In the US big media and a handful of classical and celebrity doctors have monopolised the story telling…
on all issues regarding COVID-19. Given the inherent disparities of SARS-CoV-2 infection and disease progression, there have been some missteps along the way but in general the celebrity health professionals have done a great job at relaying information – accurate to the best of their knowledge at a given time – and overall, big media and celebrity doctors get a strong pass on their COVID-19 response. Of course, there are politics, big $$$, and other conflicts but… that’s life.
One of the big “scandals” is the gain-of-function experiments apparently funded by Dr Fauci and the NIH. The NIH funds many things, and funding research into coronaviruses and other pathogens is an important funding direction. Scientists know that research, especially cutting-edge research is associated with inherent risks; especially high profile and important work with pathogens. Tampering with the “genome” of viruses is risky but that does not mean the NIH or anyone else specifically funded “gain-of-function” research to cause a global pandemic. Institutes that handle such experiments have measures in place to avoid mishaps… but even with the best precautions accidents have happened. The point is – 1) NIH probably funded some “risky” work but essentially they have to – it’s important, 2) IF… the virus did infect someone at the lab or somehow escape, there is a need for a thorough investigation and improvement of processes, but 3) even though we had a devastating global outcome … we can’t attribute to any deliberate act – it wouldn’t make sense; if “they” wanted to hurt us – there are much more effective and efficient ways. So, yes – there are politics and conflicts and dramas but … normal.
A funny recent incident was the tussle between the “powerful” Joe Rogan and neurosurgeon, CNN health-guy Dr Gupta … lol – awkward – like watching teenage girls in the schoolyard – trying to save face but both not really knowing what they were talking about. The quick story is, Joe came down with COVID-19 and was proud with his performance regarding how he tackled the infection – basically, he “threw the kitchen sink at it”; amongst other things, we used ivermectin. Ivermectin is almost as controversial as hydroxychloroquine, and not really proven to work against COVID-19 (although the data is weird and some people really believe in it). Apart from being used as an antiparasitic in humans, it is also used in animals – i.e. horse dewormer. So, when reporting on Joe, CNN, accused him of using a “horse dewormer” to treat COVID-19; Joe was upset by the “exaggeration” and questioned Dr Gupta about it on a recent JRE episode! Dr Gupta got schooled for a few minutes trying to justify etc… All that needed to be said to Joe is that he used standard, approved, monoclonal antibody therapy early in the disease progression – he neutralized the virus; the rest – ivermectin, supplement infusions etc… were just add-ons; basically, Joe used something that really works and a bunch of other “crap” (which may or may not be helpful), and fixed himself – ivermectin is really irrelevant. Anyway, then they went on to have few more minor passive aggressive exchanges about the merits of vaccinations and other topics.
It was funny when they brought up some paper about children and vaccine-induced myocarditis – they were both trying to explain the findings. Dr Gupta, should have told him you can find some scientific paper about anything – science, doesn’t work that way – you have to read hundreds, thousands of papers to make an informed decision about something; it’s a consensus of a bodies of work… and science is not exempt from Sturgeon’s Law either. Anyway, it was funny – and a senior reporter, Limone, got caught up in the saga – and got called names J. For the record, transient myocarditis following vaccination, particularly in young males, is a thing – rare and easily resolved but can happen in some cases; so it is up to parents / guardians to decide what is best for them in each situation – in the vast majority of cases, the benefits of vaccination in children, far outweigh the risk… severe COVID-19 in children is rare but can be devastating with multi-organ disease, and side effects of vaccination are extremely rare and in most cases mild; decisions.
Talking about Sturgeon’s Law – there was some controversy this week about a “mask mandate-related” publication from one of our institutes in Victoria this week; something about going through a local paper to see how many people were wearing masks in photos; the newspaper called the manuscript crap… I had to look for myself and after careful reading, I can safely say the paper in question adheres closely to Sturgeon’s Law – many papers kind of suck for different reasons, including some of ours … but this particular paper really sucked – embarrassment level! Not sure if the authors were joking or taking themselves seriously.
Anyway, the bottom line is … Vaccination – double and triple doses (as required) is by far our best option to get out of this pandemic as efficiently as possible.
Until next time …