A journalism trainer has urged newsrooms to give reporters covering murders, inquests and tragedies better mental health support.

Leona O’Neill, who teaches at Ulster University, is calling on editors to do more to help their journalists being affected by reporting on a “constant conveyor belt of doom”.

The former Belfast Telegraph journalist has previously demanded an end to the taboo of journalists opening up about Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, having herself witnessed the fatal shooting of fellow journalist Lyra McKee in 2019.

Leona, pictured, has written a book on journalists suffering from PTSD called Broken, for which she interviewed reporters who had been left traumatised by covering incidents including court cases and natural disasters.

Discussing the issue with the Irish News, she said: “You’re constantly absorbing the trauma from a secondary source. You’re interviewing someone who has had the worst day of their life.

“You’ll find yourself in their living room absorbing their grief and trauma as you’re human.

“Journalists will cover murders, inquests and tragedies. That can chip away at their mental health over the years which has eventually broken them.”

Leona herself turned to trauma counselling to help her cope, where she was encouraged to write her experiences down as a form of therapy.

She said: “After Lyra McKee was murdered I was still working as a journalist. I felt every single story that I did, I dragged it around like a big dead horse with me.

“That included the crime scenes and funerals I covered. I thought I was the only person who felt like this, that I was going soft and couldn’t do it anymore.”