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  • Re: Hydroxychloroquine WORKS

    Originally posted by shiny! View Post
    IMO there are only two reasons why Hydroxychloroquine has met so much resistance: Trump supports it, and Big Pharma can't make money from it.
    Those who have deliberately steered public policy against this drug have the blood of millions on their hands. It's mass murder.

    ==================================================


    An Effective COVID Treatment the Media Continues to Besmirch


    By Steven Hatfill
    August 04, 2020

    On Friday, July 31, in a column ostensibly dealing with health care “misinformation,” Washington Post media critic Margaret Sullivan opened by lambasting “fringe doctors spouting dangerous falsehoods about hydroxychloroquine as a COVID-19 wonder cure.”

    Actually, it was Sullivan who was spouting dangerous falsehoods about this drug, something the Washington Post and much of the rest of the media have been doing for months. On May 15, the Post offered a stark warning to any Americans who may have taken hope in a possible therapy for COVID-19. In the newspaper’s telling, there was nothing unambiguous about the science -- or the politics -- of hydroxychloroquine: “Drug promoted by Trump as coronavirus game-changer increasingly linked to deaths,” blared the headline. Written by three Post staff writers, the story asserted that the effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine in treating COVID-19 is scant and that the drug is inherently unsafe. This claim is nonsense.

    Biased against the use of hydroxychloroquine for COVID-19 -- and the Washington Post is hardly alone -- the paper described an April 21, 2020, drug study on U.S. Veterans Affairs patients hospitalized with the illness. It found a high death rate in patients taking the drug hydroxychloroquine. But this was a flawed study with a small sample, the main flaw being that the drug was given to the sickest patients who were already dying because of their age and severe pre-existing conditions. This study was quickly debunked. It had been posted on a non-peer-reviewed medical archive that specifically warns that studies posted on its website should not be reported in the media as established information.

    Yet, the Post and countless other news outlets did just the opposite, making repeated claims that hydroxychloroquine was ineffective and caused serious cardiac problems. Nowhere was there any mention of the fact that COVID-19 damages the heart during infection, sometimes causing irregular and sometimes fatal heart rhythms in patients not taking the drug.

    To a media unrelentingly hostile to Donald Trump, this meant that the president could be portrayed as recklessly promoting the use of a “dangerous” drug. Ignoring the refutation of the VA study in its May 15 article, the Washington Post cited a Brazil study published on April 24 in which a COVID trial using chloroquine (a related but different drug than hydroxychloroquine) was stopped because 11 patients treated with it died. The reporters never mentioned another problem with that study: The Brazilian doctors were giving their patients lethal cumulative doses of the drug.

    On and on it has gone since then, in a circle of self-reinforcing commentary. Following the news that Trump was taking the drug himself, opinion hosts on cable news channels launched continual attacks on both hydroxychloroquine and the president. “This will kill you!” Fox News Channel’s Neil Cavuto exclaimed. “The president of the United States just acknowledge that he is taking hydroxychloroquine, a drug that [was] meant really to treat malaria and lupus.”

    Washington Post reporters Ariana Cha and Laurie McGinley were back again on May 22, with a new article shouting out the new supposed news: “Antimalarial drug touted by President Trump is linked to increased risk of death in coronavirus patients, study says.” The media uproar this time was based on a large study just published in the Lancet. There was just one problem. The Lancet paper was fraudulent and it was quickly retracted.
    However, the damage from the biased media storm was done and it was long-lasting. Continuing patient enrollment needed for early-use clinical trials of hydroxychloroquine dried up within a week. Patients were afraid to take the drug, doctors became afraid to prescribe it, pharmacies refused to fill prescriptions, and in a rush of incompetent analysis and non-existent senior leadership, the FDA revoked its Emergency Use Authorization for the drug.

    So what is the real story on hydroxychloroquine? Here, briefly, is what we know:

    When the COVID-19 pandemic began, a search was made for suitable antiviral therapies to use as treatment until a vaccine could be produced. One drug, hydroxychloroquine, was found to be the most effective and safe for use against the virus. Federal funds were used for clinical trials of it, but there was no guidance from Dr. Anthony Fauci or the NIH Treatment Guidelines Panel on what role the drug would play in the national pandemic response. Fauci seemed to be unaware that there actually was a national pandemic plan for respiratory viruses.

    Following a careful regimen developed by doctors in France, some knowledgeable practicing U.S. physicians began prescribing hydroxychloroquine to patients still in the early phase of COVID infection. Its effects seemed dramatic. Patients still became sick, but for the most part they avoided hospitalization. In contrast --- and in error -- the NIH-funded studies somehow became focused on giving hydroxychloroquine to late-presenting hospitalized patients. This was in spite of the fact that unlike the drug’s early use in ambulatory patients, there was no real data to support the drug’s use in more severe hospitalized patients.

    By April, it was clear that roughly seven days from the time of the first onset of symptoms, a COVID-19 infection could sometimes progress into a more radical late phase of severe disease with inflammation of the blood vessels in the body and immune system over-reactions. Many patients developed blood clots in their lungs and needed mechanical ventilation. Some needed kidney dialysis. In light of this pathological carnage, no antiviral drug could be expected to show much of an effect during this severe second stage of COVID.

    On April 6, 2020, an international team of medical experts published an extensive study of hydroxychloroquine in more than 130,000 patients with connective tissue disorders. They reaffirmed that hydroxychloroquine was a safe drug with no serious side effects. The drug could safely be given to pregnant women and breast-feeding mothers. Consequently, countries such as China, Turkey, South Korea, India, Morocco, Algeria, and others began to use hydroxychloroquine widely and early in their national pandemic response. Doctors overseas were safely prescribing the drug based on clinical signs and symptoms because widespread testing was not available.

    However, the NIH promoted a much different strategy for the United States. The “Fauci Strategy” was to keep early infected patients quarantined at home without treatment until they developed a shortness of breath and had to be admitted to a hospital. Then they would they be given hydroxychloroquine. The Food and Drug Administration cluelessly agreed to this doctrine and it stated in its hydroxychloroquine Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) that “hospitalized patients were likely to have a greater prospect of benefit (compared to ambulatory patients with mild illness).”
    In reality just the opposite was true. This was a tragic mistake by Fauci and FDA Commissioner Dr. Stephen Hahn and it was a mistake that would cost the lives of thousands of Americans in the days to come.

    At the same time, accumulating data showed remarkable results if hydroxychloroquine were given to patients early, during a seven-day window from the time of first symptom onset. If given during this window, most infections did not progress into the severe, lethal second stage of the disease. Patients still got sick, but they avoided hospitalization or the later transfer to an intensive care unit. In mid-April a high-level memo was sent to the FDA alerting them to the fact that the best use for hydroxychloroquine was for its early use in still ambulatory COVID patients. These patients were quarantined at home but were not short of breath and did not yet require supplemental oxygen and hospitalization.

    Failing to understand that COVID-19 could be a two-stage disease process, the FDA ignored the memo and, as previously mentioned, it withdrew its EUA for hydroxychloroquine based on flawed studies and clinical trials that were applicable only to late-stage COVID patients.

    By now, however, some countries had already implemented early, aggressive, outpatient community treatment with hydroxychloroquine and within weeks were able to minimize their COVID deaths and bring their national pandemic under some degree of control.



    In countries such as Great Britain and the United States, where the “Fauci-Hahn Strategy” was followed, there was a much higher death rate and an ever-increasing number of cases. COVID patients in the U.S. would continue to be quarantined at home and left untreated until they developed shortness of breath. Then they would be admitted to the hospital and given hydroxychloroquine outside the narrow window for the drug’s maximum effectiveness.
    In further contrast, countries that started out with the “Fauci-Hahn Doctrine” and then later shifted their policy towards aggressive outpatient hydroxychloroquine use, after a brief lag period also saw a stunning rapid reduction in COVID mortality and hospital admissions.

    Finally, several nations that had started using an aggressive early-use outpatient policy for hydroxychloroquine, including France and Switzerland, stopped this practice when the WHO temporarily withdrew its support for the drug. Five days after the publication of the fake Lancet study and the resulting media onslaught, Swiss politicians banned hydroxychloroquine use in the country from May27 until June 11, when it was quickly reinstated.



    The consequences of suddenly stopping hydroxychloroquine can be seen by examining a graph of the Case Fatality Ratio Index (nrCFR) for Switzerland. This is derived by dividing the number of daily new COVID fatalities by the new cases resolved over a period with a seven-day moving average. Looking at the evolution curve of the CFR it can be seen that during the weeks preceding the ban on hydroxychloroquine, the nrCFR index fluctuated between 3% and 5%.
    Following a lag of 13 days after stopping outpatient hydroxychloroquine use, the country’s COVID-19 deaths increased four-fold and the nrCFR index stayed elevated at the highest level it had been since early in the COVID pandemic, oscillating at over 10%-15%. Early outpatient hydroxychloroquine was restarted June 11 but the four-fold “wave of excess lethality” lasted until June 22, after which the nrCFR rapidly returned to its background value.

    Here in our country, Fauci continued to ignore the ever accumulating and remarkable early-use data on hydroxychloroquine and he became focused on a new antiviral compound named remdesivir. This was an experimental drug that had to be given intravenously every day for five days. It was never suitable for major widespread outpatient or at-home use as part of a national pandemic plan. We now know now that remdesivir has no effect on overall COVID patient mortality and it costs thousands of dollars per patient.

    Hydroxychloroquine, by contrast, costs 60 cents a tablet, it can be taken at home, it fits in with the national pandemic plan for respiratory viruses, and a course of therapy simply requires swallowing three tablets in the first 24 hours followed by one tablet every 12 hours for five days.

    There are now 53 studies that show positive results of hydroxychloroquine in COVID infections. There are 14 global studies that show neutral or negative results -- and 10 of them were of patients in very late stages of COVID-19, where no antiviral drug can be expected to have much effect. Of the remaining four studies, two come from the same University of Minnesota author. The other two are from the faulty Brazil paper, which should be retracted, and the fake Lancet paper, which was.

    Millions of people are taking or have taken hydroxychloroquine in nations that have managed to get their national pandemic under some degree of control. Two recent, large, early-use clinical trials have been conducted by the Henry Ford Health System and at Mount Sinai showing a 51% and 47% lower mortality, respectively, in hospitalized patients given hydroxychloroquine. A recent study from Spain published on July 29, two days before Margaret Sullivan’s strafing of “fringe doctors,” shows a 66% reduction in COVID mortality in patients taking hydroxychloroquine. No serious side effects were reported in these studies and no epidemic of heartbeat abnormalities.

    This is ground-shaking news. Why is it not being widely reported? Why is the American media trying to run the U.S. pandemic response with its own misinformation?

    Steven Hatfill is a veteran virologist who helped establish the Rapid Hemorrhagic Fever Response Teams for the National Medical Disaster Unit in Kenya, Africa. He is an adjunct assistant professor in two departments at the George Washington University Medical Center where he teaches mass casualty medicine. He is principle author of the prophetic book “Three Seconds Until Midnight -- Preparing for the Next Pandemic,” published by Amazon in 2019.
    The most important words are: "a COVID-19 infection could sometimes progress into a more radical late phase of severe disease with inflammation of the blood vessels in the body and immune system over-reactions. Many patients developed blood clots in their lungs and needed mechanical ventilation. Some needed kidney dialysis. In light of this pathological carnage, no antiviral drug could be expected to show much of an effect during this severe second stage of COVID."

    In fact, depending upon the meaning of the word "drug", i.e. something given to a patient to suppress an infection; that statement is clearly not true. Thus one must add; why not add the work of Dr Paul Makin using intravenous vitamin C, Hydrocortisone and Thiamine, vitamin B1 to reduce the death rate from sepsis, (exactly what the above patients are dying from), by ~80% which was fully reported more than 2 years ago; moreover, since upgraded to MATH+ protocol for use against COVID and announced April 5th.

    My question being, considering the now many hundreds of thousands of totally unnecessary deaths of innocent citizens; is there an US citizen prepared to file a charge of corporate genocide, against
    Dr. Anthony Fauci with the International Court of the Hague? Again, the same with the United States Supreme Court?


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    • Re: Hydroxychloroquine WORKS

      Attached Files

      Be kinder than necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

      Comment


      • Re: Hydroxychloroquine WORKS

        any vaccine will not be produced in globally adequate quantities for a long time. the first likely recipients will be frontline healthcare workers [they have 3.4 times the risk of getting the disease in spit of good ppe just because they have so much exposure] and other high risk groups. data from these groups will reveal the efficacy and side effects of a vaccine.

        re plaquinil- latest i've read is not useful at late stage, unlikely useful at early stage.

        Comment


        • Re: Hydroxychloroquine WORKS

          i STRONGLY recommend this article on medical decision making during the pandemic. it sets forth the dilemmas, clinical and theoretical, and the conflicts among doctors when they have sick patients and little knowledge to guide them.

          https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/05/m...s-doctors.html

          Comment


          • Re: Hydroxychloroquine WORKS

            Originally posted by jk View Post
            i STRONGLY recommend this article on medical decision making during the pandemic. it sets forth the dilemmas, clinical and theoretical, and the conflicts among doctors when they have sick patients and little knowledge to guide them.

            https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/05/m...s-doctors.html
            A long but excellent read. Doctors threw everything at it all the treatments that some here were advocating were tried.

            I hope we learn a lot of lessons from this. Still can't believe the stupidity of some leaders. You just don't mouth off about a drug in public you are killing people doing that, doctors will pick it up anyway.

            Comment


            • Re: Hydroxychloroquine WORKS

              Originally posted by jk View Post
              i STRONGLY recommend this article on medical decision making during the pandemic. it sets forth the dilemmas, clinical and theoretical, and the conflicts among doctors when they have sick patients and little knowledge to guide them.

              https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/05/m...s-doctors.html
              While this NY Times article did an excellent job portraying the heartache and stress felt by frontline workers bearing the brunt of treating patients, it's portrayal of the ineffectiveness of hydroxychloroquine is at odds with actual data where it has been used correctly, some of which has been posted earlier in this thread. When it comes to describing what healthcare workers are up against it's good with the feels. When it comes to presenting conclusions about hydroxychloroquine it's bad with the facts. An article that uses a lot of words to essentially say "a lot of people took hydroxychloroquine and it didn't work" is meaningless without context.

              Hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin are zinc ionophores. Their function in treating this disease is to drive zinc into the cells where it disrupts the RNA replication of the coronavirus. It is not effective late in the course of the disease when the coronavirus has already done severe organ damage. It is not effective when prescribed at lethal levels as was done in Brazil, or when prescribed alone without azithromycin and, if possible, zinc. When used under these circumstances it is useless and even dangerous. Unfortunately, these are the conclusions that sources such as the NY Times like to parrot.

              Use the NY Times for feels. For facts, look at the data coming from doctors and countries that are prescribing the drug correctly. Any article that concludes that hydroxychloroquine is not effective or safe, must show full context: when and how was it prescribed. This article fails to do that. Show me evidence of failure where it has been used properly:

              A. early onset at moderate (not lethal) dosage,
              B. before the virus has replicated to the point of causing organ damage, and
              C. prescribed concurrently with Azithrymicin and Zinc.

              You will note that this NY Times article does not specify how it was prescribed. It does not give context. It just concludes it's no good.

              From earlier in this thread:

              "Finally, several nations that had started using an aggressive early-use outpatient policy for hydroxychloroquine, including France and Switzerland, stopped this practice when the WHO temporarily withdrew its support for the drug. Five days after the publication of the fake Lancet study and the resulting media onslaught, Swiss politicians banned hydroxychloroquine use in the country from May27 until June 11, when it was quickly reinstated.


              Be kinder than necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

              Comment


              • Re: Hydroxychloroquine WORKS

                Media Should Do a Mea Culpa as French Analysis Offers a Stunning Observation About Hydroxychloroquine Use


                By Stacey Lennox Jul 15, 2020 11:34 AM EST

                We have been told repeatedly by health experts to demonstrate the effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine and the other meds prescribed with it we need strict clinical trials. These are studies where some patients receive medication, and some do not. For many healthcare providers, this is a noxious thought if there is evidence to believe a treatment may work.

                How do you ethically deny a potential treatment to an eligible patient to conduct a study? So-called double-blind studies described above are the preferred method advocated by Dr. Fauci. These double-blind studies allow people to die in the name of “science” if a drug is effective. They are in the “control group.”
                There are ethical issues with this approach that researches at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center addressed with a new concurrent trial based on machine learning developed following the H1N1 pandemic. This method has been ignored by the NIH and FDA approval processes.

                Such was the fate of the hydroxychloroquine, azithromycin, and zinc combination. Scientifically there was every reason to believe it would work. Clinically, doctors saw results when directly treating patients. Several recommended that the drug be produced in sufficient amounts and given early and outpatient.

                President Trump expressed optimism based on studies in France and China, and the media freaked out. The president’s political opposition would go on to cling to any proof the drug would not work and suppress any information that it would. This politicization culminated in the horrific study published by Lancet that the publication quietly retracted.

                However, the damage was already done. The World Health Organization suspended trials immediately after the study published in Lancet. Switzerland, which had been using the treatment, prohibited the use of the drug in COVID-19 shortly after that on May 27th. The retraction was so stealth that the ban was not lifted in Switzerland until June 11th.

                This window allowed French researchers to analyze what happened in the entire population of COVID-19 patients during the ban. They used the case fatality rate (CFR) as the measure observed. The graph is stunning.

                It also the only period where the Swiss CFR approached or exceeded that in France where there has been no use of hydroxychloroquine outside a few isolated trials.

                The CFR returned to the highest level it had been since early in the pandemic at over 15%. Upon resumption of treatment with hydroxychloroquine, it returned to below 5%. A statistical analysis of the data:
                A statistically significant difference
                For those who are not convinced of the observational result, we conducted a statistical difference test by comparing the three periods: May 28th – June 8th, June 9th – 22nd, June 23rd – July 6th . The period from June 9th till the 22nd is that in which the index increased some 13 days after the suspension of hydroxychloroquine. There is of course an effect of delay between stopping the prescription of the drug and possible deaths, which explains the delay of 13 days.

                We therefore observe that for the period from the 28th of May till the 8th of June, the index is 2.39% and then drops to 11.52% or 4.8 times more and then drops to 3%.
                When testing for statistical significance between the various observations, the difference is significant at 99% with a p <0.0001. 13 days after the HCQ prescription was resumed, the index dropped to 3% and this was again a significant effect.


                For those who have forgotten statistics, a p-value of 0.05 or less indicates statistical significance. If the graph is not convincing, a confidence interval of 99% in a statistical analysis based on full population data should be.

                Between this information and a study published by researchers in India, it is time for the media to do a mea culpa. Their hysteria convinced politicians in the United States to ban or restrict the drug. As Dr. David Samadi said on The Larry O’Connor Show, the decision to use this treatment needs to be left between a doctor and a patient. He has been disturbed by the interference by the government into the doctor-patient relationship.

                Dr. Samadi re-emphasized the use of hydroxychloroquine cocktail is effective in early COVID-19 according to clinical experience and multiple studies. The FDA and NIH need to tell governors and other officials who have banned its use to lift their bans ASAP and tell pharmacists to stop questioning doctors who prescribe it.

                It is far preferable to keep people out of the hospital using an old, inexpensive, and demonstrably safe and effective medication combination. There is no reason other than profit to wait until patients are hospitalized to get a new medication IV. If the media or the public health agencies cared about public health, this would be broadcast loudly and often. It is becoming increasingly clear they care more about politics.

                Be kinder than necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

                Comment


                • Re: Hydroxychloroquine WORKS

                  The Key to Defeating COVID-19 Already Exists. We Need to Start Using It | Opinion

                  Harvey A. Risch, MD, PhD , Professor of Epidemiology, Yale School of Public Health




                  As professor of epidemiology at Yale School of Public Health, I have authored over 300 peer-reviewed publications and currently hold senior positions on the editorial boards of several leading journals. I am usually accustomed to advocating for positions within the mainstream of medicine, so have been flummoxed to find that, in the midst of a crisis, I am fighting for a treatment that the data fully support but which, for reasons having nothing to do with a correct understanding of the science, has been pushed to the sidelines. As a result, tens of thousands of patients with COVID-19 are dying unnecessarily. Fortunately, the situation can be reversed easily and quickly.

                  I am referring, of course, to the medication hydroxychloroquine. When this inexpensive oral medication is given very early in the course of illness, before the virus has had time to multiply beyond control, it has shown to be highly effective, especially when given in combination with the antibiotics azithromycin or doxycycline and the nutritional supplement zinc.

                  On May 27, I published an article in the American Journal of Epidemiology (AJE) entitled, "Early Outpatient Treatment of Symptomatic, High-Risk COVID-19 Patients that Should be Ramped-Up Immediately as Key to the Pandemic Crisis." That article, published in the world's leading epidemiology journal, analyzed five studies, demonstrating clear-cut and significant benefits to treated patients, plus other very large studies that showed the medication safety.

                  Physicians who have been using these medications in the face of widespread skepticism have been truly heroic. They have done what the science shows is best for their patients, often at great personal risk. I myself know of two doctors who have saved the lives of hundreds of patients with these medications, but are now fighting state medical boards to save their licenses and reputations. The cases against them are completely without scientific merit.

                  Since publication of my May 27 article, seven more studies have demonstrated similar benefit. In a lengthy follow-up letter, also published by AJE, I discuss these seven studies and renew my call for the immediate early use of hydroxychloroquine in high-risk patients. These seven studies include: an additional 400 high-risk patients treated by Dr. Vladimir Zelenko, with zero deaths; four studies totaling almost 500 high-risk patients treated in nursing homes and clinics across the U.S., with no deaths; a controlled trial of more than 700 high-risk patients in Brazil, with significantly reduced risk of hospitalization and two deaths among 334 patients treated with hydroxychloroquine; and another study of 398 matched patients in France, also with significantly reduced hospitalization risk. Since my letter was published, even more doctors have reported to me their completely successful use.

                  My original article in the AJE is available free online, and I encourage readers—especially physicians, nurses, physician assistants and associates, and respiratory therapists—to search the title and read it. My follow-up letter is linked there to the original paper.

                  Beyond these studies of individual patients, we have seen what happens in large populations when these drugs are used. These have been "natural experiments." In the northern Brazil state of Pará, COVID-19 deaths were increasing exponentially. On April 6, the public hospital network purchased 75,000 doses of azithromycin and 90,000 doses of hydroxychloroquine. Over the next few weeks, authorities began distributing these medications to infected individuals. Even though new cases continued to occur, on May 22 the death rate started to plummet and is now about one-eighth what it was at the peak.

                  A reverse natural experiment happened in Switzerland. On May 27, the Swiss national government banned outpatient use of hydroxychloroquine for COVID-19. Around June 10, COVID-19 deaths increased four-fold and remained elevated. On June 11, the Swiss government revoked the ban, and on June 23 the death rate reverted to what it had been beforehand. People who die from COVID-19 live about three to five weeks from the start of symptoms, which makes the evidence of a causal relation in these experiments strong. Both episodes suggest that a combination of hydroxychloroquine and its companion medications reduces mortality and should be immediately adopted as the new standard of care in high-risk patients.

                  Why has hydroxychloroquine been disregarded?

                  First, as all know, the medication has become highly politicized. For many, it is viewed as a marker of political identity, on both sides of the political spectrum. Nobody needs me to remind them that this is not how medicine should proceed. We must judge this medication strictly on the science. When doctors graduate from medical school, they formally promise to make the health and life of the patient their first consideration, without biases of race, religion, nationality, social standing—or political affiliation. Lives must come first.

                  Second, the drug has not been used properly in many studies. Hydroxychloroquine has shown major success when used early in high-risk people but, as one would expect for an antiviral, much less success when used late in the disease course. Even so, it has demonstrated significant benefit in large hospital studies in Michigan and New York City when started within the first 24 to 48 hours after admission.

                  In fact, as inexpensive, oral and widely available medications, and a nutritional supplement, the combination of hydroxychloroquine, azithromycin or doxycycline, and zinc are well-suited for early treatment in the outpatient setting. The combination should be prescribed in high-risk patients immediately upon clinical suspicion of COVID-19 disease, without waiting for results of testing. Delays in waiting before starting the medications can reduce their efficacy.

                  Third, concerns have been raised by the FDA and others about risks of cardiac arrhythmia, especially when hydroxychloroquine is given in combination with azithromycin. The FDA based its comments on data in its FDA Adverse Event Reporting System. This reporting system captured up to a thousand cases of arrhythmias attributed to hydroxychloroquine use. In fact, the number is likely higher than that, since the reporting system, which requires physicians or patients to initiate contact with the FDA, appreciably undercounts drug side effects.

                  But what the FDA did not announce is that these adverse events were generated from tens of millions of patient uses of hydroxychloroquine for long periods of time, often for the chronic treatment of lupus or rheumatoid arthritis. Even if the true rates of arrhythmia are ten-fold higher than those reported, the harms would be minuscule compared to the mortality occurring right now in inadequately treated high-risk COVID-19 patients. This fact is proven by an Oxford University study of more than 320,000 older patients taking both hydroxychloroquine and azithromycin, who had arrhythmia excess death rates of less than 9/100,000 users, as I discuss in my May 27 paper cited above. A new paper in the American Journal of Medicine by established cardiologists around the world fully agrees with this.

                  In the future, I believe this misbegotten episode regarding hydroxychloroquine will be studied by sociologists of medicine as a classic example of how extra-scientific factors overrode clear-cut medical evidence. But for now, reality demands a clear, scientific eye on the evidence and where it points. For the sake of high-risk patients, for the sake of our parents and grandparents, for the sake of the unemployed, for our economy and for our polity, especially those disproportionally affected, we must start treating immediately.

                  Harvey A. Risch, MD, PhD, is professor of epidemiology at Yale School of Public Health.
                  The views expressd in this article are the writer's own.



                  Be kinder than necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

                  Comment


                  • New Zealand Now Forcing Citizens into Concentration Camps

                    New Zealand has now made it MANDATORY for all positive cases to go into quarantine facilities under military guard. Not only the person who tests positive, but members of their household as well. They. Have. No. Choice.

                    They can call it a "quarantine facility in a hotel" if they like, but if you can't leave then it's nothing but a concentration camp. Are prisoners allowed to bring their pets with them to these concentration camps? If not, what pet owner in their right mind would go to get tested, if it could result in their beloved pets being left abandoned to die?

                    If this policy spreads over here, millions of people, if they feel sick, will refuse to get tested rather than risk being interred in a concentration camp, whether they have pets to worry about or not. Unless they're among the millions of newly unemployed and homeless. A lot of them might be desperate enough to catch it on purpose just to have a roof over their head for a few weeks.

                    https://jordanschachtel.substack.com...rcing-citizens

                    A new mandatory quarantine policy went into effect last week, but it went largely ignored by the press. The country’s health director announced last Thursday that all cases of COVID would be “managed in a quarantine facility.”

                    “This will apply to any cases and also close family members who might be at risk as appropriate,” he added, without adding many more details to the open-ended drastic edict.

                    Initially, the quarantine policy only applied to new arrivals coming into the country. It remains unknown if anyone has attempted to disobey the new forced quarantine policy. Today, any Kiwi that tests positive is immediately isolated and sent to hotels-turned-quarantine centers. Individuals are quarantined in separate rooms and are not allowed to leave the grounds of the facility or even leave their rooms without permission.

                    ...

                    A late June video has surfaced of New Zealand Prime Minister Jacina Ardern discussing what happens in the mandatory quarantine facilities, which again, were initially only for inbound travelers, but are now being used for the entire population inside of New Zealand as well.
                    https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=27...9egDk81LriBhH5

                    Here are some of the relevant comments from her Facebook Live Q&A:

                    On what happens if someone refuses testing:
                    “What do we do if someone refuses to be tested? Well they can’t now. If someone refuses in our facilities to be tested, they have to keep staying, so they won’t be able to leave after 14 days. They have to stay on for another 14 days. So it’s a pretty good incentive. You either get your test done and make sure you’re cleared, or we will keep you in a facility longer, so I think most people will look at that and say, ‘I’ll take the test.’”

                    On the dramatic measures uniquely undertaken by New Zealand:
                    “There are countries that are requiring self-isolation. We have taken it a step further.”

                    On monitoring individuals in the facilities:
                    “If anyone moves into a common area or is getting some fresh air, which is all monitored, no one can do it on their own. They can only leave… or, um, be in a space to get a little bit of fresh air if they are supervised, because of course it’s a quarantine facility.”

                    ….

                    In addition to adding the general population to the quarantine facilities, the government has taken several other drastic steps in dealing with a virus with a 99.8% recovery rate. Elections have been postponed, and their biggest city in Auckland has been pushed into an indefinite lockdown.
                    There is no coming back from this, I'm afraid.

                    Be kinder than necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

                    Comment


                    • Re: New Zealand Now Forcing Citizens into Concentration Camps

                      what you describe, shiny, is comparable to an isolation ward, for people who have an extremely contagious disease. and i don't think a "concentration camp" normally restricts its residence to 14 days. arrangements can be made for others to care for pets for 2 weeks.

                      Comment


                      • Re: New Zealand Now Forcing Citizens into Concentration Camps

                        Comment


                        • Re: New Zealand Now Forcing Citizens into Concentration Camps

                          https://www.zerohedge.com/political/...eight-pandemic

                          Comment


                          • Re: New Zealand Now Forcing Citizens into Concentration Camps

                            Originally posted by jk View Post
                            what you describe, shiny, is comparable to an isolation ward, for people who have an extremely contagious disease. and i don't think a "concentration camp" normally restricts its residence to 14 days. arrangements can be made for others to care for pets for 2 weeks.
                            I can't find anyone I'd trust with a housekey who's willing and able to care for my pets in my absence (trust me, I've tried). And I'm far from alone in being alone. There are millions of boomers like me who have no family and no close relationships nearby.

                            As an aside, I find it both amusing and sad that so many people are feeling suicidal after a few months of social isolation. They've discovered that social media just doesn't cut it. They realized that they actually need physical contact, warmth, hugs. It's a good life lesson if they have the wits to learn it. Maybe when this is all over (if it's ever over) all these people who have suffered depression and anxiety under short-term isolation will extend themselves and befriend old or sick people who have lived in isolation like this for years.

                            As another aside, I'm also finding the stories about Covid-19 "long haulers" of particular galling amusement. They've been sick with a post-viral illness for what, a few months? Millions of people with ME/CFS (a post-viral syndrome) have been crippled with the same symptoms and worse for decades. Unable to work, unable to get treatment, unable to qualify for disability, living lives of "quiet desperation." I'm cynically curious to see how these new "long haulers" are going to be treated, compared to the real long-haulers.

                            As for having others come over to a "sick house" to care for pets, who would? The propaganda machine has pulled out all the stops to scare people sh!tless about this virus. How else do you get people to accept such infringements on their God-given rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? What do you say after you've been swept away to that benign "isolation ward"?

                            "Hi, Mary. I've been quarantined for testing positive for a HORRIBLE SUPER DEADLY SUPER CONTAGIOUS DISEASE. My healthy family's been taken away, too. I know you're terrified of catching it and the germs are all over my house just waiting to infect you, but would you be a dear, put on a hazmat suit and stop over to feed my cats and clean their litterboxes for the next two weeks? It'll mean risking a fine and arrest for breaking the citywide lockdown, but do it for me, will you?"

                            The aftermath of 9/11 showed me that most people in the world today are so gutless and frightened of death that they will excuse any indignity imposed upon them by "authorities" just to feel safe. But it doesn't make you safe. The cure becomes worse than the disease. Giving up your liberty without a fight invites totalitarianism, and totalitarianism makes government far more dangerous than any of the dangers they're purportedly protected you from.

                            Be kinder than necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

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                            • Re: New Zealand Now Forcing Citizens into Concentration Camps

                              Originally posted by Mega View Post
                              This needs to be seen by everyone. Thanks, Mike.

                              Be kinder than necessary because everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.

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                              • Re: New Zealand Now Forcing Citizens into Concentration Camps

                                Walking Bella today & reflected on the fact that am doing so little mileage that i could drive a V8 Mustang & still use less fuel than i was when i had to go into the office everday!

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