As COVID cases upsurge, Chinese medical student were pushed to take the risk

Analysis of news article

source: Sixth Tone

Sixth Tone, a digital-born agency sponsored by a Chinese state-affiliated newspaper, reported the COVID crisis as the Chinese government dramatically turned away from its “Zero cases” policy. This feature article unveiled the severe consequence of upsurging cases and the pressure on the young medical student whose sacrifices were often neglected in the mainstream discourse.

The subheadings “Everyone is overworked” and “Feeling the squeeze” didn’t quite distinguish themselves. They were not descriptive enough to summarise the discursive topics of each section. As a 2000-word feature story, this article can be chunked into smaller pieces.

Although its writing style is well-adjusted for online readers, Sixth Tone hasn’t fully unleashed the potential of online journalism. Even in China, finding a commercial news website without a comment section is difficult. Apart from the still images, there’s no clear sign of utilising multimedia features in its storytelling.

The editor did embedded links to additional sources. However, as an English newspaper written for western readers, most of the linked sources in this article were written in Chinese. Besides, the editor didn’t place links on the right phrase.

With less than 50 staff, it’s important to note that the 7-year-old news agency is still chronically underfunded. Even so, I am still willing to recommend this site to western readers who would love to understand Chinese people from a microscopic narrative rather than mislead by the false grand narrative.