Natalie Harp, a former conservative media personality turned White House aide, rose to prominence in 2019 after publicly claiming that Donald Trump’s Right to Try Act saved her life during a battle with stage 2 bone cancer.
Her narrative became a major political talking point—most notably featured during a prime-time speech at the 2020 Republican National Convention. However, detailed analyses by medical experts, health policy analysts, and investigative journalists have identified significant factual inconsistencies and timeline contradictions in her story.
Key Elements of Natalie Harp’s Account
According to Harp’s own accounts in blog posts and public appearances:
- The Medical Error: In November 2015, she suffered a severe medical accident when a nurse intravenously infused her with sterile water instead of saline solution. She claimed this left her severely ill, housebound, and in chronic pain.
- Cancer Diagnosis & Standard Treatment: She was later diagnosed with a rare, stage 2 bone cancer. She stated that she failed two rounds of standard chemotherapy and was turned away from clinical trials due to her age or health status.
- Palliative Offers: She claimed that rather than offering further curative efforts, healthcare providers only offered palliative measures, medical marijuana, opioids, or voluntary stopping of eating and drinking (VSED).
- The “Right to Try” Salvation: She stated that Donald Trump signing the Right to Try Act in May 2018 granted her access to an experimental treatment that cured/managed her cancer, allowing her to transition from “dying with cancer” to “living with cancer.”
Fact-Checking and Timeline Analysis
While Harp’s experience with chronic health complications and a cancer diagnosis is consistent with real-world medical conditions, the specific claim that the federal Right to Try Act saved her life does not align with medical regulations or her own timeline.
1. Off-Label Use vs. Right to Try
- Her Claim: Harp publicly stated she received an FDA-approved immunotherapy drug for an unapproved (off-label) use.
- The Medical Reality: The federal Right to Try Act strictly applies to unapproved, experimental drugs that have passed Phase I trials but are not yet approved by the FDA for any purpose.
- The Truth: Prescribing an FDA-approved drug for an off-label purpose has been standard, legal medical practice in the United States for decades long before the 2018 Right to Try legislation was enacted. Doctors did not need federal Right to Try laws to prescribe her that medication.
2. The Timeline Contradiction
- May 30, 2018: President Trump signed the Right to Try Act into law.
- Pre-Existing Treatment: Medical reporting (including analyses by The Washington Post and Undark Magazine) noted that Harp had publicly referenced receiving her new, successful immunotherapy treatment months before the Right to Try Act was signed into law. Therefore, her access to the treatment chronologically could not have been enabled by the federal statute.
3. Misattribution of “Sterile Water” to Cancer
In some of her accounts, Harp linked her rare bone cancer diagnosis to the 2015 intravenous sterile water infusion error. Oncologists and medical experts note there is no scientific mechanism or medical precedent by which an IV error with sterile water causes bone cancer.
Summary of Truthfulness
| Narrative Element | Claimed by Harp | Fact-Check / Verification |
|---|---|---|
| Stage 2 Bone Cancer | Diagnosed with rare bone cancer and failed chemotherapies. | Plausible: Bone cancers are rare and frequently resistant to conventional chemotherapies. |
| Saved by “Right to Try” | The 2018 law allowed her to get experimental drugs that saved her life. | Inaccurate: She received an FDA-approved drug off-label (which was already legal). Additionally, her treatment began prior to the law’s passage. |
| Medical Error Context | An IV sterile water mix-up caused or directly triggered her condition. |
| Unsupported: An IV water infusion error causes hemolysis/vascular issues, not bone cancer. No hospital records or lawsuits regarding this specific incident were ever made public. |