But she offers nothing to indicate she knows how to keep anyone from getting the virus. Treating sick people does not mean no one gets sick.
Then she makes this astounding set of assertions:
“I know you people want to talk about a mask. Hello? You don’t need mask. There is a cure. I know they don’t want to open schools. No, you don’t need people to be locked down. There is prevention and there is a cure.”
How is having a cure a reason for no one to wear a mask?
She wears head to toe protection and insists her patients wear a face covering when coming to see her.
Now, why would someone who thinks there is a 100% foolproof cure bother with all of that?
This one detail alone is, IMO, very damning for her credibility. Anyone who believes what she says would have zero reason to wear a mask at all. They are expensive (when used all the time, and with the type she is wearing) and uncomfortable.
And how is a cure a “prevention”?
Logically, she must be saying everyone should be on a permanent regimen of prophylactic combination therapy. But this does not add up. That would take billions of pills of the stuff every week for the US alone. And do we take zpak antibiotic as part of the prevention? That makes no sense. Antibiotics would be quickly useless if everyone took them all the time. And what about the percentage of people who are known to be sensitive to HCQ for any of several reasons?
And how and why is she conflating opening schools with HCQ? Is she suggesting every school kid needs to get a regular dose of HCQ as well?
The people who want to open schools are basing that on the fact that children seem to mostly not be affected by this virus. Nothing to do with masks or HCQ.
But all of that speaks to logical inconsistencies or questions about why she is saying what she says.
But she goes way off the rails after this opening set of remarks.
“Let me ask you Dr. Sanjay Gupta. Hear me. Have you ever seen a COVID patient? Have you ever treated anybody with hydroxychloroquine and they died from heart disease? When you do, come and talk to me because I sit down in my clinic every day and I see these patients walk in everyday scared to death.”
Wait…what?
Q-T prolongation is a well described risk for taking HCQ. Is she saying Gupta cannot cite this fact if he does not personally treat patients and seen some of them die due to heart problems?
She seems to be saying only personal experience matters. If she has not seen it, it is a lie.
“I tell all of you doctors that are sitting down and watching Americans die. You’re like the good Nazi … the good one, the good Germans that watched Jews get k*lled and you did not speak up. If they come after me, they threaten me. They’ve threatened to … I mean, I’ve gotten all kinds of threats. Or they’re going to report me to the bots. I say, you know what? I don’t care. I’m not going to let Americans die. And if this is the hill where I get nailed on, I will get nailed on it. I don’t care. You can report me to the bots, you can k*ll me, you can do whatever, but I’m not going to let Americans die.”
OMG! How to even start unpacking that screed?
Who is she talking about? What doctors are just sitting down and watching people die?
Like good Nazis? Like Germans who “watched Jews get k!lled”?
What on Earth is she talking about here?
Who is trying to k*ll her? Threaten her? Has she gone to the police? Police take threats very seriously. As we all should. But how seriously can we take someone who rants on like this?
Report her to the bots? Chips malfunctioning in doctors?
WTF is she talking about?
This is who people want to hitch their wagon to?
This is what we want the election to hinge on?
“Instead, the conversation gets dishonestly dragged down to:
1) It kills people
2) It’s proven not to work.”
No, that is not what the conversation is dragged down to. To assert so is what is dishonest.
The questions is, can it save everyone who takes it?
Can it prevent anyone from ever getting sick?
Lots of drugs that save lives also cause harm to some percentage of people. So does this one.
Some people had best not take it.
The details on that have been presented here over and over for many months.
To imply no one who takes it can be harmed and even k*lled by it…now that is dishonest.
Even the advocates here on this page seem mostly willing to concede quite readily that the drug is worthless unless taken early. So what to do about those who are not treated early, who have passed this hypothetical efficacy window?
Those people need to be helped to, right?
It seems many of the same people that insist the drug only works if taken early, also scoff at any other drugs or treatments, some of which are known to help people who are gravely ill.
Can you explain why a rational person would say HCQ is ineffective unless taken early, but also dismiss other treatments which might help all the people who do not get HCQ “early”?
BTW…there is no indication Stella Immanuel only treated people early, or treated anyone early.
She says they cannot breathe when she see them.
That aint early.
For anyone willing to see reality and truth, please see this rather lengthy, but meticulously referenced, article:
https://medium.com/@filiperafaeli/hydroxychloroquine-the-narrative-that-doesnt-work-is-the-biggest-hoax-in-recent-human-history-2685487ad717
Click on the links within the 57 “Pieces” to the puzzle of HCQ to see original reports, incidents, papers, other official documentation.
And I hope no one can possibly try to disingenuously dismiss any of this as the author being pro-Trump.
They didn’t bother. They just took it off as violating their rules.
She made statements that are not supported by evidence.
No one is allowed to claim a drug or treatment is a cure, unless there is proof that it is a cure.
It is illegal in the US, and others places to I would guess, to make statements of medical efficacy that are unsupported.
Companies advertising supplements and such are highly constrained about what they can say regarding the possible uses and benefits of those substances.
In the case of a drug which is being tested for efficacy in clinical trials, it is flat out illegal, as well as unethical, to make claims that are not supported by FDA approvals.
Any doctor can legally prescribe any medication that has been approved (no matter what conditions/diseases the approval was for) for any condition that doctor deems medically appropriate.
But that does not mean the doctor can go on TV and claim that such off label usage is in fact a cure for a condition or disease that the drug in question has not been approved for.
Just imagine if any and every doctor did something like this based on nothing more than a belief that that one person had in their mind?
It would be chaos, and no one would have any idea how to sperate out actual knowledge from spurious and/or unsupported claims.
Consumers would be in a hopeless morass in such a free-for-all situation.
For better or worse, love it or hate it, we have a regulatory body that evaluates claims and evidence of medical efficacy, and they use scientific evidence to arrive conclusions and to issue approvals for what can be legally claimed.
And we also have legislatures and guidelines for how the rules can be changed.
What we do not have, and no one should want, is a chaotic situation where anyone can say anything they want.
I think if someone made such statements and claims as a private citizen, there would be a much stronger case for not allowing such censorship.
But she was clearly using her status a licensed medical professional to make claims that are not supported by scientific evidence, and not approved by the FDA.
That is unethical, and probably illegal.
And she may easily have opened herself up to claims of malpractice if anyone she has treated has a bad outcome.
If she had qualified her remarks to make it clear that she was voicing personal opinions, the same case could be made, IMO, about unreasonable censorship.
In fact many people are voicing such opinions all the time.
Issac Newton believed in astrology. I guess that disproves gravity and his Laws of Motion.
Chad
And alchemy! You are being flippant. Calculus and Laws of Motion basically speak for themselves. In the case of this doctor, all anyone has are her unverified verbal claims, with contradictions as pointed out by McGinley above, and no actual scientific evidence. No peer-reviewed publication. No tables. No detailed anything. Yet, there is a claim of 100% success. Anytime anyone in experimental science claims 100% accuracy or success, you should check to see if you still have your wallet, and slowly and quietly back out of the room.
She hasn’t even demonstrated the ability to turn lead into gold.
I knew Isaac Newton.
Isaac Newton was a friend of mine.
Stella Emmanuel is no Isaac Newton.
For one thing, Isaac gave us a very thick book full of his evidence.
Here is a list of studies I found with a short search.
Though I have made an effort to exclude duplicates of the same trial, some may be duplicates.
There are no clinical trials which used the gold standard that found any benefit from using HCQ:
Hydroxychloroquine Fails as Postexposure Prophylaxis for Covid-19
https://rheumnow.com/news/hydroxychloroquine-fails-postexposure-prophylaxis-covid-19
Hydroxychloroquine in Nonhospitalized Adults With Early COVID-19
https://www.acpjournals.org/doi/10.7326/M20-4207
Low-cost dexamethasone reduces death by up to one third in hospitalised patients with severe respiratory complications of COVID-19
Hydroxychloroquine… has now been stopped due to lack of efficacy
https://www.recoverytrial.net/news/low-cost-dexamethasone-reduces-death-by-up-to-one-third-in-hospitalised-patients-with-severe-respiratory-complications-of-covid-19
Results of the randomized, controlled, open-label Phase III trial, which took place at more than two dozen sites in Brazil…
Hydroxychloroquine flunks Phase III trial in mild-to-moderate Covid-19
https://medcitynews.com/2020/07/hydroxychloroquine-flunks-phase-iii-trial-in-mild-to-moderate-covid-19/
Randomized trial shows hydroxychloroquine doesn’t prevent Covid-19 as questions arise about earlier study
https://medcitynews.com/2020/06/randomized-trial-shows-hydroxychloroquine-ineffective-against-covid-19-as-questions-arise-about-an-earlier-study/
Report: VA still using hydroxychloroquine for Covid-19; mounting data indicate no effect
https://medcitynews.com/2020/05/report-va-still-using-hydroxychloroquine-for-covid-19-mounting-data-indicate-no-effect/
Novartis halts its trial of hydroxychloroquine in Covid-19, citing poor enrollment
https://medcitynews.com/2020/06/novartis-halts-its-trial-of-hydroxychloroquine-in-covid-19-citing-poor-enrollment/
Review of: “Hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin as a treatment of COVID-19: results of an open-label non-randomized clinical trial Gautret et al 2010
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0924857920302338#!
Neither HCQ nor HCQ+AZTH showed a significant effect on the viral load levels in any of the tested compartments. When the drug was used as a pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), HCQ did not confer protection against acquisition of infection. Our findings do not support the use of HCQ, either alone or in combination with AZTH, as an antiviral treatment for COVID-19 in humans.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2558-4
Hydroxychloroquine trials for COVID-19 suspended by WHO
https://www.cnet.com/news/hydroxychloroquine-trials-for-covid-19-suspended-by-the-who/#ftag=MSF491fea7
Hydroxychloroquine for Early Treatment of Adults with Mild Covid-19: A Randomized-Controlled Trial
In patients with mild Covid-19, no benefit was observed with HCQ beyond the usual care.
https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/doi/10.1093/cid/ciaa1009/5872589?searchresult=1
Effect of Hydroxychloroquine in Hospitalized Patients with COVID-19: Preliminary results from a multi-centre, randomized, controlled trial.
Conclusions: In patients hospitalized with COVID-19, hydroxychloroquine was not associated with reductions in 28-day mortality but was associated with an increased length of hospital stay and increased risk of progressing to invasive mechanical ventilation or death.
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.15.20151852v1
Among patients hospitalized with mild-to-moderate Covid-19, the use of hydroxychloroquine, alone or with azithromycin, did not improve clinical status at 15 days as compared with standard care.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2019014
Observational Study of Hydroxychloroquine in Hospitalized Patients with Covid-19
In this observational study involving patients with Covid-19 who had been admitted to the hospital, hydroxychloroquine administration was not associated with either a greatly lowered or an increased risk of the composite end point of intubation or death.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2012410
Outcomes of Hydroxychloroquine Usage in United States Veterans Hospitalized with COVID-19
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666634020300064
A Randomized Trial of Hydroxychloroquine as Postexposure Prophylaxis for Covid-19
After high-risk or moderate-risk exposure to Covid-19, hydroxychloroquine did not prevent illness compatible with Covid-19 or confirmed infection when used as postexposure prophylaxis within 4 days after exposure.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2016638?query%3Dfeatured_home=
Refuting Henry Ford study in the same journal:
An observational cohort study of hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin for COVID-19
https://www.ijidonline.com/article/S1201-9712(20)30530-0/fulltext
Brazil study finds no hydroxychloroquine benefit for Covid-19
https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/world/2020-07-24-brazil-study-finds-no-hydroxychloroquine-benefit-for-covid-19/
Hydroxychloroquine in patients with mainly mild to moderate coronavirus disease 2019: open label, randomised controlled trial
Administration of hydroxychloroquine did not result in a significantly higher probability of negative conversion than standard of care alone in patients admitted to hospital with mainly persistent mild to moderate covid-19. Adverse events were higher in hydroxychloroquine recipients than in non-recipients.
https://www.bmj.com/content/369/bmj.m1849
Association of Treatment With Hydroxychloroquine or Azithromycin With In-Hospital Mortality in Patients With COVID-19 in New York State
Among patients hospitalized in metropolitan New York with COVID-19, treatment with hydroxychloroquine, azithromycin, or both, compared with neither treatment, was not significantly associated with differences in in-hospital mortality
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32392282/
No evidence of rapid antiviral clearance or clinical benefit with the combination of hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin in patients with severe COVID-19 infection
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32240719/
Patient Taking Hydroxychloroquine Right After Discontinuing Azithromycin Develops QTc Prolongation and Cardiac Arrest
https://ismp.org/communityambulatory/medication-safety-alert-april-2020
The QT interval in patients with COVID-19 treated with hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-0888-2
Risk of QT Interval Prolongation Associated With Use of Hydroxychloroquine With or Without Concomitant Azithromycin Among Hospitalized Patients Testing Positive for Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32356863/
Characteristics associated with hospitalisation for
COVID-19 in people with rheumatic disease: data
from the COVID-19 Global Rheumatology Alliance
physician-reported registry
https://ard.bmj.com/content/annrheumdis/79/7/859.full.pdf
“Former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb, MD, said the verdict on hydroxychloroquine is not in doubt.
“We all hoped it was going to work. … All of the studies that were rigorously done have pointed in the same direction, which is that the drug doesn’t work,” Gottlieb told MSNBC. “I think at this point, we can definitively say hydroxychloroquine doesn’t work. I’m not sure what more we need to do.””
“It is unprofessional to say there is a cure for COVID or a proven way to prevent COVID through the use of a pill,” John Whyte, MD, chief medical officer of WebMD, said in an interview with Men’s Health.
Why does HCQ not work in people who are sick?
Why did it seem to work in some in vitro experiments?
The in vitro tests used VERO cells…kidney cells from green monkeys.
Recently, the same experiment using HCQ in cells in vitro, but this time using human lung cells, showed that there was no effect for HCQ:
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.22.216150v1
Hydroxychloroquine can’t stop COVID-19. It’s time to move on, scientists say
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/covid-19-coronavirus-hydroxychloroquine-no-evidence-treatment
I personally wish these articles and anyone discussing these issues would leave out the politics, but that seems to be asking too much these days.
I have a feeling many readers will object to the authors of articles, like the Science News one, referring to the characterizations from various political and public health leaders, and from that decide the article is a political one and ignore it.
This is unfortunate.
It clouds the ability to be objective.
Dr Simone Gold (@drsimonegold) has tweeted that she was “terminated from employment”, i.e. fired, after her video went viral.
She repeatedly referenced a 2005 study as proof that HCQ cured COVID 19.
But that study was an in vitro look at using chloroquine to block infection in kidney cells from the green monkey.
For a medical professional to use that as a justification for blithely treating patients who are sick with another virus, could reasonably be taken as proof of incompetence. At best.
Recklessness and malpractice is probably a fair characterization.
Is CoV-2 confirmed as the cause of this pandemic?
Posted on August 5, 2020 by budbromley (link below)
As you know, COVID-19 (aka SARS CoV-2) is said to be affecting senior citizens (like me) more than any other group. But is that really true? Or, is SARS CoV-2 a follow-on infection after pneumonia or other disease which weakened the immune system?
As far as I can find, neither Koch’s postulates nor Rivers postulates (1), the standards for confirmation of cause (etiology) of infectious diseases, has been completed or published for SARS CoV-2. If you have done this virology, or if you can provide a reference to such a report, then please you would be helping us all by letting us know where it is published.
My literature search found no confirmation Koch’s or Rivers’ postulates has been fulfilled for SARS CoV-2, which is commonly called Covid-19, and merely associated with the deaths and disease in this so-called pandemic. A PCR test confirms that a specific sequence is found in the patient sample. An antibody test confirms that the patient has antibodies for a given pathogen. But, an association or correlation of a sequence or antibody with a disease is not equivalent and does not prove cause.
Do your own literature search. The scientists and papers usually mention justification or reason that Koch’s or Rivers’ postulates have not been fulfilled for CoV-2, for example the absence of a validated animal model is mentioned as well as the difficulties with animal models and cell culture media. (3)
SARS CoV-1 was confirmed following Koch’s postulates in 2003 by Dutch scientists. (2) But sequence homology between CoV-1 and CoV-2 has been reported at about 79%, while for example, homology between bat and CoV-2 is about 96%.
Without confirmation of cause following Koch’s or Rivers’ postulates, the world is probably doing extensive and expensive testing for sequence and antibodies and designing vaccines for exosomes or apoptotic bodies.
Time for some due diligence please.
(1) Viruses and Koch’s Postulates, Thomas M. Rivers. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC545348/
(2) Koch’s postulates fulfilled for SARS virus. Ron A. M. Fouchier, et al. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7095368/
(3) Amending Koch’s postulates for viral disease: When “growth in pure culture” leads to a loss of virulence, Joseph Prescott, Heinz Feldmann, and David Safronetz. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5182102/
https://budbromley.blog/2020/08/05/is-cov-2-confirmed-as-the-cause-of-this-pandemic/
Sequence homology is not informative. With only a few exceptions, most viruses have combinations of highly conserved and highly variable sequences. Coronavirus is the most variable kind.
The conserved parts are often repetitious, making assembly from short fragments (e.g., Illumina) difficult or impossible. Long-read or single-molecule methods are just not good enough because of their high error rate and significant artifacts.
Furthermore, most of sequence variation in viruses (as well as in living things), is neutral. Heavy-hitting mutations are small and few in number. Often one amino acid substitution is enough to cause a pandemic, while hundreds of others might have no observable effect. Sequence homology is useless.
The tests for coronavirus target a short conserved sequence that is common to all or nearly all coronaviruses, If the purported COVID-19 existed and could be defined as a thing (“Here’s a fully assembled genome, cloned and tested for stability, accompanied by reliable serology and protein structure data”), then selecting a more meaningful target for a PCR test could be possible. As things stand, no such feature is known and everyone is testing for “a coronavirus” with no practical purpose.
Whatever sequence was presented as COVID-19, if it ever was true sequence, will never be found in the wild anymore.
As far as epidemiology goes, coronaviruses are a normal fact of life. They have been with us for hundreds of millions of years, and I have a strong hunch that regular exposure to them is an absolute requirement for normal life.
Regarding Koch’s postulates, they suggest good simple questions to ask, but I find them a bit naïve. Today, we know enough to ask questions like this: can we be sure that any given case of respiratory distress associated with a positive CoV test would be less severe without the coronavirus present?
Here’s some stuff Koch did not know:
https://www.pnas.org/content/116/52/27142