Misleading: In India, promising studies on ivermectin were stopped for political reasons.

There is no evidence that this step was "political." WHO doesn't recommend ivermectin.In an interview with the far-right outlet, the Epoch Times, Dr. Robert Malone alleged that promising studies on ivermectin were stopped for political reasons in India. He said: "There’s some great epidemiologic studies or data coming out of India where certain Indian states had been on ivermectin. The incidence of attack rate of disease was low. Then they withdrew it for political reasons. There was a change in regime. It went up. Then they reimplemented it. It went back down again. So that’s pretty strong evidence." According to the World Health Organization (WHO), ivermectin is an anti-parasitic drug. It is used to treat illnesses such as river blindness (onchocerciasis) and scabies. At the moment, WHO recommends that ivermectin be used only in COVID-19 trials, as it is still unclear if the anti-parasitic helps treat COVID-19. In India, healthcare authorities have been using ivermectin during the COVID-19 pandemic in the hope that the drug reduced the severity of COVID-19, or prevented severe cases altogether. However, the most recent guidelines show that healthcare authorities no longer recommend ivermectin. As India Today reported, "the Union Health Ministry and Family Welfare's directorate general of health services (DGHS) has issued revised guidelines to stop the use of Ivermectin and Doxycycline in Covid-19 treatment." There is no evidence that this move was, as Malone alleged, "political" or what his "change in regime" comment means exactly. Malone did not expand on these particular comments. UPDATE: In September, India Today published an article explaining the reasoning behind the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and the National Task Force on COVID-19 dropping the use of ivermectin. As the paper reported, "Studies [...] found there was no clarity on mortality benefit, no effect on length of hospital stay and recovery in case of Ivermectin." The COVID-19 pandemic has given rise to a lot of potentially dangerous misinformation. For reliable advice on COVID-19, including symptoms, prevention, and available treatment, please refer to the World Health Organization or your national healthcare authority.