Dimensões políticas de uma epidemia: O caso da gripe A (H1N1) na imprensa escrita da Argentina

Abstract

The current study addresses social representations of the influenza A (H1N1) epidemic in Argentina in 2009, in the country’s mainstream newspapers. The methodology was twofold, qualitative and quantitative, with an analysis of two dimensions: the construction of the epidemic as an “object” (designation and characterization) and the sources of information in the news stories, seeking to identify the social actors involved in each case. The results show that designating the epidemic as “H1N1” rather than “swine flu” was a conscious political decision to exempt a hazardous form of livestock production from its role in the disease, while focusing responsibility on individual patients. The study addresses the relations between recommendations by policy spokespersons (especially at the international level), the pharmaceuticalization of the epidemic, shifting of the population’s demands to validate biomedical hegemony, and local press coverage of the epidemic.