Covid conspiracy theory ‘newspaper’ doing rounds

VILLAGERS ‘PUT IT IN THE BIN’

A “NEWSPAPER” which promotes conspiracy theories and anti-Covid stories has been shoved through letterboxes in at least one Leicestershire village.

Copies of The Light newspaper have been delivered to residents of the village of Worthington, near Coalville.

The paper, which claims to be “people funded”, mainly touts conspiracy theories on the Covid-19 pandemic, including articles claimout ing the disease is a myth and that vaccines are dangerous.

One resident of Worthington said everyone he had spoken to about the publication had just thrown it straight in the bin, but there is concern nationally that this spreading of misinformation could be dangerous, particularly with the current push to roll out booster jabs.

The publication has also been distributed in London, Manchester, Yorkshire, North Wales, Surrey and Cambridgeshire.

The resident said: “I think it’s terrible. I think it must have been a BOGOF week, you’ve got buy one get one free on your conspiracy theories.

“I spoke [to another resident] when I went to buy a proper newspaper and he said

‘yeah, I had one of those, I threw it in the bin’, and someone else in the shop at the time said ‘I had one too, I threw it in the bin’. “It’s an insult to anyone who has had a relative or a friend die of Covid, it’s an absolute insult.”

In a previous statement on soaring infection rates, Leicestershire County Council’s director of public health Mike Sandys, left, said: “I really think people need to get their noses of the conspiracy theories and internet chatrooms and know the facts. For me, it’s about getting people to take it seriously again. People, unfortunately at the wrong time, seem to have given up.”

MP for Market Harborough, Oadby and Wigston, Neil O’Brien has previously condemned attempts to spread Covid lies after an anti-vaxx newsletter was distributed in his constituency, slamming them as “deliberately misleading”.

He said: “The best resource for information on the Covid vaccine is the NHS website.”