The Data that Matters - South Korea - Chloroquine -China take 2

originally posted by: SoulReaper

originally posted by: soulwaxer
a reply to: SoulReaper

You are ignoring a very big factor: The number of dead caused by the extreme measures being taken.

How high would that number have to be for you to want easing of those measures?

Isolation and economic uncertainty can and does lead to suicide. Many of these people would otherwise remain perfectly healthy. A large number of people dying from Corona already have a relatively low quality of life, due to existing medical issues.

I am not advocating for complete lock down or complete social isolation. Rather social distancing whenever possible and smart mitigation measures that allow the economy to continue while at the same time doing everything we can to minimize community spread.

South Korea is not in complete lock-down. Those who are confirmed infected should isolate for a time, but when they are no longer infectious should be free to reenter society. Aggressive testing, targeted isolation, aggressive contact tracing, and real time information disseminated to the public are all mitigation actions that will help without causing undue stress.

It isn't all or nothing.

Are you suggesting that the unhindered virus is less dangerous then the mitigation measures?
If so, do you have projections that more then 1.5 million people would be dead as result of mitigation measures by the end of April?

Are you suggesting that we should do nothing to hinder community spread?

Soul

Thanks! I very much appreciate your response. You make some excellent points that add to my own take on all this.

I’m saying that we should make a clear distinction between the vulnerable population, and the younger, healthy population. We should do everything we can to protect the first group, while we let the rest continue their life and business as usual. In the meantime, extra resources should go towards the medical sector, so that enough equipment and staff is available to take care of the sick. A large part of this should go to finding a vaccine.

Sort of like in WW2 the US jacked up its steel industry to unimaginable levels because there was a common goal and the nation was united. That’s what should be done for the medical sector now.

The non risk group will get sick, then get better, mostly at home, and have antibodies, so there will be very few people left to infect the vulnerable once they are out of quarantine.

I’m generally advocating a more offensive strategy, without committing economical suicide.

soulwaxer

originally posted by: tanstaafl

originally posted by: SoulReaper
Do you have any studies which explain how Hydroxychloroquine is less toxic?

No, hence the (at least that is what I recall hearing) disclaimer...

I have seen people claim that elsewhere, but have yet to see any clinical study proving this claim. I would be very interested to read the study and see what mechanism is driving that claim.

As I understand it, Hydroxychloroquine is a synthetic that is nearly identical in structure to Chloroquine and shares ALL the same side effects.

In fact the more I look into Hydroxychloroquine, the less I like it.

...snip...

This thing interferes with both your innate and adaptive immune system responses. I still recommend avoiding this drug if at all possible.

Interesting... I don't pretend to understand all of the science... I wonder what it does to the other aspects of the immune system - the Interferon system, and especially the Microbiome.

I am not sure if Hydroxychloroquine impacts the Microbiome, though I would not be surprised if it did. I know digestive issues do manifest from Hydroxychloroquine therapy. I do know for certain that the Azithromyicin (antibiotic) that they are pairing it with will have a MASSIVE impact on the microbiome.

So you have a Virus which is able to dampen or interfere with almost every aspect of your immune system, operating in stealth mode to spread all over the body including into the CNS. Then when your immune system finally kicks in and starts fighting back. You are going to take two drugs together that will wreak your microbiome and handicap your immune system? No thanks.

Soul

originally posted by: chris_stibrany
Sorry if this has been asked then, but what is your opinion on both the French trials and the NY trials which showed immense success in combining both azithromyicin and hydroxychloroquine and zinc?



a reply to: SoulReaper

Here is the situation as I see it. Nobody dies from the Virus itself. The virus can only infect certain cells and although it does cause cell destruction. The immune system kicks in well before the Virus can cause anything close to lethal levels of cell death all on its own.

Everyone dies from the ensuing immune response. The immune system kills the body through Cytokine storm or prolonged and progressive inflammation leading to major organ failure. This process of Immune response manifests as Symptoms. You can have the virus and have no symptoms. Yet symptoms always are indicative of Immune response.

Now here is the tricky part. Doctors are taught to treat Symptoms with drugs. Now if they correctly diagnose what is causing the symptoms and pair that with just the right drug at just the right dose, then they are helping. However in a situation like this with no clinical data, they are just guessing.

The problem with this, is that many drugs are Immuno-suppressants. Thus you can use a drug that will suppress the immune system and thus simultaneously make your symptoms go away. Now this is fine if the drug is ALSO taking out the virus or bacteria or whatever is ailing you. If the Drug can replace the function of the immune system it is suppressing, you should be fine. Sometimes this is not the case and particularly with Viruses, often the immune system is the only thing that can successfully clear your system.

I suspect that the drug combo above is causing the symptoms to go away, but not necessarily clearing the virus. Yet, I have not had time to research and support that hypothesis. Perhaps the clinical studies have not been completed, nor the data released and this might be something we will just have to wait and find out.

So the Patients will feel drastically better in a short period of time, but they may not be cured. I suspect we will see many of them relapse once they get off the drug regimen and the immune suppression wears off. Symptoms will reemerge as the immune system kicks in. Then, if the viral load has been greatly increased in the meantime, this could lead to a rapid deterioration and potentially sudden death.

Soul

I’m generally advocating a more offensive strategy, without committing economical suicide.

soulwaxer

I'm in agreement with this. It just might be a little tricky to find that perfect balance of just the right amount of mitigation while allowing maximum economic freedom within that mitigation.

Soul

originally posted by: SoulReaper
I am not sure if Hydroxychloroquine impacts the Microbiome, though I would not be surprised if it did. I know digestive issues do manifest from Hydroxychloroquine therapy. I do know for certain that the Azithromyicin (antibiotic) that they are pairing it with will have a MASSIVE impact on the microbiome.

So you have a Virus which is able to dampen or interfere with almost every aspect of your immune system, operating in stealth mode to spread all over the body including into the CNS. Then when your immune system finally kicks in and starts fighting back. You are going to take two drugs together that will wreak your microbiome and handicap your immune system? No thanks.

Soul

Ok, so, I just was made aware of something that I totally missed, that explains a lot...

In the Very Good News thread that is discussing the study going on in Monroe NY by Dr Zelenko, you see his letter, where he specifically states:

"The rationale for my treatment plan is as follows. I combined the data available fro China and South Korea with the recent study published from France. We know that hydroxychloraquine helps Zinc enter the cell. We know that Zinc slows viral replication within the cell. Regarding the use of azithromycin, I postulate that it probably prevents secondary bacterial infections, but I am not sure. These three drugs are well known and usually well tolerated, hence the risk to the patient is low."

Text in his letter below, bottom of page 1 and top of page 2:



It is extremely important that anyone discussing this bring up this point - hammer it - until the talking heads discussing (hydroxy)chloraquine make this point very clear.

It is not the hydroxychloraquine that is producing the great results, it is the Zinc. The (hydroxy)chloraquine is only a facilitator, and the z-pack (azithromycin) is only to maybe help prevent secondary bacterial infections.

This is so typical of 'modern medicine' - do anything and everything to minimize/obfuscate/obliterate any mention of any natural (non-patentable so no money in it) substance to protect their Medical Mafia cash cow. It is just infuriating.

a reply to: tanstaafl

So I did a little digging and this is interesting. The ORIGINAL trial using the drug combo involved a group of 26 patients, with an additional 16 patients as a control group. They reported a high success rate, but what they did not widely report, is that 6 of the 26 patients taking the drug combo, didn't even make it to day six of the treatment to be reevaluated.

Drug combo study

The first thing that I would comment on is this. Remember I said at the beginning that there were 20 patients in the hydroxychloroquine group, and 16 patients who got standard of care. But, if you actually look at the methods in the study, you'll see that there were actually 26 patients who got hydroxychloroquine. For this analysis, remember, the primary thing was eradication at day 6. In order to be assessable, they still have to be analyzable at day 6. There were actually 6 patients in the hydroxychloroquine group that dropped out of the study because they were no longer assessable.

I think it's important for viewers to note that if you actually look in the methods, these 6 patients, there were 3 of them that were taken out of the study because they decompensated and went to the ICU. Every single one of those patients was still PCR positive. There was 1 patient that passed away, that was actually PCR negative, but passed away. There was 1 that went home who was actually PCR negative. Then 1 actually stopped due to nausea—a side effect from the hydroxychloroquine—who was still PCR positive as well. In my opinion—although I understand why the authors did what they did—at least 5 of these patients, I would consider failures. You have patients go into the ICU, you have a patient that passes away, you have someone who had to stop due to an adverse event.

In a study with only 42 people, if 6 drop out and 5 out of that six are total failures, you are looking at a 12% initial failure rate, yet 12% of people need hospitalization without this drug therapy. So the other 88 percent of patients who recovered, likely would have recovered anyways.

The clinical data still has not been released.

Soul

originally posted by: SoulReaper
a reply to: tanstaafl

So I did a little digging and this is interesting. The ORIGINAL trial using the drug combo involved a group of 26 patients, with an additional 16 patients as a control group. They reported a high success rate, but what they did not widely report, is that 6 of the 26 patients taking the drug combo, didn't even make it to day six of the treatment to be reevaluated.

Drug combo studySoul

Correction...

The above trial you linked is the French trial, just one reference that Dr. Zelenko used to design his own trial. Dr. Zelenko's 'trial' is not a formal controlled study - he is simply using his brain and designed a treatment protocol that he reasonsed would be low risk, and have good potential for working.

Extremely importantly - the above French study did not use Zinc in any form, and it is Zinc that is apparently what makes the magic happen.

According to this, as of 3/24 (that is 3 days ago), he has now treated 500 people and kept them out of the hospital.

And again - he claims (his words, not mine) 100% success rate.

a reply to: tanstaafl



Sorry I wasn't clear.. I was talking about the original trial. Not dr Z. Just to show the lack of impact the drugs had. Zinc may well be the critical piece, I'd like to see a way found to make it impactful without the drugs which harm the immune system.

Soul

a reply to: tanstaafl

Btw.. when I have time.. I'm going to look closer at the parameters that DR Z used. Will post here with analysis.

Soul

originally posted by: SoulReaper
a reply to: tanstaafl



Sorry I wasn't clear.. I was talking about the original trial. Not dr Z. Just to show the lack of impact the drugs had. Zinc may well be the critical piece, I'd like to see a way found to make it impactful without the drugs which harm the immune system.

Soul

Emphatically agree
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