Medical boards are now under increasing pressure to take action. Public health organizations have urged them to take a tougher stance by disciplining the doctors and potentially revoking their licenses. The push comes as the pandemic enters its second winter and the number of deaths in the United States exceeds 800,000.
At least a dozen regulatory boards in states including Oregon, Rhode Island, Maine, and Texas have recently sanctioned some doctors, but many of the most prolific promoters of COVID-19 misinformation continue to hold unblemished medical licenses.
"It's no different than if someone called you claiming to be the IRS and trying to steal your money," said Brian Castrucci, president and chief executive officer of the de Beaumont Foundation. "It's a con, and we protect Americans from con artists."
Castrucci's organization, which promotes public health, and No License For Disinformation, which combats false medical information, released a report on Wednesday that highlighted some of the cases. The report comes just a week after the Federation of State Medical Boards released a survey that revealed that 67 percent of the boards had seen an increase in complaints about COVID-19 misinformation.
This figure "shows how widespread the problem has become," according to Dr. Humayun Chaudhry, president and CEO of the federation.
Dr. Kencee Graves, a physician at the University of Utah hospital in Salt Lake City, said one of her patients decided not to get vaccinated after hearing false information from a doctor.
"She was led astray" by someone she should have trusted, according to Graves, who described the patient as a "very, very sweet older lady."
"I realize now I am wrong, but that is who I thought I should listen to," the woman later admitted.
According to a national poll conducted by the de Beaumont Foundation, there is widespread support for cracking down on such doctors. In a survey of 2,200 adults, 91 percent said doctors have no right to intentionally spread false information.
However, policing doctors is a difficult task for boards that were established long before social media. Their investigations typically take months or even years, and many of their proceedings are held in private.
Castrucci stated that it is time for them to "evolve," but that this will be difficult. Tennessee's medical licensing board removed a recently adopted misinformation policy from its website this month in response to pressure from a Republican state lawmaker and a new virus-related law.
Individual board members have also been targeted. Kristina Lawson, the president of California's medical board, said last week that anti-vaccine activists stalked her at home and followed her to her office. She stated that the individuals identified themselves as members of America's Frontline Doctors, a group that opposes the COVID-19 vaccine and spreads misinformation.
Dr. Simone Gold, the group's leader, who was arrested during the Jan. 6 insurgency at the United States Capitol, tweeted this month to her nearly 390,000 followers that "nurses know that Covid patients are dying from government subsidized hospital protocols (Remdesivir, intubation), NOT from Covid."
Gold is still a licensed physician in California, despite the fact that her emergency medicine certification expired last year. Complaints and investigations in the state are not made public, so it is unclear whether she is the subject of any.
The Idaho Medical Association became so enraged by pathologist Dr. Ryan Cole's promotion of the anti-parasite drug ivermectin that it filed a complaint with the state medical board. Susie Keller, the association's chief executive director, stated that she believed it was the first time the organization sought legal action against one of its own. She explained that many doctors are fed up.
According to Keller, the spread of falsehoods has "actually caused our physicians and nurses to be subjected to verbal assaults" by patients who believe the false information is true.
Cole did not respond to an Associated Press request for comment, but his work voicemail stated that he is "unable to prescribe medications or issue vaccine or mask exemption letters." The voicemail also directed callers to the website of the Front Line COVID-19 Critical Care Alliance, an ivermectin advocacy group.
Unless there is a formal hearing, all physician investigations in Idaho are conducted in private. Meanwhile, the Washington State Medical Board is looking into five complaints about Cole, according to spokeswoman Stephanie Mason.
Investigating misinformation is "very difficult because a lot of action isn't documented," she explained in an email. Many examples take place "quietly in an office."
Sherri Tenpenny's license in Ohio was automatically renewed in September after the Cleveland-based osteopathic doctor testified this summer before a state House Health Committee that COVID-19 vaccines cause magnetism.
Tenpenny explained that vaccine recipients "can put a key on their forehead; it sticks."
A recent license renewal, according to Jerica Stewart, a spokesperson for the state's medical board, does not preclude the board from taking action.
Stewart stated that "making a false, fraudulent, deceptive, or misleading statement" is grounds for discipline.
Dr. Stella Immanuel of Texas appeared in a video promoting the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine. "There's no need for masks. There is a treatment."
According to records, the Texas Medical Board ordered her to pay $500 and improve her consent procedures in October after discovering she had prescribed hydroxychloroquine to a COVID-19 patient without adequately explaining the potential health consequences.
The AP sent Immanuel a Facebook message, but she did not respond, and the medical practice where she works did not respond to an email.
No License For Disinformation founder Dr. Nick Sawyer called the action against Immanuel a "small slap on the wrist" and accused the nation's medical boards of "not doing their job of protecting public health."
As an emergency physician in Sacramento, California, he has seen the devastation firsthand. He claimed that just this month, a diabetic patient in her 70s insisted she didn't have COVID-19 despite testing positive, then demanded ivermectin and signed out against medical advice when the drug was denied.
"She said, 'If I have COVID, you gave it to me,'" he recalled, blaming the woman's reluctance on doctors who spread misinformation. "It's taking our lives."