Tag: Merck

Pfizer’s anti-COVID pill Paxlovid shows no benefit for younger adults

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

Pfizer’s anti-COVID pill Paxlovid shows no benefit for younger adults

The report’s authors found that Pfizer’s antiviral medication Paxlovid offered little to no benefit for younger adults. However, it did reduce the risk of hospitalization for high-risk seniors. Notably, supplementary material from the original study of Paxlovid in high-risk non-hospitalized adults with COVID-19 during the Delta wave had demonstrated benefits in those younger than 65, albeit the difference compared to the placebo was much less than in those 65 and older.

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Among those over 65, there was a 73 percent decrease in the hospitalization rate and a 79 percent reduction in the risk of death. However, patients between the ages of 40 and 65 saw no benefit in taking the antiviral medication in either category, regardless of previous immunity status.

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Another critical study from Hong Kong published in Lancet Infectious Diseases on the same day as the Israeli study but which went unmentioned in the press offered further evidence of Paxlovid’s limited therapeutic role. The authors reviewed their clinical experience with Paxlovid and Lagevrio, Merck’s antiviral pill, Molnupiravir, in hospitalized patients. They compared them to hospitalized patients who did not receive those medications during the horrific wave of infections that slammed into the semi-autonomous region in February and March.

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The mortality risk reduction for Lagevrio was 52 percent, and for Paxlovid it was 66 percent. Those receiving antivirals had a lower risk of their disease progressing, but the drugs did not significantly impact their need for mechanical ventilation or ICU admission. The patients in the study averaged in age from mid-70s to early 80s.

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Given the results of these studies, it bears mentioning that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has recently estimated that approximately 95 percent of Americans aged 16 and older have some level of immunity against COVID-19.

The FDA loves horse medicine if it’s really expensive, still under patent, and toxic (Fauci, Baric, Denison, DTRA & Gilead Sciences)

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

The FDA loves horse medicine if it’s really expensive, still under patent, and toxic

Related:

Study shows effectiveness of pill form of remdesivir to treat COVID-19 in mice (Ralph Baric & Gilead Sciences)**

Molnupiravir & Ivermectin’s Equine Connections

An emerging antiviral takes aim at COVID-19

[Molnupiravir] EIDD-2801’s story starts years before the coronavirus crisis. In 2014, Painter and his colleagues at Emory University began a project funded by the Defense Threat Reduction Agency to find an antiviral compound that could fight Venezuelan equine encephalitis virus (VEEV). During the Cold War, both the US and the Soviet Union studied VEEV as a potential biological weapon. Typically transmitted through mosquito bites, VEEV causes high fevers, headaches, and sometimes encephalitis, swelling of the brain that can be deadly.

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In late 2019, Painter got a contract from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases* to move EIDD-2801 into Phase I clinical trials for influenza. The plan was to file an investigational new drug application and find a partner to help with the clinical work.

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Just as the team was contemplating its next move, word of a virus spreading in Wuhan, China, was starting to make news. One of Painter’s collaborators, UNC coronavirus expert Ralph Baric**, immediately alerted him that the new pathogen was probably a coronavirus—one that EIDD-2801 could potentially combat.

Denison*** says the research team knew a coronavirus outbreak was inevitable. “Every single one of our grants, every single one of our papers predicted that this event was going to happen that’s occurring right now,” he says. “The whole goal of our drug development was to plan for this.”

*Anthony Fauci, director of NIAID.

**Ralph Baric, patents.

***Mark Denison (Denison Lab/Vanderbilt University Medical Center & Gilead Sciences)

J&J pauses production of its Covid-19 vaccine despite persistent need 💰

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

J&J pauses production of its Covid-19 vaccine despite persistent need

The facility, in the Dutch city of Leiden, has instead been making an experimental but potentially more profitable vaccine to protect against an unrelated virus.

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But poorer countries remain reliant on Johnson & Johnson’s vaccine, which does not require ultracold refrigeration. It has been shown to provide strong and long-lasting protection against severe disease across variants, including omicron, when given as a two-shot regimen. As a single shot, the vaccine is less expensive and relatively easy to give to hard-to-reach populations.

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Unlike companies such as Pfizer and Moderna, which have reaped billions of dollars in profits, Johnson & Johnson did not find the COVID vaccine to be a big moneymaker.

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Since production of the COVID vaccine was halted late last year, the Netherlands plant has been manufacturing an experimental vaccine against respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV, that will be used for a clinical trial in older adults in wealthy countries, a person familiar with the matter said. Even if it proves effective, the vaccine is not expected to become available for several years.

WHO-led programme aims to buy antiviral COVID-19 pills for $10 -document

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

WHO-led programme aims to buy antiviral COVID-19 pills for $10 -document

Merck & Co’s experimental pill molnupiravir is likely to be one of the drugs, and other drugs to treat mild patients are being developed.

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Although it does not explicitly cite molnupiravir, the ACT-A document expects to pay $10 dollar per course for “novel oral antivirals for mild/moderate patients”.

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Another 4.3 million courses of repurposed COVID-19 pills to treat critical patients are also expected to be purchased at a price of $28 per course, the document says, without naming any specific drug.

Nebraska AG Says Doctors Can Legally Prescribe Ivermectin, HCQ for COVID, Calls Out FDA, CDC, Fauci, Media for ‘Fueling Confusion and Misinformation’

Tina Marie (Ms. Cat)

By Megan Redshaw | The Defender | October 18, 2021

Few subjects have been more controversial than ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine — two long-established, inexpensive medications widely and successfully used in many parts of the world for the prevention and treatment of COVID.

Nebraska AG Says Doctors Can Legally Prescribe Ivermectin, HCQ for COVID, Calls Out FDA, CDC, Fauci, Media for ‘Fueling Confusion and Misinformation’