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Leading conservative media figures – including Fox News hosts Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham – have mentioned ivermectin as a drug that could potentially be used to treat Covid-19.
This is part of a recent theme in right-wing media of attacking public health officials for promoting highly effective coronavirus vaccines as the best way out of the pandemic instead of potential therapies to treat the virus. .
Throughout the pandemic, Fox News, talk radios and right-wing websites have promoted unproven therapies to treat Covid-19 while simultaneously casting doubt on the effectiveness of vaccines and masks.
The FDA has warned for months that ivermectin may be dangerous and said it had “received several reports of patients in need of medical support who were hospitalized after self-medicating with ivermectin intended for medical professionals. horses”. Although there are human uses for ivermectin, the FDA has not approved it for the treatment or prevention of Covid-19 in humans and the drug is not an antiviral drug.
“Taking a drug for unapproved use can be very dangerous. This is also true for ivermectin,” the FDA said on its website. “There is a lot of misinformation around, and you may have heard that it is normal to take high doses of ivermectin.
A Fox News spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment on Monday when asked about hosts on the network promoting ivermectin.
Federal health officials aren’t the only ones pouring cold water over the idea that the drug can treat Covid-19.
In Mississippi, where only 37% of the population is fully vaccinated, health officials said on Friday they received an increasing number of calls about people ingesting the drug.
“Patients should be advised not to take any medicine intended to treat animals and to take only ivermectin prescribed by their physician,” the Mississippi state health department said in an alert. “Animal drugs are very concentrated for large animals and can be very toxic to humans.”
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