It was easy to think that once Trump was elected that there would be a shift away from the online lies driven by conspiracy propagandists pushing false information about COVID-19 and vaccines. Unfortunately, the lies continue unabated, with some particularly dangerous ones coming from individuals who claim to be physicians or actual physicians who abuse their professional standing to spread misinformation.
Paul Ellis Marik, born in 1958, exemplifies this problem. Until January 2022, he served as chair of the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at Eastern Virginia Medical School. His professional standing eroded when the American Board of Internal Medicine moved to revoke his certification for spreading misinformation, with the revocation finalized in August 2024. Marik developed the now-discredited "Marik protocol" for preventing sepsis and co-founded the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance, a group that has promoted ineffective COVID-19 treatments including hydroxychloroquine, ivermectin, and intravenous vitamin C.
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