TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (Legal Newsline) – A Florida appeals court recently refused to allow ivermectin to be a part of the treatment of a man suffering from COVID-19 with grim survival chances.
Staff at Mayo Clinic Florida refused to include the drug, an anti-parasite medicine at the center of controversy over its usefulness when dealing with COVID, in the treatment plan of Daniel Pisano.
His wife Claudia and son Christopher went to Duval County Circuit Court on Dec. 29 to force doctors to use it but were unsuccessful. They appealed to the First District Appellate Court, which affirmed the Duvall decision on Jan. 14.
On Jan. 27, the court issued its written decision. The courts say Claudia and Christopher, as attorneys-in-fact and health care proxies for Daniel, failed to prove they were entitled to the relief requested.
“We greatly empathize with the desire and conviction of Appellants to explore every option to assist in the survival of their family member,” the decision says.
“But the rule of law cannot give way to benevolent inclination, regardless of the unpleasantness of the judicial duty. Our role here is to apply the law as written, absent personal sentiment or bias, and to consider only those arguments properly raised.”
When the suit was filed, Daniel was in a medically induced coma and attached to a ventilator. An outside physician, Dr. Ed Balbona, provided the treatment plan including ivermectin. Despite the Mayo Clinic estimating Daniel’s chance of survival as less than 5%, it rejected Balbona’s recommendation.
Mayo Clinic says there is no proof it helps treat COVID-19 and it is not FDA-approved for that use. It prohibits its staff from prescribing medications for off-label use that are not supported by medical literature.
The trial court said the Pisanos did not show the rights of privacy and self-determination entitled them to relief and raised issues during the appeal it skipped at the trial court when it pointed at probate law.
“Appellants mischaracterize the scope and purpose of rule 5.900. It does not, as they contend, ‘require’ courts to intervene in medical treatment, but rather creates an expeditious procedural mechanism for limited medical disputes,” the decision says.
“The rule requires only that the trial court render a decision. It is silent regarding the scope of relief to which a petitioner is or may be entitled under substantive law.”