COVID conspiracy theories only sew distrust and fear

Dear Editor:
Regarding the Sept. 27, 2023 letter to the editor from Caroline Epp under the headline “Mainstream media not the best source for truth.”
In the spirit of fairness I checked on each of the “news” sources Ms. Epp promoted. I won’t name them again because frankly I don’t want to give these clearly biased sites additional visibility. Of course everyone is free to source their information from any place they wish and, human nature being what it is, we gravitate to providers which support our biases.  
For me, I’ll put my trust in reputable news sources which practice rigorous fact checking and carefully vet their sources for credibility and expertise. My go-to sources are the New York Times and Reuters, two legacy news organizations which have won numerous awards for their fact-based reporting.
Naturally I turned to these sources as well as the National Institutes of Health to fact check Ms. Epp’s claim that 579 elite athletes have dropped dead after what she refers to as “the jab” — a term I’m assuming is intended to be pejorative. All three sources, and numerous others in fact, refute this conspiracy-fueled claim. Serious cardiac events have been reported both from COVID-19 infections and, to a much lesser extent, vaccinations. Numerous NIH studies point out that there are many comorbidity factors involved. It’s not a simple case of if you do A then B happens.  
Being a person of logic and a believer in science, I tend to believe these credible sources rather than dubious faith-based online sources or other less-than-credible sources such as Sen. Ron Johnson (R) Wisconsin who spread the falsehood of athlete deaths in an appearance on a conservative podcast.  
To my knowledge Sen. Johnson has no medical degree to support his assertions nor did he provide credible (or even in-credible) evidence.
For better or for worse, vaccinations, and COVID-19 in particular, have become highly politicized and many consider it a badge of honor (or political party affiliation) to not get vaccinated.  I think that’s an ill-informed decision but one that each person is free to make, again for better or worse. But please stop fear mongering and spreading fabricated conspiracy theories which only serve to sew distrust and fear.
Loren Berthelsen,
Aurora