Guardian.co.uk

Media 'Reinforcing mental illness stigma'...

Journalists are reinforcing the stigma around mental illness by failing to provide "balanced" coverage, according to a survey published today.

While common mental health problems are treated in much the same way as other health issues, sufferers of severe mental illness were portrayed as "problem people", in ways similar to asylum seekers, youth offenders and drug users, according to the report Mind over Matter: Media reporting of mental health.

The report was published at the launch of a five-year campaign to both monitor the media and encourage more balanced coverage of the issues surrounding mental health in a bid to reduce prejudice. It was compiled by an alliance of mental health charities, including mental health media.

Attending the launch, the health minister, Rosie Winterton, criticised the way people with serious mental illness were represented in the media, claiming journalists tended to represent sufferers as a threat to the general public.

Messages about the risk of violence posed by people with mental health problems were present in 15% of stories, over three-quarters of which implied the risk was high, not low, according to the study.

This is despite the fact that people with mental health problems were more of a risk to themselves than others. Around 4,500 people kill themselves each year, nearly double the number killed on the roads.

Only 6% of stories about mental health included interviews with people experiencing difficulties, the survey found, with coverage often including stigmatising language and "unhelpful comments".

Overall, the study found "clear evidence" that reporting on severe mental health problems across the media was still problematic.

But Ms Winterton admitted the government also had a role to play in the portrayal of mental health in the media.

"What it shows, perhaps, is some gaps - not only in the media response ... [but] are we as a government doing enough to assist the media and people with mental health problems to improve coverage?" she said, speaking to an audience of journalists and mental health professionals.

"We need to make sure there is balanced coverage, and that particularly applies to people with severe mental health problems. "

The minister called for action, "particularly looking at what can be done to work with journalists to provide a more balanced view", before being barracked by a psychiatrist from the floor over the conflicting messages issued by the government itself.

Professor Graham Thornicroft criticised the minister for sending out messages in "two different directions", which he said served to reinforce the very stigma it accused the media of perpetuating.

The draft mental health bill - which has yet to be tabled in parliament, despite first being drawn up three years ago - supported the mistaken assumption that people with mental illness were particularly dangerous, he said.

The controversial bill has faced strong opposition from a broad alliance of campaigners over plans to detain people with untreatable mental illness who have committed no crimes.

"It is time to consider having a close look and accept that the current mental health bill is pointing in the wrong direction," he told Ms Winterton.

Efforts to improve coverage under the five-year Shift programme will include a mental health bureau to enable journalists to access people with mental health problems for interviews for mental health-related stores.

Guidelines jointly drawn up in conjunction with the National Union of Journalists and the Society of Editors will also be distributed to the media.