Indiana doctor makes false claims in viral video

Indiana doctor makes false claims in viral video

(Reuters) – Social media users have been sharing a video in which a man who identifies himself as a family medicine physician makes some false or misleading claims during an Indiana school board meeting.

Examples can be seen, a Twitter post with more than 5 million views.

— Sebastian Gorka DrG (@SebGorka) August 9, 2021

The 6-minute video shows a man who identifies himself as Dr Daniel Stock speaking at a Mt Vernon school board meeting on Aug 6, 2021. Stock makes a variety of claims about COVID-19 vaccines and masking. Some are misleading, some are false, and some are beyond the scope of this check.

US coronavirus cases have been rising due to the highly contagious Delta variant, which emerged in India but has quickly spread and now accounts for more than 80% of US coronavirus cases.

‘MASKS ARE INEFFECTIVE’

At the 00:46 mark, the man says that COVID-19 and other respiratory viruses are “spread by aerosol particles, which are small enough to go through every mask”.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) say that wearing a face mask can help protect yourself and others from spreading the virus. This should be combined with other methods of prevention such as frequent handwashing and social distancing.

There have been studies conducted in different locations that show wearing a face covering helps reduce the spread of disease.

Simulations showing particles being exposed with and without a face covering can be seen.

Reuters this week addressed misleading claims stemming from a study about masks and aerosols.

‘VACCINES ARE INEFFECTIVE, COVID WILL NEVER GO AWAY’

At 01:22, the man says that nobody can make the COVID-19 virus go away, including the vaccine. This claim is missing context.

Experts do believe that the virus will continue to exist and eventually evolve into a less serious illness as populations build immunity over time, as explained. A study here suggests that one day the virus may become “no more virulent than the common cold” while stressing the importance of vaccination.

As cases rise around the world and in the United States, vaccines are important as they have been proven to reduce severe illness and hospitalization.

Meanwhile, most recent COVID-19 deaths have been among the unvaccinated. In Italy, 99% of COVID deaths since February were not fully vaccinated. Indonesian officials found unvaccinated people more than three times more likely to die of COVID-19 than those vaccinated.

In the United States, unvaccinated people represent nearly 97% of severe cases, according to the White House COVID-19 Response Team.

SUMMER BREAKOUTS AND ADE

At the 2:05 mark, the man questions why a vaccine that is “supposedly so effective” had a breakout during the summer. He explains that this is due to “antibody-mediated viral enhancement”, also known as antibody-dependent enhancement or ADE.

Data from the CDC here shows a significant decrease in hospitalizations and deaths from COVID-19 after the rollout of the vaccines in early 2021. Both cases and hospitalizations have recently increased as the more contagious Delta variant became dominant in the United States over the summer.

ADE was a concern that had been taken into consideration by scientists creating COVID-19 vaccines and there have been no signs of cases happening during clinical trials or the roll-out.

The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia explains on its website “Neither COVID-19 disease nor the new COVID-19 vaccines have shown evidence of causing ADE. People infected with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, have not been likely to develop ADE upon repeat exposure. This is true of other coronaviruses as well. Likewise, studies of vaccines in the laboratory with animals or in the clinical trials in people have not found evidence of ADE.”

‘VACCINATED PEOPLE SHED’

At the 3:25 mark, the man explains that vaccinated individuals shed the virus on to others.

Reuters Fact Check has previously debunked the claim that individuals inoculated with the COVID-19 vaccine shed the virus and infect others.

“There is no way for a COVID-19 vaccinated person to “shed vaccine,” the Centers for Disease Control’s COVID-19 Clinical Team said in an email responding to Reuters questions for a previous article in April 2021.

“COVID-19 vaccines give instructions to teach our cells how to make a protein—or even just a piece of a protein—that triggers an immune response inside our bodies. After the protein piece is made, the cell breaks down the instructions and gets rid of them. The immune response, which produces antibodies, is what protects us from getting infected if the real virus enters our bodies.”

The CDC team also stated the vaccines cannot cause people to shed the COVID-19 virus, echoing all the other experts Reuters spoke to, saying “COVID-19 vaccines do not use the live virus that causes COVID-19 and cannot cause COVID-19. Therefore, people who receive a COVID-19 vaccine cannot shed the virus or the vaccine.”

COVID-19 TREATMENTS WORK WELL

At the 4:47 mark, the man says that he has treated over 15 COVID-19 patients with vitamin D, ivermectin and zinc and none were sick enough to be hospitalized.

This anecdotal treatment of 15 patients is not a rigorous scientific study (in a controlled environment) and therefore proof that these treatments work as well as or better than vaccination. The FDA has approved remdesivir, monoclonal antibody treatments, immune modulators, sedatives and renal replacement therapies for use on COVID-19 patients.

Research for the use of ivermectin in treating the virus is still ongoing.

NATURAL INFECTION IMMUNITY

At 5:30, the man says that individuals who have recovered from the virus receive no benefit from the vaccination.

The CDC recommends on its website here that individuals who recovered from COVID-19 should still be vaccinated, as experts do not know how long protection from recovery lasts. It also explains that the vaccine provides “a strong boost in protection” for those recovered from the virus.

A CDC case-control study published on Aug. 6, 2021 (here), examined Kentucky residents who contracted the virus in 2020 and compared individuals who were reinfected in May to June 2021 with individuals who were not. It found that "being unvaccinated was associated with 2.34 times the odds of reinfection compared with being fully vaccinated.”

Several doctors have made videos and blog posts debunking the claims made in Stock’s video, visible zdoggmd.com/mt-vernon/.

Reuters left a message at Stock’s practice seeking comment from him but there was no response as of this article’s publication.

Local media and Indiana health authorities also responded to the video.

VERDICT

Misleading. Some of the claims made in this video are false or missing context.