Photo: George Burns/Harpo Productions
When an eagerMehmet Ozcompleted his Ivy League education in 1986, the sky was the limit on what he’d achieve. And he nearly reached it.
Dr. Oz became America’s doctor, teaching viewers about their bodily functions and putting health in terms that everyone could understand. But even beforeOprah selected him as a protégé, doubts were brewing in the medical community about his approach to the profession — doubts that would later boil over andspark backlash.
Here, a timeline of the rise and fall of Dr. Oz.
Mehmet Oz graduates from Harvard in 1982.
1986: Mehmet Oz Earns Dual Graduate Degrees from UPenn
After earning an undergraduate degree in biology from Harvard University in 1982, Oz went on to study at the University of Pennsylvania, where he graduated with a Doctor of Medicine and Master of Business Administration, according to his Senate campaign website. About.com reported that in medical school, he served as class president then student body president.
1995: The ‘Therapeutic Touch’
According to Jerry Whitworth, whom Oz opened an alternative “mind-body” care center with inside the hospital, complaints about Oz’s credibility reached top administrators.New Yorkmagazine reportedthat Oz and Whitworth were told they’d at least need to stop practicing therapeutic touch — an unsupported “energy therapy” in which a practitioner waves their hand over a patient’s body to balance their “energy field” — if they wanted to keep the center afloat, because it was too damaging to the hospital’s name.
The small adjustment allowed the center to stay open, but Whitworth later toldNew Yorkthat they “were merely tolerated” at the hospital.
1996: A Taste of Stardom During the World Series
During the 1996 World Series, cardiothoracic surgeon Eric Rose was tapped to perform a life-saving heart transplant surgery on retired MLB player Frank Torre, with Dr. Oz serving as deputy surgeon. The highly publicized operation was successful, and a day after the surgery, Torre watched from a hospital bed as his younger brother’s MLB team — the Yankees — took home the championship.
Howard Earl Simmons/NY Daily News Archive via Getty
2003: Columbia University Whistleblowers Allege Animal Cruelty
Dell’Orto specifically said she witnessed the inhumane treatment of dogs in lab experiments investigating aspects of heart function over which Oz served in the role of “principal investigator” — including leaving dogs in pain and paralyzed for weeks, with no discernible research benefit, before they were euthanized or died.
Columbia’s websitenotes that when one is named principal investigator of a research study, he or she “has overall responsibility for safety and compliance in his or her laboratory.” According to Dell’Orto, other principal investigators did come into the lab and directly oversee their animals' care, but with Oz, she said, “There were no endpoints. What I saw was abuse.”
2004: First Appearance onThe Oprah Winfrey Show
Oprah took a liking to Oz after appearing as the first guest on his short-lived Discovery Channel showSecond Opinion with Dr. Ozin 2003. The following year she invited him to come onTheOprah WinfreyShow, and soon enough he had become her go-to medical guru, ultimately appearing on the talk show more than 60 times.
The Oprah Winfrey Show
2005: The Poop Episode
One of Dr. Oz’s breakthrough television moments was when he opened the conversation about one of the most common (and least discussed) bodily functions: poop.
On May 3, 2005, 39-year-old Maureen — a true martyr for the cause — described her bowel issues on national television, prompting Oz to give a lesson onwhat healthy bowel movements look like. Viewers will never forget Oprah’s reaction to hearing the stool descriptors “tiny marbles” and “S-shaped” in her studio.
The episode branded Oz as a poop expert, and showed thatno health topic is too embarrassingto talk about.
2009:The Dr. Oz ShowPremieres
2011: Arsenic & Apple Juice
WhenThe Dr. Oz Showtold viewers that apple juice contains dangerous levels of the cancer-causing chemical arsenic, it waslike “yelling ‘Fire!’ in a movie theater,“his former med school classmate Dr. Richard Bresser toldGood Morning America. Except there was no fire, the FDA said.
At the start of his third season, Oz geared up to declare that tests conducted in the show’s lab revealed several samples of apple juice exceeding the safe limit of arsenic. Professionals on the matter,including the FDAand one of the apple juice manufacturers, warned Oz before the segment aired that his methodology was inaccurate and would be irresponsible if publicized because it failed to distinguish between organic and inorganic arsenic. (Organic arsenic, commonly found in juice, has not been linked to cancer.)
Dr. Oz.Harpo Inc./AP
2013: Oz’s Early Career Mentor Questions His Science
Surgeon Eric Rose, who gave Oz his first career job after medical school at a Columbia-affiliated hospital, toldThe New Yorkerthat he believes Oz is talented, but doesn’t agree with his scientific “baseline.”
“I want to stress that Mehmet is a fine surgeon,” Rose told the outlet. “He is intellectually unbelievably gifted.”
He continued: “But I think if there is any criticism you can apply to some of the stuff he talks about it is that there is no hierarchy of evidence. There rarely is with the alternatives. They have acquired a market, and that drives so much. At times, I think Mehmet does feed into that.”
Asked if he would send a patient to Oz for an operation, Rose replied, “No. I wouldn’t,” adding that Oz had become more of an entertainer. “In medicine, your baseline need has to be for a level of evidence that can lead to your conclusions. I don’t know how else you do it. Sometimes Mehmet will entertain wacky ideas — particularly if they are wacky and have entertainment value.”
2015: Doctors Call for Oz’s Firing from Columbia
After years of questionable medical claims airing onThe Dr. Oz Show, a group of doctors from various institutionscalled for his firingfrom Columbia University, where he’d continued to hold a high-level role in the surgery department.
“We are surprised and dismayed that Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons would permit Dr. Mehmet Oz to occupy a faculty appointment, let alone a senior administrative position in the Department of Surgery,” read the letter, addressed to Columbia’s dean of medicine, Lee Goldman.
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“I bring the public information that will help them on their path to be their best selves,” Oz responded in a statement,according to USA Today.“We provide multiple points of view, including mine, which is offered without conflict of interest,” the statement continued. “That doesn’t sit well with certain agendas which distort the facts.”
In the medical world, Oz’s show had long been criticized for at times leaning on alternative medicine and alleged pseudoscience. Episodes explored"miracle” weight loss products, the possibility of Ebola becoming airborne, and the (widely disgraced)practice of conversion therapy. Plus, there was the arsenic in apple juice controversy.
Dr. Oz/Twitter
2016: Trump Enters the Picture
On screen, Oztook hold of Trump’s physical exam resultsto decipher them and asked some questions about his health; he then used that “comprehensive” information toreport to the worldthat Trump is in good condition.Vox called the segment “disturbing,“and described it as “Trump’s post-fact politics meet Oz’s medical misinformation showmanship.”
Later, during President Trump’s administration, Oz was appointed to thePresident’s Council on Sports, Fitness, and Nutrition.
2020: Dangerous COVID Claims Sink Popularity
In the first weeks of the COVID-19 pandemic, Oz appeared on Fox Newsmore than 25 timesto promote hydroxychloroquine/chloroquine — an antimalarial drug also used for treating lupus — as a cure for the novel coronavirus, according toThe New York Times, despite lacking evidence that it was safe or effective. (CNBC recently reported thatOz owns at least $630,000 in stockin pharmaceutical companies that distribute hydroxychloroquine.)
The original, unedited Dr. Oz image.Dr. Oz/Twitter
2021: Senate Campaign Launches in Pennsylvania
Alongtime resident of New Jersey, Oz changed his address to Pennsylvania so that he couldvie for a vacating Senate seat. As a result, he announced the end ofThe Dr. Oz Show.
Oz ultimatelyearned the endorsement of Trump, helping himnarrowly defeat hedge fund executive David McCormickin the 2022 Republican primary.
Dr. Mehmet Oz/Twitter
2022: Jersey, Puppies and Crudités Taint the Campaign
Since the Pennsylvania primaries confirmed that Oz would be facing off with Democratic Lt. Gov. John Fetterman in November, the television star’s campaign has repeatedly blundered, in large part due to Fetterman’sinternet savvy methodof painting Oz as something of a laughing stock.
From day one Fetterman’s most public rebuke of Oz is that prior to the campaign, he hadn’t lived in Pennsylvania since getting his Ivy League education in the ’80s. Fetterman has alleged that Oz still doesn’t spend much time in Pennsylvania, instead splitting his days amongvarious propertiesaround the globe, and that his status as a wealthy outsider doesn’t qualify him to understand Pennsylvanians' needs.
Fetterman hit the point home in a number of ways —having Snooki record a videoreminding Oz that he’s a Jerseyan, erecting a billboard about Oz’s residence on the New Jersey/Pennsylvania state line, andflying a banner over the Jersey Shorewhile Oz was visiting there that read “Hey Dr. Oz! Welcome home to NJ!”
Then camethe crudités “scandal,“born from a bizarre video Oz posted that shows him shopping for what he calls “crudités” and talking about how high the prices have gotten. He was criticized for misnaming the popular Pennsylvania grocery store he was in and describing a veggie plate with a word most voters don’t use.
More damaging than the viral video itself washis team’s response to the situation, when a senior campaign adviser tried spinning Oz’s veggie-filled grocery list as a way to harp on Fetterman’s past health issues, saying, “If John Fetterman had ever eaten a vegetable in his life, then maybe he wouldn’t have had a major stroke.”
In OctoberOz suffered a late-campaign setbackwhen the news about his link to Columbia University animal experiments in 2003 resurfaced. Even if a stretch, people almost instantly began tagging #PuppyKillerOz in tweets.
source: people.com
