Hospital Can’t Be Pressured To Administer Ivermectin To COVID-19 Sufferers, Decide Guidelines: NPR

By Mitchel Last updated Sep 7, 2021

The Food and Drug Administration, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the World Health Organization are among the groups that have warned against the use of ivermectin (shown here in India) in treating COVID-19 patients. Soumyabrata Roy / NurPhoto / Getty Images Hide caption

Toggle caption

Soumyabrata Roy / NurPhoto / Getty Images

An Ohio judge overturned a previous emergency order that required a hospital to administer ivermectin to a COVID-19 patient against the hospital’s wishes. The anti-parasitic drug is most commonly used as a de-wormer in animals in the United States.

Federal agencies and medical associations have warned against using ivermectin to treat COVID-19 due to limited evidence of its effectiveness. But prescriptions – and associated poison control calls – skyrocketed in 2021 as far-right media touted it as a treatment for COVID-19.

A previous judgment by another judge ordered West Chester Hospital, near Cincinnati, to administer the drug to a patient after his wife filed a lawsuit over the hospital’s refusal to issue a prescription from an outside doctor.

“After considering all of the evidence presented in this case, there can be no doubt that the medical and scientific community does not support the use of ivermectin to treat COVID-19,” wrote Judge Michael A. Oster in the new ruling: Issued Monday.

Ivermectin is used in humans to treat parasites such as lice and worms that cause river blindness. It’s also FDA cleared for similar uses in animals, including as a deworming agent for farm animals and for preventing heartworm in dogs and cats.

However, the FDA, CDC, and American Medical Association have all warned against using ivermectin as a COVID-19 treatment until additional clinical trials can be completed. The National Institutes of Health, which did not make a formal recommendation, say that most of the existing studies on the drug’s ability to fight COVID “had incomplete information and significant methodological limitations.”

At the center of the lawsuit affected by Monday’s order is Jeffrey Smith, who tested positive for COVID-19 in July, the court records read.

After his admission to West Chester Hospital near Cincinnati, Smith’s condition steadily deteriorated: in mid-July he was transferred to the intensive care unit. On August 1, he was put on a ventilator. On August 20, doctors put him in a medically induced coma.

His wife Julie Smith contacted Dr. Fred Wagshul, a doctor with the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance, who advocated the use of ivermectin in COVID patients. He is not certified and, by his own admission, has not worked in a hospital in 10 years.

Wagshul wrote a prescription for ivermectin without seeing Smith and despite a lack of medical privileges at West Chester Hospital, the court records say.

The hospital refused to give the drug because it would interfere with other drugs.

When Julie Smith filed suit, another judge issued a restraining order on Aug. 23 ordering West Chester Hospital to administer 30 milligrams a day for 21 days. Smith’s attorneys say his condition has since improved.

But in another hearing late last week, doctors at West Chester Hospital told the court that ivermectin did not help their patient. Wagshul, who testified on behalf of the Smiths, did not convince the judge otherwise.

“Plaintiff’s own witness … testified that ‘I honestly don’t know’ whether Jeff Smith’s continued use of ivermectin will benefit,” Oster wrote in the judgment.

“Although this court is sympathetic to the plaintiff and understands the idea of wanting to do everything possible to help her loved one, public policy should and will not support allowing a doctor to try ‘any’ type of treatment on people” the judge wrote.