When I swallow, knives cut my throat.
I cough and sometimes I can’t stop. That is shocking.
I caught COVID.
Three years dodged. But this week I suddenly felt lousy and a home test said “positive”. The thermometer showed: 101.8.
No big deal I thought. Almost everyone gets COVID. Many people say it’s no worse than a cold.
I have been vaccinated and refreshed several times. My fever is not particularly high. I’m fit. This gives me the opportunity to lie around.
But then came the knives on my throat and the cough that made it difficult for me to breathe.
darn. This is way worse than any flu I’ve had. I feel bad. It hurts so much to talk that I’m just writing.
I think, “COVID is still killing several hundred Americans every day.” Will I be one? i feel like i could die But COVID mainly kills old people. Wait, that’s me!
Actually, I’m very old. 76. I didn’t think about being that old last week when I rode my bike and played volleyball. I felt like a kid. Everything is different now.
Half of American men don’t even make it to 73. I forget that when I’m feeling good.
I inquire as to which hospital I should go to if I have difficulty breathing. My doctor requests a Paxlovid prescription.
day 2
Paxlovid leaves an unpleasant metallic taste. Someone’s digging for silver in my mouth.
Ibuprofen brought my fever down, but it’s still above normal. The knives and the choking cough are still there.
will i die Do I have to go to the emergency room then? Will they put me on a ventilator? I’m afraid of it. I shouldn’t have searched on google.
Google makes everything scarier. Will I get COVID for a long time? Do you have brain fog? Do you get COVID pneumonia? I have to stop googling.
But at least I’m not worse.
day 4
I’m getting better! Crisis over!
Every sip still hurts, but my cough no longer scares me. I am no longer afraid that I will die.
Thanks Paxlovid!
Was it Paxlovid that made the difference? No way to know. But cheers to America’s much-maligned free market. Pfizer invented and produced this drug in just a year.
Pfizer ran tests in which Paxlovid reduced deaths so much that the company was advised to stop clinical trials and give subjects only the drug.
Even so, the Food and Drug Administration didn’t allow the rest of us to take it for another three months.
The government is killing people by delaying the approval of life-saving drugs.
Yes, we want to be sure that any new drug is safe, and a delay of months is a big improvement over the 10 years they usually take. But it’s still too long!
My brother’s potentially life-saving drug, Gelsolin, has been going through the review process for almost 10 years.
FDA delays are one reason drugs cost so much.
At least during the pandemic, the FDA has relaxed regulations to get some drugs to people faster. Great.
But of course many things become more difficult once the government is involved in anything.
Health and Human Services decided they would distribute the pills.
One result: I can’t get Paxlovid shipped from my local pharmacy.
CVS says it delivers, but their phone system hangs up when I ask. I am sending my son to pick it up.
The costs? Zero dollars proudly printed on the label.
When the state pays for things, common sense often disappears.
Paxlovid comes with 19 pages of detailed… instructions?
There is nonsense like “Important Notice of Privacy” asking me to sign and return a paper to CVS acknowledging “I have received the CVS/Pharmacy Notice of Privacy”.
That’s another government complication, a HIPAA privacy rule. The government’s obsession with paperwork and rules discourages medical research and forces us all to lie (come on, you did it) by claiming that we read fine print that almost nobody reads.
I’m glad I’m not dead. Thanks to Pfizer for developing Paxlovid. I am grateful that I live in America.
But more and more I hate the intrusions of our ever-growing government.
Every Tuesday, Stossel posts a new video about the struggle between government and freedom on JohnStossel.com.
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