Mainstream Media Relates Xbox 360 to Teen Girl Death

It's the summer and the mainstream media, eager to avoid looking at itself, has decided to related the death of an asthmatic teenager to the fact that an Xbox 360 was in the same room at the same time.

We've used The Sun's story to illustrate this piece about the coverage provided by the media regarding the death of 13 year-old Anna-Lee Kehoe but we could also have used the Daily Mail, The Daily Mirror or many other muck-raking rags.

Even The Sun's story - headlined "Anna-Lee, 13, dies as she plays Xbox", stated:

"Dad Tony said: 'I was speaking to Anna-Lee ten minutes before and she was fine. She was playing on the Xbox then went to the toilet. When she came back she said she couldn't breathe and collapsed.'"

The Daily Mail headlines its sorry coverage with, "'Mum, I can't breathe': Tragic last words of 13-year-old girl who suffered heart attack as she played XBox."

The Mirror goes with a sligthly less skewed header, "Girl, 13, has fatal heart attack after playing Xbox".

While the Daily Star just bulldozes in with "GIRL DIES ON XBOX".

As ever it's down to the local paper - in this case the Bridport News - to provide actual coverage with: "Bridport: Tragedy as 13-year-old dies of heart attack".

It states that, "THE family and friends of Anna-Lee Kehoe have paid tribute to the 13-year-old Sir John Colfox student who died suddenly at the weekend.

"It is believed the teenager, who suffered from asthma, died of a heart attack. She had been playing on her Xbox at her home in Queens Road, Bridport, on Friday and had not even had a sniffle, her dad Tony said.

“The doctors told us it was the asthma that caused the heart attack. It happened Friday night but she actually passed on Saturday afternoon."

You might have hoped that during a period when the national news media is under scrutiny for its coverage and the way it achieves its coverage - especially of tragic and early deaths - some restraint let alone factual context could have been provided.