In this editorial, the author discusses the incidence of murder-suicide in Ireland & the resulting media coverage. All cases received extensive & detailed reporting sparked off by the first deaths. Coverage was often sensational & given the similiarities between some of the cases, a copy-cat effect may have occurred. A number of issues that now need to addressed include: the creation & development of specialist perinatal psychiatric services; the skills of primary care providers in the recognition, assessment, & management of suicide risk; & media guidelines for the reporting of murder-suicides. (12 refs.)