Media Context

• COVID-19 is a global pandemic. The disease was first identified in December 2019 before the pandemic was declared in March 2020.
• It was clear that mass immunisation was essential to prevent the spread of COVID. At the start of 2020, the world saw unprecedented levels of funding for vaccine research and development. By Dec 2020 the UK was the first western country to license a vaccine against COVID which is astonishingly fast. By Jan 2021 the NHS has delivered more than 1 million vaccinations
• On 23 June 2016, citizens of the UK voted to leave the EU. This was nicknamed 'Brexit'. The vote was very close with 51.9% voting to leave and 48.1% voting to remain. Boris Johnson was a figurehead of the Leave campaign which The Sun newspaper supported
• During WW2 Winston Churchill gave a rallying speech in which he quoted Horatio Nelson, "England expects that every man will do his duty". This was slightly altered to "Britain expects that you too, this day will do your duty" on a WW2 poster and has now become a much-quoted phrase in the tabloid press.
• Kate Garraway is a popular TV broadcaster in the UK, having co-hosted Good Morning Britain since 2014. Her husband, Derek Draper, was left seriously ill after contracting COVID
• Gary Lineker is a former England footballer and now a popular presenter on BBC's Match of The Day. He has 8.5 million followers on Twitter. In April 2020 he donated £140,000 to the British Red Cross emergency response to the COVID crisis in the UK.
• In the early years, the Sun nominally supported the Labour Party but moved back and forth between Labour and the Conservatives, depending on party leadership.
• Today, The Sun is described as having political allegiance to the Conservatives and doesn't support the EU.
• The Sun is very vocal in telling readers how they should act, whether voting during lockdown or getting vaccinated. For example, "Boris ticks all the boxes" in 2019 and "Stay home" in 2020.
• During the pandemic, news media played a crucial role in communicating public health and policy information. Traditional newspaper coverage and representations were important amidst increasing disinformation and conspiracy theories spread online
• Militaristic language is so embedded in the government and media's representation of the medical world that this has come to be normalised by audiences. Hospitals are the 'frontline', healthcare workers are 'heroes' and we 'fight' and 'battle' diseases
• The vaccine rollout began in Dec 2020 and worked in phases, prioritising the population according to vulnerability and age. The UK's rollout was among the fastest in the world
• COVID-19 is represented as an enemy on this front cover with media language framing the pandemic as a war it is a disease to "conquer". Such language is used in the context to motivate and inspire action in the audience, encouraging them to join the "Jabs army". The idea COVID is an invader is reinforced with The Sun's use of nationalistic imagery including the Union Jack and Big Ben
• Getting vaccinated is shown as a positive action by The Sun and this is clear in their repeated calls for readers to support their rollout of vaccinations, "Join our jabs army", making it clear that when the reader's age group can get vaccinated they should. The use of endorsements along with "The Sun Says" implies the reader should trust its viewpoint. Getting vaccinated is shown as a matter of urgency with the combined use of clock face, imperative verbs and terms such as 'rapidly'
• Brexit is represented positively in the off-lead. The Sun suggests this political decision has brought "newfound freedom" to the UK, while terms such as "heralded" and "dawn" imply Britain has a great future away from the future away from the EU. This is in line with the Sun's pro-leave isolationist ideology.