title: The reporting of theoretical health risks by the media: Canadian newspaper reporting of potential blood transmission of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The media play an important role at the interface of science and policy by communicating scientific information to the public and policy makers. In issues of theoretical risk, in which there is scientific uncertainty, the media's role as disseminators of information is particularly important due to the potential to influence public perception of the severity of the risk. In this article we describe how the Canadian print media reported the theoretical risk of blood transmission of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (CJD).
  
  
  METHODS
  We searched 3 newspaper databases for articles published by 6 major Canadian daily newspapers between January 1990 and December 1999. We identified all articles relating to blood transmission of CJD. In duplicate we extracted information from the articles and entered the information into a qualitative software program. We compared the observations obtained from this content analysis with information obtained from a previous policy analysis examining the Canadian blood system's decision-making concerning the potential transfusion transmission of CJD.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Our search identified 245 relevant articles. We observed that newspapers in one instance accelerated a policy decision, which had important resource and health implication, by communicating information on risk to the public. We also observed that newspapers primarily relied upon expert opinion (47 articles) as opposed to published medical evidence (28 articles) when communicating risk information. Journalists we interviewed described the challenges of balancing their responsibility to raise awareness of potential health threats with not unnecessarily arousing fear amongst the public.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Based on our findings we recommend that journalists report information from both expert opinion sources and from published studies when communicating information on risk. We also recommend researchers work more closely with journalists to assist them in identifying and appraising relevant scientific information on risk.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada. kumanan.wilson@uhn.on.ca
authors.forename: Kumanan
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Wilson
authors.forename: Catherine
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Code
authors.forename: Christopher
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Dornan
authors.forename: Nadya
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Ahmad
authors.forename: Paul
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Hébert
authors.forename: Ian
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Graham
mesh_terms: D015706:Bibliometrics; D001771:Blood Banks / Q000592:standards; D017848:Blood-Borne Pathogens; D002170:Canada; D007562:Creutzfeldt-Jakob Syndrome / Q000097:blood / Q000635:transmission*; D006801:Humans; D033181:Information Dissemination / Q000379:methods; D018156:Journalism, Medical / Q000592:standards*; D008402:Mass Media / Q000592:standards / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D009524:Newspapers as Topic / Q000592:standards / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011050:Policy Making; D018570:Risk Assessment / Q000592:standards*; D012941:Social Responsibility