To the Editor:
To cavalierly repeat the urban myth that "ivermectin is horse paste" to disparage its very successful therapeutic history with humans is disgraceful. That is lazy journalism: to blindly accept clichés from the media echo chamber as truth and then repeat them unchallenged.
You should have noted that over 3.7 billion human doses have been administered since it was approved for humans in 1987. And "horse paste" is the pejorative you use? Really? Note the conclusion in an NIH report.
In the current international emergency of COVID-19, with mutant viral strains, vaccination refusals and potentially waning immunities over months presenting new challenges, IVM can be an effective component of the mix of therapeutics deployed against this pandemic.
A simple web search would have enabled adding some truthful perspective its therapeutic value to humans. For example, this posting from the Japanese Academy of Science says "This paper looks in depth at the events surrounding ivermectin’s passage from being a huge success in Animal Health into its widespread use in humans, a development which has led many to describe it as a “wonder” drug."
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The inventors of ivermectin received a Nobel prize in 2015. Note specifically this sentence from a paper: "In 2015, the Nobel Committee for Physiology or Medicine, in its only award for treatments of infectious diseases since six decades prior, honoured the discovery of ivermectin (IVM), a multifaceted drug deployed against some of the world's most devastating tropical diseases."
Ivermectin has been effectively administered to COVID-infected patients worldwide, one study says.
During mass IVM treatments in Peru, excess deaths fell by a mean of 74% over 30 days in its ten states with the most extensive treatments.
You pay homage to the FDA in your hit-piece. Big Pharma funds HALF of its budget. Since federal law states that no vaccine can be developed and administered in the US if there exist therapeutic drugs that effectively treat the disease, can you point out the conflict of interest that the FDA has in determining that "ivermectin shouldn't be part of the COVID treatment protocol?"
