To me, propaganda is more overt in it's attempt to sway people's opinion, to strike fear or to rally around a cause.
But the more subtle invisible enemy seems to work best these days. But you are right that it comes down to objectivity / impartiality in the media.
This reminds me of the Vietnam war, Arguable you could call it the last war with casualties, in the sence that the Press were truly free and photographed what they saw and showed us, now it is a different story, now a bomb goes off in country "X" and we only see it if it is one of "theirs".
We just get numbers released, 10 died yesterday, 15 today....
I will always remember watching British and Irish T.V. growing up and seeing the difference in coverage, I wish I could have recorded the shocking differences in news coverage.