"Where is the vaccine against domestic violence?"

The purpose of this study was to investigate how domestic violence was presented in Swedish newspapers before and during the covid-19 pandemic. Based on the result, we discuss how a changed reporting can influence the involved parties (perpetrators and victims), and social work in a wider context.To answer the questions of the study, we have studied how newspapers presented the parties in domestic violence, the explanations for the violence, and the character of the violence. The focus of the study was to investigate if there were differences before and during the pandemic. 134 articles were studied in total, from the newspapers Aftonbladet, Expressen, Dagens Nyheter and Svenska Dagbladet. We found that the newspaper coverage on domestic violence has changed during the covid-19 pandemic, compared to before. During the pandemic, the newspapers reported the pandemic in itself as a reason for domestic violence, and hence excluded many other possible explanations. The reporting during the pandemic often focused on serious domestic violence, on cases where shelters for women were involved, and the pandemic as a reason for domestic violence. Consequently, other types of violence and other types of victims have gotten less coverage in the newspapers. There are fewer articles embracing the width of victims who suffer from domestic violence. In addition, we found that the reporting on the perpetrators committing the violence was more one-dimensional. Before the pandemic, it was clearer that the perpetrators could come from a wide range of age groups, social positions, genders, sexualities etc. During the pandemic, nearly all cases presented in the newspapers were about a hetrosexual man, who was often a father. In summary, we found that the reporting has become more linear and one-dimensional during the pandemic, but also more alarming. The changed newspaper coverage of domestic violence could certainly influence the general picture of the problem, both in the public and in social work.