Doctor Loses License for Bogus COVID Exemptions

0:00It's March 29th. This is Canada News Today, powered by AI. A Toronto doctor named Celeste Jean Thurowell just lost her medical license after a tribunal ruled, she issued 1,475. Bogus exemption letters during the COVID Delta wave. This was back in late summer and fall of 2021, letting patients skip vaccines, masks and tests without any real medical backup. She charged $300 per letter, pocketing an estimated $427,500 over three months. Thurowell, a psychiatrist specializing in sleep issues, pushed these out mostly by phone, basing them on patient fears, misinformation, and unverified. Stories, no proper exams, or doctor consultations involved. The move hit hard during a time when vaccines were rolling out big. Lines were long a clinics and protests against mandates were heating up across. Canada, official stress exemptions should be rare, only for legit conditions, but Thurowell

1:02fed into the skepticism, putting folks at risk from the highly, contagious variant, and investigation reviewed 112 charts and found just two letters met guidelines. She had no training in immunology or public health, and passed complaints about her opioid prescribing and record keeping didn't lead to real fixes. The tribunal called her actions incompetent and dishonorable, saying she profited off fears during a crisis that demanded trust in science. They hit her with $10,370 in costs, closing the book on a practice that never should have gone that far.