# All of ndr's Comments + Replies

1JohnBuridan16dBecause 20 is nice sample size. The experiment, however, is now past its deadline.
Covid vaccine safety: how correct are these allegations?

See a reproduction of Lawrie's metastudy here.
Even without both of those constributions the result doesn't meaningfully change.

How do the ivermectin meta-reviews come to so different conclusions?

I have not managed to see Hariyanto et al reproduced yet (any help welcome), so I don't know what effect removing Elgazzar from it would have on that specific meta-study.

For Bryant et al though this is the result with both Elgazzar's in:

This is the result with both Elgazzar's out:

`RR` moved, but the result is fundamentally the same.
Do you think it would change the result for Hariyanto et al?

How do the ivermectin meta-reviews come to so different conclusions?

Update:
A recent preprint compares Roman et al and Bryant et al: Bayesian Meta Analysis of Ivermectin Effectiveness in Treating Covid-19 Disease

Summary:
The two studies find similar `RR` (risk reduction as $RR=\frac{risk_{ivermectin}}{risk_{control}}$)

Bryant found `RR = 0.38 [CI 95%: (0.19, 0.73)]`
Roman found `RR = 0.37 [CI 95%: (0.12, 1.13)]`

Roman et al should conclude there's not enough evidence because they can't rule out RR >= 1 at 95% confidence. Instead they conclude:

In comparison to SOC or placebo, IVM did not reduce all-cause mortality, length of stay or viral clearance in RCTs in COVID-19 pa

How would you run the statistics on whether Ivermectin helped India reduce COVID-19 cases?

India's situation is messy because of the different states policies.
To properly do this one would need to control for incidence and lockdown policy state-by-state. Also some states have no approval for Ivermectin yet it gets used.

My best bet is that we'll get the cleaner data on whether it works from Europe, in particular from Slovakia and Czechia.
Even if EMA advises against Ivermectin, Slovakia approved it for both prophylaxis and treatment in late January 2021.

I could not find how widespread the slovak usage of Ivermectin is, but there are few points:

4ChristianKl4mohttps://www.statista.com/statistics/1245971/number-delta-variant-worldwide-by-country/ [https://www.statista.com/statistics/1245971/number-delta-variant-worldwide-by-country/] has data as of two days ago and shows 6 cases of delta for Slovakia.
How do the ivermectin meta-reviews come to so different conclusions?

The Medina study received some methodological complains, see the JAMA letter.

Ivermectin proponents seem to consistently push for a regimen of:

• high dosage (0.2mg/kg once-a-week for prevention)
• early usage, ideally as prevention
• usage with/after meals

If they're right one can imagine studies that see no effects either because of low dosage, late administration or administering it on empty stomach (the anti-parasite regimen), which the Medina study does.

2Bucky4moThat’s super-helpful - thanks! One thing the negative meta-study noted was the variation in doses between studies (12 - 210mg).
How do the ivermectin meta-reviews come to so different conclusions?

Another meta-analysis (Bryant et al) has a very similar title but positive claims Ivermectin for Prevention and Treatment of COVID-19 Infection: A Systematic Review, Meta-analysis, and Trial Sequential Analysis to Inform Clinical Guidelines.

The authors have put out an official rebuttal of the negative meta-analysis which is an interesting read and point to many of their perceived flaws.

The comments on the preprint of the negative study (Roman et al) are also interesting.

For instance:

Hi, I'm Dr.Niaee and I was surprised that even basic data from our RCT i

2ndr3moUpdate: A recent preprint compares Roman et al and Bryant et al: Bayesian Meta Analysis of Ivermectin Effectiveness in Treating Covid-19 Disease [https://www.researchgate.net/publication/353195913_Bayesian_Meta_Analysis_of_Ivermectin_Effectiveness_in_Treating_Covid-19_Disease] Summary: The two studies find similar RR (risk reduction as ) Bryant found RR = 0.38 [CI 95%: (0.19, 0.73)] Roman found RR = 0.37 [CI 95%: (0.12, 1.13)] Roman et al should conclude there's not enough evidence because they can't rule out RR >= 1 at 95% confidence. Instead they conclude: Bryant and Roman use similar methods, the difference in the confidence interval is because they picked different studies. Bryant has different estimates for mild vs severe vs all cases. 0.38 is for all-cases to allow comparison with Roman batched all-cases together and has no breakdowns. This third Bayesian (meta-?)meta-analysis concludes:
Covid vaccine safety: how correct are these allegations?
1. seriously, what are the chances that all three vaccines are both dangerous and equally so?

Malone/Weinstein say they seem to have minor differences, at least in mechanism/effect. Their point being that if you get the S p circulating you're in trouble. All the three seem to produce that effect.

1. One must also consider the reaction of other experts [...] When experts in high places thought there was a risk of rare blood clots, they were often willing to halt [...]

Well done, this is a very well put and good point. I don't know what drove the craze on ... (read more)

Covid vaccine safety: how correct are these allegations?

There's also criticism of the Bryant and Lawrie paper.

What's an actual criticism of that paper from that article? That meta-studies are garbage-in-garbage-out? That's weak at best, the author seems to have spent no time in spot checking any of the papers included to check whether this actually happened.

The Japanese data is at the center of Byram Bridle's claims, which is systematically debunked ...

... by a nameless "Concerned Scientist". I don't want to play ranking authorities, but it's obvious someone is mad at Bridle enough to steal his name to p... (read more)

Covid vaccine safety: how correct are these allegations?

Thy disagree, but in which direction? The second chart seem to report numbers higher than the first chart but I'm not sure they are about the same data. What's your read? Can you put some links for the second graph source?

2DPiepgrass4moI constructed the second graph manually, by recording the number of results of 22 queries at OpenVAERS [https://www.openvaers.com/]. OpenVAERS (which I learned about through Steve K) says it provides the same data [https://vaers.hhs.gov/data.html] as the government.
Covid vaccine safety: how correct are these allegations?

Is the risk of female reproductive harm from the vaccines any worse than the risk from infection?

That is a brilliant question. Data from Israel and UK (both high vaccination rates) should reveal useful, but I do wonder how much data is required to make that claim.

In the UK (ONS) 1.7 males died for each dead female in the 15-45 age bucket. It's 2.3 in the 20-25 age bucket. This suggests female (young especially) are less prone to be badly affected, but it says nothing of other fertility-related adverse reactions.

Regarding Ivermectin, see my top level rep... (read more)

Covid vaccine safety: how correct are these allegations?

The whole video is painful to watch, it gets more bearable after the 2:11 mark when Kirsch (the blue shirt guy) slows a bit down.

The following is a recap of what I've understood them saying and some unpacking. I'm not educated in anything medical and still have a bunch of open question. If you spot any error or know the answer to these questions please let me know.

# TL;DW

They seem to be making 3 main points:

1. Ivermectin prevents and treats SARS-CoV-2. It's extremely safe, common and cheap.
2. Vaccines were rushed. Long term adverse reactions are unknown, some
4dachamian4moAs I mentioned in my post, blog posts by David Gorski systematically address most of the issues you've highlighted ( https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/ivermectin-is-the-new-hydroxychloroquine-take-2/ [https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/ivermectin-is-the-new-hydroxychloroquine-take-2/] ) Ivermectin: "The mechanisms of action of Ivermectin against SARS-CoV-2:" this paper is explicitly critiqued, not least the sensational claim of a 1 in 23 trillion chance of the positive effect being random. (this isn't how statistical analysis works, apparently...) There's also criticism of the Bryant and Lawrie paper. On twitter recently Malone has acknowledged his mistake having been presented with evidence of dosing analysis by Pfizer ( https://twitter.com/RWMaloneMD/status/1406555309200531458 [https://twitter.com/RWMaloneMD/status/1406555309200531458] ) The key paper that shows cytotoxicty from the spike protein is with regards to the spike protein found in sars-cov-2, according to Gorski and the papers he cites the s-protein created via the mrna vaccines is modified to attach to cells in the muscle rather than freely circulating. (Its since been found that there are circulating levels of spike protein post mrna vaccine but in extremely small quantities, far lower than you'd get via an infection, and that the clearance of the protein is as expected for the proper functioning of the vaccine. ( https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2021/06/15/the-novavax-vaccine-data-and-spike-proteins-in-general [https://blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archives/2021/06/15/the-novavax-vaccine-data-and-spike-proteins-in-general] ) ) The Japanese biodistribution data is also debunked, the study is in rats, the percentage build up in the ovaries is exceptionally small and studies have been completed looking specifically at ovarian function post mrna vaccine with no issues found. The Japanese data is at the center of Byram Bridle's claims, which is systematically debunked here https://by
Covid vaccine safety: how correct are these allegations?

Nobody is very likely an exaggeration, I suspect is severely under used, but I have no idea about the reversals.

Did you report to VAERS yourself or via your doctor?

2CraigMichael4moI might have been mistaken. I was thinking VARES was part of vSafe, but they may be different. I did for sure report it to vSafe.
AstraZeneca COVID Vaccine and blood clots

I've found a post from EMA claiming:

Batch ABV5300 was delivered to 17 EU countries and comprises 1 million doses of the vaccine.

but still no signal on how big is the batch single countries get.

AstraZeneca COVID Vaccine and blood clots