I was going to try to write something really preposterous today to celebrate April Fools Day, but I just can’t come up with anything more incredible than current government policy.
April 1st
Published
Tidewater News and Opinion Forum
A place for civil discussion of the events of the day for Tidewater residents without the limitations imposed by media forums.
Tidewater News and Opinion Forum 
I am sorry to say, but that 2012 piece is too close to what you actually believe to be readily identifiable as an April 1 joke. I suppose it was, but I am not at all sure.
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I know when I’m serious and when I’m not, but part of writing satire is that you don’t.
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Well, by that measure it is excellent satire – if it is satire.
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RE: “I just can’t come up with anything more incredible than current government policy.”
Your options ran out when Bambi came out as a queer.
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Wasn’t “Bambi” a secret paramour of the past president. She was paid peanuts from the campaign rally funds. Now you are saying she was gay?
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Most preposterous thing I’ve seen is turning to NPR for medical advice. That’s either satire or comedy, whichever you like. (Dr. Risch at Yale aggressively endorsed ivermectin, as did Dr. Zelenko and Dr. Gold.)
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Note that they did so as an element of the MASK protocols, not as stand alone.
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You have quite an imagination when it comes to imagining things so you won’t have to admit you were dead wrong. Now you are obviously imagining a miraculous but unknown synergy between worm poison and the rest of the MASK ingredients. So much better than simply admitting the FDA was right and you were wrong.
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First, remember that at the time the FDA offered no alternative. Now, there are better choices.
But do tell me, how effective is your automobile’s transmission at getting you to the grocery store. by itself? Can your car get you there without it?
The MASK protocols evolved over time, but they were sequenced to counter the phases of the disease. First there is the viral replication stage and then the inflammation stage, with a micro-coagulation stage overlapping those.
In the viral replication stage, ANYTHING that slows the virus has a benefit, but that benefit doesn’t manifest until the inflammation stage.
In that first stage, Ivermectin, Zinc, Vitamins D anc C and Quecertin were there to slow the virus. Fluvoxamine also has antiviral properties but is most useful in the inflammation stage. The more the viral replication is slowed while the body ramps up antibodies, the less severe the inflammation stage will be.
It almost seems that the various studies were designed to seek failure, as none of the double blind studies actually used the MASK protocol in the way it was intended.
There are better choices now, but prior to the vaccines and the monoclonal antibodies even a small benefit makes a difference,
Almost 400,000 people died in the US before the vaccines were available. reducing that by 2% is 8000 lives.
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What you are actually saying is that there is no real scientific evidence for the MASK protocol but being part of the MASK protocol means that this study is invalid because, you know, worm poison is like my automobile transmission? So in this analogy the transmission is the unproven, unknown imaginary synergy?
You can tapdance all night long but this study shows that Ivermectin has no anti-viral properties that can reduce Covid infection.
Your 8,000 lives saved is a joke. But, like I said you would rather imagine things than just admit the FDA was absolutely correct to recommend against these worm pills and the courts were absolutely wrong to compel doctors to go against the best available medical science.
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It shows no such thing.
The study shows a very small benefit that is not statistically significant. It could be that the difference in outcome is non-existent, but it could also be twice as large.
But again, you don’t ride your transmission to the grocery. It is part of a whole car that gets you there.
That you cannot see that Ivermectin was a part of a whole is characteristic of you. You are moderately good at looking up isolated facts on the internet, but you have utterly no understanding of how the natural world works.
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“It could also be twice as large?”
Why stop at “twice.”
Why not ten times a large?
The study found no benefit. Period. Neither has any other rigorous study.
“You are moderately good at looking up isolated facts on the internet, but you have utterly no understanding of how the natural world works.”
More desperation. You always turn to this kind of baloney (“Paul the Great,” “Pope Paul”) when you are backed into a corner because you will not give up on nonsense. But I digress.
In spite of my lack of understanding, I do understand that claims of efficacy in medicine have to withstand serious testing. Ivermectin has repeated failed such testing and the so-called MASK protocol with its magical but mysterious synergies has not been tested at all. According to you. But still you are sure that it works. And would have saved 8,000 lives. Riiiight.
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at least you now concede the lack of understanding.
This study showed a 2% difference, but statistically it could be 0% or 4% but so what? That would only be the results from Ivermectin or no ivermectin.
That’s not how it is supposed to be used.
What good are results from using a medication wrongly?
Again, you can’t go to the grocery on your transmission, nor can you go in your car without the transmission. I+MASK was a great deal better than what the FDA approved at the time, which was nothing until you were seriously ill.
But it was only good as a whole, testing the components in isolation doesn’t tell you anything.
A thousand studies testing components of the whole separately tell you nothing about the whole.
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Well Bruce, you betray the depth of your analysis with that attack on NPR. Here is the first sentence of the NPR report. Try really, really hard and see if you can understand it. . .
“The anti-parasitic ivermectin doesn’t reduce the risk of hospitalization from COVID-19, according to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine.”
Get it now? NPR was not providing “medical advice.” They were reporting the news that a significant study on Ivermectin as a Covid treatment has been published in the New England Journal of Medicine. The large double-blind study found no benefit of ingesting this worm poison. None at all. Take ivermectin or sugar pills – the effect is the same except sugar pills won’t poison you.
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RE: “The large double-blind study found no benefit of ingesting this worm poison. None at all.”
Not correct.The study actually found no significant reduction in hospitalizations using the study’s administration protocol. That’s a far cry from “no benefit…None at all.”
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“Not correct”
Uh, they FOUND no benefit at all. If you are imagining some benefit not measured by staying out of the hospital, THEY DIDN’T FIND IT.
You people defending horse worm poison and trying to spin away a careful, large scale double-blind trial is beyond laughable. But it does illustrate the brain rot that constantly having to lie, distort and ignore evidence that being a Trump follower induces. IMHO.
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If you got COVID before the vaccines would you want something that prevented hospitalization or something that prevented you from DYING in the hospital?
That is a very different thing.
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“That is a very different thing.”
Deeper and deeper you dig.
So, Ivermectin does not reduce hospitalizations but it does reduce death? So those with the placebo who were hospitalized were more likely to die in the hospital than those in the hospital who had been treated with Ivermectin. Amazing. But, you will have to cite where the study found that because I did not see it.
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Again, the MASK protocol, when followed on full, has shown reduced mortality, in the time period before other therapies edged it out.
A study that does not include using the medication as recommended doesn’t tell you anything about using it as recommended, and that is in the context of the MASK protocol at the time.
COVID is a complex disease, and it has phases that require different, sequenced interventions. Picking one modality and testing it in isolation is as foolish as you saddling up your transmission and going out for a loaf of bread.
That you don’t get that proves my observation. You have facts but no understanding.
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“Again, the MASK protocol, when followed on full, has shown reduced mortality,”
No, it has not. Not in any kind of scientifically rigorous study.
I find it ironic and laughable that you can get egg all over your face defending what is almost literally snake oil and accuse me of no understanding of the natural world.
Yes, I know how to use Google and I use it before stating things as facts. You should try it.
Here is the history of the origins of this treatment. It is an extension of another unproven therapy the so-called “Marik cocktail” that was a failed treatment for sepsis. Basically, vitamins and steroids. In October 2020, Ivermectin was added as a “core medication” in the protocol – it is the engine, not the transmission to use your analogy.
https://tinyurl.com/3ert36n6
Mentioned and linked to in the story above is a compilation of studies that have sought benefit from this drug. Here is that compilation report. . .
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8406455/
The findings of multiple studies – no identifiable benefit. More recent studies such as the one we started with have not changed the picture. Just made it more clear – this stuff does not work.
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Both of your links are from after the vaccines and monoclonal antibodies were available.
I have repeatedly written that the MASK protocols have been overtaken by time, and indeed the current versions have changed.
Your second link is a review of literature, not new research, and none of the selected studies was of the MASK protocol, all were ivermectin in isolation.
The first link tips the hand of the researchers and the CDC’s relentless campaign against treatments including Ivermectin. They feared that if people believed there was an effective treatment option they would decline vaccination,
The obsession with vaccination led to antipathy toward any alternative.
I am a big believer in vaccination, but I would not choose to let people who declined vaccines die when there was a treatment regimen that increased their chances of survival.
But the CDC and FDA are about control, not ethical treatment.
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“But the CDC and FDA are about control, not ethical treatment.”
Yadda, yadda, yadda. That does not change the fact that your whole argument and damning of the government is based on a fact nowhere in evidence. NOWHERE. The stuff (ivermectin whether alone or combined with vitamins and steroids) does not work. It has NEVER been able to demonstrate any measurable benefit in ANY rigorous study. Your constantly repeating that it does work when it does not only confirms that you are unwilling to let scientific evidence upset your preferred beliefs.
You think it is a bad thing for the government to tell the truth about the state of the science on treatments which is all they have ever done. I disagree. It was the exaggerated hyping of unproven treatments by clowns like Rand Paul, Tucker Carlson. Alex Jones, Donald Trump, and Joe Rogan that kept people from getting vaccinated. THAT is what was unethical in this story. The government did its best to push back based on science, but it is hard to get through to people who have a cult mentality.
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The “brain rot” is all yours. You seem to think a single study is definitive. It isn’t.
You keep referring to “horse worm poison,” but Ivermectin is available in human-usable form, which the study presumably administered. The only person guilty of spin is you.
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There was very limited difference between those who too Ivermectin and those who received the placebo.
Funny how “gold standard”studies that don’t comport to you or Don’s notions aren’t really all that good, but when there are international reports that Novovax is a good treatment, Don bitches and moans about the FDA not approving it quickly enough. Because there are international studies showing that Ivermectic is NOT an approved treatment.
I called it shortly after Paul posted this story. I have been proven 100% right in what I predicted.
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Have you asked yourself why the FDA is slow walking Novovax as a booster?
It has certainly established safety.
It is not as effective as a primary vaccine as the mRNAs but used as a booster, it is effective against a difference antigen spectrum than the mRNAs. That makes it more effective against variants because different areas on the spike protein are covered, as well as the ACE receptor.
But in any case, if it is known safe, and my doctor an I agree that missing the vaccines as a booster is a better option, why is the FDA telling me I can only have the same mRNA vaccine I already had?
What possible public good comes from blocking accessto a safe vaccine?
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Your double standard is noted with the same disgust noted even before you decided because the FDA doesn’t follow YOUR advice, they are somehow corrupt or evil in some way.
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The FDA is not neutral. It controls the decisions I make with my doctor.
That implies they have a superior claim on my life than I do and I reject that entirely.
If they want to advise me and my doctor, fine, but they are wrong to deny my right to make my own health care choices so long as those choices harm no one else.
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“The FDA is not neutral.”
Compared to what? caution is not a bad thing when it comes to certain things. THey never do things fast enough for you. THen when they do make a recommendation or a decision that you disagree with, they need to take more time?
Silly hypocrisy, as usual.
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OK. when a drug is known to be safe, what is the justification for the FDA overruling my decision, after consulting with my doctor, to use it?
Keep in mind that over 100,000 people died between the time Paxlovid was proven safe and the time the FDA allowed it into the marketplace.
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Overall safety protocols may be inconvenient, but they just haven’t approved the drug fast enough for your liking.
THey are the professionals. You won’t go to an auto mechanic for a heart murmur. I want all of the information verified before using something that may or may not be safe.
And don’t give me that crap about international proof. You poo-pooed it when it didn’t meet your standards.
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First, when they are available, I read the original research. A great deal of it does not rise to high school term paper standards.
My doctor is a professional and I can consult her in making my decisions, However I do not want people with another agenda making that choice.
The FDA and CDC have deemphasized therapeutics in their zeal to leave no alternatives to vaccination.
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“The FDA and CDC have deemphasized therapeutics in their zeal to leave no alternatives to vaccination.”
Proof? Or just the usual anti-governmental agency rhetoric?
And your own personal speculation is NOT proof.
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Did you not read the article on Ivermectin? Their concern was not that it might harm anybody but that people might see it as an alternative to vaccination.
That has been consistent.
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“Did you not read the article on Ivermectin? Their concern was not that it might harm anybody but that people might see it as an alternative to vaccination.”
Can you NEVER get your facts straight? Always some twist on truth?
That was a concern expressed by an academic, not by the CDC or FDA. It is a legitimate concern. People who avoid or delay vaccines or treatments based on belief in snake oil are risky their lives.
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“but they are wrong to deny my right to make my own health care choices so long as those choices harm no one else.”
No, they are not wrong. They are doing the work that we have given them. We have decided that we want medicines to be safe and effective. Why? Because the “market” is full of people who will peddle medicines that are neither if they could. So sad that you feel put upon because they do not have the ability to act instantly whenever you see a bright shiny object that you want right now. But that’s the way it is.
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Had you read your own link, you would have seen that the reason for blocking the use of the MASK protocol was to deny people an alternative to vaccination for fear that if they thought there was a perceived effective alternative more would choose not to vaccinate.
Even were the treatment only marginally effective, blocking it was a matter of coercion, not safety.
And remember that at the time, there were no alternative treatments
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“Had you read your own link, you would have seen that the reason for blocking the use of the MASK protocol was to deny people an alternative to vaccination for fear that if they thought there was a perceived effective alternative more would choose not to vaccinate.”
You are really something. You accuse me of not reading the link and then you characterize what it says in a dishonest way. I read it. And I have not LIED about what it says.
Neither the CDC nor the FDA offered any such reason. One of the promoters of ivermectin tweeted a conspiracy theory along those lines and one Columbia University expert interviewed expressed the fear that people putting faith in a treatment that does not work would avoid vaccination or delay getting real treatments. That is a very rational fear. These clowns are literally killing people promoting bogus cures.
The reason for recommending against ivermectin is simple. It does not work. There is no sinister plot. Nor any “corruption” As the article points out other novel treatments that have demonstrated benefits have received the green light.
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“The FDA and CDC have deemphasized therapeutics in their zeal to leave no alternatives to vaccination.”
Uh, how does this explain that a new VACCINE is taking a few weeks to get an EUA? If your charge is accurate, then they would speed it along. Even though the emergency is over vaccine-wise.
Of course, your charge is not accurate. FDA blesses things for which they have evidence that they are safe and effective. That is their job. Therapeutics that do not work do not get their blessing. That is a good thing. In doing this work they have withheld endorsement of ingesting bleach or taking worm pills. They have endorsed new treatments that demonstrate benefits.
Finally, they do their work in the real world where prevention is inherently preferable to treatment. Especially when prevention is proven, and many proposed treatments are not.
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Congress authorized the FDA to determine safety and to a limited extent, efficacy for intended purpose, but off label use was left to physicians. The power to determine appropriateness is entirely an administrative overreach based on obscure language in Obamacare.
the fact it that we could have started vaccinating 5 months sooner and Paxlovid was delayed at least 4 months. The ramp up time starts when use can be anticipated.
Hundreds of thousands of Americans died due to the FDA’s risk aversion.
If I wanted to take the chance on Moderna’s vaccine in Sept 2020 that should have been my choice.
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“the fact it that we could have started vaccinating 5 months sooner”
No, we could not.
This is typical of your bullshit. With what? Five months sooner would have been mid-summer 2020 and the vaccines were just then beginng trials with manufacturing and distribution not even begun.
Paxlovid’s success based on early analysis of Phase 1 tests was announced by Pfizer in November 2021. It got an EUA the next month. The availability was and is limited by supply – not by approvals.
Off-label prescription of drugs is legal if your doctor wants to do it. One out of Five prescriptions are off-label.
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Really?
You think your doctor could have given you an off-label Rx for HCQ or Ivermectin?
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The safety and antibody response of the Moderna vaccine was established in July 2020. Efficacy trials(which were unnecessary, we could have just let willing patients try them)were done by October 2020.
The vaccines should have been available in July 2020 to willing patients. Supply depends on when the manufacturer thinks he will be able to deliver.
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“The vaccines should have been available in July 2020 to willing patients”
Vaccines that did not exist. And a formulation that had JUST been tested for safety but not efficacy.
Is magical thinking still a requirement now that Trump is out of office? There seems to be a lot of magic involved in your speculation of what might have been.
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“You think your doctor could have given you an off-label Rx for HCQ or Ivermectin?”
Funny question since the prescriptions for these off-label drugs went through the roof. Ivermectin went from 3,600 to 88,000 per week. And supplies of HCQ for on-label use were gone.
The answer is obviously – Yes.
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…”turning to NPR for medical advice. ”
Right. Joe Rogan is a MUCH better source for medical advice. At least NPR TALKS to actual doctors. Rogan makes shit up for ratings.
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Rogan’s experience is not of value for guidance as he mixed two antiviral approaches. ivermectin and monoclonal antibodies, and we don’t know the timing employed.
The monoclonal antibodies are certainly superior to Ivermectin, but half a million people died with no treatment options before they came along.
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“Rogan’s experience is not of value “…
Kind of my point. Yet, a lot of people followed Rogan’s advice over that of medical doctors and infectious disease experts. Experts that news organizations like NPR interviewed.
My point was about Bruce’s unwarranted and idiotic attack on NPR.
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