First cell-based quadrivalent influenza vaccine approved for use in Europe (Jan 2019)
https://www.seqirus....roved-in-europe
Are you quite sure this had been in use in the US for a year or so before this?
Quite. It had been used by an estimated 1 to 10 million at least that year, probably significantly more than Italy used in 2019. The idea that masks somehow bring the virus out of latency also lacks evidence. It is very harmful information which led to censorship by YouTube.
Seqirus Begins Shipping 2017-2018 Influenza Vaccines to the U.S. Market
Seqirus is now shipping its portfolio of over 50 million doses of influenza vaccines to the U.S. market in preparation for the upcoming 2017-2018 influenza season.
20 Jul 2017
- Seqirus is now shipping its portfolio of over 50 million doses of influenza vaccines to the U.S. market in preparation for the upcoming 2017-2018 influenza season.
- Seqirus utilizes both egg and cell-based technologies to offer the broadest portfolio of influenza vaccines in the US, including both trivalent and quadrivalent formulations
- The Seqirus portfolio includes FLUAD®, the only adjuvanted seasonal influenza vaccine specifically developed for people 65 years and older; and FLUCELVAX QUADRIVALENT®, the first cell-based seasonal influenza vaccine licensed in the U.S.
- According to the U.S. Centers for Diseases Control and Prevention (CDC), the best way to help prevent influenza is by getting vaccinated each year1
HCQ in short supply? Trump bought 70 million doses back in March or April. Where the heck did they all go?
True, I was not sick when I asked my doc about the availability of HCQ should I become ill. He said: Not No Way, Not No How!
Seventy million doses is hardly enough to wet the palate for one morning of a screaming, paranoid mass of 300 million. When people who are outside the risk groups (by age and health considerations) and have no symptoms ask for a medicine in short supply, it is only fair of doctors to reject the suggestion as absurd.
The doc's tone when he says "not no way, not no how" seems more jovial than serious. Even if so, he would not be making the decision, it would likely be the hospital where you were admitted. And due to the global shortage of HCQ and lack of evidence in its favor, this would be unlikely as well. The bottom line is we don't go out prescribing prophylactic regimens of a scarce (and probably not that effective) medicine that lupus and RA patients need to otherwise healthy and asymptomatic people. If every doctor did that, it would just be chaos. Lupus patients could die.
HCQ is just not that profitable, and though some Indian firms recently stepped up production it will likely be a drop in the bucket getting swallowed up by their domestic economy. The efforts to curtail its use in the COVID-19 pandemic will likely be necessary to ensure a steady supply to those who need it more.
Also worth noting is the HCQ and retinopathy criteria were recently revised and made more stringent,
Three iterations of the American Academy of Ophthalmology HCQ dosing and HCQR screening guidelines have been published without including prescribing physicians on the writing committees. This may contribute prescribing physicians' low adherence to the guidelines. As ancillary tests have improved, asymptomatic HCQR is being detected earlier, leading to a higher reported prevalence of HCQR and a drop in the ceiling for safe dosing. These trends put stricter constraints on prescribers and their patients, who may have had well-controlled autoimmune disease on HCQ doses previously considered below the high-risk threshold for HCQR. Indeed, stopping HCQ at the earliest sign of HCQR should be reconsidered; for cases of early HCQR, dose reduction and more intensive monitoring for retinopathy may strike a more appropriate balance between HCQ risk and benefits.
As to the high dose / low dose studies, there is only one certainty. 2-2.4 grams in 24 hours would be very unwise, & this is exactly what Recovery/Solidarity used. If they could have resisted the temptation to overdose their critically ill patients, the trials most likely wouldn't have been halted. Not that this would have changed the outcome. Antivirals that work by inhibiting replication must be given before viral load has peaked. It ain't rocket science. We've understood this from the Tamiflu model for many years.
It's harder to know to take preventative medicine before the virus has replicated to the point of presenting symptoms.
HCQ has too many side effects, and it is too much of a preventative. By the time of symptoms, anything that stops viral replication is useless. We likely need a specific modulator of the genes and T cells involved immune response and subsequent inflammation. The nebulized Quercetin in the other thread seems interesting, because quercetin has a long history with allergies and auto-immune diseases as a safe Mast Cell stabilizer.