A trove of hacked documents has revealed that a network of right-wing health care providers has made millions of dollars selling unproven treatments for Covid-19 like hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin.
The data, shared with The Intercept by an anonymous hacker, includes hundreds of thousands of records and shows how a network of sites including a pro-Trump group called America’s Frontline Doctors is both fueling and profiting from misinformation about Covid-19.
The greed is stunning, and what we’ve uncovered so far may well be just the tip of the iceberg. We’re continuing to analyze this leak and dig for further evidence of pandemic profiteering, but as a nonprofit news outlet we rely on the financial support of our readers to help fund this investigative journalism.
If you’ve saved your payment information with ActBlue Express, your donation will go through immediately:
While the Delta variant surged through unvaccinated populations across the country, these pro-Trump health care providers cashed in by selling drugs that the Food and Drug Administration and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warn are at best ineffective against the disease, and at worst could cause severe illness.
The scheme emerged from an effort by the Trump campaign in 2020 to recruit doctors who would back up the former president’s erroneous claims about Covid-19. Since then, it has morphed into a cash cow for right-wing health care providers and associated companies to peddle unproven remedies to vaccine resisters.
But the scandal isn’t just the millions of dollars these groups have pocketed selling snake oil. They’ve also pushed Covid-19 misinformation far and wide across the internet and cable news, hardening partisan resistance to the vaccine. And most of the 72,000 people who paid for consultations from America’s Frontline Doctors are in their 50s and 60s and therefore at high risk of hospitalization and death from the virus.
The politicization of the Covid-19 vaccine is one of the most confounding obstacles to ending the pandemic. Our reporting is calling out and helping shut down some of the worst actors, and your support helps us keep digging.
