COVID-19 threatens media freedom with a ‘death sentence,’ experts say
Panelists Meera Selva from the U.K.-based Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, Peter Erdelyi from 444.hu Hungary, and Courtney Radsch from the New-York-based Committee to Protect Journalists shared a virtual stage for Friday’s panel on COVID-19 and Media Freedom at the Carleton University-hosted Journalism in the Time of Crisis conference.
While sharing their own experiences and delving into current challenges facing all news organizations, the panelists discussed how the pandemic has affected the media industry.
“The media industry has been in crisis for the last decade,” said Selva. “The pandemic has just accelerated a lot of change that was happening anyway.”
Erdelyi described an increase in intimidation and fear-mongering tactics in Hungary country since the outbreak of COVID-19.
As the pandemic worsened, the Hungarian government restricted information about COVID-19, limiting journalists’ access to vital information, he added.
“If you call a hospital…you are told that they can’t answer your question and you have to turn to the central government communication office,” said Erdelyi. “There’s no way really to ask anything.”
The spreading of misinformation was also criminalized. While journalists abhor the spread of false news, they also condemn government crackdowns on communication when the justification can be specious.
Erdelyi said the government’s strong-arm approach has damaged the public’s desire to communicate with any media:
“When people see their neighbours being taken away for a post on Facebook it can be intimidating.”
While Hungary is not facing major problems with COVID-19 misinformation, that is what is being communicated by the government — and this framing of the situation is being reflected in law enforcement’s arrest patterns, he said.
“It’s important to understand the gradual, slow erosion of every institution that ultimately leads to this in Hungary,” he said.
Additionally, Radsch said that her top priority with CPJ has been getting journalists out of prisons worldwide to protect them from the health and safety issues — intensified because of COVID-19 — faced while in these institutions.
“It can ultimately lead to a death sentence,” she said.
There is a lack of protocols within prisons to protect inmates from the coronavirus, and “we need to show the world that they need to let these journalists out, especially if they are in pre-trial detention,” said Radsch.
The economic health of news media was already in decline before the pandemic, but the panelists agreed that the industry has been truly engulfed in crisis since the pandemic began, said Selva.
But the importance of good journalism has never been more apparent, she said.
“At the start of the crisis, (the public) needed good, reliable info and they needed the coronavirus explained to them the way that journalists can explain,” said Selva. “It was all very needed. We need to keep a hold of the kernel of that need.”
The full video of the panel discussion can be found here.
