despite, like, this. what doctor a lot of poll apparently endeared himself to ron desantis with the prince is not appearances and conservative media and a series of op-eds where he said that covid isn t so bad and you definitely shouldn t wear a mask to avoid getting it. since becoming surgeon general of florida, doctor ladapo has done press conferences with ron desantis where he has ominously questioned the safety of the vaccines, encouraging people to not get them because they re dangerous. he also earned himself a brief moment of notoriety in the press for refusing to personally, himself, wear a mask while he was in a meeting with the state senator who had just been diagnosed with cancer. she asked him to please put on a mask because of her serious medical condition. he refused. but one of the ways dr. ladapo rose to prominence and conservative media circles and
it s a weird fight to pick right now. under the leadership of ron desantis and joe ladapo, florida s insisting that as a state government, they are gonna do nothing to mitigate the spread of covid whatsoever. and worse than that, they re gonna continue to spread out and misinformation about both vaccines and masks. but they insist that they must be able to continue to give people monoclonal antibodies that literally do not work against the omicron variant which is covid now. we are two years into this pandemic. this is wet passes for pandemic policy in our third most populous state. and as i said, republican politics are in such a state right now that what happens in florida tends to spread to other red states as soon as it gets featured on fox news or whatever. doctor ladapo s confirmation process to officially become the surgeon general of florida,
to this top medical post in florida that ron desantis put him in, was in large part on the basis of him staking his credibility on being a frontline doctor. in his conservative media appearances and his op-eds, he presented himself as a frontline doctor who spent time as a physician treating many, many, many covid patients. and his expertise and his matter was born out of the hard work he had experienced with all of his experience treating patients with covid-19. we reported exclusive a couple of months ago with evidence that calls this into question. doctor ladapo wrote to op-eds in 2020 city that he took care of covid patients, particularly at you see l.a. s flagship hospital. multiple people who worked at
valiantly to try to get an answer out of governor ron desantis s handpicked surgeon general for the state of florida. senator book and her democratic colleagues ultimately got up and walked out of that hearing, saying that they were fed up with a doctor ladapo s refusal to offer any answers to the questions. after that, the sun-sentinel published this response. quote, joseph ladapo and his contrived evasiveness moscow. quote, doctor ladapo is an expert, all right. he s masterful at dodging questions, and salting the intelligence of floridians, and avoiding answering questions. i m married to data, ladapo told senators. the reality is that he is married to desantis s agenda to politicize the pandemic. the doctor does not deserve to be confirmed as surgeon general, especially now that he has shown that he has so little respect for the people of florida that he wouldn t give them straight answers through senators.
and any existing records that we can find indicate lots of other doctors treating covid patients at ucla s hospital but not him. one other thing to know about doctor ladapo, is that he has not yet been confirmed into this post as florida s surgeon general. governor desantis put him up for the job months ago and he has essentially been functioning as florida surgeon but he has to be confirmed by the state senate and florida. yesterday, he appeared before the florida senate for his confirmation hearing, and it was it was it was something. thank you so much mister chair and thank you doctor ladapo for being with us today. do you believe vaccines work? you recognize for an answer. thank you, thank you senator. i consider vaccines in the same