California Positioned to Pass COVID-19 ‘Medical Misinformation Bill’

The California legislature is positioned to pass a “medical misinformation bill,” according to The Epoch Times. The bill, AB-2098, introduced by Democratic Assemblyman Evan Low, designates that any physician or surgeon who engages in the “dissemination or promotion of misinformation or disinformation” regarding COVID-19 is at “risk [of] losing their medical license.”

This “medical misinformation bill,” physician Dr. Syed Haider explained, currently in the California Legislature, aims to prevent doctors from promoting off-label treatments for COVID-19 such as ivermectin. This, he said, “begs the question of who decides what is the truth?”

“In any scientific field or endeavor, there is no absolute truth.” And “Dr. [Anthony] Fauci is not science, like he claims to be,” Haider says.

“He does not have the last word on what scientific truth is. We’re always getting closer to the truth, but we have never arrived at a final truth in medicine. So, there always has to be room for debate. Doctors have to be able to take multiple different sides of an argument. So physicians have to be able to hash things out among themselves and to prescribe off-label. You can’t single out one disease and say, ‘This is off limits for the way we’ve conducted medicine for the past 100 years.’ Patients should be able to consult with their physician, discuss treatments and risks, and make decisions without the interference of the government.

“In nearly every hospital and clinic in the United States right now, it’s considered to be some form of misinformation or disinformation to say anything other than the vaccines are safe and effective.

“To say there are any risks associated with the vaccines is claimed to be misinformation or disinformation, and the working definition of misinformation or disinformation seems to be anything that would prevent someone from submitting to or doubting the FDA [Food and Drug Administration] and CDC [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] guidelines and recommendations.”

The FDA has not approved ivermectin as a treatment for COVID-19, citing studies saying it has not proved effective, and it says COVID vaccines pose minimal risks as other vaccines do. Detractors point to the rushed testing time used because of the worldwide health emergency, saying that side effects cannot yet be fully known, but the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention counter that all tests were performed and the vaccines are safe.

If AB 2098 becomes law, any doctor who prescribes ivermectin — even at the request of a patient — stands to lose his or her medical license in California and the likelihood of practicing medicine anywhere else in the country.

“Once you lose your license in one state and you have licenses to practice in other states, you have to report that you lost your license in California to every other state you are licensed in, and then every medical board will start asking questions like, ‘Why did you lose your license in California?’ Once the snowball starts rolling, depending on what the medical board thinks about the reasoning behind the loss of your license in California, you can lose all of your licenses,” Haider said.

He pointed out that the pathway to state-approved treatments for COVID-19 may be the beginning of a slippery slope toward physicians losing their autonomy to practice medicine and the availability of off-label drugs.

“Once you make this inroad in violation of physician autonomy on how to treat COVID for their patients, that could just be the beginning,” Haider cautioned. “What about after that? Do you go after a doctor’s ability to prescribe off-label for anything? Do we have to be restricted to what has been FDA approved for any indication? What happens when we don’t have an on-label drug for the treatment of an indication? What then? How do we treat our patients then?”

Newsmax staffer Jack Gournell contributed.

Via        Newsmax