FDA Delivers Warning to Alex Jones, InfoWars Over Virus Claims

FDA Delivers Warning to Alex Jones, InfoWars Over Virus Claims
InfoWars founder Alex Jones takes photos at a hearing to examine foreign influence operations' use of social media platforms before the Intelligence Committee at the Capitol in Washington on Sept. 5, 2018. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)
Zachary Stieber
4/10/2020
Updated:
4/10/2020
Alex Jones, the InfoWars founder, was warned by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to stop making claims related to the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, commonly known as novel coronavirus.

Jones in three separate videos said products he sells will help boost people’s immune systems, linking a strengthened system to staving off the new virus, which causes the potentially deadly COVID-19 disease.

“I’m not going to belabor this, I’m just gonna tell ya, that for just your daily life, and your gums and your teeth and for regular viruses and bacteria, the patented Nano Silver we have, the Pentagon has come out and documented, and homeland security have said this stuff kills the whole SARS corona family at point blank range. Well of course it does, it kills every virus,” Jones said in one video watched by FDA workers.

“If you are concerned about the coronavirus or the flu or the common cold, then I recommend you to go to the InfoWars store, pick up a little bit of silver that really acts its way to boost your immune system and fight off infection,” he said in another.

The videos were hosted on Jones’s InfoWars and Banned Video websites.

People wear masks as they walk outside the Elmhurst Hospital Center in Elmhurst, Queens, New York on March 29, 2020. (Chung I Ho/The Epoch Times)
People wear masks as they walk outside the Elmhurst Hospital Center in Elmhurst, Queens, New York on March 29, 2020. (Chung I Ho/The Epoch Times)

FDA official Donald Ashley said in a warning letter to Jones that the FDA determined his InfoWars Store website offers four products that are intended to mitigate, prevent, treat, diagnose, or cure COVID-19. The products are not approved and are misbranded, he said.

“We request that you take immediate action to cease the sale” of the products, Ashley wrote, threatening Jones with legal action, including a possible order to return money to customers, if he doesn’t stop the claims.

The FDA has so far sent similar letters to 25 other companies for unapproved sales linked to the COVID-19 pandemic, including companies selling liquids, essential oils, and colloidal silver products.

Jones, who didn’t immediately return a request for comment, was warned last month to stop selling and marketing products as a treatment or cure for the CCP virus by Letitia James, New York’s attorney general.

“As the coronavirus continues to pose serious risks to public health, Alex Jones has spewed outright lies and has profited off of New Yorkers’ anxieties,” James said in a statement after sending a cease-and-desist order.

“If these unlawful violations do not cease immediately, my office will not hesitate to take legal action and hold Mr. Jones accountable for the harm he’s caused.”