Swine Flu Coverage: Panic or Proper?

By: Joe Strupp The growing swine flu scare is a Page One story in nearly every U.S. newspaper today. Jon Stewart on "The Daily Show" calls it "Snoutbreak 2009." But is the coverage overplaying the danger or providing proper levels of information?

Health journalism veterans and experts warn that too much negative coverage can stir panic, but advise reporters and editors to stick to basic facts and advice from the best experts.

"You have to watch the tone of what you are covering, avoid subjective adjectives, just tell the story," says Al Tompkins, a top instructor at the Poynter Institute. "Myth-busting is an important piece of it. Be careful that speed doesn't lead to inaccuracy. Be cautious."

Tompkins points to the extended photos of people wearing surgical masks, which he contends are found to provide little protection. He says they also paint an image of real danger to readers and viewers. "There are opportunities here to learn how your community works and how it responds to this."

He cited a Wall Street Journal online report that offered the history of pandemics and indicated the historic facts point to an outbreak likely to occur now, and that the results can be serious, but not impossible to handle. "There is also an opportunity to ask how many people die of flu in any year in the U.S."

Trudy Lieberman, president of he Association of Heath Care Journalists and director of the health and medical program at the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism, warns that the fine line must be walked carefully for reporters.

"You can over-hype the danger or minimize it and people do not get the advice they need," she said. "What I have seen seems mixed, but I have not seen an urgency to go out and buy masks, but to do the sensible things."

She also pointed to a need to put it in perspective: "The more history and context you can get, the better. You need to give the how-to advice."

While most newspapers placed the story on Page One Tuesday, the placement and space given have varied. Among those that made it the front page lead story is the Philadelphia Inquirer, with the headline: "Global alert rises; travel advisory set." But no front page photos of masked residents.

"We don?t want to overplay it," said Inquirer Health and Science Editor Karl Stark. "No one has died yet in the United States. There are a lot of questions we are asking. We have to go after it."

But he warned, "you have to play it in a moderate, straight up way. We are not ready for panic at the moment. There is no service in passing on unfiltered anxiety. It doesn't help people."

Several journalism organizations, from the AHCJ to Poynter, have posted guidelines and resources for reporters covering the story.

Ivan Oransky, an online managing editor at Scientific American and an AHCJ board member, says he believes the coverage by newspapers and wire services has been tempered. He says the scares for anthrax and SARS dating back to 2001 helped educate them.

"They are asking the right questions," he said. "You saw a lot of overblown stuff back with anthrax, but people learned a lot during SARS and they are applying those lessons here."