ISSN electrónico: 1885-5210
DOI: https://doi.org/10.14201/rmc.25812

FEATURES OF COVERAGE OF THE SARS-COVID-19 CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC IN THE UKRAINIAN AUDIOVISUAL MEDIA (ON THE EXAMPLE OF NEWS RELEASES OF CENTRAL AND REGIONAL TELEVISION CHANNELS AND PUBLIC SERVICE BROADCASTERS OF UKRAINE)

Características de la cobertura de la pandemia de coronavirus sars-covid-19 en los medios audiovisuales ucranianos (en el ejemplo de los comunicados de prensa de los canales de televisión centrales y regionales y as emisoras de servicio público de Ucrania)

Pavlenko LIUDMYLA

Department of Information Broadcasting. Interregional Academy of Personnel Management (Kyiv, Ukraine).

Author for correspondence: Pavlenko Liudmyla
Email: ukrradioinform@gmail.com

Received: June 18th, 2023
Accepted: June 26th, 2023

Abstract

This paper explores some patterns of coverage of the coronavirus pandemic in the news programs of television and radio channels of the National Public Television and Radio Company of Ukraine. The process of pandemic coverage is reflexive and does not have a clear strategy or policy. The study is the first in this direction, and this is its scientific novelty. The most stable characteristic of vaccination coverage by Ukrainian Radio news is informing the audience about everything related to COVID-19 vaccinations.

Keywords: coronavirus pandemic; news programs; television and radio channels; media; Ukraine; public service broadcasters.

Resumen

Este artículo explora algunos patrones de cobertura de la pandemia de coronavirus en los programas de noticias de los canales de radio y televisión de la Compañía Nacional de Radio y Televisión Pública de Ucrania. El proceso de cobertura de la pandemia es reflexivo y no tiene una estrategia o política clara. El estudio es el primero en esta dirección, y esta es su novedad científica. La característica más estable de la cobertura de vacunación de las noticias de la radio ucraniana es informar a la audiencia sobre todo lo relacionado con las vacunas contra el COVID-19.

Palabras clave: pandemia de coronavirus; programas de noticiea; canales de radio y television; Ucrania emisoras de servicio público.

Introduction

Recently, researchers have shown an increased interest in coverage of the coronavirus pandemic in the news programs of television and radio channels. Therefore, we decided to analyze the coverage of the coronavirus pandemic in the news programs of the National Public Television and Radio Company of Ukraine and to identify certain patterns. The main study period is six months – from April 14, 2020 to October 14, 2020: from the height of quarantine restrictions in Ukraine to the gradual stabilization of the situation. Also, a separate part of the study is devoted to covering the start of mass vaccination against coronavirus in Ukraine.

The aim of the study is to identify the quantitative patterns of coverage in the public broadcast news of the coronavirus pandemic SARS-COVID-19. Analysis of the dynamics of changes in the number of information messages on selected topics, the presence or absence of a connection with the number of patients with coronavirus and the number of deaths from complications of the disease.

One of the main objectives of this study is to determine with specific examples whether the coverage of the pandemic was statistically adequate to the situation; demonstrate a pattern that confirms that the intensity of coverage of the problem in the media, even in the case of Public Broadcasting channels, which aims to satisfy the public information interest, but is determined not so much by the actual severity of the problem as its public resonance. Which are not always synchronous processes.

The scientific issue of coronavirus coverage in the media, as well as the topic itself, is quite new. However, the study of this topic has already been addressed by the authors of numerous analytical studies in publications that do not have the official status of scientific and which are cared for by international NGOs to study the work of the media. As well as the topic has been studied in some scientific articles of domestic media researchers, more widely the topic has been developed by the international scientific community.

In particular, researchers of the NGO Institute of Mass Media pay considerable attention to this topic in Ukraine in their works – its thorough analytical calculations study mainly the coverage of the coronavirus pandemic by Ukrainian TV channels and online resources. The topic of coverage of the coronavirus pandemic in the news of Public Broadcasting has not been objectively developed, our study is the first in this direction and this is its scientific novelty.

Methodology

In the study on all platforms, we counted the amount of material – individual information messages, plot + eyeliner, synchrony + eyeliner in the news releases of all TV and radio channels of the public broadcaster. In research on vaccination, the news of the Ukrainian radio mentioned coronavirus – the word “vaccination”, counted the amount of material on the topic of vaccinations against coronavirus, counted the number of materials on specific topics of general coronavirus vaccination.

Results

The subject of the study is information that covers various aspects of the spread of coronavirus in Ukraine and the world, the object of study – informational messages on selected topics, which were on the news of various television and radio channels of the National Public Television and Radio Company of Ukraine from April 14 to October 14, 2020 – from the period of actualization to the period of stabilization of information saturation of the topic. As well as information messages of the First Channel of Ukrainian Radio on the course of mass vaccination in Ukraine in the periods from February 24 to March 5, 2021 – the start of vaccination and a month after the start – from March 24 to April 2, 2021.

It should be clarified that news content for all branches and platforms of Public Broadcasting is produced by a single division of the National Public Television and Radio Company of Ukraine – the Information Programs Directorate, which is based in the company’s Central Directorate in Kyiv and has an extensive network of news offices in all regional administrative centers. This unit is a convergent newsroom that produces news for digital platforms, for UA: First TV channel, for several Public Broadcasting radio stations, in particular for Ukrainian Radio – First Channel of Ukrainian Radio and rebroadcasts these issues on Radio Culture – Third Channel of Ukrainian Radio.

And also separately produces news for Radio Ray – the Second Channel of Ukrainian Radio. At the same time, separately in the regions, in close cooperation with the Central Directorate, news is prepared for regional radio stations and regional TV channels – branches of Public Broadcasting. Production of this product for different platforms is made according to uniform Information standards. This is one of the main editorial documents approved by the Board of the National Public Television and Radio Company¹. Information standards, in particular, provide for mandatory efficiency, accuracy, reliability, completeness of presentation, balance, separation of facts from opinions, accessibility of information. And the ethical principles of presenting information on the air of NSTU channels provide for the mandatory publication of socially significant news. Any news that the editorial board considers to be socially important and significant must be aired. Undoubtedly, news about the spread of coronavirus in Ukraine and in the world is evaluated by public journalists as socially powerful information¹.

Regarding the time frame of the study, it should be noted that although the coronavirus outbreak was first recorded in December 2019 in China, and it was recognized by the WHO as a pandemic on March 11, 2020 and the Public Broadcaster carefully covered all these and related events, however, the author intentionally did not resort to the study of the initial period of the pandemic. Considering that this period is a separate topic of study, which should pay special attention to such issues as misunderstanding of society, which was clearly reflected in the attack of the local population of the village of Novi Sanzhary in Poltava region on tourists who came to the sanatorium for isolation; problems of spreading fakes, etc. The same article, as already pointed out, has other purposes, which are to demonstrate some patterns of coverage of the coronavirus in a period of relative stabilization, when the world is already aware of the issue and its scale, and journalists should realize their social responsibility in countering a proliferation Pandemic.

We will first consider some aspects of the coverage of the topic of coronavirus around the same time by others, in particular, online media. According to IMI monitoring, in March 2020 the national online media very actively covered the situation with the spread of COVID-19 and the consequences of the infection both in the world and in Ukraine² . Since, in our study, partial attention is paid to the coverage of the topic of coronavirus in regional news, it is interesting to see how this coverage occurs in other regional editions outside the network of branches of the Public. However, research on such content is currently lacking. Among the available ones is L. Pisarenko’s research “Coverage of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic in Odesa media. For monitoring, the authors chose materials on dumskaya.net, “First city”, “Odessa life” for the period March-April 2020, which were studied for the presence of signs of manipulation on this topic. That is, the focus of the study is different from that chosen in this article. In the course of the analysis of 200 materials connected with a coronavirus are revealed. Of these, about 70 with manipulations³. VoxUkraine also analyzed the news feeds of Ukrainian online media and found out which topics about Covid-19 dominated the information space, published the following conclusions: “Most media wrote about international and Ukrainian statistics, quarantine measures and the state of the country’s medical system. The greatest interest in coronavirus was in March, after which the amount of news on this topic is steadily declining… The peak of interest in covid came in March-April, when the first case of Covid-19 was detected in Ukraine and quarantine restrictions were introduced. Compared to February, the share of news with the mention of coronavirus has tripled: from 11% to 37% (37,310 news in March against 9,850 in February). In April, news with the mention of covid became a little less – 32% (34,204 news), but interest in it still remained – perhaps due to the discussion of quarantine restrictions, which were extended several times. During the two months of quarantine, the society was tired not only of following the rules of social distance, but also of reading news about the coronavirus. Thus, in the May news feeds, coronavirus reports were 20% (19,655), and in June – 13% (11,387)”⁴.

Similar trends were found in our study, which covers a six-month period starting from April 14, 2020 inclusive. As of this day, 3,764 patients with coronavirus (+ 392 on this day) and 108 deaths from the pandemic coronavirus strain (+ 10 on this day) were recorded in Ukraine. And already on April 30 the incidence statistics increased tenfold and amounted to 10,861 (+455 on this day), and the mortality statistics – several times and amounted to 272 (+11 on this day). The number of reports on the topic of coronavirus remained stable⁵ (Table 1).

For some time, these statistics have remained stable, although the incidence and mortality from coronavirus complications are growing rapidly in the world and in Ukraine in particular. Then the decline begins. So. On May 11, 416 cases of infection were detected in Ukraine per day, a total of 15,648 people⁵ (Table 2).

As of June 10, there were 28,831 cases of infection in Ukraine and a daily increase in patients – 525. On June 20, the situation in the country significantly deteriorated – 841 people were infected per day. As of June 14, 2020, Ukraine ranked 16th in the world (8-th in Europe) in the number of recorded cases of infection and 18th in the world (8-th in Europe) – in the number of deaths. The number of infected per 1 million population is 51,145 people (70-th in the world and 35th in Europe), and the number of deaths from COVID-19 per million population is 1189 people (42-nd in the world and 29th in Europe)⁵. At the same time, the number of reports on the topic of coronavirus in the studied media steadily decreased, although not at a rapid pace (Table 3). The number of coverages concerning coronavirus within the media under the analysis in July 2020 is reflected in table 4.

On August 7, Ukraine updated the record for the number of new cases for the previous day – 1,453 and the number of daily deaths – 33⁵. The number of coronavirus reports has only decreased (Table 5).

On September 4, 2723 new cases of coronavirus infection were recorded in Ukraine – a record number of new patients per day⁵. However, the news did not respond synchronously – the number of reports of a pandemic did not increase (Table 6).

On October 3, Ukraine ranked 11th in the world in terms of the number of new infections, with 4,633 infected per day. The total number of infected on this day was 217,661 people⁵. News content is almost unresponsive to record numbers – the number of reports on the subject of coronavirus remains at the lowest levels for the entire study period (Table 7).

Similar trends are observed during the coverage of the coronavirus vaccination campaign. The materials of the First Channel of the Ukrainian Radio about vaccination in the selected period were studied according to the following characteristics: