Media management of a community outbreak of meningococcal meningitis

Cases and, particularly, clusters of meningococcal meningitis often create high levels of public concern and attract the interest of news media. We describe below our experience of managing intense local and national media interest during a community outbreak of meningococcal disease in Derbyshire. Our learning is set out as ten key recommendations. Four of these are around managing the media, including using a proactive press release, providing detailed briefings, using a single spokesperson and coordination of the response by a press officer experienced in media management. Another four describe how to deliver an appropriate on-site response, often requested during community intervention programmes. The two final recommendations relate to ensuring good communication and supporting staff during what is an intensely stressful period. We hope our experiences may help others if faced with a similar problem.