Minister calls meeting to discuss suicide reporting

Associate Health Minister Peter Dunne. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Media representatives, mental health professionals and researchers will meet at Parliament on February 28 to discuss guidelines for reporting suicides, Associate Health Minister Peter Dunne said today.

Mr Dunne said he had invited Prime Minister John Key's chief science adviser Sir Peter Gluckman, Chief Coroner Judge Neil MacLean, and key representatives of traditional media and the blogosphere to the meeting.

"It is vital that media in all its forms are full participants in updating the guidelines to ensure they are workable and achieve the aim of responsible reporting on the issues around suicide," Mr Dunne said.

Current guidelines were drafted in 1999 and Mr Dunne said the media world had changed hugely since then, particularly through the growth in online media and social networking sites.

"We also have a lot more research and understanding at our disposal on the complex issues around suicide," he said.

"Both of these realities need to be factored into some new thinking."

The meeting would be the first step to achieving a new set of guidelines.

- NZPA