A former trauma surgeon who worked at the Washington hospital that treated the first confirmed U.S. COVID-19 patient told a Senate roundtable that hospital leaders concealed problems, retaliated against dissenting physicians and supported restrictions against unvaccinated patients, allegations that remain disputed and include medical assertions that conflict with federal treatment and infection-control guidance.

By yourNEWS Media Newsroom

A Washington physician who treated patients and performed intensive-care quality reviews during the COVID-19 pandemic told a Senate roundtable Monday that he witnessed what he described as fraudulent hospital practices, harmful treatment protocols, retaliation against doctors and efforts to deny services and civil liberties to people who declined COVID-19 vaccination.

Dr. James P. Miller, a former trauma and critical-care surgeon at Providence Regional Medical Center Everett, delivered the allegations during Sen. Ron Johnson’s roundtable, “COVID-19 Hospital Protocols: Real Stories from Real People,” held Monday in Washington.

Johnson’s office announced the event as a forum for physicians, nurses, patients and families to discuss their experiences with hospital COVID-19 policies. The official announcement describes it as a roundtable and does not state that participants were placed under oath. Miller, however, made many of the same allegations in an earlier written declaration signed under penalty of perjury.

Miller worked at the Everett hospital that treated the first confirmed COVID-19 patient in the United States in January 2020. Providence records identify Dr. George Diaz, then the hospital’s infectious disease section chief, as one of the physicians who treated that patient and subsequently participated in clinical research involving remdesivir.

Miller told the roundtable that his duties during the pandemic included surgery, intensive-care treatment and separate ICU quality reviews. He alleged those reviews uncovered misconduct extending into senior hospital management and said he faced disciplinary proceedings after reporting what he believed was fraud.

Among Miller’s most serious claims was that the hospital’s infectious disease chief privately discussed working with Washington state officials on restrictions that would limit the ability of unvaccinated people to participate in society.

Miller’s prior declaration identifies Diaz as the official he said made those remarks. In that document, Miller alleged that a May 2021 conversation included discussion of making access to a driver’s license contingent on COVID vaccine status.

The declaration provides Miller’s account of that conversation, but the allegation that Diaz worked with the governor’s office to impose a vaccination requirement for driver’s-license renewal has not been independently established. Washington later imposed vaccination requirements on many health care workers, but the public state records reviewed for this report do not show that Washington adopted a statewide COVID vaccination requirement for obtaining or renewing a driver’s license.

Miller also challenged the way his hospital handled remdesivir, COVID death reporting, staffing, personal protective equipment and patients who declined vaccination. His statement to the roundtable was:

“During COVID-19, I was a staff surgeon, ICU provider at the hospital where the first diagnosed COVID patient in the United States was treated. I cared for hundreds of COVID patients and also contracted independently to perform ICU quality reviews at the hospital, in addition to my surgical and ICU duties as a physician.
My reviews uncovered fraud extending to senior hospital leadership. I reported these findings. There were protocols put in place that caused—thank you—that caused demonstrable harm and increased mortality.
After our hospital was given remdesivir by federal authorities, we were provided misleading and inaccurate information about the drug by medical leadership. When I had a young trauma patient just after remdesivir was released, she appeared to be a perfect candidate based on the guidelines. The infectious disease doctor on call told me privately not to give it to her because, quote, ‘She seemed like a nice girl,’ unquote.
Any physician honestly reviewing the real-world data at that time could have recognized early that remdesivir caused more harm than good.
I observed messaging by the hospital that falsely inflated COVID infections and deaths, contributing to public fear and generating misleading headlines. In my experience, we never faced shortages of equipment or staff. I witnessed nurses being sent home because there were not enough patients, while headlines about our hospital were simultaneously running, stating that we were overwhelmed by COVID patients.
I further observed that mask and PPE protocols initiated during COVID lacked scientific basis and did not medically work, but the mask and PPE protocols did dehumanize patients and staff.
I witnessed patients who died from trauma and other causes being reported as COVID-19 deaths on their death certificates. I watched previously compassionate and devoted doctors and nurses become cruel and ambivalent about the well-being of patients as the COVID experience evolved.
The head of infectious disease medicine at my hospital privately told me that he was working with the state government to restrict the civil rights of unvaccinated people, including their ability to drive and, therefore, work, by making their driver’s license renewal contingent on their COVID vaccine status.
Hospital leadership, including the chief medical officer of our medical group, endorsed the local medical establishment’s refusal to provide healthcare to unvaccinated patients. Primary care and urgent care physicians refused to see unvaccinated patients with the chief medical officer’s knowledge and approval, through policy.
In response, I opened a free clinic to care for those denied care through my local church. The church became a licensed clinic.
I observed that many of the alternative treatments that were censored by medical societies, pharmacists, social media, the press, and established health agencies were highly effective. Treatments including ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, vitamin D, zinc, quercetin, and just physical exercise were highly effective at treating COVID.
When I advocated for patient care rather than harmful protocols and spoke against the fraud, I was targeted for removal through baseless disciplinary actions, with a stated goal of taking away my medical license and ability to ever practice medicine again.
I endured countless unfounded disciplinary hearings, show trials, and sham peer review procedures, which included the threat of me being arrested. This was all in retaliation for me speaking out.
I defeated every attack. I remained in good standing, and I told the truth.
I witnessed physicians and nurses who observed the harms done by the COVID protocols either remain silent or be forced out of our community.
The public health officials, hospital leaders, and physicians who implemented these treatments and protocols should be held accountable. The data were available, and the harms were obvious.
Accountability is necessary if we’re going to maintain public trust and a functioning healthcare system.”

Several of Miller’s medical conclusions in that testimony differ from findings reached by federal regulators and major clinical trials.

His assertion that remdesivir caused “more harm than good,” for example, is not the conclusion reached by the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA granted remdesivir emergency authorization in May 2020 after a National Institutes of Health-sponsored trial found that it shortened recovery time in some hospitalized patients, and the agency formally approved the drug for COVID-19 treatment in October 2020 after reviewing safety and effectiveness data. Remdesivir remains an FDA-approved COVID-19 treatment for qualifying patients.

Miller’s previous sworn declaration provides additional detail about the patient he referenced Monday. He said that in early November 2020 he consulted an infectious disease physician regarding a young woman hospitalized following a vehicle crash who also had early COVID-19 symptoms. Miller wrote that she appeared to qualify for remdesivir under hospital guidelines but that the infectious disease doctor advised against using it because she “seemed like a nice girl.” Miller interpreted that remark as evidence that the physician knew the drug was harmful. The declaration documents Miller’s interpretation of the exchange; it does not independently establish why the other physician made the recommendation.

His testimony also characterized ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, vitamin D, zinc, quercetin and exercise collectively as “highly effective” COVID treatments.

The FDA has not approved or authorized ivermectin to prevent or treat COVID-19 and states that available clinical trial data do not demonstrate that ivermectin is effective against the disease. The agency revoked its emergency authorization for hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine in June 2020 after concluding they were unlikely to be effective for the authorized COVID-19 uses and that their known and potential benefits no longer outweighed their risks.

Miller’s blanket assertion that COVID-era masks and protective-equipment practices “lacked scientific basis and did not medically work” also conflicts with federal infection-control guidance. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention continues to describe well-fitting masks and respirators as forms of source control and recommends NIOSH-approved respirators such as N95s in specified health care situations involving suspected or confirmed respiratory infection.

Other portions of Miller’s testimony concern events he says he personally witnessed and cannot be established from clinical studies alone.

His declaration states that he believed hospital leaders overstated COVID infections and deaths, that he observed nurses being sent home during periods when news accounts portrayed the hospital as overwhelmed, and that he saw death certificates listing COVID-19 in cases involving deaths from trauma or other causes. Those remain Miller’s allegations; the material presented here does not include the underlying patient records, death certificates or hospital data needed to independently verify individual cases.

Miller also alleged that hospital leadership knew primary care and urgent-care practices were declining to treat some unvaccinated patients. He said he responded by establishing a free clinic through his church for people who said they had been denied care.

Contemporary reporting from Monday’s roundtable confirms that Miller publicly repeated his allegation that physicians refused care to unvaccinated patients and his claim that he endured disciplinary proceedings after speaking out.

The most politically significant allegation involves Miller’s account of his conversation with Diaz.

In his declaration, Miller wrote that Diaz told him in approximately May 2021 that people who had not received COVID-19 vaccines should not have the same access to certain societal resources as vaccinated people and that he was communicating with the Washington governor’s office about policy.

Miller’s declaration goes further than his Senate remarks, alleging that Diaz supported denying unvaccinated people access to transportation and preventive medical care and expressed approval when Miller warned that such restrictions could produce civil unrest. Those statements represent Miller’s account of a private conversation. No recording or transcript of the conversation was included in the materials reviewed for this report.

Diaz was a prominent figure in Providence’s early pandemic response. Providence identifies him as the infectious disease physician who treated the first confirmed U.S. COVID-19 patient, and he later served as a principal investigator in remdesivir clinical research.

Miller’s broader allegations about misconduct predate Monday’s appearance. His written declaration states that he joined Providence Regional Medical Center Everett in 2014, held leadership positions in trauma and acute-care surgery and reported what he characterized as fraudulent practices to federal authorities during the pandemic. He also alleged that hospital administrators subsequently attempted to discipline him and threaten his medical career.

The declaration itself establishes that Miller formally made those allegations under penalty of perjury. It does not, by itself, establish that the people and institutions he accused committed fraud, deliberately increased patient mortality, manipulated death certificates or conspired with government officials to violate civil rights.

Monday’s roundtable provided Miller a national forum to repeat those claims as Johnson continues examining the federal and institutional response to the pandemic. Johnson’s office said the event was the first in his series of COVID-related hearings and roundtables devoted entirely to what patients, families and health professionals said occurred inside hospitals.

Miller closed by arguing that accountability for pandemic-era decisions is necessary to restore confidence in medicine and public health.

“Accountability is necessary if we’re going to maintain public trust and a functioning healthcare system,” he said.

Clarify the article’s central allegationReduce the lengthy quoted testimony
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