Banerjee Debanjan
Department of Psychiatry, National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS), Bengaluru, Karnataka, India.
Int J Soc Psychiatry. 2020 Dec 27:20764020985572. doi: 10.1177/0020764020985572.
Mortality and morbidity due to suicides have been an ever-growing burden in India. The public response to the understanding of suicidal deaths and popular perceptions are heavily dependent on media discourse and reporting of such cases. Recently, the alleged death of a young Indian celebrity due to suicide in India led to a media debacle that quickly spurred into endless speculations and sensational reporting of the associated details. Incidents of high-profile suicide often cause varied perceptions, attitudes and beliefs related to the 'act' that can get further compounded by misinformation and media-portrayal of the same. Recent cross-sectional research by Raj et al. (2020) explores the adherence of Indian media reporting of suicides for a month after the celebrity-death. It reveals that more than 80% of the news articles deviate from the prevalent Press Council of India (PCI) and the World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines for media-reporting of suicides. With this study in the background, the commentary contextualizes its findings in the Indian socio-cultural scenario, reviews the influence of media on public attitudes toward suicide, and highlights the need for active media-public health collaboration as a part of a national suicide prevention strategy. Suicides need to be viewed beyond just the 'medical or psychological health' model through a more holistic biopsychosocial framework.
在印度，自杀导致的死亡率和发病率一直是日益沉重的负担。公众对自杀死亡的理解以及普遍看法在很大程度上依赖于媒体对此类事件的报道和论述。最近，一名年轻的印度名人在印度疑似自杀死亡，引发了一场媒体风波，迅速演变成对相关细节的无尽猜测和耸人听闻的报道。备受瞩目的自杀事件往往会引发与这种“行为”相关的各种看法、态度和信念，而错误信息和媒体对此的描绘会使情况更加复杂。拉杰等人（2020年）最近的横断面研究探讨了印度媒体在名人自杀死亡后一个月内对自杀事件的报道情况。研究表明，超过80%的新闻文章偏离了印度新闻理事会（PCI）和世界卫生组织（WHO）关于自杀事件媒体报道的指导方针。基于这项研究，本评论将其研究结果置于印度社会文化背景中进行阐释，审视媒体对公众自杀态度的影响，并强调作为国家自杀预防战略的一部分，媒体与公共卫生积极合作的必要性。需要通过更全面的生物心理社会框架，超越单纯的“医学或心理健康”模式来看待自杀问题。
