The evolution of epidemics and the publication of epidemic news in the local press: a study in the region of Braga (Northern Portugal)

Abstract The periods 1918–1920 and 2019–2021 were characterized by epidemic moments. The COVID-19 pandemic recalled the crises associated with the Spanish flu, exanthematic typhus, and smallpox of the 1920s. However, few works have focused on a comparative task of these episodes in local newspapers. Through the analysis of the daily editions of Commercio do Minho and its successor, Correio do Minho, we fill this gap with this work. It was possible to portray the socioeconomic reach of these pandemics in a community in the northern coastal region of Portugal. Using time series analysis of the number of news items as well as the number of deaths from each of the episodes in the periods 1918 and 1920 and 2020 and 2021 (namely using Autoregressive Distributed Lag models), we conclude that the COVID-19 pandemic exhibited a greater focus on the problem in the local press. Other results made it possible to view the differentiated response of the number of news items regarding each epidemic episode depending on the number of deaths in the population, both between 1918 and 1920 and between 2020 and 2021. Thus, our work came to demonstrate three pieces of evidence in the relationship between news and epidemic processes. Firstly, COVID-19, as an example of the most recent pandemic, brought a reactivity of the local press resulting in a greater number of news, even compared to the number of fatalities. Secondly, the number of news published on epidemic/pandemic issues tends to follow the evolution of the severity of the event—there is more news in the months that follow periods of greater severity of the disease. Finally, the “disappearance” of published news faster in 1918–1920 also reveals a lesser focus that newsrooms perceived on society of that time in the face of the reported pandemic (Nie et al. 2022)