Review of the Emerging Evidence Demonstrating the Efficacy of Ivermectin in the Prophylaxis and Treatment of COVID-19

[Becky1951]

Background:​

After COVID-19 emerged on U.S shores, providers began reviewing the emerging basic science, translational, and clinical data to identify potentially effective treatment options. In addition, a multitude of both novel and repurposed therapeutic agents were used empirically and studied within clinical trials.

Areas of Uncertainty:​

The majority of trialed agents have failed to provide reproducible, definitive proof of efficacy in reducing the mortality of COVID-19 with the exception of corticosteroids in moderate to severe disease. Recently, evidence has emerged that the oral antiparasitic agent ivermectin exhibits numerous antiviral and anti-inflammatory mechanisms with trial results reporting significant outcome benefits. Given some have not passed peer review, several expert groups including Unitaid/World Health Organization have undertaken a systematic global effort to contact all active trial investigators to rapidly gather the data needed to grade and perform meta-analyses.

Data Sources:​

Data were sourced from published peer-reviewed studies, manuscripts posted to preprint servers, expert meta-analyses, and numerous epidemiological analyses of regions with ivermectin distribution campaigns.

Therapeutic Advances:​

A large majority of randomized and observational controlled trials of ivermectin are reporting repeated, large magnitude improvements in clinical outcomes. Numerous prophylaxis trials demonstrate that regular ivermectin use leads to large reductions in transmission. Multiple, large “natural experiments” occurred in regions that initiated “ivermectin distribution” campaigns followed by tight, reproducible, temporally associated decreases in case counts and case fatality rates compared with nearby regions without such campaigns.

Conclusions:​

Meta-analyses based on 18 randomized controlled treatment trials of ivermectin in COVID-19 have found large, statistically significant reductions in mortality, time to clinical recovery, and time to viral clearance. Furthermore, results from numerous controlled prophylaxis trials report significantly reduced risks of contracting COVID-19 with the regular use of ivermectin. Finally, the many examples of ivermectin distribution campaigns leading to rapid population-wide decreases in morbidity and mortality indicate that an oral agent effective in all phases of COVID-19 has been identified.
Keywords: ivermectin, COVID-19, infectious disease, pulmonary infection, respiratory failure

More at:​

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Review of the Emerging Evidence Demonstrating the Efficacy of Ivermectin in the Prophylaxis and Treatment of COVID-19 (nih.gov)

 

[AnnieA]

Copying from another thread since this provides a quick visual of the OP article findings.

The article is from the American Journal of Therapeutics article (link to visuals) and is a literature review and meta analysis, so findings from multiple studies are reviewed and compared. The lead authors for the individual studies are in the second column.

Here are the stats in tabular form with easy to interpret visuals in the last two columns:

Figure 1: Prophylaxis

Figure 2: Recovery time

Figure 3: Mortality

 

[AnnieA]

Ivermectin has antibacterial, antiparasitic, and antiviral properties for specific organisms in both humans and animals. It also targets a few types of human cancers involving epigenetic deregulators such as SIN3A and SIN3B--tumor reducing properties that are still in the study phase.

It is mostly used as an antiparasitic in veterinary medicine.

It is usually dosed by body weight, so animal forms should not!!! be used by humans. Humans must see a medical practitioner and get a prescription.