The conviction of Lucy Letby for killing seven babies is “fair” says Health Secretary Wes Streeting.
The Cabinet minister stressed that he stood by this view unless this conclusion is successfully challenged in the courts.
He also criticised the public campaign to prove her innocence, rather than seeking to do so through the legal system.
Lawyers for Letby recently launched a new bid to overthrow her conviction for killing seven babies, after a group of international medical experts who reexamined evidence used at her trial concluded none had actually been murdered.
The nurse was convicted of killing the newborns and attempting to murder eight more between June 2015 and June 2016 while working in the neonatal unit of the Countess of Chester Hospital in Chester, northern England.
As Britain’s worst serial child killer of modern times, she is serving 15 full life terms in prison and was told she would never be released.
Letby, 35, has maintained her innocence throughout but has been refused permission to appeal against her convictions.
Former Conservative Cabinet minister Sir David Davis has called for a retrial of Letby, arguing in Parliament that there was “no hard evidence” against her.
But Mr Streeting told LBC Radio: “There is a judicial process to follow if people think there has been an unsafe or wrong conviction.
“I would ask people to consider the grieving parents who have lost their babies.”
Criticising the public campaign, he added: “Waging a campaign in this way, in the wake of these convictions is not the right thing to do.
“If people believe on any conviction that there has been an unsafe or unfair or unlawful conviction there are legal routes to follow and I would encourage those people to follow the legal route.
“This is not a political campaign, this is a legal process.”
Mr Streeting last year described speculation that Letby was innocent as “crass and insensitive”.
On Monday, he added: “Until I’m told otherwise by the courts of this land then I continue to stand by the view that that there has been a fair conviction until the courts determine otherwise.”
Since her trial, medical specialists and other supporters have questioned her guilt, suggesting that expert evidence presented by the prosecution to the jury was flawed.
Her lawyer Mark McDonald said new medical findings from the international experts “demolished” the case against her.
“There is overwhelming evidence that the conviction is unsafe,” he said. “If (the experts) are correct, no crime was committed.”
He has submitted a preliminary application to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC), which examines potential miscarriages of justice. It said work was underway to assess the filing.
At her trial, prosecutors said Letby had killed the five baby boys and two baby girls by injecting the infants with insulin or air, or force-feeding them milk.
