A string of mysterious pneumonia cases in the Wuhan province of China was reported to The World Health Organization (WHO) on the last day of 2019. A week later, the cause was determined to be a previously unseen coronavirus, later named COVID-19 (World Health Organization). By the end of March 2020, the virus had spread across the world, creating a global pandemic on a scale not before seen in modern times. Over the course of the first two years of the global COVID-19 pandemic, certain variants of the coronavirus have corresponded with peaks in hospitalizations, cases, and deaths (Centers for Disease Control). 

 

December 1, 2021, was when the Omicron variant of COVID-19 first appeared in the United States, the day after the U.S. classified it as a variant of concern, and five days after the World Health Organization gave it this designation (Centers for Disease Control). The variant overwhelmed the U.S.; at its peak at the end of January, the seven-day average case count in the U.S. was over three times higher than any previously recorded week (Centers for Disease Control). Because the public often uses the media as its primary source of health information (Schwitzer et. al., 2005), understanding how a prominent news organization like the New York Times is framing a current and cataclysmic health event is crucial.

 

Research Question: How did the New York Times frame the Omicron variant between December 2021 and February 2022?