DeSantis’ Antivaxx Surgeon General Blasted by Lawmakers, Colleagues as a ‘Charlatan’: ‘Sullied the Academic Reputation’ of University of Florida

AP Photo/Chris O’Meara

Dr. Joseph Ladapo, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ hand-picked choice for the state’s surgeon general, has frequently made headlines for his controversial views on vaccines, and his colleagues at the University of Florida College of Medicine have “lost faith” in him, worried about how he might be damaging the university’s reputation, reports Politico’s Arek Sarkissian in a scathing profile.

As Sarkissian reported, Ladapo was tapped to be Florida’s Surgeon General in the middle of the pandemic, selected for his vocal opposition to not just vaccine mandates, but to the vaccines themselves:

Ladapo has made headlines across the country for his contentious stances on Covid mandates and vaccines as surgeon general. He has bucked the medical establishment by claiming Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines are dangerous for healthy young men and warned people under the age of 65 from getting the most recent Covid boosters. He was also criticized for supporting hydroxychloroquine, the anti-malaria drug heralded as a coronavirus treatment by former President Donald Trump. A study later found the drug didn’t prevent Covid-19.

Ladapo was hired for a tenured position at the UF College of Medicine along with his appointment as surgeon general, a practice that Sarkissian noted was fairly standard — but “Ladapo had warning signs from the start.”

To research the article, P0litico conducted “interviews with more than two dozen current and former faculty members, state lawmakers and former agency heads, as well as reviews of internal university emails and reports.”

His application went through a substantially quicker and less rigorous vetting than past applicants, lasting “less than three weeks” instead of the several months that it usually took. He also somehow has avoided teaching classes and even admitted in an email to  the college heads that he had only visited the campus twice during his first year on the job — a far cry from the sort of on-campus presence and commitment normally expected for a tenured job that comes with a six-figure salary.

And unsurprisingly, the financial aspect of his hiring has not gone unnoticed, with the College of Medicine struggling with expansion costs and Ladapo not only drawing a $262,000 paycheck (on top of his $250,000 salary as surgeon general) without teaching classes, he has not fulfilled a pledge he made to transfer an annual $600,000 National Institutes for Health grant he had been awarded while he was at UCLA to UF. Politico used public records requests to review emails that college heads sent to Ladapo inquiring about the status of the funds, which several years later have not been transferred to UF.

The high salary coupled with the failure to bring the expected grant money has made other med school professors even more skeptical of Ladapo, wrote Sarkissian. One professor, granted anonymity, said that they kept getting emails “about doing more to help” with the college’s budget shortfall, “and then you have this guy who’s not doing anything…I don’t know what he’s doing but it’s not research.”

Ladapo’s outspoken attacks on Covid-19 vaccines, and vaccines in general — out of step with the medical community, including the UF College of Medicine — have pushed the criticism of his hiring to the boiling point.

State Senator Tina Polsky (D) previously tangled with Ladapo when he refused to wear a mask in her office shortly after his appointment. Polsky had just been diagnosed with cancer and was starting radiation therapy that week, but Ladapo still refused, claiming he thought a mask interfered with his ability to “communicate clearly.”

Polsky recalled Ladapo’s confirmation hearings as “really frustrating,” telling Politico he “never taught a class per se” and gave “typical word salad answers for everything” — and added she was unsurprised to hear about his colleagues at the med school being similarly frustrated with him.

“This guy is a charlatan,” said Polsky, “he’s not looking out for anyone’s health and he’s going to campaign with DeSantis.”

“Dr Ladapo has undoubtedly sullied the academic reputation of the University,” the professor said. “He continues to detract from the incredible science and outstanding clinical work being done by real UF scientists and clinicians.”

The Politico article generated a lot of buzz among Florida-based social media users, including from many of my fellow UF alumni, expressing outrage at the state’s flagship university apparently bypassing their own vetting procedures to make a hire under political pressure.

Florida Democratic Party chair Nikki Fried is also a UF alumna, earning both her undergrad and law degrees in Gainesville, so her expected criticism of the Republican governor took on a sharper edge in a comment she sent to Mediaite.

“Joseph Ladapo is an embarrassment to his profession, the University of Florida, and the State of Florida itself,” said Fried. “From pushing wild conspiracy theories to stumping for Ron’s presidential campaign, Ladapo has repeatedly disrespected the ethical principles of both medicine and government. This quack should never have been given tenure at UF, let alone an appointment as Florida’s Surgeon General.”

The DeSantis administration and Ladapo declined Politico’s request for comment.