focus
By Modesto P. Sa-onoy
The news last Monday spread quickly that the Food and Drug Administration has granted the application of a local pharmaceutical company to manufacture, distribute and sell the controversial drug, Ivermectin. The news came out in the national press last May 7 but word of mouth and social media took it from there. Some drugstores also told their clients that they have Ivermectin and will now sell to the public.
Not that Ivermectin had been entirely lost. The fact is that the drug has been sold and bought in the underground because of the government’s ban on it. Since the drug has been proven effective, safe and cheap, government enforcers could not stop its spread.
Indeed, no law can ever prevent a good thing at a time when people are in critical need of help and the government has nothing to offer except a vaccine with adverse effects and at a high price. Despite massive propaganda, mainly false, against Ivermectin, the drug continues to spread. Fake news from mainstream media and the government have their limits although they can inflict great harm.
The Philippine Star news said that FDA Director-General Eric Domingo told reporters they gave Lloyd Laboratories a certificate of product registration for Ivermectin “after they submitted data to support quality and stability of the product.”
Lloyd Laboratories’ can now sell Ivermectin but it can be purchased only with a prescription.
In its delaying calibrated tactics, the FDA placed conditions to this as an anti-parasitic by banning its use for the prevention or treatment of COVID-19 while mainstream media kept on insisting that the evidence of its effectiveness is “thin”. Well, for people in dire need of help, “thin” is better than nothing.
This claimed “thin evidence” is actually extremely thin if not non-existent because there are more evidence of the effectiveness of Ivermectin than the vaccine that has resulted in deaths and other adverse effects. No adverse effects, only good results had been reported worldwide about Ivermectin.
The report said that “Domingo has admitted that the FDA is under pressure on the approval of Ivermectin, but said that this has not affected their regulatory processes.”
This is serious. If Domingo is absolutely certain that Ivermectin is dangerous, toxic as earlier claimed by WHO and DOH, he should not have given in to pressure. In fact, if forced to approve a dangerous drug, he should have the courage to resign otherwise he would have death and other illness over his head.
He could have produced proof against Ivermectin instead of making blanket statements that go against the facts presented by experts from other nations.
Deputy Speaker Bernadette Herrera-Dy (Bagong Henerasyon Party-list), who hailed the FDA’s registration of the drug nevertheless said, “I would like to personally thank FDA Director General Dr. Eric Domingo for being open to our suggestions, and for taking the necessary steps to ensure that this in-demand drug now has clear regulation and quality-control standards behind it.”
Moreover, Domingo had earlier allowed six hospitals to use Ivermectin, not because of pressure but because he knew that it was not dangerous as the anti-Ivermectin propaganda claim.
The major obstacle of Ivermectin is that people of power and profiteering pharmaceuticals cannot make huge money from it. The patent of this drug once owned by Merck had already expired so that it can be manufactured by any laboratory. Remember Dr. Allan Landrito who was harassed for manufacturing Ivermectin? Well, now he has been vindicated in his contention that Ivermectin is safe and cheap.
Because Ivermectin is cheap and safe, it poses a serious threat to the government and big pharmaceutical producing the vaccine that does not immunize or protect and is extremely expensive.
If people are getting vaccinated, it is because the government pays for those vaccines otherwise it would be impossible for the poor to get the jab. But at what price to the nation at the time of economic slowdown?
The government has to borrow millions of dollars to pay for those vaccines and tie us down to the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund that intends to “change” our way of life. We will soon become their prisoners and dictate on our government. Even now our liberties are restrained.
