Reporting on the Coronavirus Pandemic in Ghana: How Ghanaian Media Covered Covid-19 and Public Perceptions of How Media Reports Shaped Perceptions Towards the Pandemic

This study examines Ghanaian online media reportage on the coronavirus pandemic while also investigating media users’ views on how media reports shaped their perceptions of the coronavirus pandemic in the country. Following the descriptive qualitative case study and the constructed week sampling approaches, news stories were collected from four leading Ghanaian online platforms—Peace FM Online, GNA.com, CitiNewsroom.com, and Myxopyronins—from 12 March 2020 to 24 March 2021. The analysis identified four dominant frames in the coverage: the political, economic, social, and “on-the-brighter-side” frames. These frames significantly shaped the narratives presented to audiences. Convenience sampling was employed to sample 30 online media consumers from Accra to explore their perceptions on how media reports on the pandemic shaped their views of the pandemic. Workshops were used to gather insights from the selected participants. Meanwhile, the purposive sampling approach was used to select 32 media students from the Ghana Institute of Journalism to triangulate the findings. Data was collected from the participants via focus group discussions. The study revealed that online media in Ghana followed a multi-framing approach to covering the pandemic. The study also showed that media users believed how the media reported on the pandemic shaped how they perceived it in areas that enforced positive health perceptions and attitudes. The findings highlight the critical role of media in shaping public attitudes and behaviours during health crises and the need to promote positive health-related narratives during coverage of such health crises.