Caretaker health minister Hugo de Jonge has told the AD in an interview that he is concerned about the presence of so many viruswappies – or coronavirus deniers – in parliament.

Coming across them on Twitter is one thing but ‘now you hear these noises in parliament and that really worries me,’ De Jonge said, without mentioning the far right Forum voor Democratie by name.

FvD made scrapping the coronavirus measures a key part of their campaign, which won the party eight seats in the new look parliament – with 5% of the votes. Some 73% of FvD voters said the party’s coronavirus stance was the most important issue in deciding to vote for it.

People are fed up with coronavirus and that means they are more vulnerable to alternative theories, De Jonge said. ‘But there is also a group with has gone for a party which denies the seriousness of the virus, calls all the measures into question, and raises doubts about only real way out of the crisis – vaccination.’