CNN
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Dozens of professors from Harvard, Yale, Columbia and other universities wrote a letter to the Mayo Clinic on Thursday protesting the suspension of a doctor after he publicly criticized a federal agency.
“Placing academic freedom in jeopardy will certainly tarnish Mayo’s reputation among many who have always considered Mayo a beacon of scientific integrity,” the professors wrote.
In a January story on CNN, Dr. Michael Joyner, who is the principal investigator of a government-funded study on convalescent plasma, said he was “frustrated” by the National Institutes of Health’s “bureaucratic red tape,” calling the agency’s Covid-19 “wet blanket” treatment guidelines that discourage doctors from offering what he considers promising treatments to their patients.
Two months later, Mayo suspended Joyner for a week without pay, instructing him in part to “discuss only approved topics” with reporters and to “stick to prescribed messages.” The letter warned him that the prescribed set of “behavioral changes must be immediate and sustained” and that failure to comply would result in his termination – as well as any additional “confirmed complaints” from staff, even if unrelated to the issues outlined in the letter.
This week’s letter from the 29 professors said that “by pursuing one of its most senior and valued professors, Mayo is sending a terrible message not only to its fellow faculty, but to other institutions in academic medicine.” Joyner, a professor of anesthesiology, has been with Mayo for nearly 36 years.
Mayo should be ashamed of themselves tweeted Dr. Nicholas Christakis, a physician and professor at Yale University, who signed the letter, described Mayo’s letter to Joyner as “doublespeak from 1984.”
Last week, the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression wrote about Joyner’s suspension.
The Alliance for Academic Freedom wrote a letter to Mayo on June 7 calling the disciplinary action against Joyner “a direct attack on his academic freedom.”
Andrea Kalmanowitz, a Mayo spokeswoman, said in a statement to CNN that “Mayo has disciplined Dr. Joyner for disrespectful treatment of colleagues and for making unprofessional comments about NIH regulation of convalescent plasma” and that “Mayo Clinic supports academic freedom as is evident from the hundreds of interviews that Mayo doctors, including Dr. Joyner, give each year.
“idiomatic language”
In November, CNN contacted Joyner for a story about the use of convalescent plasma — an antibody-rich blood product from people who have recovered from Covid-19 — to treat immunocompromised patients infected with the virus.
Emails obtained by CNN show Joyner received permission from a Mayo communications official before doing the interview.
In January, Joyner and colleagues published a study showing that convalescent plasma transfusions can help people with Covid who have weakened immune systems.
However, other studies have shown that convalescent plasma is not effective, and NIH guidelines for the treatment of Covid-19 say there is not enough evidence to recommend for or against the use of convalescent plasma in people with compromised immune systems.
Three times last year, Joyner and dozens of other doctors at Harvard, Stanford, Johns Hopkins, Columbia and other academic medical centers wrote emails to NIH scientists, sending them research materials and asking them to revise the guidelines.
In his March letter to Joyner, Dr. Carlos Mantilla, chairman of Mayo’s Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine, referred to this part of the CNN story: “Joyner said he was ‘frustrated’ by the ‘bureaucratic tightrope’ of NIH, calling the agency’s guidelines a ‘wet blanket’ that discourages doctors from trying convalescent plasma on these people.”
Mantilla wrote that Mayo’s public relations team expressed concern about his comments in the CNN story and that “this latest situation shines a light on a negative and unprofessional pattern of behavior you have exhibited for some time. Your use of idiomatic language is problematic and reflects poorly on Mayo Clinic’s brand and reputation.”
Joyner’s attorney, Kelly Miller, told CNN that it was “quite clear that the use of idiomatic language would be a form of creative expression when discussing his own scholarship and research.”
Suzanne Nossell, chief executive of PEN America, a human rights and free expression organization, said Mayo’s objection to Joyner’s “idiomatic language” seemed like an “idiosyncratic complaint.”
She said she wonders what might be next — whether Mayo might tell its scientists they can’t use metaphors, similes or analogies in their discussions with journalists.
“Objection to the manner of expression or the phraseology used goes against the spirit of the policy, which is intended to protect academic freedom and freedom of expression,” Nossel said. “[Joyner] must be able to communicate using the language and expression of his choice.’
A Mayo spokesman, Kalmanowitz, said in a statement that “Dr. Joyner’s comments about the NIH do not reflect the expression of a scientific or academic opinion, but instead are an expression of his personal frustration with the NIH’s regulation of a therapy he advocates.
A critique of the history of transgender athletes
The disciplinary letter to Joyner also referenced comments he made in a June 2022 New York Times article.
On June 19, the newspaper published an article about banning transgender swimmers from competing in high-level international competitions, which quoted Joyner as saying, “There are social aspects to the sport, but the physiology and biology support it.”
In his disciplinary letter to Joyner, the Mayo official wrote that “your June 2022 comments in a NY Times article were problematic in the media and the LGBTQI+ community at Mayo Clinic,” and that Mayo executives met with Joyner and discussed “your use of language as inflammatory in this context.”
On May 29, 2022, a few weeks before this article, the New York Times published a story about Leah Thomas, a transgender swimmer at the University of Pennsylvania. According to Joyner’s lawyer, both the June article and the May article used quotes from an interview he gave the newspaper in March 2022.
The first article discusses the debate about the role of testosterone in physiological development.
“Testosterone is the 800-pound gorilla,” Joyner said in that story.
A few days later on Twitter, Jennifer Winter, an LGBTQ advocate in Rochester, New York, asked Joyner if he was “deliberately trying to be transphobic by invoking images of a giant gorilla when talking about trans women in sports?”
Joyner was “talking about testosterone. He doesn’t talk about people,” said Miller, his attorney. “He wasn’t talking about individuals or groups.
Mayo’s disciplinary letter to Joyner did not mention this May New York Times story.
Claims for behavioral problems
The disciplinary letter stated that Joyner “failed to operate consistently within the Mayo Clinic guidelines related to media interactions” and that colleagues described “your tone as unpleasant and having a ‘bullying’ quality.” One person asked not to work with you anymore because of your behavior.
Joyner’s attorney told CNN that Mayo has not provided any examples of such behavior and that there are no examples in his personnel file.
“We have repeatedly asked for examples of these allegations and Mayo has not responded to our requests,” Miller said.
“Mike’s personal record has years of excellent grades and compliments for his collegiality and contribution to Mayo.”
Mayo’s letter to Joyner also mentions a 2020 disciplinary matter that includes severance, according to both Mayo’s spokesman and Joyner’s attorney.
Nossel, the CEO of PEN America, said that when universities want to police a researcher’s speech, they will sometimes “stack it” with other unrelated complaints in what she described as “proxy repression.”
She said this could serve to “chill” other researchers from talking about their areas of expertise for fear of being called out for “anyone they’ve ever offended or bothered.”
CNN’s Amanda Moussa and John Bonifield contributed to this report.