Available via license: CC BY 4.0
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This is an Accepted Manuscript for Canadian Journal of Political Science as part of the
Cambridge Coronavirus Collection.
DOI: 10.1017/S0008423921000214
Out of an Abundance of Caution:
COVID-19 and Health Risk Frames in Canadian News Media
Rebecca Wallace, University of Toronto
Andrea Lawlor, King’s University College, Western University
Erin Tolley, Carleton University
Abstract: Although Canada‘s first documented case of COVID-19 appeared in mid-January 2020, it
was not until March that messaging about the need to contain the virus heightened. In this research
note, we document the use of the media‘s construction of risk through framing in the early stages of
the pandemic. We analyze three dimensions – severity, authority and proximity – of the health risk
narratives related to COVID-19 that dominated Canadians‘ concerns about the virus. To capture
these narratives, we examine print and online news coverage from two nationally-distributed media
sources. We assess these frames alongside epidemiological data and find there is a clear link between
media coverage, epidemiological data, and risk frames in the early stages of the pandemic. It appears
that the media relied on health expertise and political sources to guide their coverage and was
responsive to the public health data presented to Canadians.
KEYWORDS: COVID-19, risk, public policy compliance, narratives, health
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: The authors thank the Journal's two editorial teams and six
anonymous reviewers for their comments and suggestions.
When Canada‘s first case of COVID-19 was documented in mid-January, public health
officials assured the public that the risk to Canadians was ―very low.‖ As additional cases appeared,
however, the risk narrative began to change. Provinces and territories declared states of emergency,
as did some cities, and the federal government passed a suite of emergency measures. As these
measures were being introduced, more than half of Canadians (55%) thought it was likely they or
someone they know would contract the virus; an equal percentage feared there not being enough
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medical equipment (Abacus Data 2020). As the pandemic unfolded, experts and elites helped to
reshape these beliefs, and resulting behaviour, through the risk assessments they constructed.
Health advice evolved from self-monitoring when returning from abroad, to hygiene
measures and physical distancing, to the closure of borders and non-essential services. For the most
part, compliance with health directives, including limited social contact, avoiding non-essential travel
and working from home, was relatively high (Merkley et al. 2020, supplementary materials).
Individuals seemed to understand the personal advantage of avoiding infection and the penalties for
non-compliance, as well as the collective advantage of preserving healthcare resources by reducing
transmission rates.
Existing research shows the media played a role by framing the pandemic primarily as a
health crisis (Poirier et al. 2020). This research note extends this analysis by focusing on the media‘s
construction of risk in the early stages of the pandemic, specifically in terms of framing the severity
and proximity of the virus. We also consider the source of the risk framing, comparing the
operational and strategic interventions offered by public health officials, on the one hand, and
politicians and government authorities, on the other. By assessing these frames alongside
epidemiological data, we conclude the media offered Canadians non-sensationalized coverage that
corresponded quite closely with the virus‘s actual trajectory. The media‘s framing seems to have
been principally informed by data and real-world events, rather than being driven by hype or moral
panic. Canadians received messages from the media, health professionals, and public authorities that
balanced considerations of risk, including the pandemic‘s severity and proximity, and this may have
played a role in their overall compliance with public health directives. For political scientists, this
finding is significant because it illustrates the interplay between the media, practitioners, and political
actors to encourage policy compliance and social consensus in a time of uncertainty.
Media Framing, Risk, and Public Policy Compliance
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News media serve as the major conduit through which people learn about issues affecting
their political communities, especially in disaster scenarios when individuals are struggling to
understand the world around them (Lawlor and Crow 2018). Amidst health and environmental
crises, ―citizens tend to turn to the media for a greater understanding, but at the same time media
and journalists are part of the process of framing science as certain or uncertain knowledge‖
(Jönsson 2011, 123). In playing an active role in constructing our understandings of crises, news
media highlight the various dimensions of risk associated with them.
Communication of risk is vital to public policy compliance because how individuals
understand the nature, severity, and proximity of risk influences their reaction to proposed
interventions and, by extension, the efficacy of those interventions (Kiss et al. 2020). Existing
research shows that citizens look to elites and experts to understand complex problems, and the
information shared by these sources helps shape citizens‘ views and behaviour (Druckman 2001;
Lachapelle et al. 2014). An individual‘s response is shaped by their underlying worldview and their
impressions of the information source‘s credibility, but these moderators seem to matter less in
high-risk policy domains or when an issue is new and emerging (Lachapelle et al. 2014; Zaller 1992).
Research conducted in the early months of 2020, as cases of COVID-19 were growing, suggests
elites and the Canadian public were in a ―rare moment‖ of cross-partisan consensus (Merkley et al.
2020). The current study demonstrates that consensus extended, in large part, to health officials and
public authorities and to the media which framed the crisis in a manner that corresponded to its
actual severity and proximity.
Most Canadians learned about the virus‘ trajectory and potential harm through the media.
Although public reception to scientific information can vary and often depends on the degree of
consensus within the scientific community, as well as individuals‘ values, baseline science knowledge,
and trust in scientific researchers (Fischhoff and Scheufele 2013; Hahn et al. 2015; Suhay and
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Druckman 2015), media frames about risk can shape public attitudes and behaviour. Such effects
have been observed in support for water fluoridation (Perrella and Kiss 2015), responses to climate
change (Jones 2014), and in the aftermath of disasters (Vasterman et al. 2005). However, if the
media, public health officials, and governments overplay their hand — if they exaggerate, over-react,
or sensationalize — this can dampen adherence to health directives (Anzur 2000; Vasterman et al.
2005). For example, in the United States, right-leaning media disseminated false information and
conspiracy theories about the virus, and consumers of those news sources were significantly more
likely to endorse misinformation about the pandemic (Motta et al. 2020). Those narratives may have
helped shape citizens‘ views and behaviour, resulting in a different trajectory of case growth.
This research note looks at risk in three ways. First, we analyze news media frames related to
COVID-19‘s severity and spread, documenting if and how the framing changed alongside
epidemiological data. There is some evidence of the media sensationalizing health risks in other
contexts (Vasterman et al. 2005), so our aim is to determine if the media‘s portrayal of risk is
disproportionate to the case data in Canada.
1
The media could have framed the virus as a distant
foreign threat (risk attenuation), or an unstoppable foreign invader (risk amplification), but given
evidence of limited polarization and general compliance with public policy directives, a more
balanced narrative is possible. Consequently, as Canadian cases of COVID-19 increase, we expect
that the framing around risk severity will intensify, but these narratives will not deviate dramatically
from the virus‘s actual trajectory.
Second, this analysis compares the source of health information, drawing on Boin and Hart
(2010)‘s theorization of the two levels of crisis response: (1) operational, which includes the medical
personnel, epidemiologists, and public health professionals focusing on the immediate threat, and (2)
strategic, which includes political authorities who work in tandem with those in operations but
whose role is more tactical and public-facing and who ultimately must account for the state‘s
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management of the crisis (see also Weible et al. 2020). We compare the risk frames offered by public
health officials and epidemiologists, and those coming from political sources, including the prime
minister, premiers, and mayors. As Canadian cases of COVID-19 increase, we expect operational
experts to become more central in news coverage and for coverage to increasingly rely on the
technical expertise offered by public health authorities as opposed to messaging from political
sources.
2
Finally, this note turns to frames on the proximity of risk to assess whether COVID-19 was
presented as a generalized or distant risk versus a more personal or proximate risk, and if and how
this changed over time. There are many ways to interpret proximity of risk as it relates to the
pandemic, such as measures of personal versus communal experiences with the virus or safety and
hygiene practices. However, given that this analysis focused on the initial wave of the pandemic,
proximity is conceptualized as physical vicinity or exposure to cases; this allows us to track whether
the frames shifted as cases moved from China and Europe to North America, and to the different
provinces and cities within Canada. Although COVID-19 continues to affect the global community,
the risk frames are likely to become more domestic, rather than international, as the number of new
COVID-19 cases in Canada increases.
Our analytical focus builds on recent research on COVID-19 risk perceptions. For example,
Dryhurst et al. (2020) highlight the cognitive and temporal-spatial dimensions of COVID-19‘s
transmission as key aspects of risk perception, which include concerns about contracting the virus,
its spread within one‘s country of residence, and its perceived seriousness or impact on one‘s health.
Perceived seriousness and contraction are captured in our measure of severity, which includes terms
and phrases associated with transmission. We also assess severity by comparing the media‘s coverage
of COVID-19‘s effect on health outcomes alongside the coverage of recovery and containment.
Similarly, our interpretation of proximity assesses whether COVID-19 was communicated as a
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problem affecting countries outside Canada (―over there‖) or within Canada (―at home‖). Our over-
time analysis allows us to test whether news framing of risk shifted to capture concerns associated
with various sites of contraction, such as international travel versus community-based contraction, as
the virus evolved. By analyzing the trajectory of these frames, we document how the media covered
the virus and measures whether its framing of risk was consistent with epidemiological markers of
its evolution.
Data & Method
To understand the risk frames, this analysis draws on mainstream print and online news
coverage from two main sources – Postmedia and the Canadian Press – which both have
widespread national and local reach. These news conglomerates were selected as they represent
many of Canada‘s top national, regional, and city news outlets, including the CBC, CTV News, The
Globe and Mail, National Post, and others.
3
Most factual information about COVID-19 came from
elites and experts who used mainstream media as a conduit to the public.
4
Although social media
played a role in information dissemination, often the information in those sources reproduced that
which was captured by the traditional media, and certainly from press briefings. Media coverage was
thus a crucial source of information, particularly after lockdown measures limited interpersonal
communication.
The media sample includes every news story published between March 1 and May 31 that
mentioned COVID-19 (or coronavirus) in the headline or lead paragraph (n=10,235 articles).
5
We
adopt a dialogical approach to automated analysis to uncover how specific dimensions of risk –
including severity, proximity, and source – are communicated in coverage of the pandemic.
Using computer-assisted content analysis, we developed keyword dictionaries to identify and
measure the frequency of each risk frame (see online appendix A for details on this process). These
dictionaries identified risk frames according to their Severity (transmission versus recovery), the
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Authority of the information source (public health versus political), and the Proximity of the risk
(domestic versus international). In building the dictionaries, we adopted both deductive and
inductive processes for identifying keywords and codifying news texts (see Table 1 for illustrative
examples). For example, in addition to examining the most frequent terms and phrases in the text to
construct the foundation of our dictionaries, the research team also read a large sample of articles to
learn about the natural or common phrasing and terminology that journalists utilize in
communicating about COVID-19, and the contexts in which these terms or phrases emerge, to
expand our dictionaries. This ensured that our dictionaries were based on the language employed in
the sample and captured risk as it was written into coverage. We then conducted a series of manual
checks (detailed in online appendix A) to ensure that the dictionaries are valid. We match the news
media database with epidemiological data on the number of new COVID-19 cases per day.
6
We
present a descriptive analysis of risk frames in the media alongside data on the actual spread of the
virus.
Results
Figure 1 displays the proportion of risk frames presented in the news media database from
the beginning of March to the end of May. During this time, an overwhelming proportion of frames
focuses on the transmission of the virus. Despite the daily press briefings by political and public
health figures, authority frames were the least present in the data. We neither expect, nor see an
overwhelming difference in frame use by media source. Despite the slight ideological lean to the
right of Postmedia, both followed the same frame structure with only slight exception. For example,
Postmedia were more likely to use Domestic Proximity frames than the Canadian Press (t-test
difference significant at the .001 level), while the Canadian Press were more likely to employ
International Proximity frames (also significant at the .001 level).
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Figure 2 shows the evolution of the frames and overlays Canada‘s COVID-19 case data to
identify the relationship between media frames and new cases of the virus. The figure presents a
three-day moving average of the number of new cases to smooth periods (e.g., weekends) where
testing may have been more limited, and we use a five-day moving average (current day plus four
future days) in our counts of frame terms to account for the lag in news media adapting to the
evolving number of cases. There are some clear associations between case data and frame use.
7
The
first panel of Figure 2 shows the contrast between Transmission and Recovery frames. The
frequency of the Transmission frame increased sharply in relation to closure announcements from
March 13 to 15 and is followed by a slow trend downward, which starts to mirror the trends in
epidemiological data around mid-April. Interestingly, there is no corresponding increase around the
surge in cases in early May, though this may be due to the familiarity with the pandemic by that
point and the fact that many major aspects of coverage, such as the rollout of the Canada
Emergency Response Benefit, had already occurred. By contrast, the Recovery frame does not
emerge beyond negligible levels until the end of April and beginning of May (coinciding with a slow
reopening in some provinces) and does not break through the frequency of the Transmission frame
until the end of May. This pattern reflects the gradual rise in discussions about multi-phased plans
for reopening local economies. As Canadians became more familiar with the virus and how to limit
its spread, the focus shifted to Recovery, though the risk posed by COVID-19 (and the
Transmission frame) remained relatively high.
When we examine the authorities cited in news coverage (panel two), we find little
differentiation in the volume of references to health experts and political elites. This result is perhaps
not unexpected because although the responsibilities and autonomy of medical officers of health
vary across Canada (Fafard et al. 2018), during a public health crisis, it is likely there would be a
greater degree of collaboration and consensus between health and political authorities. At such
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times, there is need to deliver clear and incisive guidelines on health measures to limit transmission
rates, and decisions about communications – who says what – may be part of broader media and
public relations strategies. In the data, there is just one notable exception to this relative unity.
Specifically, in advance of the Easter weekend, when there was concern that physical distancing
protocols would be broken, we see a heightened frequency in the media‘s reliance on a Political
Authority frame which advised individuals to remain sheltered in place with their immediate
household. As one story noted, British Columbians were encouraged to ―resist the urge to spend the
Easter long weekend with loved ones outside their households‖ (Postmedia 2020). Interestingly, in
the media‘s framing, there were no similar increases in the lead up to Mother‘s Day and the Victoria
Day long weekend, when similar concerns were publicly expressed.
Of greatest interest is the development of Domestic and International Proximity frames.
After the mid-March closure of schools and non-essential businesses, the Domestic frame increases
and overtakes the International frame, though both follow the same general trends. Here, increases
in the number of new COVID-19 cases tend to produce a lagged increase in the use of Domestic
risk terms. Although our focus is a descriptive record of the framing of the virus in the Canadian
news media, we substantiate the connection between news frames and new cases in an analytical
model presented in online appendix C.
8
Part of the COVID-19 story was a federal one, with a focus on international borders and the
introduction of national assistance programs. Additionally, although delivery of health care is under
provincial jurisdiction and decisions around testing, closures, and the on-the-ground response had
distinct regional angles, the federal government continued to play a critical role in public health,
providing funding for applied research around the virus, vaccinations and in support of provinces‘
public health initiatives.
9
Figures 3-5 explore the six frames using new case data from each region
and news mentions that cued both the region and a frame term in the same sentence or paragraph
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(see regional dictionary in online appendix B). A manual verification of 5% of dictionary mentions
confirmed that these associations were capturing narratives that applied to each region (e.g., ―New
Brunswick saw an increase in cases over the weekend.‖)
The Transmission and Recovery frames in Figure 3 show some event-driven trends. First,
Transmission frames increased when provinces declared states of emergency, and Transmission
frame use peaks late for stories that mention the Atlantic provinces. Cases had already spiked in
Atlantic provinces when media stories began to focus on regional transmission. Second, in BC, a
province lauded for its early response to the virus, the volume of Transmission narratives follows
the case data almost exactly. However, although the province returned from lockdown earlier than
most other provinces, there is not a particular surge in Recovery narratives that focus. Third, in
Alberta, Ontario, and Quebec, the early wave of Transmission narratives seems to pre-date the swell
of COVID-19 cases, which may have increased attentiveness to physical distancing guidelines,
although we can only speculate. Finally, there are some localized peaks in the use of the
Transmission frame. These are evident around the Cargill outbreak in Alberta in late April (Baum et
al. 2020), large gatherings in a Toronto park in late May (Canadian Press 2020), and alleged
transmission of the virus by a New Brunswick doctor who travelled to Quebec in mid-to-late May
(Humphreys 2020). This coverage suggests the media were attentive to the risk of community
transmission, a reality that is borne out in the case data.
Figure 4 illustrates the use of Health and Political Authority frames alongside case data by
region. In some contexts, such as Atlantic Canada (in March), the Prairies (in March and May),
Alberta (May to June) and BC (mid-March onward), there is some degree of similarity in the
frequency of Health and Political frames (with some exceptions where we see Political frames spike
in response to local issues). Where the lines diverge, this is generally related to increased political
messaging about reopening and economic recovery or coverage of key political announcements,
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including commentary by Alberta‘s premier on the withholding of medical supplies by the United
States or the province‘s critical employment situation. The situation differed slightly in Ontario and
Quebec, where there was a more sustained and substantial focus on provincial political authorities
(though this gap narrowed in Quebec after May 1st). In those jurisdictions, the health officials were
less consistently lauded, and the relationship between them their political counterparts became more
fraught. For example, at the beginning of the outbreak, Quebec‘s public health director was mildly
critiqued. He began to draw more favourably public commentary with his somewhat ostentatious
online media presence, but this was disparaged as case numbers began to increase in the province.
As officials mused about recovery, the public health director was portrayed as a ―spin doctor‖ and
lackey politicized by a government eager to reopen despite evidence of widespread community
transmission (Freeman and Freeman 2020; Macpherson 2020). Meanwhile, throughout the
pandemic, Ontario‘s chief medical officer has been roundly criticized for his poor public messaging
with a communication style that is ―confusing … befuddle[d] … impenetrable‖ (Arthur 2020;
Salutin 2020). The government has emphasized repeatedly it is taking advice from health experts,
but the premier and key cabinet ministers have tended to carry a heavier load in press briefings. By
contrast, Canada‘s chief public health officer, Dr. Theresa Tam, as well as the lead public health
officials for British Columbia (the provincial health officer, Dr. Bonnie Henry) and Alberta (the
chief medical officer of health, Dr. Deena Hinshaw) played more forward roles in the media
commentary in the early stage of the pandemic.
Finally, Figure 5 depicts the use of Domestic versus International frames to determine
whether news coverage shifted alongside changes in the temporal-spatial risk perceptions over the
timeframe under study. While coverage about the virus became far more (or almost all) domestic-
centred in the months following our analysis, it is important to remember that the early stages of the
pandemic were marked by a transition from hearing about the virus as a problem existing in other
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countries to one that reflected a growing number of cases domestically. Here, one might expect less
regional variation in these risk frames, and in all regions, there is an understandable emphasis on
COVID-19 as a domestic issue. The Domestic frame follows case trends fairly closely in Quebec
and Ontario. It also drastically outpaces international narratives in Quebec, Ontario, Alberta and BC.
Only in the Atlantic provinces do International frames outpace Domestic ones, partly because of a
more intense focus on border restrictions in that region. For example, as a Postmedia article noted,
―Nova Scotia declared its stare of emergency on March 22, but immediately moved to ‗tighten‘ its
borders. All land, sea and air entry points are ‗closely managed‘‖ (Turnilty 2020).
Frames Alongside Evidence: The Relationship between COVID-19 Coverage and Cases
Our results suggest a correspondence between media coverage, epidemiological data, and
risk frames in the early stages of the pandemic. The media relied on health expertise and political
sources to guide their coverage and did not exaggerate the risk posed to Canadians. Other research
shows a remarkably high degree of elite and public consensus about the pandemic‘s threat, as well as
fairly high compliance with health directives and social distancing rules (Merkley et al. 2020). Given
the media‘s role in disseminating information about the virus, risk framing may have helped shape
Canadians‘ views about the virus‘ severity and proximity and encouraged compliance with public
policy measures. Regional data confirm risk frames were consistent with context-specific COVID-19
issues, events, and challenges across the Canadian provinces, which suggests the media were
following the case data and aligning the narrative to operational and strategic information provided
by health and political authorities.
Future studies will undoubtedly continue the analysis beyond May of 2020, as rates of
COVID continued to rise and fall and public health measures changed accordingly. Researchers in
public health would be well-served to evaluate if and how frames pertaining to health risks change,
particularly as provinces oscillate between stages of intense lockdown and lifting of restrictions.
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Similarly, as subsequent waves of the virus response take hold, it will be important to assess whether
the trends observed at the pandemic‘s outset return or whether media provides a more
sensationalised approach to attempt to influence behaviour. Previous research shows that, early on,
both English- and French-language Canadian news media framed the pandemic as a health crisis,
but later on, there was some divergence as the English-language coverage began to focus more on
social impacts than their French-language counterparts (Poirier et al. 2020). We recommend that our
preliminary analysis be expanded to include coverage in both languages and to explore regional
responses to recovery and ongoing discussions about the pandemic‘s more lasting effects. Future
studies ought to also consider frames pertaining to economic risk and, perhaps more telling, how
these correspond or diverge from the framing of health risks. Analyzing these dimensions of risk
and how they are communicated will shed light on media coverage and public attitudes, but also
broader compliance with efforts to curtail the virus.
Acknowledgements: The authors thank the Journal's two editorial teams and six anonymous
reviewers for their comments and suggestions.
1
In this analysis, we define sensationalism as the disproportionate framing of risk on severity relative to epidemiological
data pertaining to cases in Canada. This echoes the longstanding interpretation of sensationalism as the overstatement of
risk in media (see, for example, Wahlberg and Sjoberg 2000). We focus in this research note on the relationship (and
correspondence) between the communication of severity and proximity and the epidemiological data. Future analyses
could explore additional aspects of sensationalism, such as tone or message subject.
2
We expect that this would especially be true in the early months of the pandemic as information pertaining to the virus
– including its contraction, side-effects, and consequences on the health care system – were still relatively unknown at
that time. Reliance on health officials for safety guidelines was likely to increase along with the initial surge in Canadian
cases during the first months of the pandemic.
3
Several of the newspapers represented by Postmedia and the Canadian Press also have the highest rates of readership
in Canada (Newspapers Canada 2015) and represent Canada‘s different regions. The latter consideration is central to this
study, given the centrality of provinces and cities in response to the crisis. The sample includes an array of larger and
smaller newspapers whose content is produced by Postmedia and Canadian Press.
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4
Alluding to the media‘s role in information dissemination, Quebec‘s director of public health at one point referred to
reporters as his ―merveilleux pigeons voyageurs,‖ or ―wonderful carrier pigeons‖ (Hachey 2020).
5
Parameters pertaining to region were also incorporated in the database search to ensure the sample exclusively
contained articles about COVID-19 in Canada or its regions.
6
https://www.canada.ca/en/public-health/services/diseases/2019-novel-coronavirus-infection.html
7
Note that the left-hand axis (number of new cases) is standardized across the three sub-figures; however, the right-
hand axis (number of media mentions) is not to facilitate a clear view of the movement of the trends across time.
Regional graphs vary both axis in order to see movement in data in smaller regions that would not be possible on a
standardized axis.
8
To substantiate these visual trends, we use a Poisson regression model (online appendix C, Table C1) to determine
whether an upward change in the number of cases produces an increase in the media‘s use of particular narratives. This
simple model is only meant to determine whether there is a significant relationship between change in the number of
cases (lagged by one day) and the number of narrative terms associated with each of our six categories of risk (expressed
as a count). Incidence rate ratios (available in online appendix C) further support our descriptive analysis.
9
Thank you to the Journal‘s anonymous reviewer for this observation.
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This is an Accepted Manuscript for Canadian Journal of Political Science as part of the
Cambridge Coronavirus Collection.
DOI: 10.1017/S0008423921000214
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Table 1. Frames with Illustrative Quotes
Frame
Keyword examples
Sample story quotation
Severity
Transmission
spread, death, ICU
―Health officials in Ontario said Friday that
between 3,000 and 15,000 people could die of
COVID-19 in the province even with the public
health measures that are in place. Their
projections suggested the death toll might have
climbed to 100,000 without strong public health
measures.‖ (Canadian Press, 3 April 2020).
Recovery
reopen, resolve,
slow the spread
―The decision was announced by Premier Jason
Kenney on Wednesday, just hours before
businesses were expecting to reopen. He said
they are moving forward with plans to ease
restrictions for the remainder of Alberta, which
will see certain places, like restaurants, retail
shops, hair salons, daycares and some dental and
medical services resume operations on
Thursday.‖ (Postmedia, 14 May 2020).
Authority
Health authorities
medical officer,
epidemiologist,
public health
authority
―The province's chief medical officer
encouraged parents not to take their kids to
enclosed public spaces such as museums and
shopping malls.‖ (Canadian Press, 14 March
2020).
Political authorities
prime minister,
premier, mayor
―Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland called
on Canadians to be patient as the government
worked to enact the unprecedented new
measures, saying Ottawa is departing from the
norm by focusing on speed rather than
perfection.‖ (Canadian Press, 21 March 2020).
Proximity
Domestic
nursing home,
school, restaurant
―The largest non-profit nursing home in Nova
Scotia is reporting two more deaths from
COVID-19, bringing the total to five in two
days, amidst what the premier described as ‗a
devastating day‘ in the province.‖ (Canadian Press,
19 April 2020).
International
airport, cruise,
overseas
―All of the cases have been linked to recent
travel or have been in close contacts — such as
spouses — of those infected while travelling.‖
(Canadian Press, 10 March 2020).
Note: See the online appendix for a complete list of keywords, Boolean operators, relevant stop and exclusion words, and
information on the construction of the dictionaries.
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Figure 1. Proportion of Frames by Source
Figure 2. Media Frame Use (5-Day Moving Average) Overlaid with New Case Data (3-Day
Moving Average)
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Figure 3. Severity Media Frames with Epidemiological Data (by Region)
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Figure 4. Authority Media Frames with Epidemiological Data (by Region)
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Figure 5. Proximity Media Frames with Epidemiological Data (by Region)
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