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Staff members at Sarasota Memorial Hospital are baffled by critics who continue on a crusade against federal covid treatment.
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By Patricia Mazzei
SARASOTA, Fla. — Riots at Sarasota Memorial, one of Florida’s largest public hospitals, began last year after 3 applicants who ran on a “health freedom” platform won seats on the nine-member board that oversees the hospital. The once-dormant board The meetings began to attract many other angry people who, like the new members, denounced the hospital’s care protocols for covid-19.
An internal review last month found that Sarasota Memorial had done far more than some of its competitors to save the lives of covid patients. But that did little to appease critics, whose crusade against the hospital has not wavered. the last public establishment besieged by a growing right-wing contingent in one of Florida’s wealthiest counties, where a backlash to pandemic policies began to reshape local government.
Some Sarasota County Public Hospital Board members and Sarasota Memorial doctor are baffled and surprised by the continued fear of critics related to Covid policy, primarily the avoidance of ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine, drugs deemed useless or even destructive as Covid treatments.
“Most hospitals in the country are in the most sensitive part of Covid,” said Dr. James V. Fiorica, the hospital’s lead physician. We have a proven track record. Why don’t we move forward?
People who are part of the “health freedom” movement object to the fact that the Sarasota memorial has strictly followed the rules of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health, which do not propose the use of ivermectin or hydroxychloroquine in the remedy of Covid patients. Sarasota Memorial legalizes those drugs as remedies, according to the review, but only with a prescription from a staff doctor and possibly an exemption.
Board meetings in recent months have attracted speakers who have lost their rights because of covid, though some do not appear to live in Sarasota territory or have received covid treatment at Sarasota Memorial, according to the hospital.
Tanya Parus, Sarasota County bankruptcy chairwoman for Moms for America, a conservative group, told the council at its February meeting that the network does not accept hospital leadership as truth. Some patients, she said, had “begged” for a remedy that was refused through the hospital.
“It’s not that we’re anti-vaxxers. It’s not that we’re criticizing covid. It’s not that we have nothing to do all day, it’s about discussing publicly,” he said. “We know firsthand what happened upstairs in the hallways. We know how much hearts hurt.
Dr. Fiorica said he understands the grief of those who have lost loved ones to covid, but highlighted the hospital’s strong overall functioning during the pandemic, despite the harsh operating conditions.
“These are professionals dealing with life-and-death situations, and they have adapted throughout each and every year of the pandemic,” he said. “And we show in our report that their work is exceptional. “
Harsh and misleading comments were made about the hospital and its doctors, adding that a cardiovascular surgeon would not work on patients who had not obtained the coronavirus vaccine, in public forums or posted on reviews such as Google, Yelp and Healthgrades. Michael T. Flynn, former President Donald J. ‘s first national security adviser. Trump, who is now a Sarasota resident with a committed clientele, attended the hospital’s board meeting in February and wrote on Twitter that “it would possibly be time to privatize this hospital. “
A Facebook organization called Sarasota Memorial Hospital – Transparency Project said the hospital no longer deserves to go through a legal immunity shield that limits malpractice bills to $200,000 to $300,000 consistent with the incident at Florida’s public hospitals.
The fury culminated last month in a crusade of misinformation fueled through voicemails and emails insulting hospital staff. “Traitor,” said one woguy in his oath-laden message reviewed by The New York Times. When commentators on the Telegram app gave the impression of threatening the lives of two Sarasota Memorial doctors, their names, the hospital called the police.
The crusade began after a contributor to The Epoch Times, a purveyor of conspiracy theories and political disinformation affiliated with China’s non-secular Falun Gong movement, posted a misleading video. The video, which was later shared widely on Telegram, showed security guards escorting a doctor from the February board assembly who had earlier spoken out at the assembly, without incident, in favor of ivermectin to treat Covid.
The doctor, who is not affiliated with the hospital, was expelled not because of his comments about ivermectin, but because he had approached a board member on stage, which the board considered a violation of decorum. Still, it didn’t seem to matter. In calls and emails to the hospital, dozens of other people said they watched the video on Telegram and falsely accused hospital staff of expelling the doctor because he called to treat Covid with ivermectin.
Although abusive calls and emails have decreased in recent weeks, the pressure crusade against the hospital has not stopped. Ahead of the next board meeting on Monday, several right-wing teams scheduled a press conference to further criticize the “blatant recklessness” of the hospital’s Covid treatment protocols and call for outdoor investigations, Gov. Ron DeSantis added.
Mr. DeSantis, a Republican and likely presidential candidate, built his political persona largely by being an early skeptic of federal covid policies, peddling “medical freedom. “schools and other institutions, marked tactics that his management had resisted prolonged closures and mandates for masks and vaccines.
“They got almost everything wrong,” he said of public fitness experts on one occasion in Winter Haven, central Florida. He did not refer to Sarasota or its hospital.
Not long ago, Sarasota County, home to the artsy city of Sarasota on Florida’s Gulf Coast, seemed like one of the state’s many politically conservative but more liberal suburban pockets. Tramm Hudson, a longtime Republican who has worked at the county hospital board since 2015 and is now its president, said Sarasota’s citizens were largely “Teddy Roosevelt Republicans” who prioritized small government and environmental conservation.
“It was because of the Midwestern influence of other people who got off I-75,” and moved to Sarasota from places like Illinois and Michigan, he said. “And today it’s a completely different Republican Party. “
Since the end of the Trump administration, the county has temporarily become a hotbed of right-wing activism. Flynn, who has embraced the pro-Trump QAnon conspiracy theory, was elected last year to the Sarasota Republican Executive Committee. Boys, the far-right nationalist organization that was at the forefront of the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the U. S. Capitol, also elected.
Last year, the Sarasota County School Board changed from Liberal to Conservative after 3 new members were elected with Mr. S. DeSantis and others, adding a policy committee funded in part by Victor G. Mellor, a structural entrepreneur who was outside the doors of the Capitol on January 6, 2021. Mellor owns Hollow 2A, a sprawling venue in Venice in southern Sarasota County, which has become a gathering place for right-wing groups.
Moms for America and Hollow 2A are two of the teams hosting the Monday event before the hospital’s board meeting. The same goes for Zelenko Freedom Foundation, a Sarasota County-based organization founded by a doctor that rose to prominence early in the pandemic when its questionable Covid treatment, which included hydroxychloroquine, an antimalarial drug, won approval from the Trump White House.
Victor Rohe, one of the board members elected to the “health freedom” list last year, said he was not in favor of privatizing the hospital; its prestige as a public hospital with an elected council allows foreigners to “take a look” at how it has treated Covid, he said, which would not be imaginable with personal hospitals that do not have to respond to open records legislation or aspirants like him gaining board seats to consultant politics.
Rohe said he and the other new board members don’t need to force doctors to prescribe remedies they “disagree with” or oppose their medical judgment. that user in consultation with their doctor. We don’t think it deserves to be done in Washington or through an insurance company.
Rohe, a former New York City police officer who has lived in Sarasota for 26 years, said he was recruited to report the day before the qualification deadline through a friend, Sarasota resident, conservative activist and former doctor admitted to Sarasota. Subsequently, the friend produced a widely shared video in which he characterized himself and the other patient in his room, who, according to the friend, eventually died, as hospital prisoners receiving poor care.
“Had it not been for this incident, we would be on the board,” Mr. Rohe said.
He said the hospital had ignored considerations about its Covid protocols from taxpayers who didn’t feel the Sarasota Memorial, a 901-bed facility, was meeting their needs.
“Nobody needs to communicate about it,” Rohe said. “So the other people who elected us, they say, ‘Hey, listen, we need to see evidence. We need to know the facts. We’re not interested in public relations. ‘ We are not interested in so many references or what the government needs”.
The hospital’s internal Covid review, which took more than 70 people and 850 hours to compile and compare data such as patient outcomes with 1,300 other hospitals across the country, found fewer deaths and shorter remains for Sarasota Memorial Covid patients.
“The numbers speak for themselves,” Hudson, chairman of the board.
However, Mr. Rohe and another new board member voted against the report (the other members did) and questioned its validity. “What they’ve tried to do is select statistics carefully to show how wonderful this hospital is,” M said. Rohe .
Dr. Jonathan Hoffberger, the cardiovascular surgeon who has come under fire from some hospital critics, said he fears the acrimony could lead to the departure of some of Sarasota Memorial’s 9,000 workers and make it harder to hire doctors and nurses.
“Quietly and slowly, this will erode the medical staff,” he said. “People are passing through to endure it. It will go somewhere else. “
Susan C. Beachy and Sheelagh McNeill contributed to the research.
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