Earlier this week, Nicerazzi told you about a prank call made to the hospital where Kate Middleton was staying for her acute morning sickness. Today, that story took a tragic turn with news that the woman who took the call has been found dead, a suspected suicide.

Jacintha Saldanha, a mother of two and nurse at Edward VII Hospital for about four years, was discovered this morning. She had reportedly been quite upset about being a part of the prank that occurred just days earlier, when Australian radio DJ’s Mel Grieg and Michael Christian called the hospital, pretending to be the Queen and Prince Charles.

Now, media and media-consumers are like are full of questions. Could this tragedy have been avoided? Are we culpable?

After making international headlines, the radio DJ’s issued an official apology, and the hospital released a statement claiming they would “revamp” telephone protocol and heighten security. Everyone had gotten a nice laugh out of it, the world moved on to the next day’s headlines, and the story appeared to be over.

Unfortunately, once the world has “moved on,” very real people are left dealing with the very real repercussions of being disgraced and laughed at. Although there is some chance that more factors were in play, when Saldanha was found dead in her home this morning, and ruled out foul play, the situation seems sadly obvious.

Many are blaming Greig and Christian for the death; the radio hosts have deleted their Twitter and Facebook accounts, their jobs are on hiatus and the radio channel is being inundated with requests to fire them. Twitter user @VillaBlancUH tweeted: “@2DayFMSydney SHAME ON YOU & YOUR DJ’s. They MUST be fired & they MUST be prosecuted for breaking basic recording-without-permission laws,” while @emmamaylaurence added: “Feel so sick about this Kate nurse news. Those DJs should NOT be laughing. And the hospital should never have let her take that call.”

Now, of course, the next round of media involves the apology tours. The radio station has issued an apology for the incident, stating that they are “deeply saddened by the tragic news” and that it “sends its deepest sympathies to her family, and all that have been affected around the world.” Meanwhile, the Royal Family said: The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are deeply saddened to learn of the death of Jacintha Saldanha. Their Royal Highnesses were looked after so wonderfully well at all times by everybody at King Edward VII Hospital, and their thoughts and prayers are with Jacintha Saldanha’s family, friends and colleagues at this very sad time.”

As far as Saldanha’s guilt is concerned, it seems as though much of it was self-imposed; she received no disciplinary action from the hospital, which actually offered support to all their nurses when the controversy broke. The Royal Palace never issued a complaint or demanded the nurses involved lose their jobs, instead applauding Jacintha and her colleagues on their excellent care.

This entire situation is incredibly sad, and brutally unnecessary. The bottom line is that today a family is without a mother, a wife, a daughter – and that she was simply a woman doing the best job that she could.

So who is to blame? Perhaps the DJs themselves, perhaps the employers that pressure them to do such outrageous stunts to keep their ratings up, and perhaps the listeners who need to hear such material, or will turn the dial and look for it elsewhere.

Certainly the media is somewhat to blame, including us. When news like this breaks, the sad fact is that it is indeed worthy of coverage – a major world figure is involved in a scandal of some sort – and any outlet that doesn’t cover it only risks their audience going elsewhere for the information.

The situation is reminiscent of another incident in 2007, when a mother died from water intoxication as a result of drinking too much water while participating in a radio-sponsored “Hold Your Wee For A Wii” contest while trying to win a gaming system for her children. Stuff like this is so tragic and unnecessary – it’s bad enough when celebrities see their fame turn against them, but when an ordinary citizen dies as the result (or peripheral result) of someone placing them in a life-altering situation under the guise of “fun,” it is downright detestable.

Nicerazzi’s thoughts and condolences are with Jacintha’s family during this sad time. But perhaps as important, we pray that media talent will begin to realize the consequences of such actions, that their bosses will stop urging them to “push the envelope,” and that media-consumers will turn their backs on such stunts.

Once news is made, we here at Nicerazzi have to report it – that’s what we do. But that doesn’t mean we’re not disgusted that the news occurred in the first place.