During 2017 alone more than 47,600 Americans died from the opioid epidemic, yet despite this, it received just 16,972 mentions in all across CNN, MSNBC and Fox News over half a decade.
In contrast, by March 17, there had been just 100 confirmed Covid-19 deaths in the United States and just a few thousand globally, yet the three television channels devoted more than 40,989 mentions to it.
The timeline below contrasts the total percentage of airtime across the three stations devoted to mentions of the opioid epidemic versus Covid-19 since the start of 2015. Opioid mentions in blue are almost imperceptible compared with Covid-19.
