Country Crisis: A Content Analysis of Rural Opioid Epidemic News Coverage

“We Support Harm Reduction”: Frame Analysis of Canadian News Media Coverage of the Opioid Crisis

“…The global impact of the opioid crisis has captured the attention of news media throughout the last decade and, consequently, influenced a growing body of literature on news media and this crisis. To this end, studies analyzing the news framing of the opioid crisis are mostly US-based (Eichenlaub & Nasher, 2021;Hswen et al, 2020;Lawson & Meyers, 2020;McGinty et al, 2016McGinty et al, , 2019Orsini 2017), with only a few focusing on Canada (Johnston 2020;Matthias et al, 2019;Quan at al., 2020;Webster et al, 2019;Wild et al, 2019) and other countries (i.e., Ghana) (Thompson & Ofori-Parku, 2020). Altogether, such research highlights various trends in how the opioid crisis, opioid users, causes, and solutions are framed and discoursed by news media, acutely, though, from the US context, as the ensuing literature shows.…”

“…Thematically, the existing scholarship on the opioid crisis news coverage addresses how opioid usage is framed (McGinty et al 2016), the causes (Eichenlaub & Nasher, 2021), geographical differences (Hswen et al, 2020;Lawson &Meyers, 2020), andpreventions, solutions, andtreatments (Kennedy-Hendricks et al, 2019;McGinty et al, 2016, Orsini 2017). One such study by McGinty et al (2016) explores whether opioid use is framed by US news media as a criminal activity or treatable health condition, finding that it is more often framed as a criminal justice issue.…”

Coverage of the Opioid Crisis in National Network Television News from 2000–2020: A Content Analysis

“…12 In addition to framing theory, agenda-setting theory also provides a framework for understanding the ways in which news brings attention to issues (i.e., first-level agenda setting) and informs public perceptions (i.e., second-level agenda setting). 13 Past literature suggests that coverage of the opioid epidemic has commonly spread awareness about the rise of opioid abuse and overdose 14,15 but less often emphasized available evidence-based public health solutions to the crisis. 16 Research on second-level agenda setting reports conflicting ways in which news media have created public perceptions that are more or less favorable toward those impacted by the crisis.…”

“…Most existing studies on news media coverage of the opioid crisis have utilized newspaper news coverage 14 , 15 , 22 , 24 – 27 or a combination of newspaper and television (TV) news sources 16 , 17 , 28 . Where TV news has been included, transcripts, rather than recorded clips of TV content, have been used, precluding analysis of visual aspects of the coverage, including the race of interviewed patients and depiction of graphic drug use-related material 16 , 17 , 28 .…”

“…14,18,19 However, many other studies have reported portrayal of OUD patients sympathetically as victims who often fell into addiction following legitimate pain prescriptions. [20][21][22][23] Most existing studies on news media coverage of the opioid crisis have utilized newspaper news coverage 14,15,22,[24][25][26][27] or a combination of newspaper and television (TV) news sources. 16,17,28 Where TV news has been included, transcripts, rather than recorded clips of TV content, have been used, precluding analysis of visual aspects of the coverage, including the race of interviewed patients and depiction of graphic drug use-related material.…”