Ivermectin, an antiparasitic drug that was discovered in 1975 to treat and prevent heartworm, has long been advocated against by health authorities in the U.S. as a treatment for COVID despite its positive effects on patients suffering from the disease. It has been shown to inhibit COVID replication in vitro and because of this, the Frontline COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance (FLCCC) has been campaigning for its widespread use as a treatment for COVID.
In fact, in January, Japanese researchers found that ivermectin had shown an "antiviral effect" against COVID's omicron variant and other coronavirus variants, Reuters reported. The research was carried out by Japanese trading and pharmaceuticals company Kowa Co Ltd. and Tokyo's Kitasato University, which together tested out ivermectin's efficacy in combating COVID.
More recently, Dr. Tess Lawrie, a medical doctor and Ph.D. researcher who has done a lot of work in South Africa about the use of ivermectin for COVID reported on the benefits of ivermectin on COVID patients. Dr. Lawrie, the director of the U.K. based Evidence-Based Medicine Consultancy Ltd., helped organize the British Ivermectin Recommendation Development (BIRD) panel and the International Ivermectin for COVID Conference, which took place on April 24, 2021.
According to The Epoch Times, Dr. Lawrie's meta-analysis on ivermectin that was published on February 8, 2021 showed that there was a 68% reduction in deaths among COVID patients who were treated with ivermectin. In her analysis, she studied 13 studies in which there was an "underestimation of the beneficial effect," because researchers included a study in which the control arm was given Hydroxychloroquine, another alternative COVID active treatment that has been shown to have positive benefits on COVID patients.
Dr. Lawrie also added two new randomized controlled trials to her February analysis, which featured data on mortality. The updated analysis by Dr. Lawrie was then published on March 31, 2021. This newer analysis showed that there was a 62% reduction in deaths among COVID patients. But when four studies with "high risk of bias" was not included in the sensitivity analysis, there was a 72% reduction in deaths among COVID patients. Such sensitivity analyses are performed to check and verify results.
Meanwhile, a scientific review conducted by Liverpool University's Dr. Andrew Hill, which was funded by the World Health Organization (WHO) and global health initiative Unitaid and was published on January 18, 2021 showed that ivermectin reduced COVID deaths by up to 75% and increased viral clearance. This was the result of six randomized, controlled trials with up to 1,255 patients.
"The data shows the ability of the drug Ivermectin to prevent COVID-19, to keep those with early symptoms from progressing to the hyper-inflammatory phase of the disease, and even to help critically ill patients recover,' FLCCC president Dr. Pierre Kory argued during the National Institutes of Health COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines Panel held on January 6, 2021.
Dr. Kory, who is also the former professor of medicine at St. Luke's Aurora Medical Center in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, argued that "data from 18 randomized controlled trials that included over 2,100 patients ... demonstrated that Ivermectin produces faster viral clearance, faster time to hospital discharge, faster time to clinical recovery, and a 75% reduction in mortality rates."
