Posted on 04/26/2020 12:31:32 PM PDT by Bruiser 10
There’s not much to laugh about these days, but the news that smokers might be protected from Covid-19 is certainly one of them. With study after study showing that smokers are under-represented in coronavirus wards, the renowned French neuroscientist, Jean-Pierre Changeux, is working on a randomised control trial to test the effect of nicotine patches on Covid-19 patients.
This is far from being a crackpot theory. Changeux has explained his hypothesis at length here. In simple terms, he says that nicotinic acetylcholine receptors play a key role in the development of the disease and that nicotine can put a brake on it. If he is right – and the banter heuristic says he is – it would not only save thousands of lives but would also be one in the eye for the ‘public health’ groups who have been claiming that smoking and vaping are risk factors for Covid-19.
These groups are so used to lying with impunity that they wasted no time in asserting that smoking caused coronavirus complications when the pandemic began. In the US, newspapers have been filled with reports that smokers and vapers ‘may’ be at greater risk from Covid-19, a weasel word that requires no evidence. A group of doctors in New York urged governor Andrew Cuomo to ban the sale of all tobacco and e-cigarette products on the false premise that ‘mounting evidence demonstrates the link between tobacco use and increased risk for progressive Covid-19’. Meanwhile, the World Health Organisation has been taking occasional breaks from flattering the Chinese Communist Party to make evidence-free assertions about smokers being ‘likely’ to suffer more from the coronavirus.
(Excerpt) Read more at spiked-online.com ...
The advice was to smoke fags, not blow them!
I thought that initial reports said that smokers did very badly once they were sick enough to require hospitalization. Maybe its true. If it is, it would be interesting if you could trade prophylaxis (low probability of getting sick) for a more severe case if you did get sick.
Maybe patches and/or vaping would provide the prophylaxis in a way that was less deleterious to your lungs and other organs than regular ciggies.
Maybe that’s why the homeless aren’t dropping like flies....
Well isn’t that some crazy stuff.
I can see the PSA:
Do Not Be Niggardly with Your Fags.
That’ll go over well.
LOL. “Smoke Fags” may have a whole different meaning to some people.
Push for patches
“ COVID 19 is understood to bind to ACE 2 receptors. It appears to have a disruptive effect on the homeostasis of the Renin Angiotensin System (1). Nicotine is an ACE-agonist. It has been shown to be protective in acute inflammatory reactions in ARDS probably by decreasing inflammatory cytokine production by macrophages and other mononuclear cells (2).
In this new disease smokers seem to have particularly poor outcomes (3). We postulate that at least in chronic smokers, the disruption of the normal Renin Angiotensin System is exacerbated by nicotine withdrawal leading to exacerbation of acute lung injury. We suggest that the simple use of Nicotine patches should be urgently considered and discussed.”
https://www.bmj.com/content/368/bmj.m406/rr-25
I remember my dad saying how back when he was a kid the term “sucking on a fag” meant smoking a cigarette. Times have changed a bit.
During the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 smoking tobacco was considered and advertised as a preventative measure against the flu.
Smoking linked to severe infection
Mounting evidence suggests that, compared with nonsmokers, people who smoke cigarettes face a higher risk of developing severe complications and dying from COVID-19 infections.
For instance, a study of more than 1,000 patients in China, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, found that smokers with COVID-19 were more likely to require intensive medical interventions than those who didn’t smoke. In the study, 12.3% of current smokers were admitted to an ICU, were placed on a ventilator or died, as compared with only 4.7% of nonsmokers.
https://www.livescience.com/coronavirus-covid-19-risk-and-smoking.html
>During the Spanish flu pandemic of 1918 smoking tobacco was considered and advertised as a preventative measure against the flu.<
So was cocaine, I believe.
Uh no.
“Do Not Be Niggardly with Your Fags.”
Ok, you win. That actually made me laugh.
I thought this was nuts. But it seems that nicotine is an Ace2 inhibitor. So, France is starting a clinical trial with patches
https://apple.news/AiN__xKvPT8SEeOGi19PWNQ
“ a study of more than 1,000 patients in China..”
Data from China is worthless.
L
I remember in SoCal Shakey’s Pizza Parlor had cigarette machines signed “Ye Olde Fags” (or similar). this was late 60s.
fags is an old irish term for cigarettes
Yes. Smokers do worse. That is a fact. This article is about a study of the effect of nicotine patches, which is way different than smoking/inhaling carcinogens.
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