Do You Really Want to Take A Horse Drug for COVID-19?

We Humans – Collectively Speaking – Sure Fall Short on Horse Sense. Do We Really Deserve to Survive as a Species?

“Take one of those every half mile and call me if there’s any change.”                                      – Dr. Hugo Z. Hackenbush, played by the late, great Groucho Marx, administering a horse drug to an actual horse, for once,  and not to a human patient.

“There are safe and available prophylaxis and treatments for COVID that do not involve the vaccine. The drug ivermectin, as well as a number of nutraceuticals, has been shown to be efficacious in treating COVID.” –, the Organic Consumers Association, a North American-based advocacy group pushing trash remedies for COVID-19 from sources like Facebook, Fox News and the Trump cult

A Commentary about Horse Tales and Other Anti-Vaxxer Trash by Niagara At Large reporter and publisher Doug Draper (With apologies to Mr. Ed)

Posted September 2nd, 2021 on Niagara At Large

There’s a story (or should I call it a bit of a horse tale) I got to tell you.

A few nights back I had one of those COVID dreams. Some of you may have had at least a few of them yourself during these dark and stressful times.

They are dreams that often put you in bizarre places or circumstances with all kinds of characters you haven’t thought about in a gazillion years, and at least some you wish you wouldn’t think about for another gazillion years.

Well, in this particular dream a horse stuck his head over a fence in my backyard, and started talking to me in fluid English.

‘My name is Mr. Ed,’ the horse said.

‘Holy galloping bejeezus,” I responded. “Don’t I remember you from an old TV show I used to watch when I was a kid? But let’s get something straight,” I was quick to add. “My name is not Wilbur.”

“Well my name isn’t Donald Trump, and it certainly isn’t Tucker Carlson or Sean Hannity. I don’t do Fox New,” the blond haired steed brayed “The name is Mr. Ed, so let’s get down to a little no-nonsense horse trading.”

“I’ll give you some important information,” offered the horse, “in return for a nice bale of hay.”

“I don’t grow any hay here Ed,” I replied as I began feeling comfortable conserving with the palomino on a first-name basis “so what about a nice big bag of freshly cut grass clippings? But not one blade of grass,” I added as the horse trading continued, “until you give me the information.”

“Well, okay,” agreed Ed, who proceeded to tell me in a horse whisper, so others in the neighbourhood couldn’t hear, that there is this drug out there that comes in the form of a pill or a paste that does a much better job of protecting people from COVID-19 than any of those vaccines that Health Canada or the U.S. Food and Drug Administration are recommend.

The drug is called Ivermectin, the horse explained, and there are all kinds of individuals and groups, from Trump backers and members of the old Tea Party, to this Association that is in to organic food, that recommends it.

“Wait a minute,” I said to the horse. Isn’t this a drug that has been approved for de-worming horses and cows? I don’t think it has ever been approved for people.”

“Now you are asking too many questions,” said the horse. “Stop listening to that doctor of doom and gloom Anthony Fauci, and take it,” he said as he added as he handed it to me. “I know the pill is a little large but you can wash it down with five buckets of water.”

At that point, the dream ended and I bolted awake with more sweat on me than Secretariat had on him when he won his final race for the Triple Crown in 1973.

The dream was over and a bit of an internet search informed me that the real Mr. Ed died and was buried in the Los Angeles/Hollywood area some 50 years ago.

Then later that same day, I turned on what many anti-vaxxers would call “the fake news” – you know CNN and MSNBC- to find out that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration had placed a message on social media urging people not to take the horse drug.

Here is the U.S. FDA’s  Social Media message –

Then, while physicians in both the United States and Canada found themselves having to plea with some of their patients not to take the drug – just as they had to plea with patients last year not to follow the recommendations of a former U.S. president not to drink bleach – one renown infectious disease expert after another was identifying the drug as another example of mis-information peddled by vaccine resisters and conspiracy theorists.

When I was a wee little kid, and way before I had time to develop a critical mind, Mr. Ed was a TV hero of mind. Now he just seems like a horse’s ass.

But seriously folks. And I am seriously. No more dreams here. Bye Ed.

We are still in the throws of a full-blown, global health crisis that in Canada and United States alone – even before we possibly suffer through a fourth wave – has taken the lives of more people than were killed while fighting for the two countries in World Wars One and Two alone.

Yet we still have a significant enough minority of people out there who will not take a vaccine that statistics show are protecting against serious illness and death, and would rather try a horse drug or some other quack remedy instead.

All of this anti-vaccine trash they continue to swallow from social media and an army of self-serving quacks while they continue to serve as magnets or vectors for even more deadly variants of this virus that could keep this pandemic raving our lives and communities for many more months or years to come.

I continue to be haunted by something that Dr. Anthony Fauci – one of the world’s foremost infectious disease experts going back to the years when he played a role developing life-saving treatments for AIDs – said a few months ago.

 “If everyone who could get vaccinated took the vaccine, we could crush this thing,” the good doctor said.

With that in mind, no wonder patience is running out for those who continue to refuse to get vaccinated.

What in hell is going on with this significant sub-culture of people in Canada and the United States who continue to refuse what on-the-ground statistics has proved to be s highly effective tool for preventing serious illness and death?

It has gotten to a point where we are beyond trying to have a reasonable conversation with all of these anti-vaxxers. As the late planetary scientists Carl Sagan once said and I paraphrase – “You cannot reason someone out of a belief or position that they did not reason themselves in to.”

It is a little risky to generalize about a whole species, and I know that there are plenty of people out there who have active responsibly and beyond their own self-interests to take the vaccine and to take whatever other precautions they can to protect themselves and others in their community.

Having said that, every cat I have lived with in my home has shown more sense in looking after themselves, let alone others, than too many of these individuals who will not do what we need to do to end this pandemic.

All the more reason why we need vaccine passports for fully vaccinated people to protect all of us and our public institutions and businesses from those who continue to risk our health and economy through their selfish, reckless actions.

To watch an old Marx Brothers movie (circa 1937) called ‘A Day at the Races’, featuring Groucho Marx as Dr. Hugo Z. Hakenbush playing a horse veterinarian posting as a doc for people, here is a segment of the film you can click on immediately below that makes about as much sense as anything we get out of anti-vaxxers –

And now, just in case you are either too young or too old to remember Mr. Ed in TV land, click on the screen immediately below for a peak –

For more information, click on the links below – 

https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/you-are-not-a-cow-fda-begs-americans-to-stop-taking-drug-meant-for-livestock-as-covid-19-remedy-1.5556324

https://www.fda.gov/consumers/consumer-updates/why-you-should-not-use-ivermectin-treat-or-prevent-covid-19

NIAGARA AT LARGE Encourages You To Join The Conversation By Sharing Your Views On This Post In The Space Following The Bernie Sanders Quote Below.

“A Politician Thinks Of The Next Election. A Leader Thinks Of The Next Generation.” – Bernie Sanders