Merck’s COVID-19 Pill Is Ivermectin All Over Again

6 min readOct 5, 2021

This article is dedicated to Jack Posobiec, who tweeted:

What if instead of a vaccine we just were able to get exposed to a weak version of the virus that enabled us to build the antibodies we need to fight the real thing

Although obviously comical, Posobiec’s tweet shows something about many Trump supporters, and those on the right-wing of politics more generally: They’re willing to do anything that might help COVID-19 — except take vaccines. Some, such as Daniel Horowitz, are still doubling down on Ivermectin — although those types are becoming rarer and rarer. What is much more common is people jumping from potential COVID-19 cure to potential COVID-19 cure, trying to find something — again, besides vaccines — that will help them.

Back in September, that new COVID-19 cure was Iodine — specifically, gargling Iodine. Enter the pharmaceutical company Merck & Co. along with the partner company Ridgeback Biotherapeutics, which now claim to have created an oral antibiotic to treat COVID-19.

Here’s what The Wall Street Journal wrote on the pill on 10/1/2021:

The drug, called molnupiravir, was performing so well in its late-stage trial that Merck and Ridgeback said they stopped enrolling subjects after discussions with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

You might remember molnupiravir for its important role in Rick Bright’s whistleblower complaint against Donald Trump back in May 2020. Specifically, Donald Trump constantly demanded both that the federal government give this drug support — both through federal funding to the company that was developing it, Ridgeback Biotherapeutics, and through allowing it on the market before it had met all of its safety standards. It should be noted that Ridgeback Biotherapeutics was already substantial government money before this story took place. Basically, this is something that Donald Trump really wanted to be seen as a COVID-19 cure — to the point where he wanted it to be released before all the evidence came in.

You might also notice that the FDA is approving the medication before all the information has come in. While this is not abnormal, actually looking at the data the FDA used when it approved the drug shows this to be rather odd.