JACKSONVILLE, FLORIDA — At a press conference on Thursday, Governor Ron DeSantis and State Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo reassured Floridians that laws passed during the recent legislative session will keep Florida free from COVID-related mask and vaccine mandates.
“In Florida, not only did we stand and fight against COVID-19 mandates when it was happening, but we’ve enacted permanent protections against these policies now and in the future for Floridians,” Governor DeSantis said.
The governor said Florida went against the grain of the elite, cutting against what the “experts” and bureaucrats – including the last two presidential administrations – were advising.
“And that is really, really important,” DeSantis said. “You as a parent can send your kids to school and the school can’t force them to wear a muzzle all day. They’re allowed to breathe.”
“RELENTLESS” COVID HYSTERIA
“But when we did all that stuff, people were saying, oh, you know, this is over – they’re not going to do this again,” DeSantis said. “Now we’re in a situation where we are seeing forced masking of school children in different states around this country. You have colleges imposing booster shot mandates on college students still going on in this country. You have people like Dr. Fauci who are still trying to defend mask mandates.”
DeSantis said the data on the booster shots shows the efficacy “is probably negative” and the side effects are significant, especially in young, healthy people. Rather than following real science, DeSantis says other states are more interested in following an agenda.
“I can tell you here in Florida, we did not and we will not allow the dystopian visions of paranoid hypochondriacs control our health policies.”
Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo said the “relentless” voices pushing COVID hysteria seek to control behavior and will go as far as people allow them to. Rather than fall victim to the hysteria, Ladapo said Floridians can make common sense decisions to protect their “God-given civil rights thanks to Governor DeSantis and Florida’s Legislature.
An advocate of healthy eating and getting adequate sunlight for vitamin D production, Ladapo told The Florida Standard earlier this year that drug companies are capable of tremendous corruption.
AN IMPORTANT TEST FACING THE COUNTRY
DeSantis says Americans have a right to work and earn a living, regardless of whether they want to wear a mask or take the latest COVID-19 booster shot. The country is facing an important test, DeSantis says. Will governments respect citizens’ abilities to navigate life themselves, or will they impose more harm?
“I think the root of this – why you’re seeing this pop up again – is because nobody has been held accountable. Who were the architects of these policies to begin with?” DeSantis asked.
On Wednesday, during an interview with Newsmax’s Eric Bolling, DeSantis said America needs “a reckoning” over COVID-19 policies.
“If you don’t have that reckoning, they are going to continue to try to do it again,” DeSantis said. “So we’ve got to make it clear that what they did was wrong. What they’re trying to do now in its infant stages is wrong and we can’t let this happen to our country ever again.”
DeSantis said that for months, up to January of 2021, he was “getting hit” by Trump’s White House task force to impose mask mandates and close down bars, restaurants and businesses in Florida. “Facui should have been fired,” DeSantis said.
According to DeSantis, the country needs people like Jay Bhattacharya from Stanford, Joe Ladapo, the Surgeon General in Florida, and others who are “actually following the science.”
FLORIDA LEADS THE NATION
Earlier this year, Governor DeSantis signed the strongest medical freedom legislation in the nation, creating permanent protections for Floridians from the “Biomedical Security State.” The landmark legislative package safeguards residents’ freedom by ensuring no patient is forced by a business, school, or government entity to undergo testing, wear a mask or be vaccinated for COVID-19.
The legislation also protects physicians’ freedom of speech and freedom to use their best judgment to care for their patients through alternative treatments. Florida is the first state to ban unsafe and unregulated gain-of-function research, like the research conducted in the Wuhan lab.
Leading the nation in bucking the CDC, DeSantis announced the establishment of a Florida Public Health Integrity Committee. The Surgeon General oversees the Committee to assess federal public health recommendations and guidance. Additionally, the Governor petitioned for a Statewide Grand Jury to investigate crimes and wrongdoing committed against Floridians related to the COVID-19 vaccine.
DeSantis was the first governor in the nation to sign legislation in 2021 to protect Floridians from losing their jobs due to COVID-19 vaccine mandates and protect parents’ rights to make healthcare decisions for their children.
