The news media and the agenda for noncommunicable diseases before and during the COVID-19 pandemic: Losing the competition for coverage and framing responsibility for action in Malawi
Dereck L. Hamunakwadi, Stephanie L. Smith · 2026
Read The news media and the agenda for noncommunicable diseases before and during the COVID-19 pandemic: Losing the competition for coverage and framing responsibility for action in Malawi by Dereck L. Hamunakwadi, Stephanie L. Smith (2026) in the Tower of Babel, a free online library of public-domain works preserved in clean, searchable text. No sign-up. The full text is served as a plain-text file at a predictable URL, where text is present: https://antarctic-labs.com/tower-of-babel/PMC13399344.txt.
Description
Dereck L. Hamunakwadi and Stephanie L. Smith analyzed how Malawi's news media covered chronic diseases before the COVID-19 pandemic and during it, in a 2026 study. These diseases cause most early deaths in poorer countries. The authors measured priority through headlines in two Malawian outlets published between 2015 and 2023, comparing ten chronic conditions against HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria, and COVID-19.
From 2015 to 2019 the infectious trio dominated coverage, and chronic diseases stayed low on the agenda. During the emergency years, 2020 to 2023, COVID-19 took over, while mental health headlines surged past those for HIV/AIDS and tuberculosis. In a closer framing analysis, stories most often cast domestic NGOs, rather than government or politicians, as responsible for tackling the chronic disease burden, especially cancers. The authors doubt such coverage will move these diseases up the public agenda.
Catalog record
| CREATOR | Dereck L. Hamunakwadi, Stephanie L. Smith |
|---|---|
| YEAR | 2026 |
| COLLECTION | PAPERS |
| FORMAT | TXT |
| FILE SIZE | 41656 |
| LICENSE | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0 |
| RIGHTS | CC BY |
| SOURCE | Europe PMC |