CDC Ph STATEMENT ON DOH ADVISORY AGAINST IVERMECTIN ‘IVERMECTIN SAFE FOR HUMAN USE’

With the recent announcement of the Department of Health advising against the use of Ivermectin in treating COVID-19, the Concerned Doctors and Citizens of the Philippines (CDC Ph) once again needs to set the record straight about the efficacy of this medicine. It bears repeating that Ivermectin has been on the WHO and Philippine Essential Medicines List for many years now. And this for good reason.

Ivermectin continues to be the target of a misinformation campaign which, happily, is rather easy to refute with a little research.
— The claim that Ivermectin is only for animal use is a half-truth that is both inaccurate and misleading.

There are a whole host of medicines with the same active ingredients that are used by both humans and animals. For example, the antibiotics used by people, and livestocks have the same active ingredients and are used to combat similar infections.

The difference lies in that there are separate formulations for these medicines — specifically, human-grade formulations and animal-grade formulations.

For decades now, physicians have been prescribing human-grade Ivermectin to treat their patients for parasitic diseases such as scabies, filariasis, and onchocerciasis. This is why Ivermectin is readily available through pharmacies and compounding laboratories.

On the other hand, animal-grade Ivermectin is dispensed not by physicians but by veterinarians and has never been available in pharmacies and compounding laboratories dispensing human-grade medications.
— Ivermectin is included in the list of essential drugs according to the Philippine National Formulary, which is published by the Pharmaceutical Division of the Department of Health.

The formulary is the official list of medications approved for human use and is freely and publicly available here:
https://pharma.doh.gov.ph/the-philippine-national-formulary/

Since its discovery in the late 1970s, Ivermectin has been administered to billions of people and has been proven to be an effective broad spectrum antiparasitic agent.

In a review published in The Japanese Journal of Antibiotics, researchers Yagisawa et. al report that Ivermectin has been used for more than 30 years with more than 3.7 billion doses dispensed in Africa and Central and South America.

Considering the global availability of Ivermectin in both developed and developing regions of the world, it is reasonable to estimate that the total number of Ivermectin doses dispensed globally far exceeds 3.7 billion.

The review article is freely and publicly available here:
https://pgibertie.files.wordpress.com/2021/03/74-1_44-95.pdf

Earlier this year, Ivermectin manufacturer Merck proudly announced its successful use of more than 4 billion doses of its Mectizan brand in the fight against river blindness (onchocerciasis)

Their press release can be found here:
https://www.merck.com/stories/mectizan/
— There is a large and growing body of randomized clinical trials and meta-analyses showing the efficacy of Ivermectin versus COVID.

As of August 25, 2021, there have been 63 trials studies worldwide on repurposing Ivermectin for anti-virus treatments involving 26,398 patients and 613 scientists.

The cumulative research results on the efficacy of Ivermectin are: 86 percent improvement when used as prophylaxis, 72 percent as an early treatment, and 40 percent as a late-treatment drug. These studies are all publicly available for free on https://ivmmeta.com/.
— The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has been publicly criticized by reputable scholars for attacking Ivermectin, a safe and effective drug.

In an opinion piece that appeared in the Wall Street Journal on July 28, 2021, David R. Henderson and Charles L. Hooper, both of whom are research fellows at the Hoover Institution, wrote that:

If the FDA were driven by science and evidence, it would give an emergency-use authorization for ivermectin for Covid-19. Instead, the FDA asserts without evidence that ivermectin is dangerous.

At the bottom of the FDA’s warning against ivermectin is this statement: “Meanwhile, effective ways to limit the spread of COVID-19 continue to be to wear your mask, stay at least 6 feet from others who don’t live with you, wash hands frequently, and avoid crowds.”
Is this based on the kinds of double-blind studies that the FDA requires for drug approvals? No.

The complete article is publicly available here:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/fda-ivermectin-covid-19-coronavirus-masks-anti-science-11627482393

The Hoover Institution is a highly-regarded public policy think-tank based at the University of Stanford known for hosting eminent scholars from all over the world. It maintains an extensive library and archives of scholarly literature.

Its stated mission is to improve the human condition by advancing ideas that promote economic opportunity and prosperity while securing and safeguarding peace for America and all mankind.

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CDCPH: Studies with large sample- sizes show Ivermectin effective against COVID-19
A local group of health practitioners and researchers are asking policy- makers to examine the accumulated body of scientific evidence demonstrating that Ivermectin is an effective prophylaxis and treatment for COVID-19.

According to the Concerned Doctors and Citizens of the Philippines (CDCPH), the most current global meta-study of Ivermectin shows its effectiveness in preventing hospitalizations and curbing deaths among those infected with COVID-19.

CDCPH is a non-profit, non-partisan organization composed of medical practitioners, business professionals, and civic-minded citizens advocating for science-based, cost-effective treatments to save lives and livelihoods during this pandemic.

According to CDCPH member Dr. Rafael Castillo, as of July 10, 2021, global meta-analyses of a total of 62 trials conducted by 585 scientists on 22,425 patients shows:
– An 85 percent improvement among patients in 14 trials using IVM as prophylaxis
– A 74 percent improvement in 26 early treatment trials
– A 46 percent improvement in 22 late treatment trials
– A 69 percent improvement in curbing mortality;
– And a 62 percent improvement among patients with various stages of COVID-19 infections in 32 randomized controlled trials.

Meanwhile, another CDCPH member, Dr. Benigno Agbayani, Jr., explained that “If we are serious in mustering all the tools to fight this pandemic, we should look at the scientific data. In science, two of the gold standards for evidence are peer-review and sample size.

Peer-review refers to a process where a study’s data, methods, and analysis, and are freely accessible to experts in the field for verification and criticism, while a large sample size shows that the process and treatments have been applied to a sufficiently wide segment of people.

The global meta-analyses on Ivermectin passes both standards because: first, the studies are all freely available for scrutiny at https://c19ivermectin.com; and second, because of the large samples sizes spanning a wide range of healthcare systems and patient characteristics from all over the world, Agbayani said.

Revisiting the Hippocratic Oath

According to CDCPH member Dr. Allan Landrito, “This pandemic is an opportune time for medical professionals 一 especially those now working as national health policymakers in government 一 to revisit two of the key tenets in the Hippocratic Oath, which everyone swears by as a prerequisite to joining the medical profession.”

These two tenets are that doctors are morally bound to prevent diseases, if possible, because prevention is better than cure; and to apply all measures required to nurse patients back to health, Landrito explained.

“The scientific evidence on Ivermectin as an effective prophylaxis and treatment for COVID-19 is in line with both principles, and so we must make it widely available to everyone… now,” Landrito concluded.*