Veronica Wolski, the QAnon adherent whose recent hospitalization made her a cause celebre for the controversial medication ivermectin, died in the intensive care unit of AMITA Health Resurrection Medical Center early Monday, a hospital spokeswoman said. She was 64.
Wolski’s cause of death was pneumonia due to COVID-19 infection with hypothyroidism as a contributing factor, a spokeswoman for the Cook County medical examiner’s office said Monday morning. The manner of death was natural.
For more than a week, her supporters had besieged Resurrection with demands that Wolski be given ivermectin. The medication is typically used to treat diseases caused by parasitic worms, but has been hailed as a COVID-19 cure by some despite a lack of definitive scientific proof or government authorization.
The hospital said last week that its doctors and clinicians, following the guidance of the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, do not use ivermectin for COVID-19 cases. The hospital had declined to comment on Wolski’s diagnosis, citing federal privacy laws.
Over the weekend, some of Wolski’s supporters tried to get the hospital to discharge her. A video posted Sunday night to the Telegram channel of right-wing attorney Lin Wood shows him demanding over the phone that the hospital release Wolski to a person holding her medical power of attorney.
“There’s an ambulance waiting for her outside, there’s a medical doctor waiting for her to treat her,” he said. “If you do not release her, you’re going to be guilty of murder. Do you understand what murder is?”
Another video posted on Wood’s channel shows a Chicago police officer outside the hospital speaking with a person demanding, unsuccessfully, to be allowed inside to perform a wellness check. A hospital spokeswoman said police “(assisted) in maintaining the order outside the hospital with a small group of individuals.”
Wolski was well-known for her political activism. She gained attention in 2016 by standing on a pedestrian bridge over the Kennedy Expressway with banners showing support for presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, but then switched her allegiance to the QAnon conspiracy theory. Her Telegram channel includes numerous posts showing a disdain for masking, vaccines and other mainstream approaches to avoiding COVID-19.
A separate Telegram channel devoted to her health struggles overflowed Monday with hundreds of messages of mourning and anger.