Meghan Markle said thattabloids should have a warning label to protect mental health.- Markle previously spoke about having suicidal thoughts due to the way UK tabloids treated her.
The Duchess of Sussex says she thinks tabloid newspapers should include a mental-health warning label.
Meghan Markle made the comment during "Minding the Gap," a segment in The New York Times' DealBook summit on how women can reach economic and professional parity on Tuesday.
Andrew Ross Sorkin, editor at large of DealBook, told Markle that he had read both "great things" and some "crazy things" in the tabloids about Markle as a boss.
"I would urge you not to read tabloids, because I don't think that's healthy for anyone," Markle said. "Hopefully one day they'll come with a warning label like cigarettes do, like: 'This is toxic for your mental health.'"
The duchess is said to have been criticized by palace employees during her time as a working royal. While the article doesn't appear to be online, the Daily Mail's Ephraim Hardcastle previously reported in the newspaper that the duchess had been labeled "Meghan the Menace" by staff because of her "strong will," while Tatler has reported that staff had given her the nickname "Me-Gain."
Markle now runs a charitable organization, the Archewell Foundation, in the US with Prince Harry. According to its website, the nonprofit organization's "core purpose is to uplift and unite communities - local and global, online and offline - one act of compassion at a time."
The duchess said during the summit that Archewell aims to treat its employees the way she and Harry would "want to be treated" and that they provide staff with 20 weeks of paid family leave. Markle has been vocal on the topic, and recently urged Democratic leaders in Congress to support paid family and medical leave.
It's not the first time the duchess has opened up about mental health. Markle previously spoke about the impact that the British tabloids had on her mental health during an interview with Oprah Winfrey in March.
She said the negative coverage caused her to have suicidal thoughts.
"I was ashamed to say it at the time and ashamed to have to admit it to Harry. But I knew that if I didn't say it - then I would do it," the duchess told Winfrey.
"I just didn't want to be alive anymore," she added.
As Insider's Lauren Edmonds reported at the time of the interview, Markle "experienced a harsh media storm from the British tabloids" on entering the
"Many negative rumors about her swirled, including that Markle had made Kate Middleton cry over Princess Charlotte's flower girl dress before the wedding - a story that Markle revealed in her interview with Winfrey actually happened the other way around, with Middleton making her cry over the dress," Edmonds wrote.
When asked about her mental health at the DealBook summit, Markle said she was now "feeling much better about everything."