In today’s news: One person killed, another hospitalized by their efforts of self-medication against COVID-19. (1) Preppers are all about being prepared to care for themselves. Some of us have stocks of medications to tide us through situations where normal supplies are disrupted. There’s a key point here we must not miss though: All drugs are poisons if used incorrectly. Self-medication without good information ranges between “useless” and “deadly”.
Please note: I am not a physician, nor will I pretend to be one on the internet. Nothing here is intended to either diagnose or suggest treatment. It’s a plea for not engaging in uneducated or half-educated self-medication by a pathophysiologist.
Self-medication for COVID-19: An example
Chloroquine and related ” – quine” and “quinine” drugs have been showing some good effect in helping people clear themselves of the COVID-19 coronavirus. It’s early days yet and some of the claims are clearly exaggerated … but it really does look like some good is being done with these drugs.
Normally drugs in this category are available by prescription only. They’re frequently used to protect against or treat malaria. There was some indication they helped people clear Ebola and SARS viruses, so med folks started trying them with COVID-19 patients. They’ve reported some good results.
Chloroquine for malaria isn’t available for over the counter purchase. A different formulation of chloroquine is available … to help reduce parasitism in fishtanks. Now, many of you preppers may be aware that some medications sold for aquarium use are not significantly different than their human medicine versions.
Self-medication with fish chloroquine kills people.
Maybe the couple in the news article were preppers and had heard that; I don’t know. What’s clear is that they bought some fish-tank chloroquine thinking it would protect them against COVID-19. And took it. And collapsed. One of them died; the other managed to purge herself of much of her dose and survived.
Self-medication without clear understanding is always dangerous
I’m not going to tell you you should or should not ever use off-label drugs in an emergency. It’s not my place to say. What I will say is that doing so without clear, complete, and accurate understanding of what you’re doing is a very bad idea.
The people who took the fish chloroquine clearly hadn’t understood that there can be different formulations of drugs, and that formulations make a very big difference in effect.
Drugs are also very situation-specific: Which antibiotic for which infection, taken by what route, for how long. What the counter-indications (reasons a particular person shouldn’t take it) are. Interactions and side effects. If you don’t have all the right information or know how to use it… well, every drug in some dose becomes a poison.
If you’re into self-medication, also be into self-education
There’s a copy of Alton’s Antibiotics and Infectious Disease: A Layman’s Guide on my own shelf. (Here’s a link, not because we particularly recommend Amazon or claim that this book is better than any other choice, but I do like the book and it will give you a starting point.) We also have Where There Is No Doctor, available as a free download or by purchase, and some other sources more for my pathophysiologist side.
The point is that if you choose to buy medications, you’re doing yourself a complete disservice if you don’t also provide yourself with the knowledge to use them wisely.
I only self medicate with tequila and I know EXACTLY how much to take. As long as I can hold onto a single blade of grass and not fall off the Earth, I’m still good.
The Altons’ books are the best I have found. They are very informative and written so one can understand them. I have two copies of the Alton’s Antibiotics and Infectious Disease book. I have one on the desk and one “with” the meds, just in case. The Altons’ videos are outstanding at DoomandBoom.net
I take nutrients because I often eat only one meal a day and it is often not balanced, usually a home-made meat/fat and carb meal (until the garden produces and the dandelions start growing that I nurture in my lawn to the chagrin of my neighbors). I research the online testing conclusions about nutrients that I buy for what type of nutrient it is, how it biologically relates to other nutrients (e.g., magnesium helps Vit. C absorption; and liposomal Vit. C bears some similarity to Intravenous Vit. C, in that it can bypass a lot of the digestive processes and avoid being mostly used up there). I check dosages used in tests, and what the nutrient accomplishes (especially concerning various influenzas). Then I buy some, try it. If it works for me, I keep buying. BTW, I’m approaching 70y/o and trying to get 10 more good years, despite my continuance of bad habits begun as a teen. I also examine nutrients specific to breathing (beet powder [for NOS], Quercetin), circulation (beet powder), liver (NAC, licorice root), painful peripheral neuropathy/hands while sleeping (R-ALA), energy (multi-vit with chelated ingredients), muscle mass/strength (Perfect Amino), and detox. Here is what I mean when I say “if it works”: I look like the hunched over “crooked old man” X 2 years at labor work and afterwards, even when I walk my dogs two blocks. I read and tried Adv.Bio-Nutritionals’ Perfect Amino to build up torso muscle mass. An hour later I am walking my dogs erect for the first time in several years, and each time I take the Amino. If the reader does not know what the abbreviations stand for, do a Mercola.com search who provides extensive “layperson” nutrition info. One can also read his references that take you to PUBMED.com where I spend a lot of time reading test result summaries.