First archived April 21, 2020, the US National Institute of Health (NIH) publish their first set of Treatment Guidelines intended “to inform clinicians how to care for patients with COVID-19.” The recommendations according to them are based on scientific evidence and expert opinion, based on the strength and quality of the evidence. [1]
The COVID-19 Treatment Guidelines Panel included members were appointed by the co-chairs, of which many disclosed affiliations with Gilead, the maker of failed Ebola anti-viral drug remdesivir, a clear conflict of interest.
- “The Panel does not recommend the use of any agents for post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) against SARS-CoV-2 infection outside of the setting of a clinical trial”.
- “The Panel recommends …no specific treatment for persons with suspected or confirmed asymptomatic or presymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infection”
- For management of all illness: “At present, no drug has been proven to be safe and effective for treating COVID-19. There are insufficient data to recommend either for or against the use of any antiviral or immunomodulatory therapy in patients with COVID-19 who have mild, moderate, severe, or critical illness.” [2]
- As “evidence” came to hand therapeutics were added to the guidelines.
Frontline doctors believed that no early treatment was inhumane, so they searched the literature and began treating the patient symptoms using repurposed drugs, which have known safety profiles for dosages used. The early treatment apporach was keeping patients out of hospital, and have held true through the pandemic.
This public health policy of “no treatment, go home for 14 days, and come back when you couldn’t breath“, caused a lot of mortality and morbidity, mostly because the public weren’t aware of the early treatment.
Just in one location by May 2022 Dr Tyson‘s group had treated over 10,000 COVID-19 out-patients with a 99.998% survival rate.