Radio legend Howard Stern slammed podcaster Joe Rogan for using Ivermectin when he contracted COVID, doubling down on his comments from last week that the vaccine should be ‘mandatory’ and that unvaccinated people shouldn’t burden hospitals.
The Sirius XM host criticized Rogan’s off-label use of Ivermectin – an anti-parasite drug used mainly on horses and cows – when multiple COVID-19 vaccines are readily available.
‘I heard what Joe Rogan was saying, ‘what are you busting my balls [for]? I took horse de-wormer and a doctor gave it to me.’ Well a doctor would also give you a vaccine, so why take horse de-wormer?’ Stern, 67, said yesterday.
Rogan, 54, announced he had COVID on September 1 after playing a series of shows in Florida, which is undergoing a spike in cases due to the highly contagious Delta variant.
He said he was treated with a hodgepodge of medicines including monoclonal antibodies, prednisone, and Ivermectin.
The Centers for Disease Control has warned that Ivermectin is not approved to treat or prevent COVID, despite a spike in sales during the pandemic.
The medication is used to treat river blindness and intestinal strongyloidiasis in humans, and topical formulations are used to treat head lice and rosacea, but large concentrations meant for animals can result in overdoses.
It’s not known if Rogan, who signed a $100 million deal with Spotify last year, is vaccinated, but the host has previously decried vaccine mandates as being one step closer to a ‘dictatorship’ and said that young people shouldn’t have to get jabbed.
‘I’m not an anti-vax person,’ Rogan said on his show in April.
‘In fact, I said I believe they’re safe and I encourage many people to take them. My parents were vaccinated. I just said I don’t think if you’re a young healthy person you need it.’
Stern voiced little sympathy for unvaccinated ‘imbeciles,’ suggesting that they should skip medical care if they get coronavirus despite readily available vaccines.
‘We have no time for idiots in this country anymore,’ Stern said yesterday.
‘Don’t take the cure, but don’t clog up our hospitals with your COVID when you finally get it. Stay home, don’t bother with science, it’s too late. Go f*** yourself, we just don’t have time for you.’
‘You notice, in every single case, all this anti-science s*** goes right out the window when people end up in the emergency room and they can’t breathe,’ Stern continued.
Conservative hosts Marc Bernier, Phil Valentine and Dick Farrell all died of COVID last month after decrying the vaccine and other pandemic safety protocols.
Stern has previously mocked the hosts on his show.
‘There’s never been one that said “I’m so glad I refused. I’m so happy that I can’t breathe. This is a wonderful way to die, it was worth it because I didn’t take the vaccine,'” Stern said.
Stern called for the vaccine to be mandatory on his show last week, and expressed surprise at the media blitz that followed.