The issue I described existed before the administration change.

Neither's parties people wants to be poisoned.

I’m pretty sure one party’s people does want to be poisoned, given the consistent advocacy for reduced pollution controls and such.

> Neither's parties people wants to be poisoned.

Voters for one party keep taking horse medicine and we can't seem to stop them when they experience negative side effects, and we couldn't get them to get vaccines even as their friends and loved ones were dying begging for it at the last minute. There's definitely a party divide here.

On the other hand, my liberal parent gave me stimulants for 8 years that made me anxious when I previously wasn't, and killed my appetite so hard I couldn't take more than 1-2 bites of anything at dinner, and now I'm 32 looking like a 16 year old but with the fatigue of a 64 year old.

I share your skepticism about false equivalence in general, but have to admit this particular issue to me gets at the heart of serious problems in US healthcare, and I don't see either party really addressing it. The way in which these problems get ignored by each party, and the rationale for doing so, is very different but so far I see both parties as either turning a blind eye to these problems, or lacking vision.

It feels like there’s a house on fire and one party is like, “It’s fine, I don’t see the problem and neither do you” and the other party is like “OMG the house is on fire, quick pour gasoline on it.”

I’ve sort of accepted it’s going to burn down. The problem is that it doesn’t seem there’s anyone capable of rebuilding it.

I have no opinion on ivermectin. I don't think it's a miracle cure, but I also have no idea about the actual research in that space.

But.

My assistant at my last job was all in on it during COVID. It cures everything, according to her. The moment when her cognitive dissonance hit its peak was when she gave her husband ivermectin for a cold, and was absolutely astounded that he ended up in the emergency room with diarrhea and dehydration. She was convinced it was "vaccine injury" and that he did a sneaky and got the COVID shot without her knowing. Spoiler; he did not get vaccinated.

It really was pretty funny at the time, but also sad. She was sort of my bellwether for nuts behaviors. When she started spitting Q-anon talking points, as a middle aged woman completely disconnected from anywhere that should exist, I knew we had problems.

Ivermectin is an anti-parasitic. Since having parasites on top of another condition is generally worse than just having the condition, it's not uncommon to see a positive impact when taking ivermectin for a variety of conditions in places where parasitic infections are common, if only because the body no longer has to fight the parasites in addition to the condition.

Since anti-vaxxers during COVID were looking for anything to take the place of a vaccine, ivermectin was an easy thing to latch onto.