Head lice treatment found to cure COVID-19 in overseas medical trials
The Daily Telegraph (Sydney)
5 Aug 2020
SUE DUNLEVY
A HEAD lice treatment combined with zinc and a cheap antibiotic should be rolled out immediately to treat COVID-19, according to the man who helped discover the cure for peptic ulcers.
Centre for Digestive Diseases Professor Thomas Borody, who is running a clinical trial of the lice treatment Ivermectin in the US, said studies in Bangladesh and China show it can cure the virus in four to six days. Some patients in Australia are already accessing the treatment through their GPs and a handful of anaesthetists and medical specialists are using it once a week as a preventive measure.
Professor Borody is himself using a lower dose of the therapy once a week to ensure he does not catch the coronavirus.
He says Australians who test positive to the virus that causes COVID-19 should immediately be given the triple therapy, so they do not end up in hospital. Once a patient becomes sick enough to need hospitalisation, the medication may not work. At this stage doctors are treating the effects of the virus — organ damage, pneumonia and cytokine storm — not the virus itself.
“An Ivermectin tablet can cost as little as $2, which could make it by far the cheapest, safest, and fastest cure for Australians and the Australian economy,” Prof Borody said.
“If nothing else, make it available in aged care homes immediately. Our elderly are at the highest risk and this is a very safe option especially when we have nothing else except ventilators
“Also, our frontline workers deserve more protection with a preventive medication like this, and as emergency treatment if they test positive.”
The Daily Telegraph reported earlier this year that Monash University scientists had found Ivermectin could kill COVID-19 in test tubes within 48 hours. Follow up trials, to see whether smaller doses of the drug at levels safe to use in humans, had “gone well,” the University said yesterday.
The researchers are trying to establish human trials now.
Because the drug is already safely used in humans to treat parasites like head lice, River Blindness and scabies, it could be rolled out quickly as a treatment if it is proven to work.
Prof Borody said we should not wait for more human clinical trials, arguing it should be given as an emergency care treatment right now because each of the three components had already been proven safe to use in humans.
He said the triple therapy has been trialled in 60 patients in Bangladesh and all were cured. And a trial of the treatment in China also showed 100 per cent of patients were cured.
Let's nits this thing now. Head lice treatment found to cure COVID-19 in overseas medical trials. The Daily Telegraph (Sydney) - 2020-08-05 - Contagion - SUE ...
[-] BillyBob_TX | 2 points | Aug 05 2020 12:14:48
Let’s nits this thing now
Head lice treatment found to cure COVID-19 in overseas medical trials
A HEAD lice treatment combined with zinc and a cheap antibiotic should be rolled out immediately to treat COVID-19, according to the man who helped discover the cure for peptic ulcers.
Centre for Digestive Diseases Professor Thomas Borody, who is running a clinical trial of the lice treatment Ivermectin in the US, said studies in Bangladesh and China show it can cure the virus in four to six days. Some patients in Australia are already accessing the treatment through their GPs and a handful of anaesthetists and medical specialists are using it once a week as a preventive measure.
Professor Borody is himself using a lower dose of the therapy once a week to ensure he does not catch the coronavirus.
He says Australians who test positive to the virus that causes COVID-19 should immediately be given the triple therapy, so they do not end up in hospital. Once a patient becomes sick enough to need hospitalisation, the medication may not work. At this stage doctors are treating the effects of the virus — organ damage, pneumonia and cytokine storm — not the virus itself.
“An Ivermectin tablet can cost as little as $2, which could make it by far the cheapest, safest, and fastest cure for Australians and the Australian economy,” Prof Borody said.
“If nothing else, make it available in aged care homes immediately. Our elderly are at the highest risk and this is a very safe option especially when we have nothing else except ventilators
“Also, our frontline workers deserve more protection with a preventive medication like this, and as emergency treatment if they test positive.”
The Daily Telegraph reported earlier this year that Monash University scientists had found Ivermectin could kill COVID-19 in test tubes within 48 hours. Follow up trials, to see whether smaller doses of the drug at levels safe to use in humans, had “gone well,” the University said yesterday.
The researchers are trying to establish human trials now.
Because the drug is already safely used in humans to treat parasites like head lice, River Blindness and scabies, it could be rolled out quickly as a treatment if it is proven to work.
Prof Borody said we should not wait for more human clinical trials, arguing it should be given as an emergency care treatment right now because each of the three components had already been proven safe to use in humans.
He said the triple therapy has been trialled in 60 patients in Bangladesh and all were cured. And a trial of the treatment in China also showed 100 per cent of patients were cured.
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