Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Do not take aspirin without consulting your doctor – aspirin use, even in small doses, can have nasty and sometimes fatal side effects. But a recent Israeli study of 10,477 patient records suggests a 29% reduction in Covid-19 infection and fatalities amongst regular users of therapeutic aspirin.
Aspirin may protect against COVID-19, Israeli research finds
People who take small doses are 29% less likely than others to test positive, researchers say; those who do get COVID recover faster, and with reduced aftereffects
By NATHAN JEFFAY Today, 3:20 pm
Aspirin, one of the oldest and most widely used drugs, is preventing COVID-19 infections, Israeli scientists have claimed in “exciting” findings.
In the peer-reviewed research, they found that in a sample of Israeli PCR tests, patients who take small doses of aspirin were 29 percent less likely to test positive. They cross-referenced 10,477 results with medical records covering what preventive drugs patients take.
“We were really excited to see a big reduction in the proportion of people testing positive, and this gives a promising indication that aspirin, such a well-known and inexpensive drug, may be helpful in fighting the pandemic,” Milana Frenkel-Morgenstern of Bar-Ilan University told The Times of Israel.
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The aspirin study focused on people who take “baby” 75 milligram doses of the drug for primary prevention of cardiovascular diseases, but don’t already have such diseases. Results were adjusted to account for age and co-morbidities.
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“The fact we saw that it’s not just the likelihood of infection but also disease duration points to the possibility of benefits, in biological terms, of taking aspirin,” he said.
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Read more: https://www.timesofisrael.com/aspirin-may-protect-against-covid-19-israeli-research-finds/
The abstract of the study;
The use of aspirin for primary prevention of cardiovascular disease is associated with a lower likelihood of COVID-19 infection
Eugene Merzon 1 2, Ilan Green 1 2, Shlomo Vinker 1 2, Avivit Golan-Cohen 1 2, Alessandro Gorohovski 3, Eva Avramovich 1 3, Milana Frenkel-Morgenstern 4, Eli Magen 1 5
PMID: 33621437
DOI: 10.1111/febs.15784
AbstractAcetylsalicylic acid (aspirin) is commonly used for primary and secondary prevention of cardiovascular diseases. Aspirin use is associated with better outcomes among COVID-19 positive patients. We hypothesized that aspirin use for primary cardiovascular disease prevention might have a protective effect on COVID-19 susceptibility and disease duration. We conducted a retrospective population-based cross-sectional study, utilizing data from the Leumit Health Services database. The proportion of patients treated with aspirin was significantly lower among the COVID-19-positive group, as compared to the COVID-19-negative group (73 (11.03 %) vs. 1548 (15.77%); p=0.001). Aspirin use was associated with lower likelihood of COVID-19 infection, as compared to non-users (adjusted OR 0.71 (95% CI, 0.52 to 0.99; p=0.041). Aspirin users were older (68.06 ± 12.79 vs. 56.63 ± 12.28 years of age; p<0.001), presented a lower BMI (28.77±5.4 vs. 30.37±4.55; p<0.0189) and showed higher prevalence of hypertension (56, 76.71%), diabetes (47, 64.38%) and COPD (11, 15.07%) than showed the aspirin non-users (151, 25.64%, p<0.001; 130, 22.07%, p<0.001; and 43, 7.3%, p=0.023, respectively). Moreover, COVID-19 disease duration (considered as the time between the first positive and second negative COVID-19 RT-PCR test results) among aspirin users was significantly shorter, as compared to aspirin non-users (19.8±7.8 vs. 21.9± 7.9 p= 0.045). Among hospitalized COVID-positive patients, a higher proportion of surviving subjects were treated with aspirin (20, 19.05%), as opposed to 1 dead subject (14.29%), although this difference was not significant (p=0.449). In conclusion, we observed inverse association between the likelihood of COVID-19 infection, disease duration and mortality and aspirin use for primary prevention.
Read more: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33621437/
The study appears to focus on the apparent correlation, they don’t appear to delve into the reason for the apparent therapeutic benefit.
One possible explanation, Aspirin is an anti-inflammatory, which might be the reason for its apparent effectiveness.
This isn’t the first time I’ve seen claims about the efficacy of an anti-inflammatory against Covid. Another powerful anti-inflammatory, Butesonide, was recently claimed by Oxford University and Queensland University to reduce severe Covid symptoms by 90% and dramatically improve survival.
The much maligned Hydroxychloroquine, once a widely used an anti-malarial, has a secondary use as a long term anti-inflammatory treatment for arthritis. My French friend told me hydroxychloroquine was a non-prescription over the counter medication in France, until President Macron banned it in early 2020, to stop people self medicating to treat their Covid symptoms.
I don’t know about you guys, but I think I’m starting to see a pattern. Surely this coincidence of independent claims that three unrelated powerful anti-inflammatory drugs are therapeutically effective against Covid-19 is worth someone in the medical community taking a closer look.
A note of caution – these are early days. It is possible that claims of Covid therapeutic benefit for any or all of the drugs I listed are wrong.
But it is also possible claims of Covid therapeutic benefit for all three drugs I mentioned are true. If the three listed anti-inflammatory medications help reduce Covid symptoms, because of their anti-inflammatory properties, these three anti-inflammatories could just the tip of the iceberg – there could be a whole range of anti-inflammatories which are useful for treating Covid. Perhaps somewhere out there is a cheap, generic anti-inflammatory which is even more effective than the claimed effectiveness of Butesonide, just sitting on a shelf somewhere waiting for some doctor to notice it.
Update (EW): A few commenters are dissing my warning about the health risks of Aspirin, but please accept there are genuine serious risks. Some people have health conditions like poor renal function, which even low dose aspirin can worsen. Or people already taking blood thinners like Warfarin are taking a huge risk if they take aspirin in addition to their other medications, without consulting with their doctor first. Aspirin may also increase the risk of developing nasty conditions like Crohns Disease. Asthmatics should be very careful with Aspirin, with around 20% of asthmatics aspirin makes their asthma symptoms worse. I’m sure there are plenty of other ways Aspirin can mess you up. Like I said, please talk to your doctor before self medicating with a drug as powerful as aspirin.
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In the Australian papers today is a report that Astra-Zeneca may cause blood clots. Perhaps aspirin may be effective.
Look up what happened with the American Army created “spanish” flu that originated at San Francisco barracks – aspirin ended up killing thousands
Sure – but the doses they were giving were astronomical, like intravenous 1g of Aspirin per hour in at least one case. I’m not saying Aspirin is risk free, but if you gave 1g of cooking salt per hour for an extended period you could make someone pretty sick.
https://academic.oup.com/cid/article/49/9/1405/301441
I’m not saying aspirin is risk free, I added a health warning – but I don’t think a period in which people died from doses now recognised as highly toxic is evidence Aspirin should not be considered.
Do not mean to nitpick, but just for the sake of saying it.
As I understand it the clause “highly toxic” does not match or do justice to aspirin overdosing.
The proper clause or term should be “highly poisonous”, meaning; very very unlikely to be toxic.
Highly pure efficient poisonous substances can not be or considered toxic.
cheers
And then plain brains do not understand that the death cause listed there was not flu, but aspirin poisoning.
You see neither aspirin or HCQ treatment guaranties recovery of already done damages.
If one happens to be beyond point of no return, it remains there with no chance of return to life, even when drugs like Aspirin and HCQ may do a proper arresting of the initial problem causing such deep damages in the first place
The death of thousands you point at was listed as aspirin poisoning as the symptoms associated with the death were clearly poisoning by aspirin, aka a painless end.
These thousand deaths were non changeable, at the given point…
already beyond point of no return.
The aspirin treatment there makes only one difference… painless death.
Meaning that many more, like up to hundred thousands others, ended up saved by aspirin treatment at some very critical health condition.
There is no any drug that will bring one back to life, when one already beyond point of no return… and still even at that, aspirin in high dose treatment may give a painless passage to the last mile… at the very least.
cheers
Not as big of a reduction as HCQ.
“Do not take aspirin without consulting your doctor – aspirin use, even in small doses, can have nasty and sometimes fatal side effects.”
Consult your Dr. YES, but PUHLEASE lay off the fatal risks quotes. Some people are at risk, as with ANY drug, but in general very miniscule. I have been taking it for years to thin my blood for hemochromatosis and other blood related complications.
I’m not dissing aspirin’s therapeutic benefit, but at the same time we shouldn’t ignore that if someone has a pre-existing health condition which makes them susceptible to aspirin it can really mess them up. Like I said, consult with your doctor.
…somewhere out there is a cheap, generic anti-inflammatory which is even more effective than the claimed effectiveness of Butesonide, just sitting on a shelf somewhere waiting for some doctor to notice it.”
Tonic water may be just what you suggest. Chloroquine from a tree bark in South America and another tree in Africa was used by indigenous folk for malaria. Spanish colonists reported on its use in the 17th century. The famous gin and tonic was the pleasant way that the British took their daily antimalarial dose before it became a popular cocktail.
Oh, and BTW, ‘aspirin’ was long used by North American native people as an anti-inflammatory and therapy for headache. It is extracted as a tea made with the underbark of the willow tree and possibly poplar. Ive chewed the underbark and the aspirin flavor is unmistakable.
My far flung family took to gin and tonic as a preventative under my suggestion (they added the gin part!) after one of my daughter’s families got Covid in UK. I had hydroxychloroquine tablets ready yo use as a reserve left over from a trip to Minas Gerais, Brazil.
I have been criticized (even here at WUWT) for my doing this by people who believed the lies from the totalitarians and greedy pharmacy investment beneficiaries about how dangerous this drug is! Hell, I’ve used the drug since the 1960s in Africa and recently in Brazil as have perhaps over a billion people. I dare say that of all my colleagues, and neighbors in these countries I never heard of a debility or death from it.
Add millions of lupus and arthritic users of it and there, my friends, is something vastly superior to any double blind study of a few hundred patients. Yes, there are side effects known. And there are side effects of not using it as hundreds of millions of deaths from malaria attest. Ya know, a lethal dose of milk will kill you.
Just a further word of caution — every one of those original passengers landed from the Mayflower who ate some turkey that first Thanksgiving (if I may so dare now to mention that increasingly politically incorrect celebration) is dead today. Do be careful out there!
White willow bark “pouder” extract, the very first medicine discovered produced and used as the european equivalent of quinine, an anti fever drug, the “same” medicine as the later day Aspirin,
is still produced and in sale.
The earlier and first organic bio form of Aspirin.
The capsules quite equivalent to “baby” low dose of aspirin.
The “medical package” extracted and utilized is naturally made, simply extracted by man.
Far stable and more balanced than the fossil fuel mass produced aspirin.
Not as potential and punchy as the highly concentrated aspirin,
and with no any side effects in it’s own.
Aspirin was not discovered or invented, simply happens to be a product of an attempt to achieve feasible large mass production of the same White Willow bark extract medicine in an industrial scale, from non bio source substances.
cheers
Another aspect which wasn’t discussed here: low dose aspirin has well known platelet aggregation inhibiting effects, and thus anti thrombotic properties. Roche stopped development of a platelet aggregation inhibitor in the clinic, because it wasn’t able to significantly beat the much cheaper low-dose aspirin. This adds to the anti-inflammatory effects. Both inflammation and blood clots are some of the worst effects of COVID-19. Many people were also helped when the lungs were attacked, by treatment with anti-inflammatory asthma sprays.
Butesonide IS the cheap version
if you buy branded symbicort(same drug) pay 3x or more
doing other research for personal reasons i see that pharmas buyups of older meds and the 400% or more hikes wasnt just for epipens
a wormer with anticancer properties went from 100 to 400 and then became totally UNavailable in usa.
having issues finding bulk supplies here but small volumes are just 9$ otc
Has to be a lot better than taking the vaccine as the NHS guide illustrates- there is no cure for Covid and they don’t know whether the vaccines stop you catching or passing on the virus- some testing! Probably the give away is all tested vaccines up until 2020 were rejected where as the untested vaccines from 2020 were rolled out.
“Do not take aspirin without consulting your doctor – aspirin use, even in small doses, can have nasty and sometimes fatal side effects.” This seems like news to me. Is it anything like drinking too much water?
Some people have health conditions like poor renal function, which even low dose aspirin can worsen. Or people already on blood thinners like warfarin are taking a huge risk if they take aspirin without talking to their doctor. Aspirin increases the risk of developing nasty conditions like Crohns Disease. Like I said, talk to your doctor.
Senior USAF Doc who administered my second Moderna shot , observing my SSN cap , quietly told me that if I was going to take something for pain after the shot , to take Tylenol , not aspirin because aspirin would reduce the effectiveness of the shot .
Docs see certain things that they don’t go public with …
I treated my suspected covid-19 infection in January 2020 with aspirin, before we had news of the virus. But the very first negative news that I heard about any drug for treating covid-19, was a report from supposedly from China which said that aspirin was unhelpful and dangerous for covid-19 patients. Meanwhile we’ve had this Chinese report for a year.
Protective Effect of Aspirin on COVID-19 Patients:https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT04365309
I take 325 mg Aspirin, daily, due to CABG 11/2019. No other comorbidities. Got CCP virus 10/2020. Lost taste and smell. Weak one day and fine all others. No cough. Little fever. Didn’t help me. Maybe too high of dose or just not one of the lucky 29%.
I acquired covid from a coworker for Christmas. At onset and during the infection I was consuming two aspirin and a Benadryl mornings and evenings for 15 straight days. My symptoms were minor, sinuses draining, minor cough, fever for one day, no smell or taste for months and got tired easily. Had positive tests for three months, finally passed it. Aspirin works well for me.
It is true that Aspirin is a powerful drug, that should be used with care. It can be a cause of intestinal bleeding for example, which is a “go to the emergency room” condition–as I know from personal experience.
In general, it appears that anti-inflammatory medicines are useful in treating Covid, which is something we should be investigating further.
No, it became a prescription drug in France in October 2019 (per Prof Raoult). There were already moves to suppress this cheap and patent free drug before Covid became an issue.
Please watch this and form a judgement.
Peter McCullough, MD testifies to Texas Senate HHS Committee
https://youtu.be/QAHi3lX3oGM