New NIH Covid Treatment Guidelines Worse Than Useless

What our government is telling physicians is just plain idiotic.  Read the following from a publication aimed at doctors. This was reported:

“Due to the Omicron variant and the short supply of COVID therapeutics, NIH recommends certain therapies over others for patients at high risk of progressing to severe COVID,” said federal officials on a call with clinicians Wednesday [January 12].

“In order of preference, clinicians should use the oral antiviral nirmatrelvir-ritonavir (Paxlovid), the monoclonal antibody sotrovimab, the IV antiviral remdesivir (Veklury) and finally, the oral antiviral molnupiravir,” said Alice Pau, PharmD, of the NIH COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines panel.

“While the drugs were ranked from 1 to 4, she noted that nirmatrelvir-ritonavir, sotrovimab, and IV remdesivir three times a day all had similar clinical efficacy, with a relative risk reduction of 88%, 85%, and 87% in hospitalizations and deaths, respectively, versus placebo. However, molnupiravir, with its 30% efficacy, should be used only if the other three choices are not available,” Pau noted.

Here are the main reasons why the NIH list of preferred COVID treatments should not reassure the public:

1. The first preferred action, using the Pfizer drug Paxlovid, makes little sense because there is nearly no availability of it. And even if people could get prescriptions filled, would they be acting fast enough to get benefits?  In the clinical trials people had to start the drug within three days of symptoms even though they now talk of starting within five days; that too is totally impractical and unrealistic.  Few people would be able to distinguish symptoms being COVID and not the flu or a bad cold quickly, getting an appointment with the doctor quickly and getting a prescription filled quickly.  And the safety has not been adequately assessed.
2. The monoclonal antibody sotrovimab is nearly impossible to get because of extremely limited supply. And here too, a sick person would have to get medical attention quickly, that is extremely difficult.  Even your local hospital might not have it.
3. The very expensive drug remdesivir has a terrible history of being both ineffective and having terrible side effects. It is mostly given to very ill patients in hospitals.
4. Then you get to the absolutely ludicrous fourth option, the new Merck antiviral that has a terrible level of effectiveness and that has not been proven safe. An absolutely awful choice.

What is most obscene about what NIH tells doctors is that it still refuses to include ivermectin or hydroxychloroquine as treatment options.  It ignores the extremely successful treatment protocols of frontline doctors like Dr. Fareed and Dr. Zelenko that do NOT include any of the four NIH preferences.

What a waste of US taxpayer money on the evil and criminal Fauci’s organization.

The real message for the public: Do not trust the government to effectively protect your life?  Public health protection in the US is a disgrace.  What NIH is saying is really insulting disinformation.

Dr. Joel S. Hirschhorn, author of Pandemic Blunder and many articles and podcasts on the pandemic, worked on health issues for decades, and his Pandemic Blunder Newsletter is on Substack. As a full professor at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, he directed a medical research program between the colleges of engineering and medicine.  As a senior official at the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment and the National Governors Association, he directed major studies on health-related subjects; he testified at over 50 US Senate and House hearings and authored hundreds of articles and op-ed articles in major newspapers.  He has served as an executive volunteer at a major hospital for more than 10 years.  He is a member of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons, and America’s Frontline Doctors.