Ex-NYC Covid Czar Booted from Pharmaceutical Job for Bragging About Parties During Pandemic

By: Ellen Cans

On Monday, Dr. Jay Varma, who had served as New York City’s top Covid-19 advisor during the pandemic, was fired from his job at a pharmaceutical company. As reported by the NY Post, the previous week he was secretly recorded bragging about hosting sex and drug fueled parties with his wife during the height of the pandemic and attending an underground rave. At the time, he was serving as a senior health adviser to then-Mayor Bill de Blasio from April 2020 to May 2021. Unbeknownst to him, his conversations with a woman, in which he bragged about his crazy night life, were recorded and his past caught up with him at his current job.

“On September 23, 2024, the Board of Directors of SIGA Technologies (NASDAQ: SIGA) terminated Dr. Jay Varma, effective immediately, other than for cause, from his position as Executive Vice President and Chief Medical Officer of the Company,” the firm wrote in a filing to the Securties and Exchange Commission. “Pursuant to the terms of his employment agreement, Dr. Varma’s service on the Company’s Board of Directors also automatically ended effective immediately,” said the filing. The law requires public companies to make such a filing when something happens that would likely affect the company shareholders.

Per the Post, on Thursday, conservative podcaster Steven Crowder had posted the video edits of Varma’s lengthy private conversation in which he had said, “I did all this deviant, like sexual stuff,” and, “I had to be kind of sneaky about it … because I was running the entire COVID response in the city”. The edited clips of Varma were reportedly filmed on a hidden camera and were recorded between July 27 and Aug. 14 in NY. Business owners and parents were enraged and took to the steps of City Hall to rally against the doctor, saying that while they were mandated by him to mask up, stay home, and keep their kids home from school, he himself was out and about getting randy with hordes of people. Michael Kane of Teachers for Choice said, “What disgusts me the most was hearing Varma say having drug-fueled group sex orgies was necessary for him to be his ‘authentic self’ because COVID had him ‘pent up.’”

City Councilman Bob Holden, who has been a longtime critic of Varma said in a statement: “Dr. Jay Varma’s firing is a step in the right direction, but the consequences for his actions are long overdue.” “Varma boasted about harassing people into submission over the vaccine mandate and admitted to participating in illegal sex parties, all while he, former Health Commissioner Dr. David Chokshi, and then-Mayor Bill de Blasio imposed draconian measures that shut down the entire city,” said the Queens Democrat. “The hypocrisy is outrageous.”

“While grandmothers took their last breaths alone on cold hospital beds, Dr. Varma was fulfilling his sick fantasies with hundreds of sweaty strangers,” said city Councilwoman Inna Vernikov (R-Brooklyn).

Dr. Varma said in a statement, “In those private conversations that were secretly recorded, spliced, diced, and taken out of context, I referred to events that transpired four years ago. Between April 2020 – May 2021, I participated in two private gatherings. I take responsibility for not using the best judgment at the time.”

Siga did not immediately respond to the Post’s request for comment.