QAnon-backing pastor who denied coronavirus was real is hospitalised with Covid

A local politician in Florida who once claimed there was no pandemic in a sermon is now in hospital with Covid.

Fred Lowry, 66, a councilman for Volusia County, Florida, once claimed in a controversial, conspiracy-filled sermon that, “We did not have a pandemic ... We were lied to.” Now, his colleagues say he has been in hospital for weeks with the virus.

"He is in the hospital wrestling with COVID-19," county chair Jeff Brower told The Daytona Beach News-Journal on Tuesday. "It’s been about three weeks now."

“I am praying for Volusia County Councilman Fred Lowry who is ‘in the hospital wrestling with COVID-19’” Daytona Beach mayor Derrick Henry wrote on Facebook on Tuesday.

The conservative councilman, who is a pastor at Deltona Lakes Baptist Church, faced calls to resign in May following the sermon, where he called Dr Anthony Fauci “Dr Falsey,” and spread a number of other conspiracies, including that global warming was a hoax and that, according to the QAnon movement, Hollywood elites were running paedophile rings.