ABSTRACT

International epidemiological data have emphasised that COVID-19 poses a particular threat to older adults. As media coverage plays an important, direct role in shaping official responses to unfolding crisis situations, the aim of this paper was to analyse the portrayal of older people and COVID-19 by mainstream New Zealand news media. We undertook a qualitative document analysis (QDA) of New Zealand coverage during March 2020. From a total sample pool of 482 articles obtained from the database Knowledgebasket, 91 articles met our inclusion criteria. Our analysis of this coverage found that older people were most often referred to as an nameless, homogeneous ‘other’ group who were overwhelmingly framed as being at risk and passive. Only a third of articles framed older people as active. Older people's agency and ability to navigate threats to their health and wellbeing were under-represented in news coverage. Coverage stigmatised older people as passive and inherently, rather than situationally, vulnerable and neglected the diversity of their social circumstances and intersecting identities, including ethnicity. We conclude this article with suggestions informed by our findings for promoting equitable media coverage of older New Zealanders’ in the context of pandemics.

摘要

国际流行病学数据强调，COVID-19对老年人构成特殊威胁。由于媒体报道在决定官方对正在发生的危机局势的反应中起着重要的直接作用，因此本文的目的是分析新西兰主流新闻媒体对老年人和COVID-19的描绘。我们在2020年3月对新西兰的覆盖范围进行了定性文件分析（QDA）。从数据库Knowledgebasket获得的482篇文章的总样本库中，有91篇文章符合我们的纳入标准。我们对这一覆盖率的分析发现，老年人通常被称为无名，同质的“其他”群体，绝大多数被归类为处于危险和被动状态。只有三分之一的文章认为老年人活跃。老年人' 新闻报道中所代表的机构和应对威胁其健康和福祉的能力不足。掩盖性使老年人受到污名化，他们是被动的和天生的，而不是在情境中脆弱的，并且忽视了他们的社会环境和包括种族在内的相交身份的多样性。在本文的结尾，我们提出了一些建议，这些建议根据我们的发现提供了建议，可以促进大流行背景下公平地报道老年人新西兰人。