News Rescue
Ivermectin has recently come to global attention thanks to the war against Covid and recent misinformation propaganda wars.
Described as a “wonder drug” in published studies, Ivermectin has lately come under the attack of the CDC and FDA who have falsely maligned it as solely an anti-parasitic for horses and cows.
In actuality, Ivermectin is a drug discovered from Japan that has been in use on hundreds of millions of humans since 1981 and has an “excellent safety profile” according to toxicology experts.
Ivermectin comes under a unique class of drugs the WHO classifies as the “essential drugs list,” and has been distributed across nations by the organization in various community health programs.
The drug has been of such tremendous benefit to humans in 2015 its discovery won a Nobel prize for drugs.
Science Direct writes:
“Ivermectin: a multifaceted drug of Nobel prize-honoured distinction with indicated efficacy against a new global scourge, COVID-19”
“In 2015, the Nobel Committee for Physiology or Medicine, in its only award for treatments of infectious diseases since six decades prior, honoured the discovery of ivermectin (IVM), a multifaceted drug deployed against some of the world’s most devastating tropical diseases. Since March 2020, when IVM was first used against a new global scourge, COVID-19, more than 20 randomized clinical trials (RCTs) have tracked such inpatient and outpatient treatments. Six of seven meta-analyses of IVM treatment RCTs reporting in 2021 found notable reductions in COVID-19 fatalities, with a mean 31% relative risk of mortality vs. controls. During mass IVM treatments in Peru, excess deaths fell by a mean of 74% over 30 days in its ten states with the most extensive treatments. Reductions in deaths correlated with the extent of IVM distributions in all 25 states with p < 0.002. Sharp reductions in morbidity using IVM were also observed in two animal models, of SARS-CoV-2 and a related betacoronavirus. The indicated biological mechanism of IVM, competitive binding with SARS-CoV-2 spike protein, is likely non-epitope specific, possibly yielding full efficacy against emerging viral mutant strains.” Read full: https://www.sciencedirect.com/
While the drug was primarily developed for its anti-parasitic effects, it has since been found to have a myriad of other applications.
Before we go into the list of amazing benefits Ivermectin has been studied to have, let us look at the history of its discovery:
History of Ivermectin
What do penicillin, aspirin, and ivermectin have in common? In addition to rhyming, all three belong to the select group of drugs that can claim to have had the greatest beneficial impact on the health and well-being of humanity .
They have at least two other things in common: All three are of natural origin and all three led to a Nobel Prize . Aspirin is a derivative of salicin, a compound found in a variety of plants including willow. Although Hippocrates already speaks of its use in 400 BC, it was not isolated until 1829 as salicylic acid and was synthesized a few years later as acetylsalicylic acid. The discovery of its mechanisms of action earned Sir John Vane the Nobel Prize in 1982. Penicillin was isolated from a fungus that grew by accident in a Petri dish in Alexander Fleming’s laboratory. His discovery radically changed the course of medicine and earned Fleming the Nobel Prize in 1945, along with Howard Florey and Ernst Chain.
And this brings us to ivermectin – a drug that is probably not part of our medicine cabinet, like aspirin or penicillin, but which has certainly improved the lives of millions of people since its discovery in 1975.
The long journey of a sample of Japanese soil
The story of how ivermectin was discovered is quite incredible. In the late 1960s, Satoshi Ōmura, a microbiologist at the Kitasako Institute in Tokyo, began collecting thousands of soil samples from all over Japan, searching for antibacterial compounds. He grew bacteria from the samples, identified the cultures with medical potential, and shipped them 10,000 km away to Merck laboratories in New Jersey, where his collaborator William Campbell tested their effect against parasitic worms that affect livestock and other animals. A culture from a sample collected near a golf course south of Tokyo showed a remarkable effect against worms. The bacteria in the culture turned out to be a new species, which they named Streptomyces avermictilis.. The active compound, avermectin, was chemically modified to increase its activity and safety. The new compound, called ivermectin, was marketed for animal use in 1981 and soon became one of the best-selling veterinary drugs in the world . It is remarkable that, despite decades of searching, S. avermictilis remains the only source of avermectin that has been found.
Source: https://www.isglobal.org/healthisglobal
Various Amazing Properties of Ivermectin from Studies
Anti-Covid and Covid Prophylaxis
Ivermectin has been demonstrated in various studies to have benefit in combatting Covid-19 infection and also in its prophylaxis. One such study found:
“Meta-analyses based on 18 randomized controlled treatment trials of ivermectin in COVID-19 have found large, statistically significant reductions in mortality, time to clinical recovery, and time to viral clearance. Furthermore, results from numerous controlled prophylaxis trials report significantly reduced risks of contracting COVID-19 with the regular use of ivermectin. Finally, the many examples of ivermectin distribution campaigns leading to rapid population-wide decreases in morbidity and mortality indicate that an oral agent effective in all phases of COVID-19 has been identified.”
Another Study: “Use of Ivermectin Is Associated With Lower Mortality in Hospitalized Patients With Coronavirus Disease 2019”
“Two hundred eighty patients, 173 treated with ivermectin and 107 without ivermectin, were reviewed. Most patients in both groups also received hydroxychloroquine, azithromycin, or both. Univariate analysis showed lower mortality in the ivermectin group (15.0% vs 25.2%; OR, 0.52; 95% CI, 0.29-0.96; P = .03). Mortality also was lower among ivermectin-treated patients with severe pulmonary involvement (38.8% vs 80.7%; OR, 0.15; 95% CI, 0.05-0.47; P = .001).”
Read full: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7550891/
Anti-HIV, Anti-DENV, Anti-RSV and Rabies
A 2012 study by Kylie M. Wagstaff et al. found Ivermectin actually prevents HIV replication. The study concluded:
“Ivermectin inhibits infection by HIV-1 and DENV which rely on Impα/β1-mediated nuclear transport”
“Nuclear import of viral proteins is critical to the life cycle of many viruses, including many RNA viruses that replicate exclusively in the cytoplasm such as DENV, respiratory syncytial virus and rabies…”
“In summary, the results of the present study show that ivermectin is a novel inhibitor of nuclear protein import specifically mediated by Impα/β1; the nuclear accumulation of all Impα/β1-recognized cargoes tested to date can be inhibited by short treatments with ivermectin under conditions that do not lead to cytotoxicity, with no effect on nuclear import mediated by other Imps such as Impβ1 alone or Imp13. Our recent work demonstrating that ivermectin inhibits binding of Impα2 to IN and NS5 even in the absence of Impβ1 in the AlphaScreen assay (S. M. Heaton, K. M. Wagstaff and D. A. Jans, unpublished work) strongly implies that ivermectin’s mode of action is likely to be through binding to the NLS-binding pocket of Impα, thereby preventing it from recognizing NLS-containing cargo proteins, rather than alternative mechanisms such as interfering with Impα/β heterodimerization. This is in stark contrast with small-molecule nuclear import inhibitors directed at Impβ1 that prevent binding to RanGTP/cargo release [10,14], which are mostly unsuitable for live-cell work because of uptake and precipitation issues and not highly efficient in inhibiting nuclear import in all cells. Most importantly, in the present study, we have demonstrated for the first time that inhibitors of nuclear import such as ivermectin can be potent antiviral agents, able to significantly inhibit the production of HIV-1 and DENV in infected cell systems.”
See study in NCBI here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3327999/
Potential Candidate to Promote Remyelination for Multiple Sclerosis
August 3, 2018, by Alison Rodriguez
“A recent study analyzed the role of purinergic receptor P2X4 in microglia/macrophages during autoimmune inflammation, finding that P2X4 receptors modulate microglia/macrophage inflammatory responses and identify allosteric modulator ivermectin (IVM) as a potential candidate to promote the repair of myelin damage.
“Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a chronic inflammatory disease of the brain and spinal cord that attacks and destroys the myelin sheath, leading to demyelination and neurodegeneration. A recent study analyzed the role of purinergic receptor P2X4 (P2X4R) in microglia/macrophages during autoimmune inflammation, finding that P2X4Rs modulate microglia/macrophage inflammatory responses and identify allosteric modulator ivermectin (IVM) as a potential candidate to promote the repair of myelin damage.
“The study, published by EMBO Molecular Medicine, explained how microglia survey the brain microenvironment for signals of injury or infection; understanding these mechanisms of microglia responses during pathology are important for promoting regenerative responses. The researchers were able to identify the receptor P2X4 present in the microglial cells that increases the antiinflammatory potential and encourages the body’s own repair responses.
‘“Innate immune cells contribute to axonal damage and demyelination in MS but they are also pivotal in promoting repair responses. Modulating microglia/macrophage P2X4R activation determines clinical outcome in the experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis (EAE) model of MS,” the study stated.’
Read more: https://www.ajmc.com/
Anti-Tumor
1. Esophageal Cancer: “Ivermectin suppresses tumour growth and metastasis through degradation of PAK1 in oesophageal squamous cell carcinoma”
“In this study, we found that ivermectin was effective in suppressing ESCC cell growth, migration and invasion. More importantly, our data also showed that ivermectin had a high antitumour activity against tumour growth and metastasis in nude mouse models. Additionally, ivermectin‐induced apoptosis and enhanced the cell growth inhibition induced by CDDP or 5‐FU. To our knowledge, this is the first study to investigate the antitumour activity of ivermectin against ESCC in vitro and in vivo.”
Read full: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7205794/
2. Drug Resistant Cancer: “Ivermectin reverses the drug resistance in cancer cells through EGFR/ERK/Akt/NF-κB pathway”
The study “findings demonstrated that ivermectin significantly enhanced the anti-cancer efficacy of chemotherapeutic drugs to tumor cells, especially in the drug-resistant cells. Thus, ivermectin, a FDA-approved antiparasitic drug, could potentially be used in combination with chemotherapeutic agents to treat cancers and in particular, the drug-resistant cancers.”
Rad full: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6580523/
3. Breast and Ovarian Cancer
“In OC, in vitro and in vivo results show that ivermectin has a karyopherin subunit beta 1 (KPNB1) dependent anti-tumoral effect and the combination of ivermectin and paclitaxel produces a synergistic effect than each drug alone [179]. OC patients with high expression of KPNB1 present poor survival, consequently, ivermectin represents a promising candidate for combinatory treatment in OC. Recently, an interesting study suggest that ivermectin may useful OC combinatory treatments, demonstrating that this drug significantly augmented cisplatin inhibitory effect by suppressing the phosphorylation of key molecules in Akt/mTOR signalling pathway [180]. In same study, using an OC xenograft mouse models, authors showed that ivermectin alone inhibit tumour growth and, in combination with cisplatin, completely reversed tumour growth [180]. Corroborating these findings, another in vivo and vitro study demonstrated that ivermectin reverse the chemoresistance in colorectal, breast, and chronic myeloid leukaemia cancer cells by inhibit epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)/extracellular signal-regulated kinases (ERK)/Akt/nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB) pathway (Figure 1) [181].”
Read full: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7656306/
Also on Ovarian cancer: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7272521/
3b. Study 2 on Breast Cancer: “Ivermectin induces PAK1-mediated cytostatic autophagy in breast cancer”
“In conclusion, our study has demonstrated that ivermectin is a promising anticancer drug against breast cancer. Ivermectin induces cytostatic autophagy through blocking the PAK1-AKT-MTOR axis, leading to the growth inhibition of breast cancer cells (Fig. 1). Our data provide a molecular basis for the anticancer effect of ivermectin in breast cancer cells, suggesting that the use of ivermectin as a cytostatic autophagy inducer may constitute a novel therapeutic option for breast cancer treatment.”
Read full: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5173258/
4. Colorectal Cancer: “Ivermectin has New Application in Inhibiting Colorectal Cancer Cell Growth”
The study concluded: “In conclusion, we have demonstrated that ivermectin may regulate the expression of crucial molecules Caspase-3, Bax, Bcl-2, PARP, and Cleaved-PARP in the apoptosis pathway by increasing ROS production and inhibiting the cell cycle in the S phase to inhibit colorectal cancer cells (Figure 11). Therefore, current results indicate that ivermectin might be a new potential anticancer drug for treating human colorectal cancer and other cancers.”
Read full: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8415024/
Wound Healing: “Mechanisms of ivermectin-induced wound healing”
“Ivermectin promotes wound healing partly through modulation of the inflammatory process and the levels of Transforming Growth Factor-Beta 1 and Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor. Low doses of ivermectin cream have the potential to be used in treating wounds with minimal scar tissue formation.”
Read more: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7576857/
Combatting Malaria: “Ivermectin to reduce malaria transmission I. Pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic considerations regarding efficacy and safety”
“Ivermectin MDA has the potential to reduce malaria transmission by increasing the mortality of malaria vectors biting treated individuals, particularly those only partially affected by LLINs and IRS due to behavioural or physiological resistance. A thorough understanding of the pharmacological properties of ivermectin is pivotal to design studies aiming at providing evidence for a policy recommendation.
“Ivermectin is safe in MDA campaigns at the current dose approved for onchocerciasis and LF 150–200 mcg/kg administered not more than four times a year. If used for malaria control, the dose and administration scheme will change.”
Read more: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5402169/