What's new

Rational CoViD-19 Discussion Thread: Science vs. Politics

@infection

tl;dr always drives me nuts. "Too late; done reading". What he hell. I'll "delite reason" if I want to, no matter what you say.

Of course, the mentality involved in responding to what others say with no effort at comprehension is par for our society.

I think Infection must still be in medical school, not far enough removed from those liberal indoctrination camps we call undergraduate education, still wants to be actually smart, and to fit in somehow.

But I agree with his ideas to some extent. Our medical establishment is owned outright by Big Pharma, and everything needs a thousand pills if not to cure, at least to perpetually treat and keep the consumer able to pay.

But I've seen a whole damn lot of unpatentable medicines panned in favor of something that is patentable, and for sure hydroxychloroquine is way past patent, so of course we will have manty studies coming out that will rate it marginally effective and dangerous somehow. Our researchers do know where they get their money.

But here's the one obvious thing. Nobody is anecdotally complaining about how hydroxychloroquine did nothing, or killed Uncle Tom. Pretty sure if there were things like that happening, it'd make the news.

Meanwhile, look at India, with 1.3 B population and 3/4 of the malaria in Asia. India has a significant fraction of it's population on hydroxychloroquine or the sister effective compounds like it, and practically no covid. Look around. Malaria-infested countries missed this pandemic.

We have doctors putting out notices, pleas on talk shows, for anyone who has, or knows of someone who has, been using hydroxychloroquine, who subsequently got Covid. No anecdotal stuff there.

prophylactic. And predictably prophylactic, reasoned from simple chemical oxidative power, from some observed immune system actions, and some enzyme interactions(signal +/signal - )

Many anecdotal findings of reduced virus presence, no anecdotal evidence of "no effect" where the patient had a chance to be on it a few days.

People who wand the FDA/Pharma revolving door bureaucracy to just issue an unevidenced endorsement would have to be brain dead already. People who believe the establishment reluctance and questions to equate to a "Do Not Use" policy might be just as senseless.

I think the government is unqualified to regulate medicine or commerce, way too much payola involved. No government should have that power. It would be better if professional societies took up the responsibility for policing their own little rackets, with freedom for competitive opinion rulers to join in the fray. Maybe insurance companies could regulate some things with the policy provisions stipulating payment for services to approved treatments....

For sure, I don't want an OB sitting in an office telling people what to do, or not to do...… eh...… I'm willing to tell anyone what I think at any moment, but I'm always changing my mind about one thing or another. Every damn new thing I learn bends the universe inside out. Nobody should just believe anything I say, any more than I do. Go figure it out, do your damnedest.[
 
Last edited:
@infection

tl;dr always drives me nuts. "Too late; done reading". What he hell. I'll "delite reason" if I want to, no matter what you say.

Of course, the mentality involved in responding to what others say with no effort at comprehension is par for our society.

I think Infection must still be in medical school, not far enough removed from those liberal indoctrination camps we call undergraduate education, still wants to be actually smart, and to fit in somehow.

But I agree with his ideas to some extent. Our medical establishment is owned outright by Big Pharma, and everything needs a thousand pills if not to cure, at least to perpetually treat and keep the consumer able to pay.

But I've seen a whole damn lot of unpatentable medicines panned in favor of something that is patentable, and for sure hydroxychloroquine is way past patent, so of course we will have manty studies coming out that will rate it marginally effective and dangerous somehow. Our researchers do know where they get their money.

But here's the one obvious thing. Nobody is anecdotally complaining about how hydroxychloroquine did nothing, or killed Uncle Tom. Pretty sure if there were things like that happening, it'd make the news.

Meanwhile, look at India, with 1.3 B population and 3/4 of the malaria in Asia. India has a significant fraction of it's population on hydroxychloroquine or the sister effective compounds like it, and practically no covid. Look around. Malaria-infested countries missed this pandemic.

We have doctors putting out notices, pleas on talk shows, for anyone who has, or knows of someone who has, been using hydroxychloroquine, who subsequently got Covid. No anecdotal stuff there.

prophylactic. And predictably prophylactic, reasoned from simple chemical oxidative power, from some observed immune system actions, and some enzyme interactions(signal +/signal - )

Many anecdotal findings of reduced virus presence, no anecdotal evidence of "no effect" where the patient had a chance to be on it a few days.

People who wand the FDA/Pharma revolving door bureaucracy to just issue an unevidenced endorsement would have to be brain dead already. People who believe the establishment reluctance and questions to equate to a "Do Not Use" policy might be just as senseless.

I think the government is unqualified to regulate medicine or commerce, way too much payola involved. No government should have that power. It would be better if professional societies took up the responsibility for policing their own little rackets, with freedom for competitive opinion rulers to join in the fray. Maybe insurance companies could regulate some things with the policy provisions stipulating payment for services to approved treatments....

For sure, I don't want an OB sitting in an office telling people what to do, or not to do...… eh...… I'm willing to tell anyone what I think at any moment, but I'm always changing my mind about one thing or another. Every damn new thing I learn bends the universe inside out. Nobody should just believe anything I say, any more than I do. Go figure it out, do your damnedest.[
I’m not certain which part of my post you’re actually responding to, because I’m not certain exactly what you’re arguing against. I think you may have misread large portions of it. I’m 7 years removed from medical school, and I’d be curious what about anything I said indicated any liberal indoctrination, or pro-pharmaceuticals, or anything else, really, so I’m hoping you’ll clarify.
 
I’m not certain which part of my post you’re actually responding to, because I’m not certain exactly what you’re arguing against. I think you may have misread large portions of it. I’m 7 years removed from medical school, and I’d be curious what about anything I said indicated any liberal indoctrination, or pro-pharmaceuticals, or anything else, really, so I’m hoping you’ll clarify.

Don't worry...… it's more of a compliment, nestled in a fairly rabid anti-establishment context.

I think what I was seeing was your fairly good intellect and educated viewpoint being worked to converse amicably with our little audience.

I see that you're not a bot. Whatever. It's just me poking at the hive trying to get a swarm swirling.....

I've spent a lifetime being a fly on the wall in a room full of Ph.Ds, lawyers, doctors, school teachers, profs, and political successes, and all I have to show for it is sarcasm.
 
A note from home.....

I've been doing a pretty absolute isolation thing, even for me, out at the cave nobody has ever found. But I've done two raids into California selling my stuff, meeting hardly any human and driving on empty freeways and eating trail mix and jerky. People are wearing masks in public everywhere. The hotels are mostly closed, Casinos too. Even Trump's.

Then my wife tells me her coworker went to care for her Covid mother for a week, came home, spent a few days with her family, and now her husband is in the hospital. But since she has no symptoms, she can't get the test, and can't get time off work, so there she is in the hospital, a sort of covid Cora. Meanwhile, my phones are being tracked, and I'm filling our reports about where I've been and who I talked to. And the phones are being linked to anyone we get within six feet of....

Alright.

I can do the cave for another six months.
 
Here's todays Worldometer.

https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

1.8M humans, 0.4M recovered, 0.1 M dead.....1.3M positives being isolated fairly well....

and maybe 11 M total exposed including undiagnosed at a rate of 5:1 diagnosed, with 2M recovered, so then we'd be hiding from some 6M infectives..... infecting some 0.07 new cases each day.... Or 1 new case a day for each hundred infectives...… and 0.03 recovering as cured per day.... actuve cases still increasing by 0.04 M (40k) per day.

That's about 5%, or doubling every 7 days worldwide.
 
Last edited:
USA stats seem to be in line with total stats, about 6% daily increase with 6 d doubling.

We've done in the USA some 2.8 M tests, less than 1% of the population. If my guessometer is working well enough, or the data and model is good enough, we could have now perhaps 1 M competent spreaders unknowingly sequestered at home, infecting some 30K new victims each day, mostly via cats roaming from door to door begging for milk. So lonely. How can we not pet kitty.

And all in all, we probably have less than 1% of our population exposed, infected, or carrying the virus in all.
 
And now for anecdotal accounts...….:

https://abc7news.com/coronavirus-drug-covid-19-malaria-hydroxychloroquine/6079864/

The Dr. says Zn is a required adjunct to the HCQ, that HCQ doesn't work well without it....

Here is an account of Dr. Zelenko, a NY doctor in a Hasidic community fairly hard-hit with Covid….

https://www.chicagotribune.com/coro...0200402-s4rwdsfi5ncx7oyxoiwgmoml7y-story.html

Sean Hannity has had this in his talk show quite a bit, along with references to the French doctor and China rumors. I mean, when China doctors go out of their way to alert you to something they think might help..... ya gotta just be a hard sell, right....

Dr. Zelenko used HCQ with Azithromycin and Zinc, and claimed remarkable success. He also noted in his practice that people already on HCQ were not getting Covid…..

And here's Dr. Oz...… isn't he the Wizard????

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/bethb...mo-people-need-access-to-chloroquine-n2566184

So, it is the Hannity/Zelenko/Oz conspiracy to dupe Trump and make a fool of him, right????

nah, these actually believe they've seen enough to say it can help, that it has helped, desperately ill Covid patients. Hannity has had some of the recovered patients on his show.
 
Last edited:
I haven't got to the French study yet, but here is the Watts Up article, which I think bears some investigation.

reports that studies have shown HCQ or sister compounds derived from the quinine root having antiviral action in various applications with similar mechanisms in biochemistry. It is used against some bacteria, and malaria, involving the same biochemistry and immune modification effects, and has been shown to be prophylactic agains SARS, the close relative of Covid.

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03...mon-anti-malarial-drug/?utm_source=whatfinger
 
Our bureaucracy still is set to take it's sweet time to approve anything officially, but under "Right to Try" law and general Dr. judgment, the FDA will "allow" it to be prescribed. "Compassionate Use" might be just a consideration for the feelings of the patient, but the doctor does see what happens, if anything.

That it is being hoarded, or used without supervision, is a sort of amazing thing. It is a very simple compound. It can be made by the ton, cheap. A couple of weeks tops, and you have ten tons in the chemical specialty company synthesis tank. A dollar a pound. A penny per gram. You want half a gram for a dose.

Quinine is the natural form, and has been used against malaria for over a hundrfed years. It is not curative for Marlaria, but paliataive, reducing the effects of malaria. You just have to sorta live with it.....

Accounts of negative aspects of usage, in the media today, are pretty rabid overstatements, all in defense of the Establishment, the procedures for obdurate progress in the zero fail mode usual to all off-patent remedies, whereas patent applicants with FDA connections do get a better run, although still very slow, and very expensive. Proof positive that the government should not be in this business.....

side effects are universal in real life applications of any natural or synthetic remedy, and will always require some kind of educated, experienced attendant watching for indications that something is becoming a problem, able to reduce dosage or turn to another remedy.

Chloroquine Phosphate got a rabid Press when an Arizona couple, democrats no less and maybe deranged..... lol..... worse than the average "redneck" swilling hooch mistaking methanol for ethanol, lets say.....The man died, the woman seriously affected...…

The fishtank cleaner was a solvent. Likely acidic, maybe with some soap or detergent. gotta get the scale (CaCO3) and the scum (with say toluene, for example). And the CP as something to kill some bacteria or other disease vectors..... like a virus.

I have heard.... on Hannity..... anecdotal accounts of callers saying they've used HCQ for years and have no fears, and doctors who've used it on hundreds of patients, saying it's been remarkably safe.

So why the bias in Google, political "fact" checkers, media overstating all the cautionary material churned out by the Pharma-influenced gov agencies which we can safely believe will routinely diss anything off-patent????

yah yah. Trump thought is was "interesting". Trump tried to get some HCQ so more people could try it. Trump said "Let's do the studies on this, but in case it can help, so long as we can believe it's relatively safe.... vs. covid…..why not?"

A political campaign to promote fear against HCQ is gonna do nothing...… not a good result.... if people listen. If people try it, and it doesn't work.... well, they tried it. And if there are any emerging reports of side effects or negative results, that goes against any contrary claims of benefits. We'll see.

If I'm an aborigine emerging from the jungle into the cooler climes where a fire might be nice in a cave, I'm probably gonna try it and see what happens. I'll decide if it helps. I might even tell my friends.

There might be some wild-eyed lunatic screaming at me about some damn forest or grassland fire he barely escaped, but I'll line up some rocks, and build the fire against the cave wall. I'll figure it out. More or less, we always learn first from anecdotal accounts. The nerds can do the science when they have the time. When the hunting party is over, the deer cooked and in digestion.
 
Last edited:
no, results would be the same. Whether the dude is R or D, it wouldn’t matter whoever is in office they’re there for their bottom line... not for us. No one was going to do what was best for us. They never do.

The Obama administration response to the Ebola says otherwise. IIRC, Bush's administration did well with SARS.

Trump is an incompetent, but were he a Democratic POTUS, he would have been surrounded by people who believed in the purpose of government, and this crisis would have been handled better.
 
But I agree with his ideas to some extent. Our medical establishment is owned outright by Big Pharma, and everything needs a thousand pills if not to cure, at least to perpetually treat and keep the consumer able to pay.

They are countered to an extent by Big Insurance, which doesn't like to pay for pills if people don't need them.

Our researchers do know where they get their money.

Most research money comes from the government.

But here's the one obvious thing. Nobody is anecdotally complaining about how hydroxychloroquine did nothing, or killed Uncle Tom. Pretty sure if there were things like that happening, it'd make the news.

You can find testimonies like that all over, and they don't make news, because the news reporters are just as scared as everyone else.

Meanwhile, look at India, with 1.3 B population and 3/4 of the malaria in Asia. India has a significant fraction of it's population on hydroxychloroquine or the sister effective compounds like it, and practically no covid. Look around. Malaria-infested countries missed this pandemic.

Looking at a world map, it looks more like poor countries without significant testing abilities don't have a lot of positive tests.

For sure, I don't want an OB sitting in an office telling people what to do, or not to do...… eh...…[

Since that's not happening anyhow, you don't need to worry about it.
 
Back
Top