What is the incidence of common ivermectin side effects (nausea, diarrhea, dizziness) in adults at approved doses?

1. What the authoritative summaries say: side effects are uncommon

Mayo Clinic’s patient/clinician drug page documents approved dosing for humans (weight‑based single doses around 150–200 μg/kg) but does not list incidence percentages for specific side effects in ordinary treatment; it provides dosing context while listing side effects elsewhere on the page ^[2]. Wikipedia’s ivermectin entry summarizes safety guidance by stating side effects are uncommon at standard doses (around 300 μg/kg is cited as a typical reference point) and flags more severe reactions in special situations (high Loa loa burden) rather than giving population rates for nausea, diarrhea or dizziness ^[1].

2. Drug‑safety listings enumerate symptoms but not how often they occur

Drugs.com and its side‑effect pages list dizziness, headache, somnolence and gastrointestinal complaints among reported adverse events and note that many side effects are mild and self‑limited; the Drugs.com side‑effect index mentions nervous system events (dizziness) and that some symptoms may resolve as the body adjusts, but again it does not provide a clear percent incidence for nausea, diarrhea or dizziness at approved doses in typical adult use in the materials provided ^{[3] [5]}.

3. News coverage echoes the same symptom list without rates

Mainstream reporting (CNN) that discussed ivermectin’s expanded accessibility also repeated a roster of potential harms — including dizziness and muscle‑movement difficulties — but did not cite numerical incidence rates for nausea, diarrhea or dizziness at authorized human dosing ^[4]. MedPage Today and other news pieces about policy changes mention that pharmacists must provide information sheets listing side effects such as nausea and dizziness before dispensing, indicating regulatory concern about these adverse events but not quantifying their frequency ^[6].

4. Where serious adverse events are concentrated: special populations

The clearest quantitative safety concern in the supplied material is contextual: Wikipedia and Drugs.com emphasize that serious neurological adverse events are more likely in people heavily infected with Loa loa (a parasitic infection) and in other unusual circumstances — not in routine treated populations — reinforcing that common side effects are generally uncommon while severe events are concentrated in specific, high‑risk groups ^{[1] [3]}.

5. What is missing from the available reporting (and why it matters)

None of the supplied sources present randomized‑trial or pharmacovigilance tables that give incidence percentages (for example, “x% nausea, y% diarrhea, z% dizziness”) for adult patients given labeled, weight‑based ivermectin doses for typical parasitic indications. The absence of these numbers in drug monographs and news articles means we cannot responsibly state exact rates from the current set of documents — available sources do not mention specific incidence percentages for those side effects at approved doses ^{[2] [5] [1] [3]}.

6. Practical takeaways and competing perspectives

Clinical summaries uniformly describe ivermectin as “relatively free of toxicity” at standard doses and list mild GI and nervous‑system complaints (nausea, diarrhea, dizziness) as possible but uncommon reactions; public‑health and regulatory sources (e.g., FDA statements cited by other reporting) stress that ivermectin is not authorized for COVID treatment and flag harms when misused or overdosed ^{[1] [3] [7]}. Some political and advocacy voices have promoted broader availability and described the drug as “safe with minimal side effects,” while medical and regulatory outlets caution about misuse ^{[8] [7]}. Those competing framings reflect differing priorities—access and cost versus conservative, evidence‑based use and concern about off‑label or veterinary product misuse ^{[8] [5]}.

7. How to get the precise numbers if you need them

To obtain incidence percentages for nausea, diarrhea and dizziness at approved doses, one should consult primary sources not included here: controlled clinical trial reports, the FDA’s approved label (prescribing information / package insert), product safety (SPL) data, or pooled pharmacovigilance analyses. The current provided sources do not contain those numerical incidence data and therefore cannot supply exact percentages (available sources do not mention precise incidence percentages for these side effects) ^{[2] [7] [3]}.

Limitations: This analysis is restricted to the documents you supplied. I cited each factual point to those sources and did not extrapolate numerical rates because the supplied material does not report them ^{[2] [5] [1] [3] [4] [6] [7]}.