Marcus de Brun, a GP and former Medical Council member, has been found guilty of professional misconduct over various social media posts during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Such posts saw the GP criticise the use of Covid-19 vaccines and public health guidelines.
A fitness-to-practice committee of the Medical Council also found other allegations against Mr de Brun to be proven, including his attendance and comments he made at a public rally in August 2020, where he failed to wear a face mask or maintain social distancing.
The committee found seven allegations of professional misconduct to be proven, including four of which were described as "disgraceful and dishonourable" and fell short of the standards expected of doctors.
Most of the allegations were in relation to 67 posts by de Brun on Twitter between May 2020 and October 2021. These posts mainly concerned children, lockdowns and his attendances at the rally in August 2020, as well as his failure to wear a facemask or maintain social distancing at an event attended by up to 7,000 people.
It also found that 35 tweets from de Brun had contravened the Guide to Professional Conduct and Ethics for Registered Medical Practitioners in regards to their behaviour on social media.
One such post saw de Brun claim that giving healthy children a genetic based vaccine as "the greatest crime against humanity that this century has witnessed so far". He also referred to "genocide" and "State sanctioned euthanasia", which were called "highly inappropriate and on occasion, offensive" by the inquiry chairperson, Deirdre Murphy.
She also said some posts which described lockdowns as unnecessary and used for nefarious reasons as "very concerning".
In his response, Mr de Brun accepted the findings, although he also told the committee that the inquiry had not been "an honest hearing", adding that he only turned to social media after he had tried to raise the issues with the Medical Council, which he claimed were "flatly dismissed and ignored".
De Brun, who had operated his own practice in Rush, Co Dublin, called for a public inquiry into the State's handling of the pandemic, saying the he truly believes that the Government and regulatory authorities had "blood on their hands".
The committee went on to say that the GP had posted "in a rather boastful manner", which was "troubling", specifically his posts about his hands being sore from all the handshakes he received at the rally, and that he was then treating patients in his surgery last than 48 hours later.
Professor Murphy also called de Brun's conduct "completely and utterly unacceptable".
While the GP's posts criticising the use of facemasks were in breach the use of social media, the committee found that they had not amounted to professional misconduct. But Dr Murphy said it was surprising that the doctor used profane language in his posts, when referencing to people wearing masks as "peasants" or "gobshites".
Following the ruling, Dr de Brun told the committee that their claims that he had stood over his references to vaccines and child abuse as a "grossly unfair characterisation of me".
He also insisted that his use of strong language was an attempt to bring people's attention to the matter. He also denied claims that he had put his patients at risk by conducting surgeries just two days after attending the public rally in 2020.
Dr de Brun had resigned from the Medical Council in April 2020, while the inquiry heard how he felt compelled to close his practice after terminating his HSE contract in January 2021, and that he had sold his family home as some neighbours did not want their children playing with the child of an "anti vax doctor".
The GP also said he would not apologise for keeping to his belief that Covid vaccines were both "dangerous and unnecessary".
Nessa Bird BL, Council for the Medical Council had accepted that there were no findings about the GP's clinical performance, but that he should accept that he had damaged the public trust in the medical profession, and indicated that he could be the recipient of large fines in the future.
The committee added that they would issue a report with a recommendation on sanction to the Medical Council in the near future.
