The Coronavirus Miracle Drug That Probably Isn't

Miracle drug or miracle drag? The politicization of Hydroxychloroquine threatens to harm and kill a bunch of innocent people.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Worst Year Ever, a production of I Heart Radio.
We Get Everything, so don't don't welcome Welcome, Welcome to

(00:23):
to to. Hey everybody, this is the worst year ever.
My name is Cody Johnston, and we are here talking
about the worst checking this yeah year ever. Hi everybody. Hey, also, Hey, Hi,
I'm Katie. By the way. You didn't know Stole by
the way, in case you didn't know that either. Robert

(00:43):
Evans do you have a name? No? No, he does
not Alight, I have no follow ups? Um? Yeah, today,
great episode on this year. God, we're good at this.
We've got a topic that um, we seem to be
returning to pretty regularly every single week, every single episode
of every moment of every day. Um, which is uh,

(01:03):
different aspects of the coronavirus pandemic that I think everyone
doesn't need a summary of. And today we're gonna talk
about hydrochloroquin hack. Hey, today we're going to talk about
hydroxy chloroquin um, a miracle drug that needs no explanation

(01:28):
the end. Go use it. Yeah, I guess I'll lead
us off. So we're talking about hydro chloroquine. Hydroxy chloroquin
This is the this is the medicine that our our
president is convinced as a miracle here, and so we're
going to talk about a lot of aspects of that today. Um.
And it is the president about this? Is this the
President of the United States, Yes, the one that was

(01:49):
told repeatedly to not look directly at the sun during
the eclipse, and then he did, and then someone yelled,
don't look at it, and then he kept doing it
and he pointed directly at it. Yeah. President, Yeah, the
medical genius that is the president, President science, the president
who who's bold self experimentation is responsible for us all

(02:09):
now knowing that the eyes are the best way to
get vitamin D into your body. Um. So I hope
everyone is staring at the sun without blinking for twenty
five minutes a day like you're supposed to. Yep. What okay, Well,
so let's talk about let's talk about why hydroxy clarquin

(02:30):
um is even a subject that's in the general zeitgeist.
To explain that we have to go back in time
to uh, the halcyon days of early March, those beautiful
end of winter days. Yeah, I wonder I wish there
was some sort of sound that could help us go

(02:50):
back in time and differentiate the past from the now.
But I don't know what that would be. I'm taking
off my headphones. Katie, come back, Katie, I'm done. Back
around March I think it was March. Yeah, yeah, she's
We're good. Oh no, Cody horrible. Thank you. If you're

(03:16):
not here for them, they don't work, okay. So March
sixth a small French study was published on the use
of hydroxy chloroquine to treat UH COVID nineteen patients UM.
It was about twenty people in the study UM, and
they found that medicating folks with hydroxy chloroquine was was

(03:39):
associated with a viral load reduction UM and the disappearance
of COVID nineteen in many of the patients UM. And
the effect of hydroxy chloroquine on these patients was reinforced
by pairing it with a zithra mayasin, which is an
antibiotic better known as a z pac um. So this
is like the first study that came out UM, and

(04:00):
it seemed on its surface like this could be really interesting.
First step. You know, you get a data like that
during a pandemic, you definitely want to have follow up
studies UM to kind of try to confirm as to
whether or not there's actually anything going on there and
this might be a treatment that could really help a
lot of people. Um. So a study like this of
twenty people can be a good first step. But traditionally

(04:21):
in medicine, you don't just jump from a twenty person
study to dosing millions of people with a medication. You
do more studies with more people. No. No, that's that
that's like, it's that's what we would call unspeakably reckless. Um.
It's okay, most people do because America doesn't like science. Um.

(04:44):
But science way that you handle this is you do
more studies with more people, ideally in a couple of
different parts of the world, and you see if the
patterns from the first study continue to bear out. Uh.
And that's not what happened here, because on March thirteen,
cryptocurrency investor James tadaro In a New York City lawyer
named Gregory Rigano tweeted out a link to a paper
that they had put up on Google docs um, which

(05:07):
is the most reputable publishing house for scientific the medical
journal Google docs unfamiliar. Yeah, Yeah, that's where Jonah salk
Um cured polio was in Google docs. Uh yeah yeah
so uh. In this open file sharing paper that they
threw out, the men described a drug, you know, cloroquine

(05:30):
hydroxychloroquine um. And they described the early trials and France,
and there were also some early trials in China um
that had had shown some promise as a promise as
a COVID nineteen treatment. Um. And you know, they claimed
that this drug, which they said was a treatment from malaria,
which it was initially developed that way, it's not really
used much as a treatment for malaria. It's much more
often used for lupus these days. Um. They said that

(05:53):
it was cheap and plentiful uh and wrote that it
uh not only was it effective in treating COVID nineteen,
but it quote also has strong potential as a prophylactic
preventative measure against the coronavirus, which um, the data did
not actually really suggest at this point. But by saying that,
like you're basically telling people if you just take this medicine,
you'll be safe. UM. So this Google doc put up

(06:15):
by two people who are not epidemiologists and not medical professionals,
was basically crafted to create a run on this drug. Um.
And I should also note here that Gregory Regano the lawyer,
mischaracterized his qualifications in the paper. He described himself in
the paper as an advisor to the Stanford University School
of Years. Yeah. I mean this is kind of Yeah.

(06:39):
He didn't just do that. I mean, yes, he did that,
but we had Fox News bringing them on national television
with that as part of the chiron, you know, calling
this cure. Yeah. And Stanford has specifically come out and
said that like, no one in Stanford was involved in
the study and he is not an advisor with the
Stanford School of me uson. Um, he's just a liar. Uh.

(07:03):
But yeah, as you stated, Katie, it wound up on
Fox News. And the reason it went up on Fox
News A big part of that is that on March sixteen,
friend of the Show Elon Musk tweeted a link to
Google doc and wrote, maybe worth considering Cloroquin for c
nineteen unbelievable shocking. Uh. But you know he is a
super smart businessman. Yeah. Yeah. If if you know how

(07:28):
to pay people to design a pretty cool rocket in
a pretty cool car, you know how to treat a
viral epidemic. Sure, Yeah, yeah, I've read that. Yeah, it
was the Elon Musk's Twitter. Um. So yeah, he tweets
that out on March sixte and it goes super viral.

(07:48):
And on March eighteenth, Bright Bart and the Blaze pick
up the story. And on March nineteen, that's Katie when
Fox News has Gregory regano on um and yeah he
still he claims that it's got a hundred cure rate
against the ronavirus. This was a vast mischaracterization that the
idea that it has a curate against coronavirus was a
wild miss characterization of what the data suggested, um, but

(08:09):
also the data itself. That French study was profoundly flawed
in the reality, several patients in the study had to
drop out of it because they suffered significant health side
effects to the medication. In total, four of the forty
two patients covered in that study died. These outcomes were
not included in the studies final conclusions. UM. A thing
you might be as bad science, UM. Procedure for like

(08:34):
for study to not include that kind of information. No, uh,
And we will talk more later about some weird ship
that's happening with a number of these coronavirus studies. But
it's probably worth noting that, Um, every medical professional who's
been reached to about this, who's like an epidemiologist and
stuff has h has pretty much said the same thing,

(08:55):
which is kind of echoed by something Dr Kevin Tracy,
who's a CEO of the fine Stein Institute for Medical
Research in New York City, uh said about the study,
which is that it was a complete failure. So despite
it being a complete failure, Katie, you've got some stuff
on how Fox News continued to hype this ship up. Yeah,
I mean, like, as you said, you know, he went

(09:16):
on Bright Mart championed the story. Uh, went on Fox News.
The President got his jaws into it and started, you know,
whipping it around like a dog with meat. Um, the rumors.
But yeah, Fox News, I saw this interesting little tidbit apparently. Uh.
An analysis by Media Matters found that Fox News promoted

(09:38):
using the drug a hundred and nine times between March two.
In March, a hundred and nine times in two days. Um.
And and I know in addition to that, of course,
you know Bright Bar, Daily Wire, Daily Caller, even the
opinion pages of the Wall Street Journal. Uh. We're talking
about this miracle cure. Some of these headlines are like,

(10:01):
you know, talking about how nursing homes are giving all
of their patients hydra doxychloroquin in, and just there's just
like a pervasiveness of this word floating around, and of
course people start to like latch onto that, thinking like, oh, okay,
here's something that I can do to take control of this.
What's interesting is apparently when all of this started, I mean,

(10:24):
it was a drug that I was earmarked to like,
you know, it maybe has potential to be um helpful,
but that wasn't even the strongest drug, rem to severe.
I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing that right. Rem dessevere
actually showed a lot more potential. But we all focused
on this because of all the stuff that you just outlined.

(10:45):
Are there other studies into that going on the better one? Yeah,
there's some other studies we'll talk about a little later.
But it's just like that number, Katie, a hundred and
nine times in two days, Like it's stagering and like
in a lot of ways, what we're seeing with hydroxy
chloroquin is kind of like the anti science ship that

(11:07):
has been coming out of the Republican Party. And it's
media machine for the last my entire adult life is
like it's like Chekhov's gun, right, and we've all been
waiting it for it to really Like obviously it's gone
off because the climate change ship has been completely stymy,
but like this is this is the most direct, pulling
the trigger in someone's face way i've seen it go

(11:28):
off of of where oh now we just have Now
we're just lying about medication in the middle of a pandemic.
Like that's where this his his hit um And it's
become an ideological thing whether or not you support taking
an approved medication for fucking a plague. It's it's incredibly dangerous.

(11:48):
We're going to get into some of that, thankfully. I
was gonna say it rules rules different episodes, mindless dogshit
culture or stuff that affects people's lives. Uh like this too,
I mean a little bit of defensive fox Katie. I
text you at least a hundred and nine times every

(12:09):
two days about the various pain killers that I enjoy.
So you know, who's are you texting? Are you texting
audience of millions? Yeah? I recommend everybody break into your
local CVS. UH steal some delotted and uh, as I
hear there's no consequences to opiates, So like Fox News,

(12:33):
why why not, you know, let's let's go for it. Yeah,
there used to be, but thanks to Jared Kushner, he's
he's uh stopped all the consequences. Yeah, consequences are gone,
which means the plague will I don't know that this
bit has no healthy conclusion. I just am so frustrated.
I'm sorry. I needed just barrel through it keep going.

(12:53):
So yeah, from so as we've kind of laid out here,
it hits like the right wing fever swamp ship news
circus and it it gets spread there and this winds
up kind of leading it to the biggest spreader of
misinformation in the country today, the President of the United States. Um, yeah, yeah.

(13:15):
And so the same day as that Fox News interview,
Donald Trump gives yet another one of his press conferences
and announces, because he'd just seen it on Fox News,
that hydroxy cloroquine was a possible game changer. He stated
inaccurately that the FDA had approved it um and told
the entire country, We're going to be able to make
that drug available almost immediately. Um. During a few days later,

(13:37):
during another press conference, he said that clerk Win had
a real chance to be one of the biggest game
changers in the history of medicine. Uh. Two days after that,
he continued to talk about how wonderful this was, and
he told the story of a patient named Rio Jan Dnieri. UH,
a Florida man who was at death's door, who had
like said goodbye to his family, was given hydroxy clerk
Win and then Um had a seemingly miraq ulis recovery,

(14:01):
and Trump said a number of hours later, he woke up,
felt good. He's in good shape, and he's very happy
for this particular drug that we got approved in record
setting time. There's never been anything even close to it.
And as soon as Rio John Denieri's story hit the media,
UM he was adopted by the whole right wing punditry
ecosystem and prayed in front of the nation while he
was still in a hospital bed. He was interviewed on

(14:21):
Fox News, outlets around the country read stories about him. Uh. Yeah,
So I want to make it clear, Joon Denary has
actually been pretty reasonable about all this. There was an
article recently in Miami Herald where he was like Please
don't take hydroxy chloroquine if your doctor hasn't given to
you given it to you. He specifically stated, the one
thing that scares me to death is people taking these
stories and going out and self diagnosing and self medicating.

(14:43):
They can't do that. They've got to go to a doctor. Um.
He got scared about this when he, after his being
on Fox, started getting messages on like Facebook with people
asking him how to take hydroxy cloroquine. And it's one
of those things. He may it may have saved his life.
It also may have had nothing to do with his recovery.
We don't know yet because like it was a couple
of weeks ago. And yeah, it's just it's so fucking wild,

(15:09):
how reckless. I like, the gloves are off, there's no
truth anymore. Everything's fine, So we should all take as
much fucking painkillers as we want. Yeah, what's so dangerous
about this is that people see it being spread around
and look at his story and I think, oh, yeah,
I can do that for myself. For example, there's this
story of this couple from Arizona who wanted to take

(15:30):
hydroxy chloroquin after after hearing about this um and and
and the husband died because they took chloro quin phosphate,
which obviously sounds similar, but it's actually used to clean
fish tanks. UH, and I guess both of him and
the wife took the drug and then they immediately realized

(15:51):
that they needed to go to the hospital, and the
man passed away. And I thought this was interesting. This
is a little exchange from our interview with NBC, and
the woman who decided to remain anonymous for obvious reasons,
said Trump kept saying it was basically pretty much a cure. NBC.
What would your message be to the American public, woman, Oh,
my god, don't take anything. Don't believe anything, don't believe

(16:13):
anything that the president says and his people just call
your doctor. UM and I can't imagine that they're the
only people that I've done this. Health officials in Nigeria
actually issued a warning after they said three people in
their country died from overdosing on the drug, again because

(16:34):
they were citing Trump as having pushed it for the treatment.
The CIA is also UH internally warned everybody to not
take it. That's good. At least the CIA will be okay.
I was worried most about that. I feel I feel
safe now, um, because there are a lot of complications

(16:58):
with it, like it they're the side effects are very dangerous. Yeah,
and we'll get into that a little bit more. But yes,
there are are significant side effects, as there often is
when you take you know, medication that's unapproved at random. Um.
But I think maybe the saddest thing about this is that, like,
while we're all being forced to change our whole lifestyles
as a result of this virus, like we can't even now,

(17:21):
Americans are going to be scared to eat fish, tank cleaner,
which just breaks my heart. Favorite hobbies, how many I
was excited? Yeah, it's just like how many things have
to be taken away from us? You know. Yeah, what's
what's left now? What's even left about being an American?
Banks Obama? Yeah, thanks Obama. So in the wake of

(17:43):
all this, Fox is handling like the fact that someone died,
the fact that, like there's been serious health consequences revealed
to like urging this ship has had zero impact on
Fox News. Sean Hannity has started referring to himself as
doctor Hannity in segnal helps people to tee. How dare

(18:03):
you tell you that it's pretty great. Uh yeah, He
wrote on the Fox News website that Governor Cuomo of
New York is creating a much bigger health crisis in
his states hospital system by denying New Yorkers the choice
in consultation with their doctors to take this potentially life
saving medication. I have some medication choices I think would

(18:25):
help his lung cancer, and they are all bleach. Um,
So get in contact, Rush, I can tell you how
to drink it. It's very simple that you just need
a cup and bleach. We'll get We'll get you on
the path to health, buddy. Um. So yeah, it's cool. Um.
And as this all kept happening, the President also continued

(18:46):
to push hydroxy clo quin on the people of the
United States. In early April, Uh he told America, the
side effects are the least of it. You're not going
to die from this pill. I say, try it, uh,
he said, before saying I'm not a doctor, um, which
I guess makes him more responsible than Sean Hannity slightly.

(19:06):
Do you think the president got coronavirus and then he
took this and just like because of the like he
was going to get better, but and it's not related,
but he took it and he's better, So he thinks
that this is the miracle drug because of his personal experience.
Conspiracy theorist at some point a really good book, high

(19:28):
fives everybody. So far, all of the books about inside
the Trump administration have been terrible and usually very irresponsible
to Eventually there will be a good one. And I
hope we learned the answer to that mystery, Cody, because
it's the number one mystery in my head right now
outside of has he Like, Yeah, I will say the
number one mystery in my head right now about this
administration is did he fucking get it? Like? Did he

(19:50):
get it? And just like take a couple of days
off because he's got access to like I don't know,
I don't know, but because he did not get it? Yeah,
has he fucking gotten it? I don't know if he's
gotten it, But I do know one thing that is
a cure rate against COVID nineteen products and services. It

(20:12):
is products and services. And we can say that because
there's no consequences anymore. Thanks to Jared kuch Together, we're back.
So I wanted to go into everything. I just read

(20:33):
everything I could find about the actual scientific studies that
they've done on this ship, because I wanted to know
what what actually is out there, because like one of
my big worries is that people would get rightfully frustrated
at the President for telling people to take an unapproved medication,
and then this stuff would wind up to actually be
a miracle drug and it would cause everyone to trust
the President when he says, I don't know that the

(20:53):
media or heading towards Earth isn't a problem or something.
I had a real worry about that, So I really
wanted to know, like what the fund does the data say,
and the data says um a lot of complicated and
conflicting things because spoilers, there's actually very little good data
about the use of this ship against COVID nine team,
which is not surprising. Yeah, and it's used for something else.

(21:15):
I just I I don't even know when it's a
good time to bring this up. But I find it
really interesting that whenever anyone talks about this drug, they
refer to it as the malaria drug. Uh, when he's
also used for lupus, and when even like just like
every media organization seems to refer to it as the
malaria drug, which seems to be downplaying the importance of

(21:37):
the actual use it has in the medical community and
for for people. The media is just now getting comfortable
with the idea that a medication might treat two things.
So the fact that this actually might treat three things
is really more than we can expect from them in
terms of new ones. So they have had to knock
just lupus sufferers off the off the radar um. I mean,

(21:59):
it also does seem like an attack against I mean,
if we're looking at the fox of lupus, lupus is
the people were living with loopus are women. Most people
with lupus developed the disease between the ages of fifteen
and forty five, and lupus is two or three times
more prevalent among women of color. So it does feel

(22:19):
like a targeted attack that they are not mentioning this
right and by framing it as malaria, I feel like
it's like, well, if you're like an American reading the news,
then you'll be like, oh, malaria, I'm not gonna get malaria.
We don't need to worry about people with malaria. Yeah. Yeah. Well,
And it's also just that like even less than being
a targeted attack, it's just it's a group of people

(22:41):
that are easy to ignore because of the races the
mainstream media. Yeah, so that's all good, And we are
going to have an interview with a loopus um sufferer
who takes hydroxychloroquine at the end of this episode. But
I wanted to get into a summary of, like all
of the actual research that's been done. So when we
tell about the actual dangers the side effects of this medication, UM,

(23:03):
most of them seem to come from the fact that
you are generally mixing it with a powerful antibiotic, usually
is a thromycin um and the combination of hydroxy cloquine
and is it thromyacin uh, it prolongs the q TC interval.
And I don't know what that means other than that
any any medication that prolongs the qt interval UM can

(23:25):
cause heart failure in certain people who are at risk
UM and a recent study suggests that up to eleven
of coronavirus patients are in the so called red zone
for potential cardiac side effects high percentage. That is a
lot of people, UM and it means that those people
could be very easily killed by this combination of medications. UM.

(23:47):
So and it is accurate to say that hydroxy cloquine
on its own is historically very very safe. This is
a medication that that has very few side effects, a
very limited history of harming anybody. Um, it is a
very safe medication. But number one, people aren't just getting hydroxychloroquine,
and number two, the folks getting it aren't the folks
who normally get it. So it's there saying that it's

(24:09):
kind of ignoring a lot of critical details, including the
fact that it's it's really not even accurate to say
that hydroxy clorquin is the potential miracle cure here, because
the thing that most people are testing is hydroxychloroquine paired
with an antibiotic. It's a little bit like what people
do with like talking about ayahuasca when it's like, well, no, actually,
ayahuasca is a root within M A o I and
it and the d m T, which is the drug
that makes you trip is usually like something like Mamusa

(24:31):
hostiles root bark or another DMT contraining containing plant. But like, yeah,
it's this perfect example, thank you, thank you, I tried.
It's a bummer. Uh. And there have been some doctors
who have been complicit in spreading this bullshit. One of
them is Dr Steven Smith, the founder of the Smith
Center for Infectious Diseases and Urban Health. Uh. He's been
on Laura Ingram show, The Ingram Angle. Uh. He called

(24:54):
the treatment a game changer. Uh. He said, I think
this is the beginning of the end of the pandemic.
I'm very serious. Uh. And his evidence of this was
that not a single one of his COVID nineteen patients
who has been on the hydroxy clo quint and azithromycin
regiment for five days has had to be intubated. He
stated to Ingram, the chance of that occurring by chance.

(25:15):
According to my son's leon and Hunter, who did some
stats for me, as every reputable statician says, don't trust
a doctor who doesn't have large adult sons do running
the stats for him. Um, so that's great. So yeah,

(25:36):
he said that according to Leon and Hunter the stats
quote the stats from me are point zero zero something,
which he added was ridiculously low. He's something is low,
point zero zero something is very low. I would even
say it's ridiculous. How low that is? Like the specificity too, yeah, uh,

(26:00):
Leon and Hunter, if you want to be on the show.
We love having people named Leon on the show, particularly
big fans of that. UM. So yeah, this guy went
on to tie like the research that he and his
his sons had done to that discredited French study, saying
it bolstered that research. Um, and then research it really

(26:23):
did his his bad research really bolstered the other bad research. Um.
And another bad doctor got in on the game, because
doctor memit Oz has really been on Fox and Friends
a lot. Uh, and he brought up what he called
an important randomized study still unpublished from Wuhan, China. UM.
When this study suggested that was was you know, a

(26:44):
study of sixty two patients showed that the patients who
were given the hydroxy clarquin um plus traditional therapy had
better results in the patients who just had the traditional therapy. Um.
He said that. Uh, he said, quote, we think it's real. Um.
After talking to the medical leader ship in China, which
is one of the things that's fun to me is
this mix of like, you can't trust China on anything,

(27:05):
but when they say this medicine is good, like, yeah,
it's trustworthy. Um. Yeah. So that study in Wuhan that
he's referring to was published finally in the thirty one
of March. And since Dr oz is a complete fraud
and a liar who should be locked away in a
dark cell for the rest of his life, I'm gonna
turn to Derek Lowe from Science Magazine, who is an
extremely competent scientific writer and journalist and has done a

(27:25):
really good job of breaking down his these studies. His
his cover Science and Studies Magazine is not in quotes,
no no, no, no, he's he's an actual scientist, um.
And he writes very well about this. Like his writing
is a bit dense, but his in the Pipeline blog
does a very good job of analyzing the studies being
done on this, and I recommend him heavily as a source,

(27:46):
and I'm gonna quote from him him here quote. What's
good is that this one is blinded, randomized, and controlled,
so we can actually talk about it rather than just
spending all of our time wondering what the heck is
going on this time. There were thirty one patients in
the treatment group and thirty one in the control group.
Mean age was forty four point seven years male to
female ratio almost even both groups got standard of care
oxygen therapy antiviral drugs, antibiotics presumably against suspected bacterial pneumonia,

(28:09):
and immunoglobin with without cortical steroids. In addition, the treatment
group got five days of hydroxychloroquine two milligrams. All we're
diagnosed with relatively mild illness, but all had pneumonia by
CT scan. More patients in the in the treatment group
presented with fever and cough as opposed to the control group.
After five days of treatment, the treatment group showed significant
improvements in comparison to the controls and fever and cough

(28:31):
and in pneumonia by CT scan. This is actually the
first controlled study to show any benefit for clorquin or
hydroxy chloroquine therapy against the coronavirus and mace out odd
to say that, but all the positive reports we've had
up until now, our anecdotal reports and open label studies
without control groups, you could argue that overall we're seeing
either no yeah, yeah, and we'll talk about that a
little more later. You could argue that either we're seeing

(28:53):
no benefit or and this is his analysis of that study,
you could argue that overall we're seeing either no benefit
or some benefit here, which is good as for adverse effects,
neither child reported anything serious, but both of them excluded
patients with any sort of cardiac arrhythmias, a wise precaution
since one of the most acute worries with high doses
of hydroxy cloroquine is you know, the QT interval prolongation
we were talking about. UM, So long as such patients

(29:17):
are excluded for now, hydroxychloricin is in the might do nothing,
might do some good category, which under the current condition
seems sufficient for treating patients pending further data. So what
he's saying is that rather than being a miracle cure,
having a success rate, or being a good preventative, this medication,
when given only to people who are not at risk

(29:37):
of any sort of cardiac event, might possibly do some good.
Not a miracle cure, not unlike anything we've ever seen,
a medication that might provide a mild to moditate benefit
to a subset of the population who does not suffer
from heart disease. That's the most that can be said
based on good data. Period. I wasn't listening to anything

(30:00):
you said before or after miracle cure. So good, good, good,
That's that was the right thing to take from that dash, Robert. Now,
this study again, it excluded people with heart concerns. UM.
A different study that was recently shut down early in

(30:21):
Brazil did not exclude those people. UH. This study involved
eighty one hospitalized patients in the city of Manal and
was sponsored by the Brazilian state of Amazonis, and they
had to end it early for a number of reasons.
I want to say the first thing I should note
about this study is that it had no control group.
And it had no control group because Brazil's national guidelines,

(30:42):
because the President of Brazil, jayar Bolson, was the same
kind of guy as Trump. Brazil's national treatment guidelines recommend
the use of clarquin in coronavirus patients, so the researchers
were legally forbidden from having a placebo in their trial,
which means that this was, off the top a bad study.
But even so, the study had to be shut down
early UM because so many patients had adverse health reactions

(31:05):
to this medication. UM. Within three days, researchers started noticing
harder rhythmus and patients taking the higher dose, and by
the sixth day of treatment, eleven of these patients had died,
leading to an immediate end for the high dose segment
of the trial. Yeah. So they had to shut this
study down because it killed eleven people, and they weren't
even able to do a good study because the government,

(31:26):
which is like our government forbade them from fucking uh
from from doing a real study because it it mandates
the use of clarquin in these patients. So what did
the SUNS say? Oh, yeah, you know, none of this scientists,
the scientists who halted this study after eleven people died,
has no sons that I'm aware of. So clearly he's

(31:48):
best reputable, Yeah than leon and whoever the fun um Yeah, hunter,
the best most scientific first name. Um. So there was
another study, uh that came out recently from Marseilles Hospital,
and the scientists behind it was a guy named did
he a rolt uh and it presented a thousand and

(32:09):
sixty one patients treated for at least three days with
hydroxy clorquin and a zithromiasin with a follow up nine
days after. It includes the station nine the statement patients
were cured so far and that no cardiac toxicity was observed.
Um And says that, yeah, these patients did better as
a result of this medication, which sounds great, Right, You've

(32:29):
got a thousand patients no cardiac events curate. That sounds
like a miracle cure. However, this study again had no
control group. And the reason the study had no control group,
which is is because the doctor in charge of it
believes that it's immoral to use control groups because that
would be killing people, because he already went into this

(32:50):
believing that hydroxy cloroquine is a miracle care. Basically, so
that's not a great study. UM. Not a great study. UM. Yeah,
and it sounds like a bad study. Yeah, it does
sound like a really bad study. Sounds like a lot
of bad studies are done about this specifically, it does.

(33:12):
It does sound like a lot of bad studies. UM. Now,
when I went back to uh that that science magazine.
UM in the pipeline blog, I found another analysis of
a large multinational UM data gathering collaboration from Germany, Japan,
the Netherlands, Spain, UK, and the United States. And it
compares the safety of hydroxy color quint and rheumatoid arthritis

(33:34):
patients versus patients taking another common rheumatoid arthritis drug UM.
And it compares the safety of the combination of hydroxy
color quint and isithromius and taken together versus it in
another antibiotic like comoxi cillin. So this gives us like
a good data on just how what because it because
hundreds of thousands of patients were given these drugs, you know,
for things that we're not coronavirus, we can have at

(33:55):
least a better idea of how many people react negatively
when they are dosed with this combination of drugs UM
and the good news is that combining hydroxy clorquin with
certain UH medicines UM like sulfas sulfa, the sulfa salazine
doesn't show any difference in adverse events over one month
courses of treatments um SO like short term, there's certain

(34:18):
things you compare with hydroxychloroquine that don't seem to boost
cardiovascular mortality. But the azithromiac in combination, which the presidents
in the right wing news fear are specifically pushing UM
has been associated with significant um fift increased risks of
angelic chess plain and a heart failure, and a twofold
risk of cardiovascular mortality in the first month of treatment.

(34:41):
Um SO. Again, all of the large scale data shows
that there is significant risk of killing people with this ship.
So yeah, it's not ideal, and neither is the economy tanking,
you know, So people need to have some hope. They
need to think that there's an answer whether or not
a works, because the economy, because the economy. There's also

(35:05):
a study out in Michigan recently that was put together
by a bunch of ophthalmologists, which is weird, but it's
not necessarily a bad study, um. And they they claim
that quote our Infectious Disease division and our anti microbial
pharmacist who reviewed all the available data, and we found
no convincing evidence that these drugs were effective in treating
people with COVID nineteen um and that that data is

(35:27):
consistent with the observations of doctors in Michigan Medicines hospitals.
We haven't seen any clear evidence of benefits. So we
aren't going to use hydroxychlorquine routinely anymore. We were initially
recommending it to both patients and outpatients, but we are
no longer doing that routinely. That's based on the fact
that we've been prescribing hydroxy or quin for a few
weeks did not see therapeutic benefit, but did see adverse
side effects. So again, we don't have solid, perfect data

(35:54):
on this stuff, uh, and we won't for a while,
but the data that exists suggest us we do have
perfect data suggesting that the combination of hydroxy cor quin
and um azithromiasin is toxic and potentially fatal to a
large chunk of the population. We know that to a
matter of certainty because we have studies with hundreds of
thousands of people that say it um, and we know

(36:17):
that the data on whether or not this even helps
with COVID nineteen is far from a smoking gun, and
there's data that says it could be moderately useful and
data that says it's useless, and we do not have
um a hard uh factual conclusion on that yet. But
that's what we've got in terms of fucking science here.
So that's that's what I've put together. I'm done now.

(36:42):
I would be kind of phrase miracle cure a few times,
and I'm really focusing on that. There was a lot
of words, a lot of words, a lot of words
that phrase and then some more words. So yeah, because
a miracle cure would be good. Right, and so yeah,

(37:03):
there we go. Well, you know what is also America
Cure Services together everything and we're back, Cody back. I

(37:26):
want to hear we you worked on for this thing.
I know you got some juicy stuff. Present your homework
to the class, Cody, the class of America, the American class.
I I just listened to what the president said, and
I'm here to uh let you know that whatever he
said is good. Whenever Donald Trump does anything, you kind

(37:51):
of wonder why and like so, so Donald Trump and
associates they're they're mysteriously pushing this drug that may kill people,
may make things worse, may help people a little bit,
may do nothing. Sorry, so just one correction absolutely has
killed people. Yes, thank you, thank you very much for
that fact check. Um. Yeah, and sure, so that sounds

(38:15):
like something uh he and they would do. Trump and
his associates would do exactly this, um, which they are doing.
But why is I think an interesting question given the
fact that the president like you know, owns companies still
and could have been impeached by the emoluments clause long ago,
and has used his position to campaign and to make
money for his campaign, and he uses his campaign funds

(38:37):
for personal reasons. And he's just like a money crime guy.
You know, he's like into money crimes. Right. Um So
a decent guest to this why question would be money. Um.
I think you may have seen a lot of uh
like a torrent I would say, of headlines like this
one from the Daily Beast. Trump has financial interest in

(38:58):
hydroxychloroquin manufacturer. These all seem to be based on New
York Times piece about the matter uh quote. Some associates
of Mr Trump's have financial interests in the issue. Sinofi's
largest shareholders include Fisher Asset Management, the investment company run
by Ken Fisher, a major donor two Republicans, including Mr Trump,
Another investor in both Senafi and Milan. Another pharmaceutical firm

(39:22):
is Investco, the fund previously run by Wilbur Ross, the
Commerce Secretary. As of last year, Mr Trump reported that
his three family trusts each had investments in a Dodge
and Cox mutual fund whose largest holding was in Senofi.
Several generic drugmakers are gearing up to produce hydroxy clarquin pills,
including Amnil Pharmaceuticals, whose co founder Shirag Patel is a

(39:45):
member of Trump National golf course, Bedminster in New Jersey
and his golf in Mr Trump at least twice since
he became president, according to a person who saw them.
Um so as many have pointed out, though Trump's personal
investment is something he likely didn't even know about, and
it ranges fund. Yeah, it's like these like three family

(40:07):
trust and mutual fund and it ranges between five grand
and fifteen grand um as Snows puts it, Trump's financial
stake in these companies is virtually negligible, contained indirectly via
mutual funds and administered through three family trust he does
not control. As a generic drug, hydroxy chloroquine is unlikely
to provide any one company with significant profits compared to

(40:29):
other proprietary drugs. Um Vox also points out, in regards
to his associates, Ross, like Trump, is connected indirectly through
a fund he used to run. Fisher has long been
a Snophie investor through his asset management company, and while
Patel's company does plan to produce hydroxy chloroquin Amuel has
said it plans to donate pills as well. So they
are all these sort of light relationships via proxy, very

(40:53):
indirect that aren't really going to benefit these specific people. Financially.
I guess what you'll see mentioned mostly a couple of
people kind of indirectly related to a small fund may
not have even known about it. And although I don't
want to downplay how ghoulish pharmaceutical companies are UM as
well as the people who work for and benefit from them,

(41:13):
because they are. UH, it's not like a Trump problem.
It's a gestures to society problem. UH. For example, Open
Secrets and Sludge have reported. Last month, the conservative nonprofit
group Job Creators Network collaborated with healthcare nonprofit Physicians for
Reform to launch an online petition, a series of Facebook

(41:35):
ads and a mass text message campaign urging Trump to
make hydrox clerq when available to treat patients battling COVID nineteen. UM.
Real quick, but we get into it a little bit
about Job Creators Network. It's a conservative advocacy group co
founded by Bernard Marcus, who's a former CEO of Home Depot.

(41:55):
If you're fans of propaganda organization Prager University, you might
recognize the recently made a collaboration with Job Creators Network
is a video called what are stock buy Backs? And
the answer to that question is good. They're very good. Uh.
The video specifically mentioned journalism. It does. They did a

(42:16):
good job. They're good, and you should do them and
you should let companies do them. The video sparticularly mentions
home depots specifically. Uh, doing stock by packs is good
for some reason. I don't know. I don't know why
they would do that. Um in this collaboration between Job
Creators Network and Pregri University. But anyway. According to Open Secrets,

(42:37):
Marcus gave seven million dollars to outside group supporting Trump's
twenty sixteen presidential run. He also gave one hundred thousand
dollars to the pro Trump superPAC America First Action to
further support Trump's second presidential bid and plans to spend
even more to support Trump's reelection. Physicians for Reform often
works with conservative advocacy group Freedom Works to influence the

(42:58):
deregulation of health care policies. Uh, something that I'm sure
we'll go over really great. During this pandemic. Pharmaceutical Research
and Manufacturers of America gave millions in grants to conservative
groups that pushed industry friendly policies to Trump. According to
tax returns analyzed by Open Secrets, the industry's top lobbying
group gave Freedom Works one thousand dollars. It also gave

(43:20):
five hundred thousand dollars to the Job Creators Network in UH.
They represent the most powerful drug companies in the country,
such as Bayer, Nevardis, Tava, etcetera. Um. So, yeah, so
there's clearly like some financial benefit going on with people
pushing this drug. Um But it's not like Trump is

(43:40):
illegally doing it for himself specifically, or even like his
friends generally. It seems like, if anything, it's just yeah,
dark money, farma lobbying that isn't unique to Trump. A
happy accident. Yeah, it's just like he exacerbates these behaviors.
I think people get really angry at dark money a lot,

(44:02):
and they don't consider the fact that because the money
is dark, it helps block UV rays, which lowers your
risk of skin cancer. I think that's how dark money works.
So yeah, I read that in a study done by
Job Creator's Network. Yes, Big advocates of dark money as
a sunscreen. Yeah, it's dark money. It's it's just they're shy,

(44:26):
you know. Ye all I've heard in the last ten
minutes of sunscreen. I love sunscreen, sunscreen, we love sunscreen here, folks.
So yeah, so it's just yeah, dark money, pharma lobbying society. Um,
you're gonna have these groups pushing this kind of thing,
which again this group was definitely doing in March. U.

(44:46):
You can sign the petition if you want, Folks. It's
not really about him unless we don't want to talk
about a man named Joe Pizza, which we are going
to do right, No, Cody, Cody, Cody, we are not
going to drop into the bullshit partisan nonsense. You call
him Joseph Pizza, Joseph Robinette Pizza, thank you. I think

(45:10):
it's pronounced Joe Pizza Bezza yea Joe. Uh yeah, it's
again okay to make jokes about Italians. Yeah, I feel bad.
You can't be racist. No, you cannot be racist against
Italians anymore. We solve that problem. That's the law. That's
what the law says. That is the law. That is.

(45:32):
Laws are good. Following them all without question also good. Anyway, Cody,
I feel like you've got a spicy meat a ball
to unwrap about Joe Pizza. I might have a chef
kiss here and there, who knows. Um, So we're gonna
briefly talk about a man named Joseph Pizza. I can't
confirm that his middle name is Robinett. Um uh. Emotionally

(45:56):
it is. Most people named Joe their middle name is Robinette.
So yeah, Plumber Joe Robinette, we all remember him. Um. So,
according to Sludge Pizza, I'm gonna keep It's gonna be
really fun. Pizza, formerly of the band Muffin No Stop It.

(46:17):
Sludge said Pizza wasn't a band called Muffin. They did.
I love that. We are talking about incredibly important global
politics that the lives of millions hene on right now.
That's so good, it's uh, it's quite something. We're changing
the name of this podcast to Best Year Ever. Now

(46:40):
best your best year ever with Joe Pizza. Mm hmm um.
So yeah, he's a band called Muffin. I've been trying
to find a little more on Muffin um, but we
don't need to waste our time with that. He is
a big donor to the pro Trump Superpack America First Action,
given the group hundred dollars in twenty nineteen. Mr Pizza

(47:03):
has also made large donations to other organizations that backed
the president. Since sixteen, he has given sixty two thousand,
five hundred dollars to Trump Make America Great Committee, UH
sixty four hundred dollars to the Republican National Committee, and
four thousand dollars to Donald J. Trump for President. In
making his political contributions, Pizza has listed several pharmaceutical companies

(47:24):
as his employer, including Pharmasphere, inter Cam, and Pharma ce
According to his LinkedIn, Pizza's president and CEO of inter Cam,
which appears to be a U S sales representative for
companies from around the world that produce active pharmaceutical ingredients.
One product Interchem Sales is hydroxy chloroquin soul fate, the

(47:45):
primary active ingredient of plaquinil. He seems to have a
lot of connections with the pharmaceutical company. And before we
get too much more into the Trump of it all,
I have to read two paragraphs. One is on UH
Joe's about page Joseph Pizza. Joe has been a professional

(48:08):
musician since signing with the United Artists at age fourteen. Later,
he formed the band Muffin Muffin Is on All Caps
by the Way with his childhood friend Ron many No,
and they played to packed houses. Since then, Joe has
written the music and lyrics to over two hundred plus songs. Uh.
Just a tip for the about page. If you put

(48:30):
over and a number, you don't need to put plus
because that implies that it's over the number, So over
two D plus you don't need to do that anyway.
He has also penned numerous plays, one acts and screenplays.
His musical All for Joe, for which he wrote the book,
music and lyrics, has been showcased at the Duke Theater Um.
So again, I know this unbelievable, but I'm gonna unbelievable.

(48:55):
This is the first paragraph describing All for Joe on
the All for Joe website for Joseph Pizza's musical All
for Joe. Goddamn it, this is for you. This is
towards the end of the episodes, Like God for us all,
when was the last time the world around you came

(49:18):
together to help you live your dream? All for Joe
is the familiar, heartwarming story of one man's dream to
pursue his passion and leave his unfulfilling career behind him. Uh.
I imagine he's referring to as many pharmaceutical companies that
he works for in your typical suburban It does. Yeah,
it really does. It seems like soul crushing in a way.

(49:41):
Uh so maybe you know through music he will find
his way. But in your in your typical suburban neighborhood.
Joe and his wife Lauren. Uh side note, Joe Pizza's
wife's name in real life is Lauren, who will talk
about um struggle to keep balance in their home, marriage,
and community. As the events of a high school reunion

(50:02):
and an out of control teenage party unfold on the
same night, things take a turn for the worst. Before
looking up. Before looking up though with music book and
lyrics by Joseph M. Pizza, Dang Mobbinette Joseph Mobbinette Pizza
all through show post an impressive and diverse collection of
musical numbers, ranging from modern love songs finger snapping doo

(50:23):
op to old fashioned rock and roll. So, uh, that's
a little bit about Joe and I. Maybe we'll maybe
later we'll listen to uh some songs from his musical
not in this episode. Uh, don't get your hopes up,
but um, there's so much to say about Joe M.
Pizza and one of those yes, I don't have any

(50:51):
I came into this ready to really throw down some jokes,
you know, um to do my part, and I I
have nothing. I have nothing. There understand there's no joke
to be made. Really not really no, not really, I
understand you've got nothing. But you know who does have something?
Joe Pizza. And you know what he has. He has

(51:13):
a pharmaceutical company. You know what else he has. He
also has a residence. He also has a residence in
Palm Beach, located just two miles from the president's private
club Mara Lago Um. He also has a wife, Mr.
Pizza's wife, Lauren Pizza Um, who wrote a memoir and

(51:39):
before we get to a beautiful paragraph in that book,
the book is called Meant to Be The Lives and
Loves of a Jersey Girl. And the description of this
book by Lauren Pizza, wife of all for Joe's Joe
Pizza of uh Intercom is when Lauren Pizza was thirteen,

(52:01):
she died caught under a small sale solid opening line.
Caught under a small sailboat. She struggled to reach the surface,
only to find that what she thought was up was
actually down. And that's all she remembers happened to me
ever since being resuscitated by two strangers. Pizza has felt
a presence in her life from the spirit world. Is

(52:22):
it crazy? Maybe? Her family sure thinks so, and so
on and so forth. That's her memoir. By the way,
this isn't her her work or work of fiction. This
isn't meant to be a novel. This is a memo.
It's nothing like that sounded like a work of fiction. Cody.
That sounds like actually a scientific paper. Um Jesus with

(52:43):
I assume, with a forward by her two sons confirming, Um, yeah, no,
confirming the stats. Yeah, exactly. But I hate this so much.
It's it's not it's not great, but if but hey,
don't worry, because you're gonna love this next paragraph. There's more.

(53:04):
This is from the book. I've spent the last decade
and a half staying in five star resorts and dining
with people who can buy the town I grew up in.
Donald Trump sang Happy Birthday to me at mar A Lago,
and a billionaire sent me his private jet when I
missed my connecting flight in Milan. And she goes on
with more examples. It's probably, uh, maybe it's relevant that

(53:28):
Donald Trump sang Happy Birthday to her at mar Lago,
the private club where the president schmoozes with donors. Um
it maybe gives them favors to the wife of the
guy who is the CEO of inter Cam and lives
two miles away. I don't know. Um So in conclusion,

(53:50):
I don't know. Um it's a lot of there's just
a lot of these examples of things like, Okay, yeah,
that person talks to the president and we know that Trump.
Uh yeah, he's motivated by money. He's also motivated by
the last person who said anything to him. He just
like absorbs his thoughts and ideas and it's like that's

(54:11):
that's the thing, and he focuses and he fixates on them,
and then that's it. Um it doesn't necessarily have an
ulterior motive those sometimes they do something, but sometimes it
is just like a but Dr Oz told me, the
CEO of Oracle told me, Rudy Giuliani told me. And
now this is what I believe. You know what's really
crazy about all this if theoretically, and I'm saying theoretically

(54:36):
because this is the thing that has never happened and
never will happen. But if theoretically, the host of a
podcast were to hand out the address or even the
crude location of the Pizza home in Florida and urge
people to break into it and take things that would
be a crime. That would be a crime in that
person would have committed a crime you would have just

(54:57):
committed in front if you had said that, if I
had said that. But if Joseph Pizza were to talk
to his friend Donald Trump and say this hydroxy cloroquine
ship that I have a financial interest in really should
be bought up by everyone in sundry and used immediately
as a miracle cure. And if that President of the
United States, who was also entirely hypothetical, were to urge

(55:18):
people to take this without any solid scientific backing, none
of that is illegal. Yeah, it doesn't seem like pretty Yeah,
um if a bunch of money to that president too,
in addition to just being yeah, a local friend, I
love the you know. Okay, We've been at this for

(55:43):
about an hour, and I think we've gotten some good
information out and some deep frustrations out. But I am
now so overcome with rage that I think we have
no other option but to cut to our source for today. Um,
who is a young woman who has lupus and is
on hydroxy cloquine and relies on it to exist in

(56:04):
a way that is alive. UM, and wants to talk
about how this whole situation, which is again not a crime,
has has dramatically impacted her life and caused her unremitting horror.
So we're going to cut to that now. Hello, Abby,
thank you for being on worst year ever. UM. Do

(56:24):
you want to kind of introduce yourself more than me
just saying hello Abby thing? Hello? Hello? Uh So, my
name is Abby. I am a twenty six I'm located
over in Los Angeles, and I have had lupus likely
since I was twelve. That I was diagnosed at age two. Now,
when you say likely since I was twelve, could you
explain a little bit more about like how, how the

(56:45):
hell are you? Like, how you found out? You know what?
What what? What is that like? It's been a really
interesting process. So when I was twelve years old, I
was jumping on my friends trampoline in her backyard and
my knee just gave out, which, like you know, it
sounds like something that can happen to any kid hopping
on a trampoline, but this definitely was the start of

(57:05):
something in that period of time. In retrospect, I also
realized that I had been experiencing uh clarity, which is
an inflammation of the lining of my lungs. And so
my my parents were both physicians, so this was something
that I wasn't like brought to a hospital for my
dad's nacci all. Just my mom is a nurse, and
so it was the thing of like I was in

(57:27):
banned class that when I was twelve years old in
middle school and I was having trouble breathing, but I
definitely didn't have asthma uh and so that's kind of
what we landed on and it went away eventually. Um,
as I got older, my arms started to uh well,
I guess first my my other knee went A couple
of years later, like I had a similar experience that

(57:48):
like it just kind of made a loud, cracking sound
and then it was never the same sense. As I
got into high school, I was like getting pretty serious
about playing clarinet um and as I practiced and practiced
and practice for college auditions, my hands started to give
out and they swelled from I think I was about
a size eight ring and now on the size ten

(58:09):
of twelve uh, and the swelling just has never gone
down since UM still wasn't diagnosed though, So it was
just kind of like enjoy your misery, kid, time to
figure out what you want to do with your life
that is completely different from what you're planning on. UM.
So went through college with you know, continuous unexplained symptoms

(58:29):
UM from clarency to my joints, but that was those
were the main ones. UM. Once I got out of college,
I really took getting diagnosed serious, like more seriously, not
that I hadn't been. Like throughout my entire childhood. You know,
there was like an m R I here, a meeting

(58:50):
with a physician there. My dad would be at dinner
and ask his friend about it. Like there were just
these little inklings of uh, you know, possible diagnos stick treatment,
and nothing came up. Uh. Just the correct blood tests
were also never taken. I mean, if I really want
to get into you can cut some of out if
you want. But when I was a senior in college,

(59:12):
when I was home for winter break, I went to
a rheumatologist in Beverly Hills, like hoping that this man
would be uh the answers to my problems. He did
not even touch my body. Like he he like gave
me up and down. Look, he listened to what I
had to say, and then he was like, you five
from aalgia, and he prescribed me a couple of meds
that did nothing. So that sounds really really really really frustrating.

(59:35):
It was quite frustrating. Um. Finally, though, when I when
I graduated college in twos sixteen, I met with a
younger woman rheumatologist and she listened to me and touched
my body and actually took that time and ran the
right blood tests, and I was first diagnosed with undifferentiated
connective tissue disorder. Because that's kind of it's okay. So

(59:56):
if you look at it end diagram of rheumatorid arthritis,
systemic lupus, rick and ptosis, and two Jogrin syndrome. If
those were three circles and have been diagram, undifferentiated connective
tissue disease sits right in the middle. There's a light
theory that all autoimmune diseases are somewhat the same thing,
but we differentiate them as diagnosticians based upon what is
being affected. So like, uh, you know, you're more likely

(01:00:19):
to be diagnosed with sovereign syndrome if you just can't
seem to produce any tears or saliva, because that's where
the autoimmune disease is attacking your body. But I ended
up on joints as a primary problem, so that's why
I end up with that one. UM. But as I
I had to switch doctors for a number of reasons
and I began to flare, and so uh I A

(01:00:42):
was started on hydroxy color quinn. Then though in the
summer of I've been taking it ever since. I've never
stopped four d milligrams a day. UM. And after about
a year of being on it, I stopped getting like more,
I stopped getting as much disease activity. And then we
kind of focused on, you know, talking about my my

(01:01:02):
life history in my doctor's appointments a little bit more,
and we realized that, yeah, I've probably have LUPAS for
a much longer time. Uh My. My diagnosis still says
undifferentiated connected tissue disorder though, because the treatment is the
same and we don't want my insurance premiums to go up,
which is another very interesting twist in the way that
we treat people in the US. I know, uh, it's

(01:01:25):
real fascinating. Uh, but you know I do get the
very notable uh butterfly rash across my face every now
and again. Um. I I experienced clears. You experienced daily
joint pain. Uh. My vitamin D has always been deficient. Uh,
and so I take a lot of vitamin D weekly.
It's it sucks. I really wouldn't recommend it to anybody. Well,

(01:01:48):
that's a strong anti uh lupus statement, which I don't
know people can agree with or disagree with. You autoimmunit
seasons aren't fun. How would you describe like the importance
of being able to access hydroxy chloroquine, Like what happens
to you if you are no longer able to get
this medication? So, Um, I've never gone off of it

(01:02:10):
since I was on it, but I can describe my
worst flare, and that's what I anticipate would be the
beginning of my experience of being off of it. Uh,
since I have not actually done that. But I'm very
scared too. So my last really bad flair summer and
I had been on vacation. You're not supposed to spend

(01:02:31):
a lot of time in the sun as a person
with lupus. You're sensitive to UV radiation to begin with,
and actually hydroxy chloroquine makes you more sensitive to UV,
which is really fascinating. So I spent a lot of
time in the sun for a week at altitude, and
I was also drinking a lot because it's vacation. And
the very last day, UH, my joints started to swell

(01:02:51):
around five PM. Like, we noticed that my knees were hot,
and my chest was flushed, and my face had the
malar rash. And then by now I p m. Every
single one of my joints was bolen, including my jaw,
and so like my teeth didn't connect and it was like,
you know, it was the last native camp. So I
went to the camp dance with my cane and everybody
freaked out, but I just wanted to have fun. Um,

(01:03:13):
So that would my assumption be the beginning of what
I would face. Thankfully that that flare didn't last too
long because I I hit it with some steroids right
at the beginning. But steroids are really rough on the body,
and prednizone will make me further immuno compromised UH and
any other treatment that I would seek out as a

(01:03:36):
lupa's patient without my hydroxy chloroquine would be further immunosuppressive
than hydroxy chloroquine already is, which like that that is,
hydroxy chloroquine is less of an immunosuppressant than other LUPAS medications.
It's actually more of an immuno regulator. So while it
does change the way that my immune system functions, it
doesn't just tamp it down. It It changes how it

(01:04:01):
interacts with my body, so it stops it from you know,
beating up my own system and instead directs it to
function more properly. But as I said, not as suppressive
as other things like metho trek state and a lot
of these other medications can really only be delivered properly
through I V. So that would mean that if I

(01:04:21):
were to seek treatment, I would have to go into
a doctor's office or a hospital. Where as an already
immunal compromised person, I would be more likely to catch
COVID nineteen if I don't already have it. And as
we've seen across the country, there are a triage uh

(01:04:41):
you know, methods being put into place. UH. And so
knowing that I'm more likely to get worse once infected
UH and knowing that I would be less likely to
be considered for a ventilator. Uh, should I get worse?
This just seems like the beginning of a domino effect
of shittiness. Absolutely, And I mean pregna zone is brutal

(01:05:03):
on somebody that doesn't have an autoimmune disorder. It's so
hard that body and makes you feel like you're going
to pass out at any moment in time. Yeah, like
you got hit by a truck. It's literally. Yeah. And
have you noticed any sort of difficulty, Like I've been
reading online, a lot of people have had trouble getting
their full like they've been going. They have been able

(01:05:25):
to get yeah, like ninety day prescriptions or whatever. Um,
they've been locked down a thirty year. Yeah. Coincidentally, I
picked up a ninety day prescription at like the end
of January, beginning of February, so I had a stockpile,
you know. Yeah, who would have thought, Um, I was
just started traveling and so I you know, I picked
up for that, Uh, correct me up. That actually gave
me like the prescription bottle, like the manufacturer's bottle, because

(01:05:47):
they're like, just take it, You're taking all of it. Anyway,
I thought that was amazing. Um, you gotta take the
little joys when you're product real. So um, all of
that said, I am thankfully okay for now that I
know this this won't last forever, and I've been really
in touch with the way that this story has unfolded
since uh it started. I actually saw like the o

(01:06:07):
g elon Musk tweet and somebody had posted on Reddit
in February that there was some testing of hydroxy chloroquine
in China, So I was like tapped in on this one.
How did that feel when you see that, like this,
this weird little niche, you know, hydroxy chloroquine. Nobody who
didn't take it knew what the hell this stuff was
prior to that Musk tweet. It's also a relatively drug

(01:06:30):
as well, I mean chloric for a while, but yeah,
hydroxy chlorquine has been around a little. Uh it's a
little bit more recent than chloroquine itself. But like overall,
this is an old drug. It's an old malarial that
actually doesn't work as well on malaria anymore, so it's
been kind of abandoned in its original treatment form and
now it's almost exclusively only grabbed automneian people which has

(01:06:50):
been an infuriating like invisibility that media has allowed us
to fall into. Uh rarely is it actually described as
well it is used for I digress how it felt
to read that on like read it and Twitter and everything.
At first, I was like, oh, yoh, that's my boy,
Like maybe this is the only good thing that my

(01:07:12):
visibility has ever donne for me, Like what if I'm
you know, I'm gonna live forever, I'm never gonna get
this but yeah, yeah, right again, gotta gotta make little jokes.
As the story, though, became more clear, and I you know,
kept in touch with this musk tweets and started I
have like a spreadsheet of all of these resources that
I've been following because the story has just balloon so quickly. Um,

(01:07:35):
it became more and more clear that this is going
to be a big problem for not only me, but
like I will say, us as a community of automan
people who take this drug. Uh. And it's like completely
taken over my life. I have no work right now,
I'm gonna I'm a professional photographer and as you can imagine,
events that I would usually shoot have evaporated. And my

(01:07:56):
day job is scooping ice cream and I'm too immuno
compromised to do that, So I have nothing better to
do but track this and stress over it. As the
sort of stockpiling has begun. Um Like I don't know,
Like I keep just wanting to ask, like how does
it feel to have your your health care jeopardized by

(01:08:16):
a president desperate for like a miracle cure, Like it's this,
it's this, yeah, yeah, it is full fal but this
has h Like I feel like the way that I'm
being viewed by my friends is like, oh, this is
just abby, you know, making it all about her, when
it's like no, no no, no, no, no, no, you guys
don't understand, Like this is it for us. For most

(01:08:37):
people with lubis, this is the only drug that we
can take for a relatively normal life, Like otherwise you
kind of have to structure your life around infusions and
like for some people, these infusions are really really taxing.
And so that's you know, three days off of work,
like one day to prepare, one day to get it,
one day to recover. Like these are tough drugs in

(01:08:59):
the best of time times, but to see that our
most successible drug during a pandemic is being kind of
co opted as a political football, and what it's turned
into is is truly that like divisive? Uh, that divisive
thing that people are latching onto. Like the more and

(01:09:19):
more I've read, or rather, let me rewind slightly because
the original um news stories that started coming out, let
me scroll up, because the everything organized by date. Some
of the first stories that came out, we're on Breitbart
in the Blaze, those were on March eighteen. Um, those

(01:09:39):
are the first ones that I saw outside of like
Elon must mentioning it on Twitter on March sixteenth. Um,
So seeing it be grabbed so immediately by righty Twitter
was alarming. Um. And then yeah, yeah, like having that
then the like twisted into this narrative of like you're

(01:10:02):
being selfish? How dare you take this drug that you've
always taken because you're worried for your health? Like as
if that that that's not what other people are saying,
and it's the lack of scientific literacy in the conversation
overall has been Um, have you actually had people call
you selfish for taking this medication? Absolutely? Read it was

(01:10:22):
the first class called selfish. And then book yeah, like
how like I'll be fine if I don't take this medication.
Obviously it's Jeff lupas. So yeah, um, I really don't
think that people know what lupas is, like whether uh
it's you know, helped by Doctor House saying it was
never Les. I'm gonna I was gonna say, my whole

(01:10:43):
knowledge of lupus comes from doctor House. Yeah. Um. So
the quick summary though, because I feel like I haven't
really said that, I've only talked about it for me. Um,
the lupus is an autoimmune disease that is the most
kind of broad descriptor of an autoimmune disease, Like you'll
get at something like uh, you know ankloting spondylitis, which
is like really focus on your lower back and pain there,

(01:11:08):
or like Celiac disease has a clear cause and effect
of you know, uh, gluten being the cause and then
your immune system responding to that. But lupus is like
you can experience inflammation from your body attacking itself literally anywhere.
But there are some consistencies, so like most of us

(01:11:28):
get that rash, most of us experience problems in the sun,
but every everybody with lupas is different. Um. One of
the worst things that can happen for lupus patients is uh,
pericardial swelling, so the swelling of the tissue around your heart,
which can then interfere with its feeding. And then the
other thing is lupus loves the kidneys. Lupas nephritis is

(01:11:49):
one of the most common deadly versions of lupus. That
was actually why Selena Gomez got a kidney transplant, Like yeah, yeah,
so I was actually really trying to get Selena goal.
It's his attention at first, and she's kind of been
tunting about it, but not really because I guess she's
fine now, so whatever. Um, but uh, like, not taking

(01:12:09):
our medication is not just like you'll put up with
some pain for a while, Like I put up with
pain every day because there's no rewinding the ten years
of uncontrolled disease that I experienced. But without it, there
is the chance that my immune system will attack my
kidneys and I will die because like, what am I
going to get a kidney transplant during a pandemic? Probably not? Who? Well,

(01:12:33):
um Jesus, that is I think without you know, getting
too partisan because reporters aren't allowed to have opinions some bullshit. Um,
let me second, that that's some fucking bullshit. I can
also speak to a little bit more, and I've been
experiencing online because I think it's fascinating. Yeah. So I've

(01:12:54):
been following the story as to you guys know, I
sent you my my big spreadsheet. UM. And as I've
been and following it more and more, and as I've
been like, you know, proudly adopting my reply guy Crown, UM,
I've been seeing the way that the like meme culture
is kind of curdling this narrative. And then on Facebook,

(01:13:15):
I have been getting inundated by friend requests from all
men with Southeast Asian names that I'm assuming our boss.
But I've gotten dozens within the last twenty four hours
and then a couple before then that I can somewhat
trace back to a comment that I made on a
Wall Street Journal article advocating for Luca's patients getting protections

(01:13:36):
for our medication. Um, I have screenshots of full all
the friend requests, the messages that I've been getting, and
because like I got messages from some of them that
have been like gone to filtered messages, and then I
have like all of the friendly requests that I got.
It's just really weird. And it feels like I'm experiencing

(01:13:56):
bought networks that are set up specifically to so discord.
I have no proof of this yet, but I have
some light connections that could lead me to this conclusion,
or at least lead me to where I'm at now.
There's no conclusions yet, but I've been trying to get
in touch with reply all actually to see if they
can figure out what's going on. Oh, that's a good
call it And it's primarily on Facebook. Primarily on Facebook. Um,

(01:14:20):
I've tweeted up with by Ale a couple of times,
and I emailed them with all of the like friend requests.
But it feels like such a conspiracy theory even like
saying it out loud. But like, I don't know, I'm
experiencing a weird thing right now, and there's some I
don't know, there's stuff going on. As someone who has
like periodically jammed his head into aspects of the culture

(01:14:41):
war online from a reporting standpoint, Um, I get regularly
deluged in waves that go along with those head jammings.
Um of of folks you know signing that for Botanich
works for bullshit or not bott signing me up for
like mailing list, people like random um sex bo reaching
out to me on Google Hangout. It's like, yeah, it's

(01:15:02):
a thing that happens, um, when you wind up in
the middle of one of these culture war firing squads. Yeah,
and like, I have no intention to stop doing what
I'm doing until we are actually seeing progress on LUCAS
patients being guaranteed access to our medication. So like we'll
see where I end up. All right, Well, um, Abby,

(01:15:24):
I think that's everything we had. Thank you so much
for coming on. If you guys need anything else, you know,
I got all the resources and I'm just gonna keep
going on this one, So thank you so much. Well
that's gonna do it for us here at whatever this
show was called, no one knows anymore. It's been so
long ago that we created it. It's called next Year.
Please next year, please ye the year. Everything is fine

(01:15:47):
the year check us out next week if we are
all still alive, which is a crapshoot. You can find
us online at where steer pod on the things, you know,
the Instagram thing and the Twitter thing. Uh, you know,

(01:16:08):
stay safe, you guys, wash your hand, yeah, wash your
hand as safe Don't Commit Crimes where some check out
the latest album from Muffin Don't. Oh yeah, definitely check
out Muffin. Oh my god, absolutely check out Muffin. See

(01:16:28):
if your local theater's got any performances of All for
Joe coming up. Oh yeah, check that shut Out too. Okay, Hi,
we are all right. Every Everything I Tried, Worst Your

(01:16:51):
Ever is a production of I Heart Radio. For more
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