Fluvoxamine

[nsacpi]

Fluvoxamine, a cheap and widely available pill used around the world to treat mental illness, is very likely to reduce the risk of being hospitalized with Covid-19, according to new peer reviewed research published in JAMA Network Open, opening up another possible treatment option for the disease using a medicine with a decades-long track record.

Based on an analysis of data from three different clinical trials, the researchers said there is a “high probability” fluvoxamine was associated with “at least a moderate reduction in Covid-19 hospitalizations.”

The trials, which enrolled a total of nearly 2,200 unvaccinated Covid-positive patients from the U.S., Brazil and Canada, evaluated how well 100mg of fluvoxamine taken twice a day reduced the risk of being hospitalized with the disease.

The analysis, coupled with the fact that fluvoxamine is “immediately available, safe and inexpensive” around the world, makes the drug a “reasonable option for high-risk outpatients” who don’t have access to other Covid treatments like antiviral drugs or monoclonal antibodies, the researchers said.

However, they stressed it is important clinical trials examining fluvoxamine continue to bolster the results, especially those studying lower doses of the drug and how effective it is in vaccinated individuals.

A similar and widely available antidepressant, fluoxetine, should also be studied for its potential to treat Covid-19, the researchers said.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/robert...25bf0ba5611ec83d53c7df7b55ccc&sh=4e59cc402b58

 

[nsacpi]

This is but the latest in a significant body of research showing the efficacy of fluvoxamine in treating covid. It has been around a long time, meaning we have good information about its safety and side effects. It is much cheaper than recently developed antiviral treatments.

What's curious to me is that is hasn't developed a cult following. Unlike other so-called treatments with no known efficacy. Makes me wonder if lack of efficacy is a necessary quality for something to attract a cult following.

But hope springs eternal. I'm hoping that starting this thread will in a small way help make fluvoxamine the treatment of choice when any of y'all's elderly relatives come down with covid.

 

[nsacpi]

Interestingly, there was a hint about what to look for in some of the early studies of co-morbidities. These studies identified a fairly long list of factors contributing to negative outcomes (obesity, diabetes, etc). They also identified a much shorter list of factors that seemed to reduce negative outcomes. One of those was depression. It turns out that depression itself probably has nothing to do with it. But some of the commonly prescribed anti-depressants appear to help.