In mid-March, a cryptocurrency investor, a law school graduate and a self-described philosopher found each other on Twitter. They discussed their hopes that a little-known drug called hydroxychloroquine could help contain the accelerating coronavirus outbreak.

Two days later, two of them published a paper about the drug’s potential on Google Docs, falsely claiming the imprimatur of two major universities and the National Academy of Sciences.

Three weeks later, the president of the United States said he himself may take the drug and encouraged others to do the same.

“What do you have to lose?” Trump asked on Saturday. “I’ll say it again: What do you have to lose? Take it.”

The events appear to be part of a remarkable domino effect that could happen only in this moment, with this administration.

What started as a Twitter discussion on March 11 among strangers led to a thinly sourced Google Doc published on March 13 that grabbed the attention of Silicon Valley elite and conservative media. Within days, the paper scored one of its authors a spot on on both Laura Ingraham’s and Tucker Carlson’s Fox News shows. The day after Carlson’s show, Trump made his first mention of hydroxychloroquine from the White House podium. After that, presidential allies like personal attorney Rudy Giuliani started trying to dig up any information they could find.