Since the beginning of the pandemic, misinformation about COVID-19 has undermined population health and public trust in evidence-based medicine. An egregious example of this occurred during a recent session of the Ohio State legislature. Health professionals, including an osteopathic physician, provided testimony based on fallacious internet rumors that Covid vaccines “magnetize” the body. Although public health experts have uniformly condemned the testimony, it has gone viral.

As Ohio’s public health leaders work to improve our state’s vaccination rates, misinformation about life-saving vaccines threatens not only individual and public health, but also the state’s wellbeing as we work to restore Ohio’s pre-pandemic social and economic life. 

We are particularly embarrassed and angered that the physician who testified before the Ohio legislature--Dr. Sherri Tenpenny--is an osteopathic physician.  Medical misinformation violates the promise physicians make to “do no harm.” For osteopathic physicians, in particular, spreading such misinformation also violates the Osteopathic Oath.

We, the undersigned healthcare professionals and professionals-in-training, call on the American Osteopathic Association to condemn osteopathic physicians who abuse public trust by spreading lies that threaten individual and societal health and wellbeing, thereby discrediting the osteopathic profession and the work of osteopathic physicians.