Framing the unseen: COVID-19 through the eyes of a broadsheet and a tabloid

This study compares COVID-19 news framing in UK broadsheet The Guardian and tabloid The Sun during the outbreak’s first week (27 January − 3 February 2020). A content analysis of 86 articles, using an integrated framework of generic and pandemic-specific frames, reveals both convergences and divergences. Both newspapers shared human interest and attribution of responsibility among their top frames. However, The Guardian prioritized economic consequence (35%), while The Sun relied predominantly on fear/scare-mongering (30%). Notably, the same ethnicization frame served opposite functions: The Sun reinforced stigma, whereas The Guardian challenged prejudice. These findings challenge strong tabloidization claims by howing that substantive broadsheet–tabloid differences persist, and that frame frequency alone is insufficient for comparative analysis when the same frame serves different discursive functions across outlets. The study offers practical implications for responsible health journalism, particularly regarding the handling of ethnicization and threat narratives in crisis reporting.