GOP doc dispenses sketchy medical advice on virus immunity

TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Roger Marshall won't let people forget he's a doctor, putting “Doc” in the letterhead of his U.S. Senate office's news releases. But when he talks about COVID-19 vaccines, some doctors and experts say the Kansas Republican sounds far more like a politician than a physician.

He's made statements about vaccines and immunity that defy both medical consensus and official U.S. government guidance. He's aggressively fighting President Joe Biden's vaccine requirements, arguing they'll infringe on people's liberties and wreck the economy. He's acknowledged experimenting on himself with an unproven treatment for warding off the coronavirus.

Marshall's positions are pushing the first-term senator and obstetrician closer to the medical fringe. But he has company in other GOP doctors, dentists and pharmacists in Congress, several of whom have also spread sketchy medical advice when it comes to the pandemic.

Critics say the lawmakers' statements are dangerous and unethical, and that Marshall's medical degree confers a perception of expertise that carries weight with constituents and other members of Congress.

“He has an enormous role to play here because he’s a doctor and a senator,” said Arthur Caplan, founder of New York University’s medical ethics division and director of a vaccine ethics program. "He bears a very powerful responsibility to get it right.”

Marshall says he is fully vaccinated and has said he's urged his parents recently to get booster shots. He and other GOP doctors in Congress appeared in a public service campaign in April to encourage people to get vaccinated.

But that was before Biden's vaccine mandates fired up the party's conservative base and had activists predicting that grassroots opposition could help drive Republicans into power in...