RT Journal Article SR Electronic T1 Forensic rhetoric: COVID-19, the forum and the boundaries of healthcare evidence JF Medical Humanities JO J Med Humanit FD BMJ Publishing Group Ltd and Institute of Medical Ethics SP 553 OP 562 DO 10.1136/medhum-2023-012609 VO 49 IS 4 A1 Jones, David Houston YR 2023 UL http://mh.bmj.com/content/49/4/553.abstract AB The COVID-19 pandemic has brought into sharp focus the shifting role of healthcare evidence in public health presentations. This article investigates the rhetoric of those presentations as a phenomenon indicating both the commitment to evidence-based public health messaging and its political loading in three interlinked case studies: computer-generated imagery ; ‘podium’ presentation and the NSO Fleming leak of COVID-19 contact tracing data. The pandemic has seen healthcare evidence attain ever-greater visibility in public forums, and those forums have themselves undergone rapid transformation. ‘Podium’ presentations such as press conferences have featured colourful imagery, and the manifold visualisations of SARS-CoV-2 which have accompanied television broadcasts and web pages display an insistent internal rhetoric. I analyse both forms of rhetoric for what they say about the ‘forensic’ moment created by COVID-19, and evaluate each in relation to Weizman’s conception of the forum, which enables both ‘frontstage’ corporate and governmental image-building and public scrutiny. This paper evaluates the politics of the presentational strategies which have arisen around COVID-19 and the ethical potential of the forum.Data sharing not applicable as no datasets generated and/or analysed for this study.