A health-care government has slapped Final Week Tonight host John Oliver with a lawsuit, alleging the comedian-turned-talk-show-host defamed him in a 2024 episode by twisting his phrases and making “false accusations.”
The episode in query, which aired in April of final yr, linked Dr. Brian Morley, a hospital administrator and former medical director for AmeriHealth Caritas in Iowa, to a drastic lower in Medicaid providers and accused him of considering “it’s OK if individuals have s–t on them for days.”
The criticism, filed late final week within the New York Southern District Courtroom, claims that Oliver and his staff “completely snipped out of context and manipulated two sentences of Morley’s testimony” throughout an administrative continuing in order that they might “accomplish their defamation,” reviews Leisure Weekly.
Morley’s attorneys declare Oliver made “false accusations” about Morley that “had been designed to spark outrage.” They mentioned Oliver’s “feigned outrage” was “fabricated for rankings and income on the expense of Dr. Morley’s fame and private well-being.”
Within the episode, which is out there on YouTube, Oliver explored the state of Medicaid within the U.S., digging into the cost-cutting measures healthcare corporations had been taking and whether or not they had been on the expense of sufferers’ well being.
Whereas explaining the function of managed care organizations (MCOs), Oliver shared a 2018 information snippet about an Iowa cerebral palsy affected person named Louis who was struggling after his in-home care program was disrupted following cuts to Iowa’s Medicaid providers and an MCO received concerned in his care.
Oliver cited the interview with Louis and his mom and first caregiver, Joann, on the struggles individuals with disabilities in Iowa confronted after the state moved to for-profit MCOs, which Louis mentioned left him in soiled diapers for hours.
Oliver then shared audio of Morley speaking about affected person care from a 2017 administrative listening to. Within the clip, Morley mentioned: “Individuals have bowel actions every single day the place they don’t utterly clear themselves and we don’t fuss over [them] an excessive amount of. Persons are allowed to be soiled. , I’d permit him to be a little bit soiled for a few days.”
This, based on the lawsuit, subsequently broken Morley’s “fame and private well-being.” Morley “didn’t equate wiping poorly with leaving anybody sitting in their very own feces for days,” and truly “testified to the alternative,” the lawsuit says.
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The lawsuit continues, arguing that Morley by no means mentioned it’s “‘okay’ or medically acceptable for people carrying diapers or who’re in any other case motionless ‘to have s–t on them for days.’” It additionally says that Morley by no means mentioned that it’s “‘okay’ or medically acceptable for anybody to sit down or lay in their very own feces, for days at a time or in any other case.”
Quite, the swimsuit argues, Morley’s intention was to clarify that some sufferers “might not wipe completely,” however that “they’re cellular they usually’re not laying in it.”
The swimsuit says Morley’s “bowel motion” feedback had been made a few “hypothetical common individual, who’s independently cellular and may bathroom switch” however who may not have been capable of clear themselves completely after a bowel motion — a element the episode didn’t disclose, Morley’s attorneys argue.
The criticism claims that Morley’s full, unedited quote throughout the testimony mentioned, “In sure instances, sure, with the affected person with vital comorbidities, you’d need to have somebody wiping them and getting the feces off. However like I mentioned, individuals have bowel actions every single day the place they don’t utterly clear themselves and we don’t fuss over an excessive amount of. Persons are allowed to be soiled. It’s when the soiled and the feces and the urine intrude with, you understand, medical security, like in somebody who has concomitant comorbidities that you simply fear, however not on this particular case. I’d permit him to be a little bit soiled for a pair days.”
In the course of the episode, Oliver seemingly implied to viewers that his staff had listened to the complete testimony.
“I’ll be trustworthy, once I first heard that, I assumed — that must be taken out of context. There is no such thing as a approach a health care provider, a licensed doctor, would testify in a listening to that he thinks it’s okay if individuals have s–t on them for days, so we received the complete listening to,” Oliver mentioned.
“I’m not going to play it for you. I’m simply going to inform you: He mentioned it, he meant it and it made me need to punch a gap within the wall,” he continued.
“The false accusations Defendants made had been so heinous that John Oliver felt justified in telling his tens of millions of viewers: ‘F— that physician with a rusty canoe. I hope he will get tetanus of the balls,’” the criticism mentioned.
Morley is demanding a retraction, elimination of the episode from all platforms, and compensatory damages, particular damages and punitive damages to be decided by a jury.
This isn’t the primary time Oliver has confronted a lawsuit.
In 2017, coal firm CEO Bob Murray filed a swimsuit towards Oliver and his present after an episode known as out Murray and his mining firm for failing to guard the security of his miners after one among his mines in Utah collapsed in 2007, killing six miners and three rescue staff.
He mentioned methods Murray typically mistreated his staff and described him as a “geriatric Dr. Evil.”
The defamation swimsuit was ultimately tossed out by a choose, who agreed with HBO’s argument that Oliver’s feedback had been both clearly satirical and guarded below the First Modification, or had been factual and sourced from courtroom paperwork.
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