Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire The Silver Bullet for COVID-19. On America Can We Talk

After an Odessa doctor said in recent media interviews he believes he’s found the “silver bullet” for treating COVID-19, Midland Memorial’s chief medical officer disputed that claim, saying there’s no evidence the treatment offers any benefit to coronavirus patients.

Dr. Richard Bartlett, a family medicine doctor in Odessa, has said in multiple interviews with broadcast and radio stations that he’s treated dozens of COVID-19 patients with an inhaled form of budesonide, which is often used to treat asthma.

When asked about the treatment during a press conference last week, Chief Medical Officer Dr. Larry Wilson said there have been no studies showing a benefit in using inhaled steroids to treat COVID-19.

There is evidence that some steroids, including dexamethasone, may be effective in treating severe cases when given orally or intravenously, Wilson said. However, giving steroids to patients who are not severely ill may do more harm than good, he said.

“The way that steroids work is to create an immune suppression,” he said. “And you want an immune response to fight the virus.”

He said weighing the benefits of steroid treatment with the possibility of suppressing the immune system is a judgment call that should be made only on hospitalized patients.

Most recently, Bartlett was interviewed Friday for the YouTube show “America, Can We Talk?” In that interview, he said early intervention with budesonide was the key to surviving the coronavirus and likened the drug to a silver bullet.

Those who have shared the interview on Facebook are having it removed for violating the platform’s policies regarding misinformation on coronavirus, according to commenters on the YouTube video.

Bartlett made several claims in the video which are demonstrably false, including that 20 percent of the world’s population is at risk of dying from COVID-19 and that Japan and other countries have low numbers of coronavirus infections because they are using inhaled steroids.

A series of case reports from Japan found patients improved on ciclesonide – a different inhaled steroid – but the reports are considered “very low quality evidence,” according to an article in the European Respiratory Journal, because the treatment was given to only three patients and it’s unknown whether those patients would have improved without intervention.

And while about 20 percent of people globally are considered at-risk for developing a severe case of COVID-19, the mortality rate is estimated to be about 1 to 3 percent.

Odessa Regional Medical Center’s chief medical officer also addressed budesonide treatment in a report from KOSA-TV. Dr. Rohith Saravanan said blind, controlled studies, rather than anecdotal evidence, are needed to prove any effectiveness.

“If they say, ‘Oh, five cases, all solved. Magic pill. Silver bullet’ – well, that’s not how science works,” he said.