Nothing new here at all – just the latest episode of a local community discovering that its glorified local health news is often just paid-for advertising.
The Other Paper of Columbus, Ohio unveils how Ohio State University Medical Center pays one station almost $100,000 a year to air “Breakthroughs in Medicine” segments in the newscast, and pays another station almost $150,000 for a “MedBreaks” segment.
The VP and general manager of one of these stations rejected criticism saying, âTheyâre not ads, theyâre vignettes. …The reality is, a television station that maintains editorial control I donât believe is doing anything ethically wrong.â?
OK, then why doesn’t the station tell viewers what they’re getting by scrolling across the screen:
THIS VIGNETTE WAS PAID FOR BY OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER.
The Radio-Television News Directors Associationâs (RTNDA) Code of Ethics states:
Professional electronic journalists should:
* Gather and report news without fear or favor, and vigorously resist undue influence from any outside forces, including advertisers, sources, story subjects, powerful individuals, and special interest groups.
* Resist those who would seek to buy or politically influence news content or who would seek to intimidate those who gather and disseminate the news.
* Determine news content solely through editorial judgment and not as the result of outside influence.
* Resist any self-interest or peer pressure that might erode journalistic duty and service to the public.
* Recognize that sponsorship of the news will not be used in any way to determine, restrict, or manipulate content.
* Refuse to allow the interests of ownership or management to influence news judgment and content inappropriately.
As we said at the top, this is nothing new. Columbus residents join the long list of television audiences all over the country who have been spoonfed one-sided PR and advertising messages from medical centers paying their way into newscasts. The fact that a supposed “news” organization would accept these deals is an embarrassment to the TV news industry.
When will RTNDA do something about it?
Opinions on other issues in news, journals, PR, advertising, marketing
Major revisions + reversals of reporting about the efficacy of remdesivir and HCQ have compromised the public's trust in scientists and physicians. Complexity and caution are key to public #COVID19 communications @garyschwitzer https://ja.ma/3fzUW0M
SPH adjunct associate professor @garyschwitzer presented to @Georgetown University public health students on how #covid19 has been "the perfect storm of politics, PR, and polluted messages to the public."
Watch the recorded zoom presentation here: https://www.healthnewsreview.org/2020/09/perfect-storm-of-politics-pr-polluted-messages-to-the-public/.
Comments
Please note, comments are no longer published through this website. All previously made comments are still archived and available for viewing through select posts.
Comments are closed.
Our Comments Policy
But before leaving a comment, please review these notes about our policy.
You are responsible for any comments you leave on this site.
This site is primarily a forum for discussion about the quality (or lack thereof) in journalism or other media messages (advertising, marketing, public relations, medical journals, etc.) It is not intended to be a forum for definitive discussions about medicine or science.
We will delete comments that include personal attacks, unfounded allegations, unverified claims, product pitches, profanity or any from anyone who does not list a full name and a functioning email address. We will also end any thread of repetitive comments. We don”t give medical advice so we won”t respond to questions asking for it.
We don”t have sufficient staffing to contact each commenter who left such a message. If you have a question about why your comment was edited or removed, you can email us at feedback@healthnewsreview.org.
There has been a recent burst of attention to troubles with many comments left on science and science news/communication websites. Read “Online science comments: trolls, trash and treasure.”
The authors of the Retraction Watch comments policy urge commenters:
We”re also concerned about anonymous comments. We ask that all commenters leave their full name and provide an actual email address in case we feel we need to contact them. We may delete any comment left by someone who does not leave their name and a legitimate email address.
And, as noted, product pitches of any sort – pushing treatments, tests, products, procedures, physicians, medical centers, books, websites – are likely to be deleted. We don”t accept advertising on this site and are not going to give it away free.
The ability to leave comments expires after a certain period of time. So you may find that you’re unable to leave a comment on an article that is more than a few months old.
You might also like