“We Support Harm Reduction”: Frame Analysis of Canadian News Media Coverage of the Opioid Crisis
Main Article Content
Abstract
This study examines news media framing of the opioid crisis in Canada to advance an understanding of the dominant discourses and identify the narratives shaping public and policymakers’ opinions and preferred solutions. We conducted a content and frame analysis of 2,273 Canadian news articles published between January 2016 and December 2019. The analysis revealed that harm reduction and treatment were the preferred solutions instead of criminalization, and public health framing predominantly occurred. The overall tone emerged as empathetic and softer and, generally, the leading policy choices and opioid crisis were framed contradistinct from past drug epidemics.
Article Details
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Published articles are distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, adaptation, and reproduction in any medium, provided that the original work is properly cited. The author retains copyright of their work. By submitting the work to this journal, the author agrees to grant the journal a non-exclusive right to publish the submission.