Comparison of News Reports on Public Health Events in Mainstream Media in China and the West: the 2022 Shanghai COVID-19 Outbreak as an Example

Abstract

In today's era, the media is the main way to promote world exchange and communication and to achieve an in-depth understanding of multiple subjects. Since the outbreak of Covid-19 in 2020, public health events have become an important part of mainstream media coverage in Chinese and Western countries. The media affects the public's perception of the current situation of the epidemic. Due to the strong correlation between the epidemic and production and life, it will, in turn, produce greater social benefits. This requires the media to uphold an objective, fair and scientific attitude and to convey truthful information to the public. This article takes the influential Shanghai epidemic in 2022 as an example, takes the news reports of CNN and China Daily as the entry point, analyzes and compares the differences and commonalities between Chinese and Western mainstream media, and analyzes the main reasons for the differences.