America Abandoning Covid Mitigation?

Ran across this piece in the Wall St. Journal the other night. As someone who is at risk from Covid and very interested in avoiding another prolonged recovery, I'm not pleased to see it appears we're giving up on Covid.

It's majority medicine at its finest. Most people will be fine. So 20% collateral damage is fine. Apparently. 

We can't save everyone, so we'll save no one. It's cheaper that way.

A pinch of plagicide. You'll barely feel it.

If someone can find a profit in treating Covid patients, cool, but they're on their own (aside from their regularly scheduled government subsidies).

Some snippets:

"The Administration’s response has been to implore doctors to prescribe the antiviral Paxlovid. But many patients at highest risk for Covid can’t take the Pfizer drug because they have medical conditions or take drugs that could cause life-threatening interactions. One study found that half of hospitalized patients who die from Covid have a contraindication with Paxlovid. Some patients can temporarily stop taking other medications, but many can’t or would need to be weaned off them. Doctors could be sued if they prescribe Paxlovid to patients with contraindications who later have complications."

I called this out (not here) over a year ago and it was crickets. Doctors said shit online. There was no analysis. If you looked at the headlines when Paxlovid first came out, you wouldn't know this. You had to dig for it. No one would do the logistics, but I did and I knew it was going to be bullshit.  

Our perceptions were managed. Profits were protected. The media was complicit. Politicians wanted to win their re-election campaigns. And corporations wanted all the money.

Those of us who had contraindications which also meant we really really needed protection from Covid, we got nothing.

As it was, as it will always be.

(Side bar: The same dynamics are at play with regards to AI right now. We're all trapped in an episode of Shark Tank.)

"The FDA has authorized convalescent plasma for the immuno-compromised, but it is rarely administered because the National Institutes of Health’s clinical guidelines say there’s “insufficient evidence” to recommend it.

But studies have shown substantial benefit from a high-dose treatment when administered shortly after symptoms develop. The NIH and Defense Department helped fund a randomized controlled trial that found convalescent plasma reduced the risk of hospitalization by some 80% when given to patients within five days of symptom onset. Why bother funding studies if NIH ignores the results?

NIH’s resistance to convalescent plasma has perplexed some of the country’s top immunologists, who wrote to the agency last month pointing out its “logically inconsistent” position since it has recommended monoclonal antibodies based on much less evidence. Convalescent plasma “has virtually no contraindications,” “neutralizes the latest variants, adapts to the rapidly-evolving virus, and is desperately needed for immunocompromised patients,” the letter noted."

"Numerous biotech start-ups are developing Covid antivirals, but the FDA has insisted their drugs be tested against the standard of care—meaning Paxlovid. But they say Pfizer won’t give them access to its drug to run trials."

Given the amount of lying that goes on in public discourse anymore, who knows where the truth lies on these last two snippets. Paxlovid I know about because I read the primary source material. These two, I have not done my homework on and there are enough partisan snipes in the piece that there could be spin on this that doesn't accurately represent the facts. 

However, the overall question stands...where are the better treatments for Covid? Like, what's the plan? It looks like we've given up. We're going to let the free market figure it out? No matter who dies? No matter how many medical care providers we abuse or hospitals we destroy?