That's not what happened. Minaj claimed "a friend of a cousin" had a simply impossible side effect. This is pretty clearly a simple case of an urban legend being shortened from "friend of a friend of a friend" and so the rumor always gets passed on as "friend of a friend" no matter how many links there are in the chain.
Did you notice that you shortened it from "Minaj claimed a friend of a cousin..." to "Minaj claimed a friend...?" Hey, you're human too just like all of us. We suck at passing along rumors.
Let’s say it’s unsubstantiated rumor (she said it was her (not ‘a’) cousin’s friend) What every medical rumor gets knocked out? Only the ones they don’t like? What makes them the right decision makers to decide?
It’s no different from the banning of the Wuhan lab escape theory that was banned because… I dunno some republican happened to like it? Meanwhile lots of virologists believed it should at least be investigated. But no, originally only racists could consider it as a possibility.
Did you notice that you shortened it from "Minaj claimed a friend of a cousin..." to "Minaj claimed a friend...?" Hey, you're human too just like all of us. We suck at passing along rumors.