A disgraced ex-nurse who suggested at an anti-vaccination rally in the UK that nurses and doctors should be hanged is now under police investigation.
And Kate Shemirani's own son is disowning his mother, saying she's "too far gone to be helped".
Shemirani, 54, rose to prominence last year after making numerous false claims about COVID-19, including that it doesn't exist in the wild - only "pre-loaded into a syringe", the Daily Mail reported.
The 35-year veteran was struck off the nursing register in June, but that didn't stop her getting a speaking slot at the weekend's 'Worldwide Rally for Freedom' at Trafalgar Square, where she told other protesters to email her with the names of doctors and other medical professionals who support the UK's vaccine rollout.
"Ask them what is in it. Ask them, get their names, you email them to me ... with a group of lawyers we are collating that," Shemirani said in footage uploaded to social media. "At the Nuremberg trials, the doctors and nurses stood trial and they hung."
The UK has had one of the fastest vaccine rollouts, with more than two-thirds of the population having received at least one dose. The widespread coverage has caused the latest wave of infections to be far less deadly than those before it - just a few dozen deaths a day, compared to in excess of 1500 in January's outbreak, which was only slightly larger going by official figures.
Staff of the UK's National Health Service reacted in horror, saying Shemirani's comments caused "considerable distress", and Prime Minister Boris Johnson condemned them as "completely unacceptable", a spokesperson saying doctors and nurses had done "a truly heroic job throughout this pandemic and continue to do so". London Mayor Sadiq Khan said the speech was "utterly appalling", the Independent reported, and he went to the police with his concerns.
Scotland Yard said in a statement it was "aware of video circulating online showing a speech that occurred during a rally in Trafalgar Square on Saturday 24 July".
"Officers are carrying out inquiries to establish whether any offences have been committed. No arrests have been made."
Shemirani's own son wants her in handcuffs. Sebastian Shemirani, 21, has long been estranged from his mother, the Daily Mail reports, saying her obsession with conspiracy theories made his childhood "hell". She allegedly showed him YouTube videos when he was just 10 which claimed there was a "global plot" to carry out a mass genocide, and recently texted him to tell him he was going to die at the hands of the CIA - him and half the UK's entire population.
"She should be prosecuted under existing laws or if there aren’t existing laws in place that say that what she’s doing is illegal, then we should be having a national conversation about what laws we should be bringing in," he told BBC Radio 4 on Monday (UK time).
"It’s only a matter of time before somebody acts on the bad advice that she’s giving the country... We've got to do it before these ideas get bigger and more people fall down the route she's trying to take them down. You can only prevent it before it happens."
Shemirani rejected her son's characterisation of her views, telling the BBC: "From what I can see it would appear a 'conspiracy theorist' is actually now anyone who believes something other than what your controllers want them to believe. I find this deeply disturbing."
Labour leader Keir Starmer, formerly one of the UK's most senior public prosecutors, said her statements at the rally were "absolutely shocking", telling radio station LBC he hopes they would be "investigated and dealt with appropriately".
Other speakers at the rally included veteran conspiracy theorist David Icke, who claims the world is run by reptilian aliens, and UK media personality Katie Hopkins, who was recently booted out of Australia after breaking rules while in managed isolation.
