Research Information System
1st Middle East Congress on Disaster and Prehospital Management, İstanbul, Turkey, 8 - 11 October 2017, pp.64
Purpose: Many people are adversely affected by the armed attacks against security forces, which have become frequent in Turkey. This study aims to evaluate some features of these armed attacks which are covered in news.
Material and Method: The data of this descriptive study were collected through the first four news agencies (Anadolu Ajansı, İhlas News Ajansı, Doğan News Ajansı, Ajans Haber) found by the keyword “news agency” on the search engine of Google (in 2016). Typing the keywords of “armed attacks, armed conflict, hostage situations, armed robberies and acts of terrorism” on the web-site search tools of these news agencies, the researchers collected the data from the news based on the questionnaire prepared by themselves. The data were analyzed into the SPSS 19.0 statistical program for which the descriptive statistics were provided.
Findings: In 2016, in these four news agencies, bomb attacks were covered in 286 different news articles. 12.9% of these incidents (n=37) took place on august; 41.3% of them (n=118) occurred in the South Eastern Region and 15.4% of them (n=44) happened in the city of Diyarbakır. 84.6% of the incidents (n=242) were an armed conflict; 11.2% of them (n=32) were a robbery, and 4.2% of them (n=12) involved a hostage situation. A ground ambulance was used in 58.9% of the incidents involving a medical intervention (n=43) whereas an air ambulance was used in 41.1% of them (n=30). 94.4% of the news (n=270) included a photograph along with the story. 81.5% of those injured in the incidents (n=308) were soldiers/police officers/other; 12.2% of them (n=46) were civilians and 6.3% of them (n=24) were terrorists. On the other hand, 67.6% of those who died in the incidents (n=349) were terrorists; 30.8% of them (n=159) were soldiers/police officers/other and 1.6% of them (n=8) were civilians.
Conclusion: Armed attacks are a major social problem. The least damaged group of people in these incidents was civilians. The coverage of detailed information on medical interventions during armed attacks in the news by the news agencies can improve the healing of the community.
Keywords: Armed conflicts, Hostage situations, Armed robberies, Acts of terrorism, Tactical medicine.