Cancer risk communication in the news coverage of suspected cancer clusters in Ontario: Contrasting media messaging on cancer by geography

摘要

Cancer clusters attract considerable interest from the public, the media, and governments, and the risk communication undertaken during an investigation may impact cancer risk perceptions. This paper examined the frequency of select words on qualitative risk, quantitative risk, and cancer risk factors used in the news coverage of suspected cancer clusters in Ontario. A total of 84 news articles on cancer clusters in Ontario published during the period 1990-2017 were retrieved from news databases. The language on cancer risk used in the news articles was examined by various geographic characteristics such as urban and rural communities, geographic scale, and environmental and occupational exposure settings. On average, articles reporting on cancer clusters in urban areas used words describing quantitative risk more frequently compared to articles reporting on cancer clusters in rural areas. Word frequencies for cancer risk factor terms were on average higher in articles covering urban cancer clusters compared to rural. These results suggest that language around cancer risk varies across the news coverage of cancer clusters in Ontario and the communication of key information on cancer risk factors is limited. More collaboration between expert risk communicators, journalists, and community members may be needed to improve the media's risk communication around cancer.