Ohio Legislators Hear Testimony That COVID Vaccine… Magnetizes Recipients

Members of the Ohio House Health Committee on Tuesday heard testimony on a growing bit of misinformation regarding the COVID-19 vaccine: It magnetizes its recipients! 

Two witnesses raised the theory before the committee, which was considering HB 248, a bill that would among other things prohibit employers from mandating employee vaccination. 

One witness was the anti-vaccine Ohio doctor Sherri Tenpenny, who spent nearly an hour telling the committee not only about the purported health impacts of being vaccinated, but also of simply being around vaccinated people.

Tenpenny later acknowledged, in response to questions from State Rep. Allison Russo (D), that she had not submitted her theories about transmission of health effects from vaccinated to unvaccinated people to a peer-reviewed journal, nor was a draft manuscript in the works. 

“No,” she said, “We’re working on trying to figure out what is being transmitted.” 

Still, Tenpenny  managed to make headlines for her speculation about the magnetic effects of the vaccine.

“I’m sure you’ve seen the pictures all over the internet of people who’ve had these shots and now they’re magnetized!” she told the committee. “They can put a key on their forehead, it sticks, they can put spoons and forks all over them, it sticks. Because now we think there’s a metal piece to that.” 

Testimony going off the rails now.

Tenpenny is claiming there is metal in the vaccine that causes forks to stick to your forehead. She saw videos of it on the internet, you see

Also promoting the 5G cell phone network vaccine theory. This is the anti-vaccine “expert witness” pic.twitter.com/sPpuAqmHba

— Tyler Buchanan (@Tylerjoelb) June 8, 2021

Tenpenny went further, referencing speculation about a potential connection to… 5G towers. 

“There’s been people who’ve long suspected there was some sort of interface, yet to be defined — an interface between what’s being injected in these shots and all of the 5G towers,” she said. “Not proven yet, but we’re trying to figure out, ‘What is it that’s being transmitted to these unvaccinated people that are causing health problems?’” 

Later, Joanna Overholt, who identified herself as a former ICU nurse and nurse practitioner student, demonstrated the supposedly magnetic properties of vaccine recipients on herself. At first, Overholt stuck a key to her chest. Then, she tried unsuccessfully to stick the key onto her neck. Then she tried, also unsuccessfully, to stick a hairpin onto her neck. 

Wow. An anti-vaccine nurse in Ohio tried to prove the Vaccines Cause Magnetism theory in an state legislative committee. The demonstration did not go to plan pic.twitter.com/0ubELst4E8

— Tyler Buchanan (@Tylerjoelb) June 9, 2021

The theory about magnetic vaccine recipients has been spreading around the country for weeks. Recently, the far-right activist Lauren Witzke, who is guest-hosting the program TruNews alongside Milo Yiannopoulos as the TruNews crew struggles with a COVID-19 outbreak, shared video purporting to show her grandmother’s newly-magnetized vaccine injection site. 

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention even released an update to their “Myths and Facts” page addressing the theory. 

“Receiving a COVID-19 vaccine will not make you magnetic,” the page says.

There’s a simple explanation for viral videos showing metal sticking to peoples’ skin: Skin can get sticky. As The Daily Dot noted, the famed skeptic James Randi debunked an old case of the “magnetic man” by simply applying talcum powder. 

One TikTok user was recently prompted to use that same myth-busting technology. The results were enlightening. 

took advice and changed opinion based on new information — king behavior pic.twitter.com/tXElI3P9UI

— angel (@angelmendoza___) June 9, 2021