Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo personally altered a study about COVID-19 vaccines last year so it’d align closer to the dangerous anti-vax messages he’d been spreading, Politico reported Monday. According to a document released as part of a public records request, Ladapo removed part of the study to make it appear as though mRNA vaccines posed a higher risk of cardiac issues in young men than what had previously been determined by the medical community. The study raised eyebrows at the time, and researchers involved in it called out Ladapo for the false edit—exposing his sneaky switch in the document titled “Dr. L’s edits,” and in an interview with Politico. “I think it’s a lie,” Matt Hitchings, one of the researchers involved, said about Ladapo’s edits. “To say this—based on what we’ve seen, and how this analysis was made—it’s a lie.” Ladapo denied altering the study with ill-intent, telling Politico that making revisions and refinements to a medical study is standard practice.
