The Trend of Suicide Reporting in the Media: an Effectiveness Study of Daily Surveillance over Nine Years

Abstract

Inadequate suicide reports can cause copycat suicide attempts, but legal regulations for the media are rarely seen worldwide. In Taiwan, daily media surveillance with immediate feedback to correct inappropriate reports has been an interactive policy in the national suicide prevention strategy for a decade. We aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of current surveillance program via assessing the adherence rates with 12-item WHO responsible reporting guideline in print newspapers (2010-2018) and online media (2017-2018). The results showed that media reporting of suicide significantly improved in most guideline items under surveillance. But the development of psychiatric-media liaisons should further improve reporting quality.