During a recent episode of The Joe Rogan Experience podcast, host Joe Rogan demanded that Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN’s chief medical correspondent, tell him why the news network “lied” about him taking horse dewormer to treat COVID-19 (even though he literally took horse dewormer to treat COVID-19). “Why would they lie and say that’s horse dewormer? I can afford people medicine, motherf*cker,” Rogan said. “It’s ridiculous! It’s just a lie! Don’t you think that a lie like that is dangerous on a news network when you know that they know they’re lying?” Dr. Gupta admitted that “they shouldn’t have said that,” but CNN has since released a statement defending itself.
It reads, via the Washington Post:
The heart of this debate has been purposely confused and ultimately lost. It’s never been about livestock versus human dosage of Ivermectin. The issue is that a powerful voice in the media, who by example and through his platform, sowed doubt in the proven and approved science of vaccines while promoting the use of an unproven treatment for covid-19 — a drug developed to ward off parasites in farm animals. The only thing CNN did wrong here was bruise the ego of a popular podcaster who pushed dangerous conspiracy theories and risked the lives of millions of people in doing so.
Dang, that last sentence, although as the Post notes, “CNN’s statement sounds more like the work of an advocacy group than a journalism outfit… If we take Rogan’s prescription claim at face value — and CNN hasn’t challenged it — then the network’s coverage was slanted in some cases and straight-up incorrect in others.”
Somewhere out there, Howard Stern is cackling.
You are not a horse. You are not a cow. Seriously, y'all. Stop it. https://t.co/TWb75xYEY4
— U.S. FDA (@US_FDA) August 21, 2021
(Via the Washington Post)