Quality of media reporting of suicidal behaviour in India

Background: India has a suicide rate of 18–21 fatalities per 100,000 people (compared to a global rate of 11 per 100,000), constituting around 28% of all suicides worldwide. Conscientious media coverage of suicide is one of the pillars of the World Health Organization's (WHO) life framework for suicide prevention. Media reporting of suicide events has thus far gone without sufficient scrutiny in India. Methods: A scholarly content analysis study was carried out on news articles reporting on suicide attempts and deaths in 6 daily newspapers in India between 1st January 2023, and 31st January 2023. The quality of suicide reporting against the WHO guidelines and the Press Council of India (PCI) 2022 recommendation was assessed. Descriptive statistics were used. Results: A total of 117 articles were analysed. The average number of suicide articles per newspaper per week was 3.9 (range 0.4–13.2). The names, occupation, and method of suicide were mentioned in 93 (79.5%), 58 (49.6%), and 97 (82.9%) of articles, respectively. 58.1% offered a single cause for the suicide event, whereas negative life events were mentioned for 63.2% of the news. All news articles included at least one harmful information according to the WHO media reporting guidelines. 84 (71.8%) news articles violated the recommendation provided in the guideline by not including any helpful information. The reporting of suicide violated the PCI 2022 guidelines in every domain. Conclusion: Media coverage of suicidal behaviour is often suboptimal and fails to meet the standards set by the WHO suicide reporting guidelines and PCI edition 2022 guidelines.