Daiga Kamerāde

The aim of the Guidelines for Journalists on Presenation of Mental Health Issues is to adressdifficulties  they experience when reporting mental health related topics. These guidelines are the result of interviews with journalists and editors.

The interviews with journalists and editors indicate that there might be three reasons for under- representation of people with mental illnesses in mass media in Latvia. Firstly, there is a widespread assumption that audience wont be interested in mental health issues, i.e. stories about people with mental illnesses “won’t sell”.

Secondly, persons with mental illnesses in Latvia are “invisible” and hard to find even if journalist is interested, for example, to interview somebody who has mental health problems.

Thirdly, journalists are somewhat reluctant to write about mental health issues or interview people with mental illnesses because their knowledge on this topic is rather limited. In addition, people with mental illnesses and mental health care professionals often complain that journalists misrepresent information about mental health care or people with mental illnesses.

The Guidelines  provide journalists and editors with information that address all these three issues and might help to promote more representation of mental health issues in mass media.

Full tex of the guidelines is here  (in  .pdf file)

Contact

e-mail:

kamerade[at] policy.hu

Last updated
  25 August 2005