We have learned how to limit nosocomial spread.
According to Dr. John Mandrola:
Appraisal of medical evidence is just like a procedure or surgery It takes practice, effort, desire and mentors. No shortcuts
Despite these lofty sentiments, Dr. Mandrola was a COVID fabulist, who spread fake statistics, repeatedly said the pandemic was over, and treated rare, temporary vaccine side-effects as a fate worse than death. In May 2020 alone, he declared multiple absurd things to be true simply because he wanted them to be true. He said:
US Hospitals not close to being over-run. It’s the opposite in most places… We have learned how to limit nosocomial spread. It’s May not March… No US hospital is now unprepared. It’s May, not March… May is different from March. People are not stupid. Public health surveillance is better. Hospitals are ready. NYC-like situations are unlikely now in the US.
Things didn’t turn out that way, though Dr. Mandrola never looked back. While disguising himself as someone who cared deeply about “appraisal of medical evidence“, Dr. Mandrola’s singular goal was to blind people to a dangerous virus, and he was willing to say anything to do this.
COVID became a top killer of young people immediately after this article was published
If NIH-supported studies like this decreased b/c of cuts, medical science would be fine.
Remembering why so many people failed to protect themselves against a deadly virus is valuable it its own right, and Dr. Mandrola certainly won’t remind you of what he said in 2020. In fact, many doctors who spread COVID misinformation act as if its in poor taste to bring it up today. In their view, 2020 was ancient history, and they deserve a do-over.
However, we don’t need their permission. We are allowed to remember their track record and to take it into account when judging their 2025 commentary. The same biases and indifference to facts that led them to mislead people about COVID haven’t vanished. To guard against current risks, it’s vital to remember who spread misinformation and the techniques they used to falsely pacify people. Unsurprisingly, the same doctors who made things up to numb people in 2020 are making things up to numb people today. It’s all repeating itself, and it’s likely to get much worse.
Dr. David Gorksi and myself have I already discussed this with regards Dr. Mandrola’s Sensible Medicine business partner, Dr. Vinay Prasad, who has become a mouthpiece for the Trump administration, cheering their mass purges of scientists. I’ve also previously discussed how doctors who minimized COVID, also minimized RFK Jr. Meanwhile, Dr. Mandrola recently shared an observational study and said:
No malice meant. I’m sorry in advance. But if NIH-supported studies like this decreased b/c of cuts, medical science would be fine. Like coffee and blueberry studies, we could do w fewer nonrandom retrospective comparisons
While Dr. Mandrola was fine with “nonrandom retrospective comparisons” as long as they purported to show harms of vaccines, even authoring a VAERS dumpster dive himself, Dr. Mandrola wants people to think that cuts to the NIH will only affect coffee and blueberry studies, but that real medical science would be fine. This is as credible as his fabricated claim from May 2020 that “we have learned how to limit nosocomial spread.” Moreover, Dr. Mandrola predictably couldn’t even get basic facts right about the study he denigrated. As Dr. Alok Khorana pointed out:
Except that this study is not funded by NIH. The investigators have NIH support outside of this study, which they are appropriately declaring.
Unfortunately, most people didn’t care that Dr. Mandrola and like-minded doctors made things up in 2020. Maybe if they had, we wouldn’t be in such dire risk today. Sadly, cuts to the NIH will affect a lot more than coffee and blueberry studies, and even though “medical conservatives” don’t care, some of us value RCTs and believe politicians shouldn’t meddle in science.
Read this article
