Hydroxychloroquine and the Mainstream Media: A National DIS-service

by Phil Erwin

In the early weeks of the Coronavirus pandemic, there was an actual back-and-forth debate about whether Hydroxychloroquine (HCQ) would prove an effective way to combat the virus.

Three months into the U.S. spread of the infection, the initial indications were at least promising, and the Media seemed, if not hopeful, at least interested in whether the treatment would pan out.

Here is what was known, and somewhat reported in those early weeks:

1. There were several practicing doctors, notably one in France, who had been treating COVID patients with HCQ in concert with a well-known antibiotic called “Z-pak”. Their practical experience indicated the HCQ/Z-Pak combination was highly effective at halting the illness, and rapidly promoting recovery. (They noted rapid improvement within the first couple of days!)
2. If the patient was too far into the illness before the drugs were administered, the recovery was much less certain. If the patient was already in need of an ventilator, it was likely too late for the drug to help.
3. There was no associated risk except for people who had heart arrhythmia. With that one exception, there really was no reason to avoid using this treatment for anyone testing positive, or exhibiting likely symptoms of this disease. HCQ had been used to treat other diseases all around the world for decades! Treatment for COVID would last only a few days. There was mounting evidence indicating it would greatly improve the patient’s chances of recovery, provided it was administered early enough.
4. There were even indications that it might be useful to keep you from catching the virus, though this was speculative. (Nevertheless, the President did take it when he was exposed to the virus… and he has not contracted the disease!)

HCQ is not formally a COVID “cure” or “vaccine.” It is a treatment for the symptoms that seems very effective in preventing the infection from spreading if taken early enough.

That sounds like something we should have been widely prescribing for anyone showing the symptoms, or testing positive, doesn’t it? So how come we aren’t? What stopped us from doing that?

In two words: The “Mainstream Media.”

The nation’s news outlets that are considered “mainstream” (still!), including ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN and their on-line counterparts such as MSNBC, together with the nation’s supposed “newspaper of record” New York Times and its ilk, have all been working for several months to convince the American public that HCQ does not work, and might be dangerous.

In the U.K., use of the drug was halted on the basis of a study that appeared to show just that. And shortly thereafter, the FDA also removed approval for widespread use.

Why the hell would they do that?

Simple. Because Trump touted the treatment. And the “Mainstream” Press is so virulently anti-Trump that they will do anything in their power to prevent him from leading the nation past this pandemic.

The Mainstream Media are so virulently anti-Trump, they are willing to sacrifice thousands of American lives – by deliberately blocking the use of an effective treatment – in order to prevent his re-election.

Like a character in an old Twilight Zone episode says: “You think about that, now.”

The instant President Trump publicly praised HCQ as a promising potential weapon against the coronavirus, the Media turned openly hostile against it.

They ignored all promising studies of the HCQ/Z-pak combo, and focused all their attentions on that one single study that seemed to show the treatment was not only useless, it might even be dangerous.

Turns out that study was so flawed, it was retracted two weeks later. But did the Media tell you that? Did they say, “Oops! Our bad! It really isn’t dangerous, it actually works pretty well (except in this one study, where all the patients were so close to death, it was given way too late!”)

Did they tell you that?

No. They did not.

Nor did they tell you that the “mounting evidence” and “new reports” of failures of HCQ to show “any efficacy” against COVID was entirely based on flawed/incomplete studies, manipulated statistics and invalid conclusions. Meanwhile, the doctors who were actually treating COVID patients with an HCQ/antibiotic combo were seeing promising-to-remarkable results.

Don’t think the Media would actually suppress the Truth? In late July they conspired to hide/remove/ban a video from all the “social media” and Leftist-Press Web sites in order to squelch the Truth delivered by COVID front-line doctor-warriors. It’s a 45-minute testimonial filmed by doctors who traveled to D.C. specifically to inform you that the Press is bamboozling you. Check the chart  in the above link showing global fatality rates with/without HCQ; and  then watch the sparks start flying at 5:25 minutes in, where a lady doctor tells of curing 350 COVID patients with HCQ without losing a single patient! She is emphatic: “America, there IS a CURE!”

Yet, once the Liberal/Leftist Media settle on a news issue and spin it into a Story!, they no longer care about the truth of that issue. All they care about is the Story!

Truth be damned! Here’s what we want you to believe!

Is that any way to run a democracy?

The First Amendment guarantees “The Press” a special freedom, for one simple reason: It is their charge, their responsibility, to root out and disseminate the Truth, so that We the People have that Truth upon which to base our own, individual governing decisions.

Of course, we don’t make the day-to-day governing decisions; we delegate those to our elected representatives. And we elect those representatives on the basis of the news delivered to us by The Press.

If that news is not trustworthy; if it’s wrong, if it’s incomplete – and especially, if it is deliberately massaged to distort the Truth – then our own governing (electoral) decisions are also inherently flawed and untrustworthy.

No matter how diligent and smart you are: If you are working with flawed information, your choices are also likely to be flawed.

So The Press is granted Constitutional protection because We the People need their watchdog-services to uncover and deliver us The Truth about our world and our Government.

If you can’t trust The Press, how can you trust your own decisions as to whom to vote for?

Answer: You can’t.

So we must insist – No, Demand! – that the Press deliver us only the Truth. The whole Truth. And nothing like that hyper-biased BS that spews constantly from the likes of Rachel MadCow!

So: If the news sources you have been relying upon have not told you that Hydroxychloroquine is very helpful against the pandemic, and could have been saving thousands of American lives if only the Press had promoted it, rather than turning you against it, then you need to change your source for news.

I recommend One America News Network, FOX News and FOX Business for televised coverage. Their on-line coverage is also good, fair, and fairly complete, but you can find other on-line services such as TheFederalist.com. to supplement broad exposure. Glenn Beck’s TheBlaze.com has a strong Conservative bent, but he is a serious Truth-seeker who ties disparate details together in uniquely eye-opening ways.

Stoke up on Truth. You’re gonna need it in three months.

Phil Erwin is an author, IT administrator and registered Independent living in Newbury Park. He would like to support some Democrat ideals, but he has a visceral hatred for Lies and Damn Lies (and is highly suspicious of Statistics.) That pretty much eliminates supporting most Democrats, and a bunch of Republicans to boot.

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