Caritas Germany is calling on media outlets to cover the news of Alice and Ellen Kessler’s deaths in a way that avoids sending the wrong message. “We are very concerned that the extensive media coverage and romanticisation of the twin sisters’ assisted suicide may intensify a social pressure that we have been observing for several years now: elderly women, in particular, feel responsible for not becoming a burden to anyone and perceive assisted suicide as a path that needs to be considered”, Caritas President Eva Welskop-Deffaa warned. According to her, the current media coverage of the twins’ death is often characterised by a step-by-step account of the exact cause of death and type of assisted suicide. In some cases, “the organisation that supported the sisters is even publicised”. The Kessler twins’ suicide is also “idealised, namely their desire to die together because they didn’t want to go to a nursing home”. Only rarely “is there any consideration of the extent to which this act should be seen, that is to say, as an expression of despair and distress, which is something that their social environment could have helped them to address”. “Instead of promoting what is supposed to be an easy way to end one’s life, we need better suicide prevention and more palliative care”. “We strongly call for a legal framework to support suicide prevention measures, such as a ban on advertising by organizations that facilitate suicide, along with other legal regulations on assisted suicide”, Welskop-Deffaa said.