Ex-NYC COVID czar fired after attending drug-fuelled sex parties during the pandemic

The city’s former COVID czar was fired from his job at a pharmaceutical company on Monday, a week after he was caught bragging about hosting sex parties and attending an underground rave at the height of the pandemic.

Dr. Jay Varma was serving as then-Mayor Bill de Blasio’s chief health adviser during the COVID-19 crisis when he and his wife delved into sex- and drug-fueled debauchery and attended a packed Wall Street rave in secret Recorded conversations show the doctor had with a woman.

“On September 23, 2024, the Board of Directors of SIGA Technologies (NASDAQ: SIGA) terminated Dr. “Effective immediately, without cause, Jay Varma from his position as Executive Vice President and Chief Medical Officer of the Company,” the company wrote in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

“Under the terms of his employment contract, Dr. Varma’s service on the company’s board of directors automatically takes effect immediately,” the filing said, which is required when an event deemed to affect shareholders of public companies occurs.

Varma critic and city councilman Bob Holden said in a sharp statement: “Dr. Firing Jay Varma is a step in the right direction, but the consequences for his actions are long overdue.”

“Varma bragged about forcing people into submission over compulsory vaccination and admitted to attending illegal sex parties while he, former health commissioner Dr. David Chokshi and then-Mayor Bill de Blasio imposed draconian measures that paralyzed the entire city. said the Democrat from Queens.

“The hypocrisy is outrageous.”

Varma’s perfunctory chats — in which he boasted, “I did all this deviant, sexual stuff” and “I had to be kind of sneaky about it… because I was leading the entire COVID response in the city” — were published last week by conservative podcaster Steven Crowder.

His firing came as angry business owners and parents in the city joined lawmakers on the steps of City Hall on Monday to demonstrate against the lecherous doctor. They said that while they masked up, kept their children home from school and took other precautions against deadly COVID – Under his guidance, he got up close and personal with the crowds.

“While grandmothers took their final breaths alone on cold hospital beds, Dr. “Varm his sick fantasies with hundreds of sweaty strangers,” raged Councilwoman Inna Vernikov (R-Brooklyn).

Michael Kane of Teachers for Choice said: “What turned me off the most was when I heard Varma say that drug-fuelled group sex orgies were necessary for him to be his ‘authentic self’ because COVID had ‘bottled him up’.”

Varma said at one point on the tape: “My wife and I had one with our friends in August [2020] Kind of like that first summer.”

“So we rented a hotel… we all took Molly with us [MDMA] And it was like it was eight or nine or us, eight to ten of us were in a room and everyone was having a blast because everyone was so pent up.”

He said of the June 2021 rave, which was attended by hundreds of partygoers: “People were like, ‘Aren’t you scared?’ Aren’t you embarrassed?’ and I thought, ‘No, actually I love being my authentic self.'”

He also hosted another sex party in November 2020, a source close to his camp told The Post on Monday.

Philip Hickey, the former owner of GlenPatrick’s Pub in Maspeth, Queens, who attended Monday’s rally, said “thousands of lives and businesses,” including his own, have been devastated by the pandemic and its lockdowns.

Parent Yiantin Chu said she watched her 9-year-old languish at home for more than three months as she tried to navigate the Education Ministry’s remote learning systems.

“The COVID guidelines that were only supposed to be in effect for two weeks in spring 2020 have upended the lives of over a million students and their families in NYC,” Chu said.

The Varma source said the doctor “technically did not violate the mandate.”

“That was taken out of context, which was that he broke rules, which he didn’t,” the source said.

Varma himself said in a statement: “In these private conversations, which were secretly recorded, spliced ​​together, torn to pieces and taken out of context, I referred to events that occurred four years ago.” Between April 2020 and May 2021 I attended two private meetings. I take responsibility for not using my best judgment at this time.”

The edited clips of Varma were filmed with a hidden camera and recorded in New York between July 27 and August 14. The Post has not reviewed the full, unedited footage.

Siga did not respond to a Post request for comment on Monday.