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A meta analysis is a paper doing an overview of an overall set of data sets. This can be useful for researcher to get a general idea of where things currently stand in a research field, especially allowing to see where there are gaps in research. It is NOT useful for determining the empirical truth of anything. It is just a tool to inspect tools.
The actual empirical validity of a meta analysis is only as good as the underlying data, and there is zero evidence that any of his studies have any validity. If you have 1000 studies saying pouring piss in your eyes increases eye health then guess what your meta analysis will say? That’s right time to start passing in your eyes. Poor understanding if data and tge ability to see crap studies from good studies is a serious problem in science and contributes the the replicability crisis.
Underlying all this fancy numbers and graphs and shot is the fact that they have no proposed pathway of action for ivermectin on covid. Ivermectin targets neuronal tissue, and because parasites are smaller than us they are more susceptible to small doses. It is effectively a poison. This has zero effect on covid directly unless you count killing your cells before covid can a treatment, fun fact it’s not might as well go with bleach. If it has side effects that alleviate symptoms of covid, well we can probably find a less harmful more effective drug that does that better. For example they use NaHeparin to treat cardiovascular side effects because it is an anticoagulant and vovid has been seen to cause clotting and cardiovascular dilation.
Hope this helps and am happy to answer any other questions.
Here’s the thing: none of us without biomedical training are going to be able to figure out whether Ivermectin is an effective treatment. If there was anything to this, the massive corps that produce ivermectin would be going HAM to get this approved.
One of the many companies that sells ivermectin is Merck, which doesn’t have a vaccine to sell. Instead, Merck is releasing public statements begging people not to buy one of their products. A giant corporation that is entirely profit driven and straight up evil can’t even figure out a way for ivermectin to pass the sniff test.
What we can do is list off the many reasons it hasn’t been approved as a treatment, why the studies antivaxers are pointing to are bunk, the harm it does to the human body at the dosages mentioned in those studies, etc.
Hopefully I don’t sound too pissed at you or anyone else here, I just have to deal with this shit in real life too and it’s exhausting. I know you’re just trying to get more info to talk your brother off the ledge and I hope you’re able to because this shit is dangerous.
Edit: I just Googled “Merck ivermectin” and the second result is a crazy as shit antivaxxer site. Fuck this country. Hope it fucking burns to the ground in a pile of intestinal sloughings.
:jokerfied: :amerikkka:
I would be dubious of any study that a CHUD presents, but as far as studies go this one isn’t terrible. They present a clear methodology and pathway of action, in this case by inhibiting active transport of vial DNA across the nuclear membrane, and a pretty simple experiment, infecting cells and then pelleting them to collect viral particles for quantification. That being said this is one data point that needs to be replicated to have any real relevance. Also this is still ‘in vitro’ “aka in test tubes for non nerds” which is completely different from in “vivo trials” which is different from actual therapeutic use. It is possible that ivermectin is effective in preventing active transport across cell membranes, but it is also possible that the dose required would kill or seriously harm a live subject. It is also possible their study suffers from systemic errors, Steve might have improperly inoculated the test samples with COVID for example because he grabbed a vial of distilled water instead of COVID . In short one study is at best an interesting starting point for investigation, but more importantly why fucking bother when we have a vaccine that has 80%-99% effectiveness.
