I dismissed ivermectin early in the pandemic because the FDA poo-poo’ed it. “Beware! Serious harm! Should not use! It’s for animals!” (There’s a photo of a giant horse’s head on their beware page. But, it IS approved for use in humans – for parasites, head lice, rosacea, and more – and has been for decades.)

But I kept seeing it, anecdotes of its effectiveness. Then the Wall Street Journal broke the poo-poo wall about it and published this:

Why Is The FDA Attacking A Safe, Effective Drug?
Ivermectin is a promising Covid treatment and prophylaxis, but the agency is denigrating it.

“Ivermectin fights 21 viruses, including SARS-CoV-2, the cause of Covid-19. A single dose reduced the viral load of SARS-CoV-2 in cells by 99.8% in 24 hours and 99.98% in 48 hours, according to a June 2020 study published in the journal Antiviral Research.”

Here’s that study:

The FDA-Approved Drug Ivermectin Inhibits The Replication Of SARS-CoV-2 In Vitro, Antiviral Research, June 2020

“Ivermectin treatment resulted in the effective loss of essentially all [SARS-CoV-2] viral material by 48 hours.”

“Ivermectin has an established safety profile for human use and is FDA-approved for a number of parasitic infections.”

Here are some more bits from that Wall Street Journal article:

The Food and Drug Administration claims to follow the science. So why is it attacking ivermectin, a medication it certified in 1996?

Earlier this year the agency put out a special warning that “you should not use ivermectin to treat or prevent COVID-19.” The FDA’s statement included words and phrases such as “serious harm,” “hospitalized,” “dangerous,” “very dangerous,” “seizures,” “coma and even death” and “highly toxic.” Any reader would think the FDA was warning against poison pills. In fact, the drug is FDA-approved as a safe and effective antiparasitic.

Ivermectin is on the World Health Organization’s List of Essential Medicines. … Ivermectin is “one of the safest, low-cost, and widely available drugs in the history of medicine.”

Ivermectin fights 21 viruses, including SARS-CoV-2, the cause of Covid-19. A single dose reduced the viral load of SARS-CoV-2 in cells by 99.8% in 24 hours and 99.98% in 48 hours, according to a June 2020 study published in the journal Antiviral Research.

Some 70 clinical trials are evaluating the use of ivermectin for treating Covid-19. The statistically significant evidence suggests that it is safe and works for both treating and preventing the disease.

Despite the FDA’s claims, ivermectin is safe at approved doses. Out of four billion doses administered since 1998, there have been only 28 cases of serious neurological adverse events.

Get out, right? It’s been a year and a half and there are no therapies for COVID! Other than vaccines … that don’t keep you from getting infected and don’t reduce transmission and have an awful side-effect profile. And, you know, aren’t APPROVED for use in humans. But ivermectin is. And it’s cheap.

I understood better when I read that Pfizer and Moderna would not be able to get EUA (emergency use authorization) for their vaccines if there was already a safe, effective, drug that could be repurposed. And we know Pfizer has the FDA’s ear, not least of which because the former Commissioner of the FDA, Scott Gottlieb, now serves on the Board at Pfizer where he oversees “procedures applicable to pharmaceutical sales and marketing activities.”

Every day something about this pandemic stuns me.