Alar and apples: newspapers,risk and media responsibility

Abstract

During 1989, a major environmental and health risk issue, the spraying of Alar on apples, created a furor among the American people. After hearing charges from the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) that eating Alar-laden apples significantly increased a child's risk of developing cancer, numbers of school districts dropped apples from their menus and parents poured apple juice down the drains. Apple sales plummeted. The NRDC's charges, which were disseminated by a well-planned and effective public relations campaign, brought counter-charges from the US Environmental Protection Agency, which accused the NRDC of basing its study on poor data, among other things. The core of the dispute was in the risk figures and risk interpretations being used by each organization.

This study reviewed coverage in 13 newspapers during 1989 of the Alar issue. It found good and bad aspects, but little to support the degree of criticism applied by many people to media coverage of Alar. The 13 newspapers produced a total of 297 articles during the year and were not sensational in their approach. Many played the story in the prime news sections, alerting people to possible problems as suggested in most interpretations of media responsibility. Many articles also included a large number of sources and gave the apple industry a prominent voice. More problematic was their treatment of the Alar story as a hard news event, with short, superficial articles that lacked detailed analysis of the central part of the controversy—the risk issues. Four newspapers from apple-growing regions provided generally better coverage of the issue than did those from non-apple regions.

The Alar issue has become a major landmark in media coverage of risk. The coverage had great economic and other repercussions that still continue. These newspapers would have been more responsible had they made health risk information more central in their coverage. Instead, reporters covered the conflict itself instead of the science behind the conflict. The study suggests a new model of risk reporting to better serve readers and viewers.

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