Ohio doctor who claimed Covid vaccines make people magnetic has licence suspended

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An Ohio doctor who claimed that the Covid vaccine “magnetised” people and promoted 5G conspiracy theories has had her medical licence suspended by the state’s medical board.

Dr Sherri Tenpenny made headlines when she testified before the Ohio state legislature in June 2021 in favour of a bill that would prohibit any Ohio business or school from mandating vaccines.

“I’m sure you’ve seen the pictures all over the Internet of people who have had these shots and now they’re magnetised,” Dr Tenpenny said at the time. “They can put a key on their forehead. It sticks. They can put spoons and forks all over them and they can stick, because now we think that there’s a metal piece to that.”

Now she has also been fined $3,000, according to an order from the State Medical Board of Ohio. She is able to file for an appeal on the decision within 15 days after the date the notice was mailed.

Last month, the Board said that it proposed to take disciplinary action against her license to practice osteopathic medicine and surgery in the state, due to allegations that she “failed to respond to an investigator’s attempts to contact her, failed to respond to interrogatories from the Board, failed to appear at a deposition, and failed to appear at an investigative office conference.”

The Board said it received “approximately 350 complaints regarding Dr Tenpenny”, which caused it to launch an investigation.

In 2021, the osteopathic doctor came under heavy scrutiny from officials for her position on vaccines.

On 7 September 2021, Dr Tenpenny was mailed the Board’s “First Set of Interrogatories,” which asked about her recommendations concerning vaccines, as well as “specifically ask how many doses of COVID-19 vaccines she had provided and whether she had personally received a COVID-19 vaccine.”

It also asked what scientific evidence the doctor had—and requested she cite her sources— regarding her claims. One such claim, according to the Board was that “COVID-19 vaccines causing people to become magnetized or creating an interface with 5G towers.”

Another claim Dr Tenpenny made was “regarding the COVID-19 vaccine not injecting a real virus but strips of genetic material and patients suffering complications such as abnormal bleedings, myocarditis, strokes, and neurological complications.”

On top of these, she allegedly said that “some major metropolitan areas [were] liquifying dead bodies and pouring them into the water supply,” the Board wrote.

Weeks later, on 20 September 2021, Dr Tenpenny notified the Board via her attorney that she found the interrogatories “invasive,” stating she refused to answer their questions.

According to the Board, her attorney wrote, “declining to cooperate in the Board’s bad faith and unjustified assault on her licensure, livelihood, and constitutional rights cannot be construed as an admission of any allegations against her.”

The following month, the Board sent Dr Tenpenny a subpoena, ordering her to appear in November for an investigatory deposition. Through her lawyer, the doctor again said that she refused to participate.

By June 2022, the Board directed her via letter to attend an investigative office conference in July at the Board’s office; Dr Tenpenny never replied to the letter nor showed up at the conference, the Board wrote.