The recent COVID-19 pandemic quickly evolved into a global crisis that has drawn attention in many aspects and summited the headlines of newspapers worldwide. Public health as one of the concerns of sustainable development becomes paramount, and communication is a powerful tool in managing health crises. This study investigates which frames were emphasised in two Swedish newspapers Dagens Nyheter and Aftonbladet’s coverage about the Swedish public health agency Folkhälsomyndigheten’s (FHM) COVID-19 communication. A content analysis on the frequency of use of four frames – trust, transparency, fear, and threat – was conducted, covering a sample of 923 online news articles collected during a period of five months, starting from the first confirmed case in Sweden to the descent of the first wave of the outbreak. The findings demonstrated a difference in emphasis of the frames between the two newspapers. Dagens Nyheter had a stronger emphasis on the subframes openness, evidence, situation updates, and death toll. Aftonbladet emphasised more on the subframes expertise, openness, situation updates, and mitigation methods. Finally, the subframes commitment, care and empathy, susceptibility and severity, and vulnerable groups were de-emphasised in both newspapers. These results suggest that more attention is needed to maintain a balance.