by Henry Redman, Wisconsin Examiner
May 3, 2023
The Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled in a 6-1 decision Tuesday that it won’t order Aurora hospital to provide ivermectin to a patient with COVID-19.
The case was brought by Allen Gahl, who held health care power of attorney for his uncle and sought to have the anti-parasitic drug prescribed to treat him in the hospital. Doctors at Aurora Health Care had refused to administer the dewormer, so Gahl sued. A county judge ordered the hospital to allow an outside doctor to come in and prescribe the drug, but the Supreme Court upheld an appeals court decision that found that the county judge did not have the power to make such an order.
Similar lawsuits were brought across the country as popular conservative commentators, and lawmakers including U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, touted the drug as a cure for COVID-19, despite a lack of scientific evidence backing the claim. The drug, which can be used to treat worms or head lice in humans, is more commonly used as a dewormer for animals such as horses and dogs. The misleading claims about its potential use for COVID resulted in people buying ivermectin meant for horses at farm goods stores.
Taking a high dose of ivermectin can cause hypertension, seizures, coma and even death, according to a warning by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court majority, which included all of the justices except conservative Rebecca Bradley, affirmed the appellate court’s decision, finding that the circuit court judge did not base his decision on any Wisconsin statutes.
“We do not know what viable legal claim the circuit court thought Gahl had presented,” Justice Ann Walsh Bradley wrote in the court’s opinion.
In her 40-page dissent in which she invoked the “natural right” of self-determination, Bradley wrote that the circuit court made a quick decision in a case in which a patient was near death and therefore the hospital should have been forced to provide the drug.
“The circuit court considered the relevant facts and applied the correct legal standard to reach a reasonable decision in light of the life-or-death circumstances presented,” she wrote. “Like the majority of the court of appeals, a majority of this court fails to look for reasons to sustain the circuit court’s discretionary decision as the law requires. Under our highly deferential standard of review, the circuit court properly exercised its discretion in entering an order granting temporary injunctive relief to a man near death.”
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