The Boston Globe recently wrote about Governor Ron DeSantis’ choice for Florida’s Surgeon General.
He is Dr. Joseph Ladapo, a 2008 graduate of Harvard Medical school, who also earned a doctorate from Harvard in health policy.
The Globe wrote:
Dr. Joseph A. Ladapo, Florida’s new surgeon general, made waves Wednesday in the Sunshine State, inking new guidelines allowing parents to decide whether their kids should quarantine or stay in school if they’re asymptomatic following exposure to COVID-19, and he’s also spoken critically about the public health focus on vaccines as a key tool for battling the pandemic…
He wrote an opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal in September 2020 criticizing lockdowns and quarantines.
He wrote in that column, which appeared long before the emergence of the worrisome Delta variant, that many states had “weathered post-shutdown outbreaks and case counts are falling,” and that policies “forged in fear and panic have wrought tremendous damage in exchange for benefits that were attainable at a much lower cost.”
Ladapo also railed in the piece against what he said were onerous quarantine guidelines for students.
“The CDC’s quarantine guidelines for healthy, low-risk students should be revisited in light of the outsize effect quarantines have on their educational experience—and the possibility of perpetual quarantining for exposed students if testing is performed frequently,” he wrote.
After Dr. Lapado’s appointment, he moved swiftly to reduce the state’s already lax guidelines for students.
Ladapo eliminated previous mandates requiring students to quarantine for at least four days off campus if they’ve been exposed to the virus. Under the new guidelines, students who have been exposed can continue going to campus, “without restrictions or disparate treatment,” if they’re asymptomatic, They can also quarantine, but no longer than seven days, as long as they don’t get sick.
As in previous guidelines, schools can require masks as long as students can opt out, though the new rules add language that opting out is “at the parent or legal guardian’s sole discretion.”
Dr. Lapado was one of three doctors who signed the so-called Great Barrington Declaration, which held that wearing masks was not necessary, that lockdowns are ineffective, “and that allowing young and healthy people to get infected should be expected, as long as the vulnerable are protected.”
Other medical and public health experts are appalled by his views.
That sort of messaging has distressed many in public health, including Dr. Nida Qadir, an associate professor of medicine and associate director of the Medical Intensive Care Unit at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. Ladapo taught previously at UCLA as well.
“He’s expressed a lot of strange views since the beginning of the pandemic,” Qadir tweeted. “I don’t know him personally, but it’s been especially shocking considering the state LA was in this past winter. Can’t say I’m not happy he’s leaving CA but sorry for the people of FL.”
Ladapo has expressed skepticism of Covid-19 health measures, including mask-wearing and vaccinations. He’s also among a group of doctors who have supported unproven and disproved therapies, including ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine….
He praises the natural immunity that people acquire when they are infected with COVID.
“You don’t need to go to medical school to look at the data and see that there’s really great protection” offered by getting infected with and recovering from Covid-19, Ladapo said. “There’s tremendous data that supports the fact that natural immunity protects people from getting very ill, also protects people from being infected again. So that’s what it is, and that’s great.”
CNN wrote about Dr. Lapado after a Florida man wrote him a letter saying that he was right about natural immunity. A family member had COVID and now has immunity to all diseases because he died.
This is what has become of “medicine” in the world of healthcare privatization. Can’t even trust the physicians anymore.
Some physicians–in the great, grand scheme of things, an infintesimal number–but certainly not close to all. Let’s not start doing the rhetorical “all or none” political game that drive the lies of Republicans. It’s not far right anymore, it’s mainstream GOP who have bought into it–in the great, grand scheme of things, the few voices of sanity are an infinitesimal number, and most of them are silent enablers. This so-called doctor is representative of nothing in the profession of which he professes to be a member.
I have begun to wonder if the Big Money privatizers are planning to use the “bad doctors” trope to upset the world of medicine in the same way they did with their endless publicity push to find and blame and fire all the “bad teachers”
No need to wonder….medicine is fully privatized and has been for many years. The current situation is a result. These “Dr’s” are paid well for their political views.
Speaking of immunity, elected folks with Covid-19 anti-mask and anti-vaccination views are immune to evidence or common good morality. The only antidote is electoral defeat.
Or a Covid-induced total lobotomy.
There are two Floridas. The left believes in science, They get the vaccine and wear masks in public. The right has been practicing herd immunity for some time, and the result has been the third highest rates of infection per hundred thousand people. As of Oct. 1st Florida had 16,681 infections in the state. In fact, most of the red states are in the top tier of infections as they have largely been practicing herd immunity which results in a high rate of infection and death for vulnerable populations.
This strategy is working better than the so-called “death panels,” aka, lies, that were supposed to emerge from the ACA. Unfortunately, immunologists have discovered that the immunity from having the virus is less potent and shorter than the protection from the vaccine. Dr. Ladapo is perfect surgeon general for “helter skelter” De Santis. Those of us with common sense will continue to ignore both of them.https://www.statista.com/statistics/1109004/coronavirus-covid19-cases-rate-us-americans-by-state/
Documents obtained by CMD/Center For Media And Democracy show that the Tea Party Patriots Foundation was the fiscal sponsor of the organization behind America’s Frontline Doctors, which spread lies about Covid-19 and is scamming customers looking for vaccine alternatives. FL’s Surgeon General, Dr. Joseph Lapado is an AFD loyalist. There is Big Money to be made under the table and across the counter with the fake remedies.
https://www.exposedbycmd.org/2021/09/09/tea-party-patriots-are-behind-pro-trump-doctors-grifting-off-of-fake-covid-cures/
“and that allowing young and healthy people to get infected should be expected, as long as the vulnerable are protected.” Who really are the “vulnerable”. Every last person on this planet is vulnerable to getting and carrying COVID-19. It is possible that every last person on this planet can get sick and die from any variant for COVID-19 that is surely to come along.
De Santis, Ladapo and their like are losers of the first degree and their way of thinking can possible make so many, many others losers–losers of their lives and those of their loved ones.
Remember, “common sense” aint common as demonstrated by DeSantis and Ladapo.
That sentence stuck out to me too. How can you protect the vulnerable without masks, distance, no quarantining unless you’re actually symptomatic after an exposure, etc? The vulnerable will have to just stay away and isolate. And why aren’t ordinary students considered vulnerable – is it so vanishingly rare for them to become seriously ill/ die/ get long-haul covid?
Ladapo is a loyalist in the America’s Frontline Doctors (AFLD), which has consistently spread misinformation about Covid, opposed vaccinations and mask use, and hawked unapproved Covid-19 drugs. They are profiting financially from all the under the table dark money funding and the over the counter dangerous “remedies”. They contribute to DeSantis and so many like him. It is lucrative and lethal.
They define Hippocratic as hypocritical.
“Doctor” Ladapo’s favorite America’s Frontline Doctors has promoted SpeakWithAnMD, a telehealth website promoted by and connected to conspiracy theorist Jerome Corsi, that primarily distributes drugs that have been claimed by right-wing figures to be therapeutics for COVID-19. When referred via the AFLDS website, the site charges US$90 for a doctor consultation with an “AFLDS-trained” physician, which is provided by Encore Telemedicine. Orders are then fulfilled via the online pharmacy Ravkoo, which is charged on top of the consulting fee and can vary.
Hundreds of customers and donors accused the organization of charging fees for ivermectin prescriptions and consultations but failing to deliver, as well as referring customers to online pharmacies that charged excessive prices for the common anti-parasitic drug, which has also not been approved by the FDA or other regulators as a therapeutic for COVID-19.
In September 2021, based on data leaked from an anonymous breach of Cadence Health and Ravkoo, The Intercept estimated that AFLDS and its partners had made $6.7 million in revenue from these consultations between July 16 and September 12, 2021.
““You don’t need to go to medical school to look at the data and see that there’s really great protection” offered by getting infected with and recovering from Covid-19, Ladapo said. “There’s tremendous data that supports the fact that natural immunity protects people from getting very ill, also protects people from being infected again. So that’s what it is, and that’s great.””
And that is false. It has been determined that it is severe cases requiring hospitalization and ICU care can provide the protection provided by vaccines, not less severe cases. In the case of less severe non-hospitalization required infections to not allow the body to provide that kind of protection.
The religious faith-beliefs and political faith-beliefs of these people override/trump their rationo-logical thinking, especially when those two types of faith belief are combined.
Duane,
Covid infections, even mild ones, do provide protection, though perhaps not at the level of vaccinations. See https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01442-9
Israel recognizes the immunity that comes from a past Covid infection, giving citizens a “green pass” if they could show proof of infection and were not vaccinated. That is changing in a few days when citizens will only get a “green pass” good for 6 months following recovery from infection. After the 6 months they will be required to get a single jab. Those without previous Covid infection will have to have a booster along with the original two shot vaccine. See https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/all-covid-passes-in-israel-about-to-be-declared-invalid-here-s-how-to-get-a-new-one-1.10255927
Yeah, that’s what Duane said. Mid cases d not provide the same protection as vaccines.
Mild cases do not…
How are these “anti-vax” views?
“Ladapo has expressed skepticism of Covid-19 health measures, including mask-wearing and vaccinations. ”
I guess it depends on what you consider anti-vacs views.”
Ah, I missed that sentence. Probably also should follow the link to see what’s characterized as skepticism about vaccinations. I’ve certainly never heard DeSantis say anything that I would consider “anti-vax.”
DeSantis has mentioned, not very convincingly, that people should get the vaccine, but he is opposed to all masks. What he has been really pushing is the expensive monoclonal antibody treatment that costs $1500 to $2000 while the vaccine costs no more that $37 per injection.
My husband works for the Census. He recently surveyed a Navy Seal whose whole family, all five of them, had had Covid and the regeneron treatments. I hope he appreciates all this socialism he and his family received.
Yeah, we already know how willing people are to benefit from”socialism” when it is of use to them.
Gotta wonder if DeSantis and his cronies have stock in Regeneron? This whole mess is like watching The Hunger Games.
Said Ladapo:
“Vaccines are up to the person. There is nothing special about them compared to any other preventative measure. The state should be promoting good health, and vaccination isn’t the only path to that. It’s been treated almost like a religion and it’s senseless…We support measures for good health — vaccinations, losing weight, exercising, eating more fruits and vegetables, everything.”
Vaccine? You don’t need no stinking vaccine.Just eat more fruits and vegetables — especially the ones that have a little “Harvard Medical School MD” sticker on them.
I wonder what Harvard Medical, & those who teach public health policy there think of their alum?
The little bio info available says he was licensed in internal medicine in 2011; he is a “physician and health policy researcher by training, with a focus on determining the cost-effectiveness of diagnostic tests.” He is between 40-45 years old, and his net worth is estimated at between $1million-$5million.
So is he a medical Dr or a Piled High & Deep (Phd)?
“I wonder what Harvard Medical, & those who teach … there think of their alum?”
And what Harvard Law and those who teach there think about Ted Cruz and Ron DeSantis.
Nothing could be more damning with regard to the meaning of a Harvard degree than that the likes of Ted Cruz and Ron DeSantis hold them. Idiots, both.
Well, I can guess what Harvard Law emeritus professor Alan Derschowitz thinks.
It’s called passing the torch. (Or is it “torching the pass”?)
Not everybody has caught on to the medical tyranny
God bless Desantis for putting the right person at the right time. The alternate medicines work. And well.
We are so lucky to have a dr. Now general. In this great state who isn’t bought by the global elite
Been drinking bleach, have you…