A frequent flyer among anti-vax and COVID-19 denying “Karens” is back at it. This time, she filmed herself chasing down a nurse and questioning her about coronavirus patients outside of a hospital.
For months, Instagram user @monique_leal86 has posted videos to her page claiming to expose the “fake” COVID-19 pandemic. Her videos typically follow Monique as she visits medical facilities to confront healthcare workers, patients, and passersby with her beliefs that vaccines are harmful.
The latest of these videos shows Monique confronting an elderly man outside of St. Joseph’s Healthcare in Hamilton, Canada, and inquiring about the number of patients with coronavirus he witnessed inside.
As the brief video begins, Monique crosses to an elderly man in an electric wheelchair who appears to have just left the hospital. As she approaches, she asks the man if there are “a lot of COVID patients in there.”
The man asks why he is being approached by a strange woman. Monique says that she is “a mom” trying to debunk the supposed myth of COVID-19 so that she can reach her kids in Australia, and he becomes more amenable.
“I don’t know the location of COVID patients,” he says. “But I heard through the grapevine that there may be some on the fourth floor.”
As Monique is thanking the man, he launches into a brief lecture on Joseph Michael Mercola, whom he calls “the saving factor of this COVID nonsense.”
Mercola, a controversial alternative medicine physician, was recently warned by the Food and Drug Administration for marketing unproven COVID-19 treatments. He has become a prominent source for anti-vaxxers and coronavirus deniers, thanks to his reliance on pseudoscience.
The elderly man claims that “Bill Gates is under investigation” before Monique cuts him off to confirm, in his words, that there is “not a pandemic in that hospital.” The video ends soon after, but a second upload shows a portion of their following conversation.
The elderly man is in the middle of citing a Mercola report as the video starts. He claims that Vananda Shiva, an environmental activist and scientist, is going to “take down Bill Gates.”
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The man says he’s “not an anti-vaxxer,” and Monique shifts focus and follows a woman she says is a nurse as she exits the hospital. Monique fires several questions at the retreating woman’s back, asking about the number of COVID patients at the hospital.
“Nurse, are there COVID patients in there?” she says. “Please, Hamilton’s locking down. Please, please. People are going to lose their jobs. Just tell me, please. Just answer the question.”
The woman says “I’m not sure” as she walks away, despite Monique’s pleas to stop and confirm her suspicions.
“I speak to nurses,” Monique says. “I know you guys are being silenced.”
Monique often posts similar videos of herself filming empty parking lots and hammering staff members with questions they often don’t have answers to. She has over 5,500 Instagram followers.
The Daily Dot reached out to Monique and St. Joseph’s Healthcare for comment.
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