A leading Virginia critical-care doctor had his hospital privileges suspended the same day he appeared in court to testify in his lawsuit against the hospital for prohibiting him from prescribing a lifesaving treatment protocol for COVID-19 patients.
Dr. Paul Marik, director of the intensive-care unit at Sentara Norfolk General Hospital, discovered he had been suspended for 14 days when he found a letter on his desk at the hospital on November 20.
The letter was dated November 18, the very day Marik testified in Norfolk Circuit Court concerning the hospital’s recently imposed ban on his using the MATH+ protocol, which includes ivermectin and other nonstandard treatments, to treat patients dying from COVID-19. According to the Defender, the protocol “counters the body’s overwhelming inflammatory response to the SARS-CoV-2 virus” and has generated “no reports of adverse medical events” — something that cannot be said for any of the vaccines or Remdesivir, the federal government’s treatment of choice.
“Our COVID-19 protocol is based on the best scientific data available, yet Sentara claimed the medications I used were toxic and harmful, which is an absolute lie,” Marik told the Defender.
“What they want me to use is Remdesivir. We know Remdesivir increases death by three percent, increases the risk of hospital stay, and increases the risk of kidney and liver failure. It does not improve patient outcomes. It is toxic. But the hospital gets a bonus if Remdesivir is prescribed. They profit from the expensive drug but not the cheap drug that people can afford.”
Marik accused the hospital — the very one that appointed him ICU director — of impugning his character. Sentara pressured a medical journal into retracting an article touting the benefits of MATH+ that Marik had co-authored, claiming the mortality statistics he used, which came directly from the hospital’s chief, were faulty. Then they “used the fact the journal article was retracted against him,” wrote the Defender.
Marik’s lawsuit, the website explained, “alleges Sentara’s ban on the use of certain therapies against COVID violates U.S. and Virginia medical laws and the concept of informed consent — whereby ‘patients have the right to receive information and ask questions about recommended treatments so that they can make well-considered decisions about care.’”
Marik sought a temporary injunction against the ban. That request was denied by Judge David Lannetti, but he did grant Marik standing to sue, something the hospital argued he did not have since he was not being harmed by the prohibition.
Sentara’s suspension of Marik on the very day he testified in court would seem to be just cause for bringing the hospital back before the court to answer for its misrepresentations during the hearing, especially since the suspension was undertaken so secretively — exactly what Marik’s attorney, Fred Taylor, requested in a November 22 letter to Lannetti.
Taylor pointed out various suspicious details concerning the suspension. First, Sentara did not disclose the suspension during the hearing, even keeping it secret from Marik; the hospital claims it sent him copies via e-mail and overnight courier, but Taylor said he never received either. Second, the “coincidence” of the suspension letter’s date and the date of the hearing leaves “only one realistic conclusion,” namely that “Sentara has engaged in a blatant act of retaliation against Dr. Marik.” Third, Sentara is trying to keep the letter itself under wraps, claiming “peer review privilege,” as well as Marik’s upcoming hearing before hospital officials, which Marik’s attorney is forbidden to attend and where “no recording (audio/video) or transcript … will be made.” Fourth, while Sentara expressly stated in court that it would not retaliate against Marik for informing patients that the hospital had forbidden him to offer them alternative treatments, the suspension letter specifically cites an allegation that Marik had done just that.
“Sentara cannot be permitted to try to deprive Dr. Marik of standing through a retaliatory, pretextual suspension that Sentara kept secret from the Court, perhaps hoping Dr. Marik would respond to Sentara by offering to drop his suit if Sentara would withdraw its suspension,” wrote Taylor. “Such behavior is unethical and unacceptable.”
Marik awaits his hearing at the hospital on Thursday and word from Lannetti on whether he will provide any redress to a clearly wronged plaintiff.
