Medical license suspended for Ohio doctor who claimed vaccines 'magnetized' people
View a previous report on the investigation into the doctor's magnetism claim in the video player above.
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) – A Cleveland doctor who in 2021 falsely claimed COVID-19 vaccines magnetized people has had her medical license indefinitely suspended.
The State Medical Board of Ohio handed down the decision Wednesday, more than two years after Dr. Sherri Tenpenny testified before an Ohio House committee that there was an “interface” connecting COVID-19 vaccines to 5G cell towers. But the indefinite suspension was not for her COVID-19 claims; rather, it was because she repeatedly failed to cooperate with the medical board’s investigation.
According to a letter sent to Tenpenny last September, she evaded an investigator’s requests – at her office and in her email inbox – to sit for an interview. She ignored letters from the medical board detailing accusations against her, and never submitted required responses.
After receiving a letter of interrogatories in September 2021, Tenpenny advised the medical board through her attorney that she “did not believe the Board had a lawful basis” for the investigation.
Tenpenny also ignored an investigative subpoena for a deposition, reiterating that she did not believe the investigation was lawful. She declined to attend an investigative conference after for the same reason.
A long-time vaccination opponent who received her medical license in 1984, Tenpenny made national headlines in June 2021 while testifying in support a bill that would have prohibited companies from requiring mandatory vaccinations. During that testimony, she erroneously asserted to state lawmakers that 5G cell towers can “interface” with the vaccine to magnetize its recipients.
“I’m sure you’ve seen the pictures all over the internet of people who have had these shots and now they’re magnetized,” Tenpenny told the Ohio House Health Committee. “They can put a key on their forehead. It sticks. They can put spoons and forks all over them, and they can stick.”
The state medical board also fined Tenpenny $3,000 and established conditions she must meet before her license is reinstated. Upon the mailing of the outcome of the investigation and hearing, those conditions and documents will be publicly available, a medical board spokesperson confirmed.