The Ministry of Health and the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO) are combining efforts to host a workshop on responsible reporting of suicides and other issues related to mental health.
The weeklong workshop opened on Monday at the conference room of the Treasury Building and it brings together media representatives and health officials including doctors and nurses who work with at-risk individuals in the society.
Conducted by consultants – Tanya Fernandez and Dr. Nikhil Jain – who are working alongside the World Health Organisation/PAHO in conducting similar workshops across the Caribbean.
“We are here to work along with the media to promote ethical and responsible reporting on suicides. We are going to be here for the next four days on this exercise. On Monday, we worked along with a small group of about twenty persons included representatives of the media, government as well as mental health professionals and the object of the session was to contextualize WHO guidelines on responsible reporting and to understand how this will apply in the context of Antigua and Barbuda,” Fernandez reported.
She described the session as ‘great’ as participants spoke about responsible reporting and the role that the media play as well as looking at the media landscape in the country including media consumption behavior as well as to delve deeper into some of the social and economic factors driving mental health issues and suicide related issues in the country.
“We also brainstormed on some ideas for improving reporting and implementation of guidelines in the country’s context,” she stated.
Over the coming days, the workshop will have a more detailed in-depth training with a larger group of media professionals and other sector representatives and it will dive deeper into specific areas such research around media and suicide prevention and what are some of the ‘best practices’ in use in other countries.
Monday’s session featured robust discussions on many of the topics raised with participants freely sharing their ideas and experiences around the subject of the responsible reporting of suicides and mental health issues.
