President vs. The President

For several years now, I have noticed that commentators on the radio and TV are dropping the word "the" in certain circumstances. For example, "President prefers foreign aid at this time." or "United Nations convenes this weekend." or "United States has pledged assistance in the matter." Maybe it is the same phenomenon when people from the UK say "I'm going to hospital." In both cases, the omission of "the" is mysterious to me. Are we just trying to save time?

Solution 1:

Most of these seem to be instances of headlinese leaking into spoken English. Perhaps radio news reporters spend so much time skimming newspapers that they have started to think this is how normal people speak?

This style of writing should not be considered good grammar for normal prose, but is generally accepted for headlines and titles.

Saying "I'm going to hospital" is a different phenomenon at work. It's akin to saying "I'm going to bed". In these cases the "the" is omitted as a way of emphasizing the reason for going over the destination itself. You might say, "I'm going to bed" even if you are not planning on going to a physical bed. (Perhaps you are camping, and spending the night in a sleeping-bag.) Similarly saying "I had to go to hospital" is really emphasizing the necessity of hospital medical or surgical treatment rather than the necessity of a trip to the building itself. (Even though the trip to the building will be required to obtain the treatment.)