Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nina Sivertsen, Associate Professor, College of Nursing and Health Sciences, Flinders University

Last week, the United Nations warned more than 14,000 babies would die of malnutrition in 48 hours if Israel continued to block aid from entering Gaza.

After the figure was widely reported, that timeline has been walked back, with a UN spokesperson clarifying the projection is for the next 11 months.

Between April 2025 and March 2026, there will be 71,000 cases of acute malnutrition among children under five, including 14,100 severe cases.

Severe acute malnutrition means a child is extremely thin and at risk of dying.

An estimated 17,000 breastfeeding and pregnant women will also require treatment for acute malnutrition during this time.

Starvation and malnutrition are harmful for anyone. But for infants the impact can be profound and lasting.

What is malnutrition?

In infants and young children, malnutrition means they have a height, weight and head circumference that don’t match standard charts, due to a lack of proper nutrition.

Nutritional deficiencies are especially common among young children and pregnant women.

The human body needs 17 essential minerals. Deficiencies in zinc, iron and iodine are the most dangerous, linked to a higher risk of infants dying or developing brain damage.

When malnutrition is acute to severe, infants and young children will lose weight because they’re not getting enough food, and because they’re more susceptible to illness and diarrhoea.

This leads to wasting.

A child experiencing wasting has lost significant weight or fails to gain weight, resulting in a dangerously low weight-for-height ratio.

A persistent lack of adequate food leads to chronic malnutrition, or stunting, where growth and development is impaired.

Risk of infections and mortality

Malnourished infants have weakened immune systems. This makes them more vulnerable to developing infections, due to smaller organs and deficits in lean mass. Lean mass is the body’s weight excluding fat and is crucial for supporting healthy growth, strength and overall development.

When children are starving, they are much more likely to die from common illnesses such as diarrhoea and pneumonia.

Infections can make it harder to absorb nutrients, creating a dangerous cycle and worsening malnutrition.

Chronic malnutrition affects the brain

The human brain develops extraordinarily rapidly during the first 1,000 days of life (from conception to age two). During this time, adequate nutrition is essential.

Children’s developing brains are more likely to be affected by nutritional deficiencies than adults.

When prolonged, malnutrition may lead to structural brain changes, including a smaller brain and less myelin – the protective membrane that wraps around nerve cells and helps the brain send messages.

Chronic malnutrition can affect brain functions and processes such as thinking, language, attention, memory and decision-making.

These neurological impacts can cause life-long issues.

Can brain damage be permanent?

Yes, especially when malnutrition occurs during crucial periods of brain development, such as the first 1,000 days.

However, some effects are reversible. Early, intensive interventions – such as access to nutrient-rich food and medicines to treat hypoglycaemia (low blood sugar) and fight infections – can help children catch-up on growth and brain development.

For example, one review of studies involving undernourished preschool children found their cognitive abilities, such as concentration, reasoning and emotional regulation improved somewhat when they were given iron supplements and multivitamins.

However malnutrition during the crucial window under two years old increases the risk of lifelong disabilities.

It’s also important to note recovery is more likely in an environment where nutritious food is available and children’s emotional needs are taken care of.

In Gaza, Israel’s military operations have destroyed 94% of hospital infrastructure and humanitarian aid remains severely restricted. The conditions necessary for children’s recovery are out of reach.

Pregnant and breastfeeding mothers

Severe maternal malnutrition can increase the mother and child’s risk of dying or experiencing complications during pregnancy.

When a breastfeeding mother is malnourished, she will produce less breastmilk and it will be lower quality. Deficiencies in iron, iodine, and vitamins A, D and zinc will compromise the mother’s health reduce the nutritional value of breast milk. This can contribute to poor infant growth and development.

Starved mothers may experience fatigue, poor health and psychological distress, making it challenging to maintain breastfeeding.

Other organ impacts

Data from those born during the Dutch famine of 1944-45 have helped us understand the lifelong health impacts on children conceived and born while their mothers were starving.

Among this group, malnutrition affected the development and function of many of the children’s organs, including the heart, lung and kidneys.

This group also had higher rates of schizophrenia, depression and anxiety, and lower performance in cognitive testing.

They also had a higher risk of developing chronic degenerative diseases (such as cardiovascular disease and kidney failure) and dying prematurely.

Is the damage irreversible?

Recovery is possible. But it depends on how severely malnourished the child is, and when and what kind of support they receive.

Evidence shows children remain vulnerable and have a higher risk of dying even after being treated for complications from severe acute malnutrition.

Effective interventions include:

• nutritional rehabilitation (giving the child nutrient-rich foods, specialised feeding, and addressing underlying deficiencies)

• breastfeeding support for mothers

• providing rehabilitation and health care in the community (so families and children can return to everyday routines).

This seems difficult if not impossible in Gaza, where Israel’s blockade on aid and ongoing military operations mean safety and infrastructure are severely compromised.

Repeated or prolonged episodes of malnutrition increase the risk of lasting developmental harm.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Images of Gaza’s starving babies have gone round the world. This is what malnutrition does in the first 1,000 days of life – https://theconversation.com/images-of-gazas-starving-babies-have-gone-round-the-world-this-is-what-malnutrition-does-in-the-first-1-000-days-of-life-257462

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Indra Mckie, Postdoctoral Researcher in Collaborative Human-AI Interaction Culture, University of Technology Sydney

Have you heard of the “male technologist” mindset? It may sound familiar, and you may even know such people personally.

Design researchers Turkka Keinonen and Nils Ehrenberg
have defined the male technologist as someone who is obsessed with concerns about energy, efficiency and reducing labour.

This archetype became apparent in my PhD research when I interviewed 12 families about their use of early domestic robots and smart home devices Amazon Alexa and Google Home. One father over-engineered his smart home so much, his kids struggled to turn the lights on and off.

The male technologist in the home, as seen in my research, reflects wider trends of the Silicon Valley “tech bro” archetype, the techno-patriarchy, and the growing influence of a tech oligarchy in the Western world.

The male technologist often complicates and overcompensates with technology, raising the question: are these real problems tech can solve, or just quick fixes masking deeper issues?

It’s not about making men feel guilty

The term “male technologist” isn’t about making men feel guilty for using technology to innovate. Anyone can adopt this mindset. It can even apply to institutions that prioritise innovation and efficiency over emotional insight, lived experience or community-based ways of creating change.

It’s a reflection of how a masculine drive to solve surface-level problems can come before addressing patriarchal systems that have shaped the long-standing gendered division of domestic labour and “mental load”.

Mental load is the invisible, ongoing effort of planning, organising and managing daily life that often goes unnoticed but is essential to keeping things running.

Take one of my research participants, Hugo (name changed for privacy). A father of two, Hugo embodies this male technologist mindset by creating “business scenarios” to solve his family’s problems with smart home automation.

Treating family life like a system to optimise, Hugo noticed his wife looking stressed while cooking. So, he installed a smart clock with Alexa in the kitchen to help her manage multiple timers.

Hugo saw it as an empathetic solution, tailored to the way she liked to cook. But instead of sharing the load of this domestic task, he “engineered” around it, offloading responsibility to smart devices.

Smart home tech promises to save time, but it hasn’t solved who does what at home. Instead, it hands more power to those with digital know-how, letting them automate tasks they may never have done or fully understood in the first place.

Typically, these tend to be men. A recent survey by Kaspersky showed 72% of men are the ones who set up their families’ smart devices, compared to 47% of women.

Unfortunately, a recent Australian survey found women still do more unpaid domestic work than men. Even in households where women have full-time jobs, they spend almost four hours more on household chores per week than men do.

Who really benefits in a smart home

Amazon first released Alexa back in 2014, with Apple and Google quickly following with their own smart home speakers. In the past decade, some people have adopted the hype of the “smart home” to make life easier by controlling technology without needing to get off the couch.

But smart technology can also affect access to shared spaces, create new forms of control over things and people in the home, and constrain human interactions. And it can be set up to reinforce the existing hierarchy within the household.

By his own admission, Hugo has over-engineered the home to the point where his children struggle to turn the lights on and off, having disabled the physical switches in favour of voice commands.

My research looked at how automation is changing care giving and acts of service in the home. With “compassionate automation”, someone could use smart technology to support loved ones in thoughtful ways, such as setting up smart home routines or reminders to make daily life easier.

But even when it comes from a place of care, tech-based help is not the same as human care. It may not always feel meaningful to the person receiving or providing it. As another participant in my research put it:

I think there are still human interactions [..] that you probably don’t want AI to mediate for you.

So what is the alternative to a male technologist mindset? Feminist and queer technology studies offer a different lens. Researchers in these fields argue our interactions with technology are never neutral; they are shaped by gender, power and cultural norms.

When we recognise this, we can imagine ways of designing and using tech in ways that emphasise care and relationships. Instead of setting up a smart timer in the kitchen, the technologist could ask his wife what she’s cooking and join her, using the voice assistant together to follow a recipe step by step.

Looking ahead to the future of smart homes

As Alexa+ rolls out later this year with a “smarter” generative AI brain, Google increases Gemini integration into its Home app, and tech companies race to build humanoid robots that can cook dinner and fold laundry, we’re seeing the ultimate fantasy of the male technologist come to life: more toys to presumably solve the problems of domestic labour at home.

But if men are now taking on more of the digital load, will the mental load finally shift too? Or will they continue to automate the easy, visible tasks while the emotional and cognitive labour still goes unseen and unshared?

Elon Musk has declared plans to launch several thousand Optimus robots – Tesla’s bid into the humanoid robot race.
He expects the explosion of a new market of personal humanoid robots, generating US$10 trillion in revenue long-term and potentially becoming the most valuable part of Tesla’s business.

But as homes get “smarter,” we have to ask: how is this reshaping family dynamics, relationships and domestic responsibility?

It’s important to consider if outsourcing chores to technology really is about easing the load, or just engineering our way around it without addressing the deeper mental and relational work of household labour.

Indra Mckie received the UTS Research Excellence Scholarship to complete her PhD research at the University of Technology Sydney.

– ref. Who really benefits from smart tech at home? ‘Optimising’ family life can reinforce gender roles – https://theconversation.com/who-really-benefits-from-smart-tech-at-home-optimising-family-life-can-reinforce-gender-roles-256477

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendan Coates, Program Director, Housing and Economic Security, Grattan Institute

As debate rages about the federal government’s plan to lift the tax on earnings on superannuation balances over A$3 million, it’s worth revisiting why we offer super tax breaks in the first place, and why they need to be reformed.

Tax breaks on super contributions mean less tax is paid on super savings than other forms of income. These tax breaks cost the federal budget nearly $50 billion in lost revenue each year.

These tax breaks boost the retirement savings of super fund members. They also ensure workers don’t pay punitively high long-term tax rates on their super, since the impact of even low tax rates on savings compounds over time.

But they disproportionately flow to older and wealthier Australians.

Two thirds of the value of super tax breaks benefit the top 20% of income earners, who are already saving enough for their retirement.

Few retirees draw down on their retirement savings as intended, and many are net savers – their super balance continues to grow for decades after they retire.

By 2060, Treasury expects one-third of all withdrawals from super will be via bequests – up from one-fifth today.

Superannuation in Australia was intended to help fund retirements. Instead, it has become a taxpayer-subsidised inheritance scheme.

The tax breaks aren’t just inequitable; they are economically unsound. Generous tax breaks for super savers mean other taxes (such as income and company taxes) must be higher to make up the forgone revenue. That means the burden falls disproportionately on younger taxpayers.

The government should go further

The government’s plan to increase the tax rate on superannuation earnings for balances exceeding $3 million from 15% to 30% is one modest step towards fixing these problems. The tax would only apply to the amount over $3 million, not the entire balance.

This reform will affect only the top 0.5% of super account holders – about 80,000 people – and save more than $2 billion a year in its first full year.

Claims that not indexing the $3 million threshold will result in the tax affecting most younger Australians, or that it will somehow disproportionately affect younger generations, are simply nonsense.

Rather than being the biggest losers from the lack of indexation, younger Australians are the biggest beneficiaries. It means more older, wealthier Australians will shoulder some of the burden of budget repair and an ageing population. Otherwise, younger generations would bear this burden alone.

The facts speak for themselves: a mere 0.5% of Australians have more than $3 million in their super, and 85% of those are aged over 60.

Even in the unlikely scenario where the threshold remains fixed until 2055 – or for ten consecutive parliamentary terms – it would still only affect the top 10% of retiring Australians. Treasurer Jim Chalmers has rightly pointed out that it is unlikely the threshold will never be lifted.

Far from abandoning the proposed $3 million threshold, the government should go further and drop the threshold to $2 million, and only then index it to inflation, saving the budget a further $1 billion a year.

There is no rationale for offering such generous earnings tax breaks on super balances between $2 million and $3 million.

At the very least, if the $3 million threshold is maintained, it should not be indexed until inflation naturally reduces its real value to $2 million, which is estimated to occur around 2040.

Sure, it’s complicated

Levying a higher tax rate on the earnings of large super balances is complicated by the fact existing super earnings taxes are levied at the fund level, not on individual member accounts.

And it’s true that levying a 15% surcharge on the implied earnings of the account over the year (the change in account balance, net of contributions and withdrawals) will impose a tax on unrealised capital gains, or paper profits.

Taxing capital gains as they build up removes incentives to “lock in” investments to hold onto untaxed capital gains, as the Henry Tax Review recognised. But it can create cash flow problems for some self-managed super fund members who hold assets such as business premises or a farm in their fund.

Yet there are seldom easy answers when it comes to tax changes.

Most people with such substantial super balances are retirees who already maintain enough liquid assets to meet the minimum drawdown requirements.

Indeed, self-managed super funds are legally obligated to have investment strategies that ensure liquidity and the ability to meet liabilities.

In any case, the tax does not have to be paid from super. Australians with large super balances typically earn as much income from investments outside super. And the wealthiest 10% of retirees today rely more on income from outside super than income from super.

Good policy is always the art of the compromise

Australia faces the twin challenges of big budget deficits and stagnant productivity. Tax reform will be needed to respond to both.

Good public policy, like politics, always requires some level of compromise.

Super tax breaks should exist only where they support a policy aim. And on balance, trimming unneeded super tax breaks for the wealthiest 0.5% of Australians would make our super system fairer and our budget stronger.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Actually, Gen Z stand to be the biggest winners from the new $3 million super tax – https://theconversation.com/actually-gen-z-stand-to-be-the-biggest-winners-from-the-new-3-million-super-tax-257450

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Claire Walker, Associate Professor, School of Historical and Classical Studies, University of Adelaide

Is loneliness a modern epidemic as we are so often told? Did people in the past suffer similar feelings of isolation?

The word “loneliness” was not common before the 19th century. Cultural historian Fay Bound Alberti argues it was rarely used before 1800.

This does not mean people didn’t feel alone. They just had different names for it – and they didn’t always think it was bad. Modern people living hectic lives in bustling cities often yearn for peace and tranquillity; so did our forebears.

From the hermits of the early Christian church escaping society for lives of solitary prayer, to medieval anchorites in secluded cells, isolation was a prerequisite for spiritual success.

But were isolated monks, nuns and hermits also lonely, as we would understand the word today? And do early modern nuns offer solutions for our own loneliness epidemic?

Searching for solitude

Early Christian religious thinkers and medieval churchmen viewed voluntary loneliness positively, with successful practitioners becoming saints. But religious solitude was not without its problems.

Holy recluses, far from escaping society, were pursued for spiritual advice. Some, like Simeon Stylites (390–459), went to extraordinary measures, living atop a pillar near Aleppo for 30-odd years to achieve solitude.

Monasticism provided an alternative. Monastic rules, like that of Benedict of Nursia (480–547), institutionalised isolation. In Benedictine monasteries, solitude was created through seclusion from society, strict silence, and prohibition of close friendships.

Yet, like hermits, monks and nuns couldn’t escape the world completely. Monasteries constituted vital spiritual resources, providing multiple services and conducting business for wider society.

Over the centuries, reforming bishops believed there was too much interaction between monasteries and the wider community. This led to repeated church reforms from the 10th century onwards to secure separation.

Male members of the clergy were particularly worried about nuns who were considered “less capable” of maintaining holy solitude. As a result, women had to observe strict enclosure behind convent walls, limiting their economic and spiritual capacity. Reforms in the 16th century upheld nuns’ incarceration.

Many women resisted, but others embraced isolation as spiritually liberating.

Isolation in exile

Early modern English convents, exiled in Europe after Henry VIII’s dissolution of the monasteries, shed light on nuns’ experiences of loneliness.

The convents were subject to traditional rules of enclosure and silence. To become nuns, women left their homeland, family and friends. They joined English houses, so they were not alone among strangers, but they had to remain emotionally distant from one another, despite living in a community where they did everything together.

Women wanting spiritual fulfilment often sought additional solitude.

Benedictine mystic Gertrude More (1606–33) praised prescribed periods of silence because in them she might hear her Lord’s whispers.

Carmelite prioress Teresa of Jesus Maria Worsley (1601–42) took time from her busy administrative role and hid from the other nuns to pray in solitude.

Not all women found seclusion and silence so fulfilling, however, with some experiencing bouts of spiritual doubt and poor mental health. Many missed their family and homeland.

This was particularly common among young sisters and those in convent schools. In the 1660s, Catherine Aston returned to England to recover after suffering poor health and depression.

Alone in a crowd

Nuns’ diverse experiences of monastic solitude reflect modern urban loneliness.

In 1812 Lord Byron expressed the contradictory nature of loneliness in the poem Childe Harold, juxtaposing the positive solitary contemplation of nature with its negative counterpart – aloneness “midst the crowd”.

In the present day many people feel alone in cities, even domestic households, as Olivia Laing and Keith Snell have shown.

How might this be countered? Do early modern nuns offer solutions?

A study of 21st century Spanish monks and nuns found monastic training, prayer and silence create feelings of spiritual satisfaction and purpose which lessens loneliness.

Prayer is not the answer for everyone because modern isolation is caused by multiple factors in a largely secular society. There are alternative paths to meditation, however, through yoga or mindfulness which can provide feelings akin to monks’ and nuns’ “spiritual satisfaction”.

Similarly, the nuns’ sense of “purpose” might be achieved through nostalgia. Nostalgia is the longing for an idealised and unobtainable past – a time when life was better. Research by psychologists suggests nostalgia can be beneficial in counteracting loneliness, even enabling forward-looking and proactive behaviours.

This was certainly true for the nuns exiled in Europe following Henry VIII’s abolition of monasticism in England. They dreamt of a future when their convents would return to England, family and friends. All nuns prayed both communally and in private for this outcome.

Some went further, engaging in missionary work and political intrigue to achieve their goal.

We cannot know whether this stifled loneliness, but by combining the benefits of meditation and activism it likely fostered a shared sense of purpose.

Just as Gertrude More and Teresa of Jesus Maria Worsley found solitude essential for spiritual satisfaction, activist nuns believed they might reverse the English reformation from their exiled convents. Solitude, prayer and political engagement gave them a sense of purpose.

Everyone’s situation is unique. There is no single solution for resolving isolation in the contemporary world. But the knowledge that it can be positive is perhaps a step towards countering the modern epidemic.

Claire Walker has received funding from the Australian Research Council.

– ref. A not-so-modern epidemic: what 17th-century nuns can teach us about coping with loneliness – https://theconversation.com/a-not-so-modern-epidemic-what-17th-century-nuns-can-teach-us-about-coping-with-loneliness-249487

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hunter Bennett, Lecturer in Exercise Science, University of South Australia

You’ve probably heard the terms “abs” and “core” used in social media videos, Pilates classes, or even by physiotherapists.

Given they seem to refer to the same general area of your body, you might have wondered what the difference is.

When people talk about “abs”, they’re often referring to the abdominal muscles you can see. Conversely, the term “core” is used to describe a broader group of muscles in the context of function, rather than aesthetics.

While abs and core are often spoken about separately, there’s a lot of overlap between them.

What are abs?

The term “abs” is short for abdominal muscles. These are the muscles that run along the front and side of your stomach.

When someone talks about getting a six-pack, they’re usually referring to toning the rectus abdominis, the long muscle that goes from the bottom of your ribs to the top of your pelvis.

Your abdominals also include your obliques, which sit on the side of your body, and your transverse abdominis, which sits underneath your other abdominal muscles and wraps around your waist like a belt.

The term “abs” has been around for a long time, and is perhaps most often used when discussing aesthetics.

For example, it’s common to see health and wellness publications offering advice on how to achieve “flat” or “six-pack” abs.

What about the core?

When people talk about the “core”, they are often referring to your abdominals, but also the muscles in your back (your spinal erectors), hips, glutes, pelvic floor, and your diaphragm.

These are the muscles that can stabilise your spine against movement, and aid in the transfer of force between the upper and lower limbs.

The term “core” wasn’t commonly used until the early 2000s, when it became synonymous with core training.

While the exact reason for its surge in popularity isn’t clear, it most likely followed a study published in 1998 that suggested people with lower back pain might have impaired function of their deep abdominal muscles.

From there, the concept of “core training” entered the mainstream, where it was proposed to reduce lower back pain and improve athletic performance.

What does the evidence say?

When we consider all the muscles that make up the core, it seems obvious they would be important – but it might not be for the reasons you think.

For example, having good core stability doesn’t necessarily prevent lower back pain, as it’s been touted to do.

There’s evidence suggesting core stability training, which might include exercises such as planks and dead bugs, can help reduce bouts of lower back pain. However it doesn’t appear to be any more effective than other types of exercise, such as walking or weight training.

Other research suggests there aren’t any differences in how people with and without lower back pain recruit and use their core muscles.

In a separate study, improvements in core strength and stability after a nine-week core stability training program were not significantly associated with improvements in pain and function, further questioning this relationship.

The link between core strength and athletic performance is also unclear.

A 2016 review found some very small associations between measures of core muscle strength and measures of whole body strength, power and balance. However, because of the design of the studies reviewed, we don’t know whether people who have better strength, power and balance simply have stronger core muscles, or whether stronger core muscles increase strength, power and balance.

An earlier review summarised the effect of core stability training on measures of athletic performance, including jumping, sprinting and throwing. It concluded this type of training is unlikely to provide substantial benefits to measures of general athletic performance such as jumping and sprinting.

However, this review also suggested that, given the important role of the abs in torso rotation, strengthening these muscles might have merit in improving performance in sports that involve swinging a bat or throwing a ball.

This is likely to apply to other sports that involve rapid torso movement as well, such as mixed martial arts and kayaking.

How can you exercise your abs and core?

There’s good evidence that simply getting stronger by lifting weights can help prevent injuries. Training your core to get stronger should have a similar impact, as long as it’s part of a broader training program.

We also know having weaker muscles makes you more likely to experience functional limitations and disability in older age. So alongside any other potential benefits, improving core strength with the rest of your body could help keep you fit and healthy as you get older.

There are plenty of exercises you can do to train your core and abs.

If you’re new to core training, you might want to start off with some lower-level isolation exercises that don’t involve any movement of the core. These include things like planks, bird dogs, and pallof presses. These are unlikely to cause too much muscle soreness, but will train your core muscles.

Once you feel like these are going well, you can start moving into some more dynamic exercises such as sit ups, Russian twists and leg raises, where you train your abdominals using a full range of motion.

Hunter Bennett does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. What’s the difference between abs and core? One term focuses on aesthetics – and the other on function – https://theconversation.com/whats-the-difference-between-abs-and-core-one-term-focuses-on-aesthetics-and-the-other-on-function-254582

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Carwyn Jones, Honorary Adjunct Professor, Te Kawa a Māui – School of Māori Studies, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

With the ACT Party’s Regulatory Standards Bill now before the Finance and Expenditure Committee, having passed its first reading in parliament last week, parallels with the now abandoned Treaty Principles Bill have already been drawn.

Lawyer Tania Waikato, who led an urgent Waitangi Tribunal claim before the bill was introduced, has dubbed it “the Treaty Principles Bill 2.0”. The tribunal itself recommended the government “immediately halt [its] advancement”.

The reasons for the concern lie in the bill’s constitutional implications – which in turn would affect the place of te Tiriti o Waitangi/Treaty of Waitangi in the nation’s legislative framework.

Legal experts have warned of the consequences of the bill’s broad reach, one arguing it aims to create a “regulatory constitution”. Others have suggested the regulatory criteria set out in the bill are highly selective, reflecting a libertarian ideology rather than universally accepted standards of good lawmaking.

Perhaps most strikingly, the Ministry for Regulation – itself an ACT Party initiative under the coalition agreement – views the bill as unnecessary because there are more efficient and effective ways of improving the quality of lawmaking.

The primary impact of the bill would be to make it harder to enact laws that do not conform with its prescribed criteria. While not binding, in practice those criteria are intended to act as a legislative filter. The fact te Tiriti or its principles are missing from those criteria explains the Waitangi Tribunal’s alarm.

Missing rights

This is the fourth time since 2006 a similar law has been proposed by the ACT party during different governments. Each version has failed to progress once before parliament.

This time, however, a commitment in the coalition agreement between ACT, National and NZ First suggests the bill could eventually become law – although NZ First leader Winston Peters has signalled his party wants changes to what he calls a “work in progress”.

The bill in its current form sets out criteria for assessing legislation under the following categories: the rule of law; liberties; taxes, fees and levies; role of the courts; and good lawmaking.

All government bills would include a statement of consistency with the prescribed criteria, with reasons given for any inconsistencies. Government agencies would need to undertake regular reviews for consistency of the legislation they administer.

A regulatory standards board would be established to inquire into the consistency of existing legislation and legislation before parliament.

The criteria themselves prioritise some rights while overlooking others completely. As well as te Tiriti o Waitangi being conspicuously absent, so are rights recognised in the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act 1990.

Currently, both the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi and the Bill of Rights Act feature prominently in the existing legislative design guidelines administered by parliament’s Legislation Design and Advisory Committee. Those guidelines also cover most of the other criteria selected for the Regulatory Standards Bill.

But the bill’s emphasis on the protection of property rights has been criticised for potentially circumventing those existing guidelines. For example, Greenpeace has argued this could interfere with implementing effective environmental protections.

Inherently relevant to Māori

Some of these issues were raised in the urgently convened Waitangi Tribunal hearing on May 14. Claimants were concerned about the lack of consultation with Māori and that the bill’s criteria would be used to override te Tiriti rights and block measures designed to promote equity.

The tribunal’s interim report on May 16 found the Crown had breached the Treaty principles of partnership and active protection of Māori in its development of the bill. Proceeding without meaningful consultation with Māori would be a further breach of those principles, according to the tribunal.

However, a full draft of the bill was not available at the time of the hearing. The tribunal noted, in the absence of a draft bill, that it was unable to determine the precise prejudice Māori would suffer if the bill became law.

The tribunal also saw the bill as constitutionally significant. While the bill’s effects may be uncertain, the tribunal found, they “will undoubtedly be felt in the law-making and policy space, are constitutional in nature, and inherently relevant to Māori”.

According to the tribunal, the Crown had an obligation to engage in targeted consultation with Māori, but it did not do so. That obligation was heightened by the “reasonable concerns” raised by Māori about how the bill might affect the Crown’s ability to uphold its Treaty obligations.

These concerns also featured heavily in submissions responding to the initial discussion document during the consultation process – although questions remain about how many submissions were actually read and assessed.

Despite the tribunal’s recommendation that the bill’s progress be stopped to allow for meaningful engagement with Māori, Cabinet approved it on May 19, it was introduced to parliament the same day and debated under urgency on May 23.

Submissions to the select committee close on June 23, and many of these concerns will inevitably be aired again. But depending on the committee’s recommendations, and if NZ First supports a revised draft, ACT’s regulatory wishes may finally come true.

Carwyn Jones provided expert evidence for claimants in the Waitangi Tribunal’s urgent inquiry into the Regulatory Standards Bill. He was not a claimant in that inquiry.

– ref. Fourth time lucky? ACT’s regulatory standards law may finally pass, despite Treaty and legal doubts – https://theconversation.com/fourth-time-lucky-acts-regulatory-standards-law-may-finally-pass-despite-treaty-and-legal-doubts-257107

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ha Nguyen, Senior Research Fellow, The Kids Research Institute Australia

People who’ve lived through natural disasters, such as floods or cyclones, often re-assess their priorities. But for Australians who’ve lived through a severe cyclone, this can affect them in a way that’s received little attention.

Our research shows they’re more likely to take out private health insurance.

What’s so striking is a severe cyclone has a bigger impact on uptake of private health insurance than some government initiatives designed to boost cover.

What we did

Many people try to protect themselves from the financial impact of natural disasters by taking out some type of insurance. But most research so far has focused on how disasters prompt people to buy home or property insurance. So we looked at the impact of cyclones on private health insurance.

We used more than 20 years of data from the nationally representative Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) survey. The annual survey, which began in 2001, has followed the lives of more than 17,000 people.

We then matched the survey data with historical records of more than 100 cyclones crossing Australia during the same period.

We compared the same person’s health insurance status before and after a cyclone.

As we had good information about other aspects of people’s lives from the HILDA survey, we could be confident it was the cyclone (and not some other factor) that influenced their decision to take up private health insurance.

What did we find?

Only the most severe cyclones – category 5 cyclones with wind speeds over 200 kilometres per hour – had a clear effect on people’s decisions to buy private health insurance.

For example, Cyclone Debbie (a category 4 cyclone in 2017) did not lead to any noticeable change. But the effects were different after Cyclone Yasi – a powerful category 5 cyclone that hit northern Queensland in 2011. People in areas affected by this more severe cyclone were significantly more likely than people living in unaffected areas to take out health insurance, both immediately and in the following year.

The increase in private health insurance uptake was especially strong for younger people, higher earners, and people living in coastal or cyclone-prone areas.

The closer someone lived to the cyclone’s eye, the stronger the effect. People 100-200km away were about 3 percentage points more likely to get health insurance than those unaffected. But for those within 40km, the increase jumped to more than 5 percentage points.

How significant is this?

To put this in context, the largest observed effect of a major cyclone on private health insurance uptake can be stronger than national policies aimed at encouraging people to sign up.

One example is the Medicare Levy Surcharge, which people on higher incomes can avoid if they have private health insurance. This surcharge raised uptake of private health insurance by 2.4 percentage points among single high-income earners.

Another is the Lifetime Health Cover loading. If people buy private health insurance earlier in life and keep it, they can avoid this extra loading. This policy increased coverage by about 1-4 percentage points.

Why are people buying health insurance?

People hit by cyclones are likely to report damage to their homes. And in other work, we showed home damage can lower people’s sense of control over life outcomes. Home damage after a natural disaster can also make people more concerned about their health and safety.

This stress may lead people to take protective steps, such as getting private health insurance.

We also found cyclones harm people’s psychological wellbeing, regardless of whether their home is damaged, making them feel less safe and healthy. This can also influence insurance decisions.

Taken together, our findings suggest it is the emotional and practical disruptions – especially home damage and psychological stress – that prompt people to reassess their vulnerability and seek protection.

People may also take out private health insurance to feel protected against future health costs in the next big cyclone, much like buying home insurance.

What can we learn from this?

Our findings have policy implications. After a severe cyclone, people may turn to private health insurance to cope with the stress and uncertainty. Understanding this can help shape better disaster response policies.

We also found people with a higher income were more likely to take up private health insurance after a cyclone. So targeted policies – such as private health insurance subsidies or improved access to health care after disasters – could help ensure vulnerable populations are not left behind.

This research was partly funded by the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Children and Families over the Life Course (#CE200100025).

Francis Mitrou receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the National Health and Medical Research Council, the Medical Research Future Fund, and the Stan Perron Charitable Foundation.

– ref. Cyclones drive people to buy health insurance, more so than some government campaigns – https://theconversation.com/cyclones-drive-people-to-buy-health-insurance-more-so-than-some-government-campaigns-256807

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Patrick Finnerty, Postdoctoral Research Fellow in conservation and wildlife management, University of Sydney

By 2050, almost 70% of the world’s population will live in cities – 20% more than today. As cities expand, the natural world around them contracts. Species decline faster in and around cities than almost anywhere else. But what if cities could become part of the solution — places to actively restore biodiversity rather than just areas of loss?

Our new research explores whether reintroducing native animals to cities can restore ecosystems and reconnect people with nature.

To date, the rewilding movement has largely focused on reintroducing animals to “wilder”, more remote areas. Our review of more than 2,800 rewilding papers found only 17 in urban environments.

While these numbers are low, their successes show rewilding cities can and does work. Beavers now swim in a wetland in London for the first time in 400 years, platypuses are once again breeding in Sydney’s Royal National Park and hornbills fly amid Singaporean skyscrapers.

Most nature restoration in cities forgets about the animals

Many cities are working to bringing back nature through tree planting, wetland restoration and expanding green spaces. These projects offer real benefits: cooler streets, cleaner air and healthier places for people to live.

But when it comes to wildlife, most urban nature restoration stops at plants, birds, bees and beetles. Less mobile animals such as reptiles and mammals are often left out.

For years, urban restoration has been done on the assumption that if you build it, they will come. That works for birds, bats and insects, who can fly in from outside a city. But reptiles and mammals are usually unable to return on their own in fragmented cityscapes – even if enough large and suitable habitat has been restored.

As a result, many restored parks look lush but are often ecologically incomplete or overrun with invasive species, such as highly adaptable rats, cats and foxes.

Bringing back small mammals and reptiles has to be done actively. Once back, these animals can take up vital ecological roles such as digging, scavenging and predation, which boost the health of soils, cycle nutrients and keep pests under control.

Read more:
How this little marsupial’s poo nurtures urban gardens and bushland (and how you can help protect them)

Beavers, hornbills, monkeys and platypuses

What does it look like to reintroduce animals to cities?

The red squirrel (Sciurus vulgaris) was once common across Portugal but died out in the 16th century. In the early 1990s, Portuguese authorities successfully reintroduced the red squirrel to urban parks in two cities.

For decades, conservationists have worked to bring back urban forests in Rio de Janeiro in Brazil. In 2015, they successfully brought back the brown howler monkey (Alouatta guariba) and the red-rumped agouti (Dasyprocta leporina) to these forests.

By the end of the 16th century, beavers had been hunted to extinction across the United Kingdom. But in 2023, rewilding efforts in the countryside expanded to cities. A family of beavers now swim in wetlands in Ealing, 20 kilometres outside London’s centre.

The city-state of Singapore has successfully added a great deal of greenery to urban areas, from parks to green buildings. Creating this habitat enticed back the adaptable oriental pied hornbill (Anthracoceros albirostris) which is now breeding amid skyscrapers. Conservationists helped by building nesting boxes.

In 2023, platypuses (Ornithorhynchus anatinus) were reintroduced to the Royal National Park on Sydney’s urban fringe for the first time in more than 50 years. Recent monitoring confirms they are breeding.

What makes urban rewilding successful?

Understanding why a species disappeared in the first place is just as important as bringing it back. It’s no good just bringing back native animals only to watch them be devoured by foxes or cats, or run over by cars. The original threats need to be addressed.

Of the successful projects we found, there were common themes, such as artificial nest boxes, supplementary feeding, predator control and community engagement. Good projects chose their species well and planned for the long term.

Selecting the best species for rewilding can be tricky, but our recent research outlines a simple framework to identify those most likely to succeed. A good first step is to start with regionally common but locally missing species. This helps keep common species common.

If cities want to bring wildlife back, rewilding must be ecologically smart, socially inclusive, and built to last.

In countries with colonial histories, working with Traditional Owners and embedding Indigenous knowledge should be central to urban rewilding, not just for cultural inclusion but to ground projects in Country and ensure they endure.

Why rewilding cities matters for people, too

More and more, humans are disconnecting from nature. As more people live in cities, daily encounters with wildlife have become rare. This fuels what’s been dubbed nature deficit disorder.

In the United States, for instance, children can recognise over 1,000 corporate logos, yet struggle to name even a handful of native plants and animals. Australians, too, are interacting with nature less. If we don’t experience nature, we’re less likely to support conservation efforts to protect it.

Urban rewilding offers a way to change this. By bringing native animals back into city parks and reserves, we can create everyday opportunities for people to see, hear and connect with wildlife.

Where to next?

Urban rewilding is still in its early days. But the method shows promise, and can build on existing work to green cities.

Actively bringing wildlife back will mean pairing habitat restoration with targeted species returns, supported by tools like predator control, artifical habitat and movement corridors.

We also need better research – long-term studies to track which rewilding efforts actually work and new tools to help cities choose the right species, balance ecological goals with public support, and plan for the long haul.

If we want greener, wilder and more resilient cities, we can’t stop at plants. It’s time to bring the animals back too.

Patrick Finnerty is the current director for early career ecology at the Ecological Society of Australia, the Early Career Coordinator at the Australasian Wildlife Management Society, and a council member for the Royal Zoological Society of NSW. He receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Thomas Newsome receives funding from the Australian Research Council. He is immediate past-president of the Australasian Wildlife Management Society and President of the Royal Zoological Society of New South Wales

– ref. Urban rewilding has brought back beavers, hornbills and platypuses to city parks – and that’s just the start – https://theconversation.com/urban-rewilding-has-brought-back-beavers-hornbills-and-platypuses-to-city-parks-and-thats-just-the-start-256102

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Bjorn Nansen, Associate Professor, School of Computing and Information Systems, The University of Melbourne

Imagine you are planning the funeral music for a loved one who has died. You can’t remember their favourite song, so you try to login to their Spotify account. Then you realise the account login is inaccessible, and with it has gone their personal history of Spotify playlists, annual “wrapped” analytics, and liked songs curated to reflect their taste, memories, and identity.

We tend to think about inheritance in physical terms: money, property, personal belongings. But the vast volume of digital stuff we accumulate in life and leave behind in death is now just as important – and this “digital legacy” is probably more meaningful.

Digital legacies are increasingly complex and evolving. They include now-familiar items such as social media and banking accounts, along with our stored photos, videos and messages. But they also encompass virtual currencies, behavioural tracking data, and even AI-generated avatars.

This digital data is not only fundamental to our online identities in life, but to our inheritance in death. So how can we properly plan for what happens to it?

A window into our lives

Digital legacy is commonly classified into two categories: digital assets and digital presence.

Digital assets include items with economic value. For example, domain names, financial accounts, monetised social media, online businesses, virtual currencies, digital goods, and personal digital IP. Access to these is spread across platforms, hidden behind passwords or restricted by privacy laws.

Digital presence includes content with no monetary value. However, it may have great personal significance. For example, our photos and videos, social media profiles, email or chat threads, and other content archived in cloud or platform services.

There is also data that might not seem like content. It may not even seem to belong to us. This includes analytics data such as health and wellness app tracking data. It also includes behavioural data such as location, search or viewing history collected from platforms such as Google, Netflix and Spotify.

This data reveals patterns in our preferences, passions, and daily life that can hold intimate meaning. For example, knowing the music a loved one listened to on the day they died.

Digital remains now also include scheduled posthumous messages or AI-generated avatars.

All of this raises both practical and ethical questions about identity, privacy, and corporate power over our digital afterlives. Who has the right to access, delete, or transform this data?

Planning for your digital remains

Just as we prepare wills for physical possessions, we need to plan for our digital remains. Without clear instructions, important digital data may be lost and inaccessible to our loved ones.

In 2017, I helped develop key recommendations for planning your digital legacy. These include:

• creating an inventory of accounts and assets, recording usernames and login information, and if possible, downloading personal content for local storage
• specifying preferences in writing, noting wishes about what content should be preserved, deleted, or shared – and with whom
• using password managers to securely store and share access to information and legacy preferences
• designating a digital executor who has legal authority to carry out your digital legacy wishes and preferences, ideally with legal advice
• using legacy features on available platforms, such as Facebook’s Legacy Contact, Google’s Inactive Account Manager, or Apple’s Digital Legacy.

What if your loved one left no plan?

These steps may sound uncontroversial. But digital wills remain uncommon. And without them, managing someone’s digital legacy can be fraught with legal and technical barriers.

Platform terms of service and privacy rules often prevent access by anyone other than the account holder. They can also require official documentation such as a death certificate before granting limited access to download or close an account.

In such instances, gaining access will probably only be possible through imperfect workarounds, such as searching online for traces of someone’s digital life, attempting to use account recovery tools, or scouring personal documents for login information.

The need for better standards

Current platform policies have clear limitations for handling digital legacies. For example, policies are inconsistent. They are also typically limited to memorialising or deleting accounts.

With no unified framework, service providers often prioritise data privacy over family access. Current tools prioritise visible content such as profiles or posts.
However, they exclude less visible yet equally valuable (and often more meaningful) behavioural data such as listening habits.

Problems can also arise when data is removed from its original platform. For example, photos from Facebook can lose their social and relational meaning without their associated comment threads, reactions, or interactivity.

Meanwhile, emerging uses of posthumous data, especially AI-generated avatars, raise urgent issues about digital personhood, ownership, and possible harms. These “digital remains” may be stored indefinitely on commercial servers without standard protocols for curation or user rights.

The result is a growing tension between personal ownership and corporate control. This makes digital legacy not only a matter of individual concern but one of digital governance.

Standards Australia and the New South Wales Law Reform Commission have recognised this. Both organisations are seeking consultation to develop frameworks that address inconsistencies in platform standards and user access.

Managing our digital legacies demands more than practical foresight. It compels critical reflection on the infrastructures and values that shape our online afterlives.

Bjorn Nansen does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Most of us will leave behind a large ‘digital legacy’ when we die. Here’s how to plan what happens to it – https://theconversation.com/most-of-us-will-leave-behind-a-large-digital-legacy-when-we-die-heres-how-to-plan-what-happens-to-it-257121

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Elise Stephenson, Deputy Director, Global Institute for Women’s Leadership, Australian National University

The Albanese government has achieved a striking gender equality milestone following its election for a second term.

For the first time in Australian history, there will be more women than men in federal cabinet.This comes more than 120 years after women were first allowed to stand for federal parliament, and decades after Labor established its gender quota strategy.

Taking into account the full caucus, women will comprise 56% of the Labor party room, a clear record.

Percentage of ALP women in House of Representatives and Senate

Across all parties and the crossbench, women now make up a record smashing 49.1% of parliament. As recently as 2021, the Inter-Parliamentary Union ranked Australia a lowly 73rd out of 193 countries for women in ministerial positions in national parliaments. The influx of women at this election should see us rise to equal seventh place.

Looking beyond gender, the 48th parliament is shaping up to be more diverse than ever before, driven in large part by the scale of Labor’s win at the election.

Women’s place

Labor women now easily outnumber the men in both chambers: 54% in the House of Representatives and a likely 63% in the Senate, once results are finalised.

Anthony Albanese’s new cabinet – the very top of the decision making process – is made up of 12 women and 11 men.

By contrast, Liberal prime minister Tony Abbott could find space for only one woman – Julie Bishop – in his cabinet in 2013.

The numbers improved under his successors Malcolm Turnbull and Scott Morrison, whose first cabinet comprised 26% women.

Despite the historic number of current women cabinet ministers, the key positions of leader, deputy leader and treasurer are all still men.

Problem solved?

Albanese’s new cabinet is certainly a win for women’s representation. But have we achieved equality? Can we go home now? In short, no.

That’s because the other side of the chamber has a very different record.

Women are critically underrepresented in the parliamentary Liberal and National parties. They make up just 28.5% of the former coalition across both chambers – a slight increase on the previous parliament.

However, women comprise just 21% of Liberal and National MPs in the lower house, a decline of three percentage points. This has sparked renewed calls from some conservative quarters to introduce quotas.

Sussan Ley has made history as the Liberal Party’s first female leader. However, there are already indications she has inherited a “glass cliff” position, given she was elevated after a catastrophic failure at the ballot box.

Further, having more women in parliament does not guarantee substantive representative or inclusive policy-making. While some research shows women tend to advocate on female issues, a higher number of women politicians does not automatically mean more feminist policy.

Full ministry

Taking into account other characteristics, Albanese’s first ministry was the most diverse in Australia to date. But he hasn’t made advances with his second frontbench.

The retirement of Linda Burney cuts the number of First Nations ministers to just one – Malarndirri McCarthy.

The demotion from cabinet of Ed Husic — the first Muslim elected to federal parliament — and Mark Dreyfus, who is Jewish, reduces the cultural and linguistic diversity of ministers.

Penny Wong is still the lone “out” LGBTQIA+ minister and there are currently no openly disabled people in the ministry.

The average age of frontbenchers is 51. Only two ministers are under 40 – Communications Minister Anika Wells and newcomer Sam Rae.

Of the 42 frontbenchers who make up the full ministry, 23 are men and 19 are women.

Across the parliament

Beyond gender, almost one quarter of Labor members in the lower house identify as culturally and linguistically diverse, 1% as LGBTQIA+, 2% with a disability and 2% as First Nations. In the Senate, almost one in seven identify as culturally and linguistically diverse, 6% as LGBTQIA+, 6% as First Nations and none with a disability.

This is the first election where Gen Z and Millennial voters made up a larger share of the electorate than Baby Boomers. Yet only three Labor parliamentarians are younger than 35.

Charlotte Walker is expected to win the third ALP senate spot in South Australia. This would make Walker, who turned 21 on election night, the first federal politician born in the new millennium.

More work to do

Despite the progress, it’s clear from a deeper analysis that parliament as a whole still doesn’t mirror the people it represents.

Roughly one quarter of Australians are born overseas, yet we’re not seeing this same diversity filter through to parliament.

Eight First Nations MPs and senators will sit in parliament, down from 11 in the previous parliament.

People with disability are underrepresented. They comprise over 20% of the population but are not yet elected to parliament in similar numbers.

Pinning all our hopes and dreams for better disability policy on the one or two people with disabilities in politics is unfair.

Diverse candidates

The Global Institute for Women’s Leadership assessed the number of candidates from diverse backgrounds – women, self identifying LGBTQIA+, CALD, disability and First Nations – who were preselected by the main parties for the election.

The results were:

• Greens 30%
• Labor 26%
• Coalition 24%
• Others (independents and minor parties) 12%

Parliament falls a long way short of reflecting the diversity of the electorate because not enough diverse candidates are being chosen to run for seats.

But for future elections, inspiration can be taken from Labor’s strong gains achieving, and surpassing, gender parity.

Elise Stephenson receives funding from the Australian Research Council and the Australian government. She is a steering committee member of Women in International Security Australia (WIIS-A).

Blair Williams does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Labor women make history by overtaking men in cabinet. So is the job done? – https://theconversation.com/labor-women-make-history-by-overtaking-men-in-cabinet-so-is-the-job-done-256603

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Chris Hall, Associate Professor of Immunology, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau

Ever found yourself out of sync with normal sleep patterns after late nights or working a night shift? It could be you’re experiencing what scientists call social jet lag.

The term describes the misalignment between our internal body clock (circadian rhythm) and our social schedule.

Social jet lag associated with irregular sleep patterns and inconsistent exposure to daylight is increasingly common, and has been linked with a weakened immune system.

Disruption of our circadian rhythms through shift work, for example, has been shown to have a negative impact on our ability to fight infections.

These observations reinforce the idea that maintaining a robust circadian rhythm through regular exposure to daylight supports a healthy immune system.

But how does the immune system know when it’s daytime? That is precisely what our research, published today in Science Immunology, has uncovered. Our findings could eventually deliver benefits for the treatment of inflammatory conditions.

First responders to infection

Circadian rhythms are a fundamental feature of all life on Earth. Believed to have evolved some 2.5 billion years ago, they enable organisms to adapt to challenges associated with the 24-hour solar day.

At the molecular level, these circadian rhythms are orchestrated through a genetically encoded multi-component time keeper called a circadian clock. Almost all cells are known to have the components for a circadian clock. But how they function within different cell types to regulate their behaviour is very poorly understood.

In the laboratory, we use zebrafish – small freshwater fish commonly sold in pet stores – as a model organism to understand our immune response to bacterial infection.

We use larval zebrafish because their genetic makeup and immune system are similar to ours. Also, they have transparent bodies, making it easy to observe biological processes under the microscope.

We focus on an immune cell called a “neutrophil”, a type of white blood cell. We’re interested in these cells because they specialise in killing bacteria, are first responders to infection, and are the most abundant immune cell in our bodies.

Because they are very short-lived cells, neutrophils isolated from human blood are notoriously difficult to work with experimentally. However, with transparent larval zebrafish, we can film them to directly observe how these cells function, within a completely intact animal.

Cells can tell if it’s daytime

Our initial studies showed the strength of immune response to bacterial infection peaked during the day, when the animals are active.

We think this represents an evolutionary response that provides both humans and zebrafish a survival advantage. Because diurnal animals such as humans and zebrafish are most active during daylight hours, they are more likely to encounter bacterial infections.

This work made us curious to know how this enhanced immune response was being synchronised with daylight. By making movies of neutrophils killing bacteria at different times of the day, we discovered they killed bacteria more efficiently during the daytime than at night.

We then genetically edited neutrophils to turn off their circadian clocks by carefully removing specific clock components. This is an approach similar to removing important cogs from an analogue clock so it doesn’t tick anymore.

This led to the discovery that these important immune cells possess an internal light-regulated circadian clock that alerts the cells to daytime (similar to an alarm clock). This boosts their ability to kill bacteria.

Our next challenge is to understand exactly how light is detected by neutrophils, and whether human neutrophils also rely on this internal timing mechanism to regulate their antibacterial activity.

We’re also curious to see if this killing mechanism is restricted to certain types of bacteria, such as those we’re more likely to encounter during the day. Or is it a more general response to all infectious threats (including viral infections)?

This research unlocks the potential for developing drugs that target the neutrophil circadian clock to regulate the cells’ activity. Given neutrophils are the first and most abundant immune cells to be recruited to sites of inflammation, the discovery has very broad implications for many inflammatory conditions.

The research described here was led by PhD candidates Lucia Du and Pramuk Keerthisinghe, and was a collaboration between the Hall laboratory and the Chronobiology Research Group, led by Guy Warman and James Cheeseman, at the University of Auckland’s Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences.

Chris Hall receives funding from the Marsden Fund.

– ref. Daylight can boost the immune system’s ability to fight infections – new study – https://theconversation.com/daylight-can-boost-the-immune-systems-ability-to-fight-infections-new-study-257224

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

The Coalition is being glued together again, after a Liberal Party meeting on Friday gave the go ahead for Liberal leader Sussan Ley to negotiate with Nationals leader David Littleproud on the fine print of a settlement on policy.

The Liberal party room agreed to accept broadly the Nationals’ four policy demands, with the two leaders to deal with the details.

A new agreement between the parties is expected within days.

The rapprochement followed days of chaos after the Nationals on Tuesday walked out of the Coalition.

The turmoil has done significant damage to Littleproud, who has received widespread criticism of his handling of the relationship, including from within his own party. The crisis has raised questions about whether he will survive in his position in the longer term.

The Liberal meeting had before it four policies that the Nationals insisted should be kept, and not be caught up in the Liberals’ planned review of all policies.

The four were:

• removing the moratorium on nuclear energy, with a review of the remaining elements of the nuclear policy

• a $20 billion Regional Australia Future Fund, including a $1 billion annual budget allocation until the fund matured

• court-ordered divestiture powers in relation to major supermarkets and “big box” retailers

• and Universal Service Obligation reforms to boost mobile phone and internet services for regional Australians.

The Nationals’ demand on nuclear drops the core of the policy the opposition took to the election, which was for the government to fund a string of nuclear power plants.

The Liberals are divided over nuclear energy, with some wanting any policy on it scrapped.

Probably the most difficult of the Nationals’ policy points for the Liberals is the divestiture power, which was controversial within the Liberals when it was adopted last term as opposition policy.

A number of Liberals are particularly opposed to extending it to “big box” retailers.

There was also some concern among Liberals about the fiscal arrangements around the regional fund – whether it should be off budget or on budget.

While Liberals resent the Nationals’ behaviour, they were also aware of the political problems presented by a Coalition split and were anxious to get the two parties together again.

In a provocative tweet the Nationals Matt Canavan said: “Well done David Littleproud! Liberals back down on all requests.”

“Great win for the Nationals.”

Canavan ran against Littleproud for the leadership after the election.

Michelle Grattan does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. View from The Hill: Coalition is being glued together again after crisis week – https://theconversation.com/view-from-the-hill-coalition-is-being-glued-together-again-after-crisis-week-257332

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Steve Macfarlane, Head of Clinical Services, Dementia Support Australia, & Associate Professor of Psychiatry, Monash University

This week, Australia’s Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) approved a drug called donanemab for people in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease.

Donanemab has previously been approved in a number of other countries, including the United States.

So what is donanemab, and who will be able to access it in Australia?

How does donanemab work?

There are more than 100 different causes of dementia, but Alzheimer’s disease alone accounts for about 70% of these, making it the most common form of dementia.

The disease is believed to be caused by the accumulation in the brain of two abnormal proteins, amyloid and tau. The first is thought to be particularly important, and the “amyloid hypothesis” – which suggests amyloid is the key cause of Alzheimer’s disease – has driven research for many years.

Donanemab is a “monoclonal antibody” treatment. Antibodies are proteins the immune system produces that bind to harmful foreign “invaders” in the body, or targets. A monoclonal antibody has one specific target. In the case of donanemab it’s the amyloid protein. Donanemab binds to amyloid protein deposits (plaques) in the brain and allows our bodies to remove them.

Donanemab is given monthly, via intravenous infusion.

What does the evidence say?

Australia’s approval of donanemab comes as a result of a clinical trial involving 1,736 people published in 2023.

This trial showed donanemab resulted in a significant slowing of disease progression in a group of patients who had either early Alzheimer’s disease, or mild cognitive impairment with signs of Alzheimer’s pathology. Before entering the trial, all patients had the presence of amyloid protein detected via PET scanning.

Participants were randomised, and half received donanemab, while the other half received a placebo, over 18 months.

For those who received the active drug, their Alzheimer’s disease progressed 35% more slowly over 18 months compared to those who were given the placebo. The researchers ascertained this using the Integrated Alzheimer’s Disease Rating Scale, which measures cognition and function.

Those who received donanemab also demonstrated large reductions in the levels of amyloid in the brain (as measured by PET scans). The majority, by the end of the trial, were considered to be below the threshold that would normally indicate the presence of Alzheimer’s disease.

These results certainly seem to vindicate the amyloid hypothesis, which had been called into question by the results of multiple failed previous studies. They represent a major advance in our understanding of the disease.

That said, patients in the study did not improve in terms of cognition or function. They continued to decline, albeit at a significantly slower rate than those who were not treated.

The actual clinical significance has been a topic of debate. Some experts have questioned whether the meaningfulness of this result to the patient is worth the potential risks.

Is the drug safe?

Some 24% of trial participants receiving the drug experienced brain swelling. The rates rose to 40.6% in those possessing two copies of a gene called ApoE4.

Although three-quarters of people who developed brain swelling experienced no symptoms from this, there were three deaths in the treatment group during the study related to donanemab, likely a result of brain swelling.

These risks require regular monitoring with MRI scans while the drug is being given.

Some 26.8% of those who received donanemab also experienced small bleeds into the brain (microhaemorrhages) compared to 12.5% of those taking the placebo.

Cost is a barrier

Reports indicate donanemab could cost anywhere between A$40,000 and $80,000 each year in Australia. This puts it beyond the reach of many who might benefit from it.

Eli Lilly, the manufacturer of donanemab, has made an application for the drug to be listed on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, with a decision pending perhaps within a couple of months. While this would make the drug substantially more affordable for patients, it will represent a large cost to taxpayers.

The cost of the drug is in addition to costs associated with the monitoring required to ensure its safety and efficacy (such as doctor visits, MRIs and PET scans).

Who will be able to access it?

This drug is only of benefit for people with early Alzheimer’s-type dementia, so not everybody with Alzheimer’s disease will get access to it.

Almost 80% of people who were screened to participate in the trial were found unsuitable to proceed.

The terms of the TGA approval specify potential patients will first need to be found to have specific levels of amyloid protein in their brains. This would be ascertained either by PET scanning or by lumbar puncture sampling of spinal fluid.

Also, patients with two copies of the ApoE4 gene have been ruled unsuitable to receive the drug. The TGA has judged the risk/benefit profile for this group to be unfavourable. This genetic profile accounts for only 2% of the general population, but 15% of people with Alzheimer’s disease.

Improving diagnosis and tempering expectations

It’s estimated more than 400,000 Australians have dementia. But only 13% of people with dementia currently receive a diagnosis within a year of developing symptoms.

Given those with very early disease stand to benefit most from this treatment, we need to expand our dementia diagnostic services significantly.

Finally, expectations need to be tempered about what this drug can reasonably achieve. It’s important to be mindful this is not a cure.

Steve Macfarlane was an investigator on the donanemab trial, but received no direct compensation from Eli Lily for being so. Separately, has done consultancy work for Eli Lilly, for which he’s received payments.

– ref. The TGA has approved donanemab for Alzheimer’s disease. How does this drug work and who will be able to access it? – https://theconversation.com/the-tga-has-approved-donanemab-for-alzheimers-disease-how-does-this-drug-work-and-who-will-be-able-to-access-it-257321

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lauren Breen, Professor of Psychology, Curtin University

Grieving the death of a parent is often considered a natural part of life. But there are added layers of complexity when you had a difficult or estranged relationship.

This week former tennis star Jelena Dokic confirmed the death of her father and former coach Damir, whose verbal, physical and emotional abuse she revealed in 2009 and further detailed in her 2017 autobiography. They had been estranged for a decade.

In a social media post on Thursday, Dokic wrote about her “conflicting and complex emotions and feelings” around his death:

no matter how how hard, difficult and in the last 10 years even non existent [sic] our relationship and communication was, it is never easy losing a parent […] The loss of an estranged parent comes with a difficult and complicated grief.

Dokic’s news is a reminder that, when a parent dies, not all of us get to grieve a stable, warm and comforting relationship.

As in her case, a strained relationship might even be marked by maltreatment or abuse. Relinquishing contact can sometimes be the best, albeit difficult, choice.

When the parent dies, the loss can feel surprisingly complex. We may be grieving both the literal death of the parent and the figurative death, of what should have been – what we wished for and desired.

Death can spark more than sadness

Grief is not a single emotion. Usually, it involves a combination of many. Common feelings can include sadness, guilt, anger and even relief.

In sharing her social media post, Dokic has said among conflicting emotions she’s chosen to “focus on a good memory”.

Grief can reach beyond feelings. It can disrupt eating and sleeping habits and impair memory and concentration.

Deaths can also affect relationships.

For example, when grieving, someone might receive a lot of social support from family, friends and colleagues. But for others, the support they’d like might not be forthcoming. The lack of support is yet another loss and is linked to worse physical and mental health.

Family members may also react in different ways. It might be jarring or alienating if your sibling responds differently, for example by sharing fond memories of a parent you found harsh and distant.

A death can also affect your financial standing. A grieving person may be burdened with outstanding bills and funeral payments. Or the impact can be positive, via windfalls from insurance and inheritance.

What if I don’t feel sad?

With grief, it’s OK to feel how you feel. You might think you’re grieving the “wrong” way, but it can be helpful to remember there are no strict rules about how to grieve “right”.

Be gentle on yourself. And give other family members, who may have had a different relationship with the parent and therefore grieve differently, the same courtesy.

It’s also OK to feel conflicted about going to the funeral.

In this case, take the time to think through the pros and cons of attending. It might be helpful in processing your grief and in receiving support. Or you might feel that attending would be too difficult or emotionally unsafe for you.

If you choose to attend, it can help to go with someone who can support you through it.

In an estranged relationship, the adult child might not even find out about the death of the parent for many weeks or months afterwards. This means there is no option of attending the funeral or other mourning rituals. Consider making your own rituals to help process the loss and grief.

What if I do feel sad – but still hurt?

It can be really confusing to feel sad about the death of a parent with whom we had a difficult, strained or violent relationship.

Identifying where these conflicting thoughts and feelings come from can help.

You might need to acknowledge and grieve the loss of your parent, the loss of the parent-child relationship you deserved, and even the loss of hoped-for apologies and reconnections.

In many cases, it is a combination of these losses that can make the grief more challenging.

It may also be difficult to get the social support you need from family, friends and colleagues.

These potential helpers might be unaware of the difficulties you experienced in the relationship, or incorrectly believe troubled relationships are easier to grieve.

It can feel like a taboo to speak ill of the dead, but it might be helpful to be clear about the relationship and your needs so that people can support you better.

In fact, grieving the death of people with whom we have challenging, conflicting or even abusive relationships can lead to more grief than the death of those with whom we shared a warm, loving and more straightforward relationship.

If the loss is particularly difficult and your grief doesn’t change and subside over time, seek support from your general practitioner. They might be able to recommend a psychologist or counsellor with expertise in grief.

Alternatively, you can find certified bereavement practitioners who have specialised training in grief support online or seek telephone support from Griefline on 1300 845 745.

Lauren Breen receives funding from Healthway and has previously received funding from Wellcome Trust, Australian Research Council, Department of Health (Western Australia), Silver Chain, iCare Dust Diseases Board (New South Wales), and Cancer Council (Western Australia). She is on the board of Lionheart Camp for Kids, is a member of Grief Australia, and a Fellow of the Australian Psychological Society.

– ref. The death of Jelena Dokic’s father reveals the ‘difficult and complicated grief’ of losing an estranged parent – https://theconversation.com/the-death-of-jelena-dokics-father-reveals-the-difficult-and-complicated-grief-of-losing-an-estranged-parent-257324

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ellie Ong, Research Fellow, ARC Centre of Excellence for 21st Century Weather, Monash University

A little-known ocean current surrounds Antarctica, shielding it from warm water further north. But our new research shows Antarctica’s melting ice is disrupting this current, putting the continent’s last line of defence at risk.

We found meltwater from Antarctica is speeding up the current, known as the Antarctic Slope Current. And it’s set to become even faster by mid-century.

A faster current could be more unstable. This means eddies of warm water could eat away at Antarctica’s ice, posing a major concern for the stability of the Earth’s climate system.

Faster ice-melt means faster sea-level rise. Humanity must act now to preserve this natural phenomena that helps Antarctica’s ice shelves remain intact.

Melting of Antarctic ice has global consequences

Antarctica is melting as the world warms. This causes sea levels to rise. Even just a few centimetres of sea-level rise can double the chance of flooding in vulnerable coastal regions.

Previous research has shown meltwater is also slowing the global network of deep ocean currents. These currents transport water, heat and nutrients around the planet, so a global slow-down has huge ramifications.

It’s therefore crucial to reduce further loss of Antarctic ice, to stabilise our global climate system.

The Antarctic Slope Current moves ocean water westward over the continental slope, close to the coast. It acts as a barrier, preventing warm waters from further north from reaching the ice.

In this way, the current provides an important line of defence keeping warmer water at bay. It doesn’t stop Antarctica from melting, because warming air temperatures still cause this. But it slows the process.

However, our research shows this defence is under threat.

What we did

We wanted to find out how the Antarctic Slope Current will respond to changes in wind, heat, and meltwater as the climate changes. We did this using high-resolution ocean-sea ice models.

The meltwater makes the ocean around Antarctica less salty. This makes the waters closer to the coast less dense, changing the structure of the Antarctic Slope Current and speeding it up.

The models predicted a 14% increase in the speed of the current over the past 25 years and a 49% increase over the next 25 years.

But meltwater from Antarctic ice has another effect too. We found the added water also slows down the movement of dense, salty coastal water in “waterfalls” running off the Antarctic coast that feeds into the global overturning current network.

When these waterfalls of dense water slow down, warmer waters are able to flow closer to the Antarctic continent.

Together, these changes compound and cause the Antarctic Slope Current to speed up even more.

A complex story

It might be assumed the changes we modelled would be a good thing for Antarctica. That’s because the stronger the Antarctic Slope Current, the stronger the barrier between Antarctica and the warm waters to the north.

But there’s more to the story. When ocean currents flow faster, they become more turbulent –generating vigorous eddies or whirlpools.

You can see this effect if you rapidly run your hand through a bathtub of water. Watch for the dynamic, circular whirlpools in your hand’s wake.

Ocean eddies are also becoming more vigorous under climate change.

Around Antarctica, whirlpools or eddies can move large amounts of warm water towards the poles. This can make melting worse.

So although a stronger current might be expected to act as a better shield for Antarctica, the extra eddies in its wake can have the opposing effect. These eddies can amplify the transport of heat towards Antarctica, increasing melting.

Why this matters

No matter how uncertain Antarctica’s future may be, one thing is clear: this frozen frontier is crucial to the stability of our global climate.

The Antarctic Slope Current was once a steadfast guardian of the icy continent. But now the current is being transformed by the very ice it protects.

Humanity must act fast to preserve the current, by cutting carbon emissions. When it comes to Antarctica, this action isn’t optional — it’s the only way to hold the line.

Ellie Ong receives funding from the Australian Research Council and an Australian Government Research and Training Program Scholarship.

Edward Doddridge receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Matthew England receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Navid Constantinou receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

– ref. Antarctica has its own ‘shield’ against warm water – but this could now be under threat – https://theconversation.com/antarctica-has-its-own-shield-against-warm-water-but-this-could-now-be-under-threat-255738

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lauren Breen, Professor of Psychology, Curtin University

Grieving the death of a parent is often considered a natural part of life. But there are added layers of complexity when you had a difficult or estranged relationship.

This week former tennis star Jelena Dokic confirmed the death of her father and former coach Damir, whose verbal, physical and emotional abuse she revealed in 2009 and further detailed in her 2017 autobiography. They had been estranged for a decade.

In a social media post on Thursday, Dokic wrote about her “conflicting and complex emotions and feelings” around his death:

no matter how how hard, difficult and in the last 10 years even non existent [sic] our relationship and communication was, it is never easy losing a parent […] The loss of an estranged parent comes with a difficult and complicated grief.

Dokic’s news is a reminder that, when a parent dies, not all of us get to grieve a stable, warm and comforting relationship.

As in her case, a strained relationship might even be marked by maltreatment or abuse. Relinquishing contact can sometimes be the best, albeit difficult, choice.

When the parent dies, the loss can feel surprisingly complex. We may be grieving both the literal death of the parent and the figurative death, of what should have been – what we wished for and desired.

Death can spark more than sadness

Grief is not a single emotion. Usually, it involves a combination of many. Common feelings can include sadness, guilt, anger and even relief.

In sharing her social media post, Dokic has said among conflicting emotions she’s chosen to “focus on a good memory”.

Grief can reach beyond feelings. It can disrupt eating and sleeping habits and impair memory and concentration.

Deaths can also affect relationships.

For example, when grieving, someone might receive a lot of social support from family, friends and colleagues. But for others, the support they’d like might not be forthcoming. The lack of support is yet another loss and is linked to worse physical and mental health.

Family members may also react in different ways. It might be jarring or alienating if your sibling responds differently, for example by sharing fond memories of a parent you found harsh and distant.

A death can also affect your financial standing. A grieving person may be burdened with outstanding bills and funeral payments. Or the impact can be positive, via windfalls from insurance and inheritance.

What if I don’t feel sad?

With grief, it’s OK to feel how you feel. You might think you’re grieving the “wrong” way, but it can be helpful to remember there are no strict rules about how to grieve “right”.

Be gentle on yourself. And give other family members, who may have had a different relationship with the parent and therefore grieve differently, the same courtesy.

It’s also OK to feel conflicted about going to the funeral.

In this case, take the time to think through the pros and cons of attending. It might be helpful in processing your grief and in receiving support. Or you might feel that attending would be too difficult or emotionally unsafe for you.

If you choose to attend, it can help to go with someone who can support you through it.

In an estranged relationship, the adult child might not even find out about the death of the parent for many weeks or months afterwards. This means there is no option of attending the funeral or other mourning rituals. Consider making your own rituals to help process the loss and grief.

What if I do feel sad – but still hurt?

It can be really confusing to feel sad about the death of a parent with whom we had a difficult, strained or violent relationship.

Identifying where these conflicting thoughts and feelings come from can help.

You might need to acknowledge and grieve the loss of your parent, the loss of the parent-child relationship you deserved, and even the loss of hoped-for apologies and reconnections.

In many cases, it is a combination of these losses that can make the grief more challenging.

It may also be difficult to get the social support you need from family, friends and colleagues.

These potential helpers might be unaware of the difficulties you experienced in the relationship, or incorrectly believe troubled relationships are easier to grieve.

It can feel like a taboo to speak ill of the dead, but it might be helpful to be clear about the relationship and your needs so that people can support you better.

In fact, grieving the death of people with whom we have challenging, conflicting or even abusive relationships can lead to more grief than the death of those with whom we shared a warm, loving and more straightforward relationship.

If the loss is particularly difficult and your grief doesn’t change and subside over time, seek support from your general practitioner. They might be able to recommend a psychologist or counsellor with expertise in grief.

Alternatively, you can find certified bereavement practitioners who have specialised training in grief support online or seek telephone support from Griefline on 1300 845 745.

Lauren Breen receives funding from Healthway and has previously received funding from Wellcome Trust, Australian Research Council, Department of Health (Western Australia), Silver Chain, iCare Dust Diseases Board (New South Wales), and Cancer Council (Western Australia). She is on the board of Lionheart Camp for Kids, is a member of Grief Australia, and a Fellow of the Australian Psychological Society.

– ref. The death of Jelena Dokic’s father reveals the ‘complex and difficult grief’ of losing an estranged parent – https://theconversation.com/the-death-of-jelena-dokics-father-reveals-the-complex-and-difficult-grief-of-losing-an-estranged-parent-257324

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Samuel Cornell, PhD Candidate in Public Health & Community Medicine, School of Population Health, UNSW Sydney

Almost 700 rescues had been carried out in New South Wales by Friday morning as
record-breaking rainfall pounds the state. Tragically, four people have died in floodwaters.

Amid the chaos, videos posted on social media show people deliberately entering or standing above swollen rivers and flooded roads. It is a pattern of dangerous behaviour that occurs frequently during natural disasters in Australia.

Filming unsafe acts for social media is not just risky for participants. It may inspire copycat behaviour, and, if things go wrong, can endanger the lives of rescuers. It’s a public health problem which requires new remedies.

Selfies in floods: a risky business

During a flood, water can be deceiving. Just 15cm of water can knock an adult off their feet or cause a car to lose traction and float. Submerged debris and contaminated water add to the dangers.

Emergency services routinely warn the public not to enter floodwaters – on foot or in vehicles. But many people ignore the warnings, including those out to create social media content.

In a startling example posted on Tiktok during the current floods, a young man stands on a mossy log which has fallen over a flooded river. The video, accompanied by dramatic music, shows swirling floodwaters surging beneath him. One wrong step, and the man could easily have drowned.

In other examples posted on Tiktok in recent days, a woman wades through murky floodwaters, and a person films as the car they are travelling in drives down a flooded road.

Similar behaviour was observed during floods in Townsville earlier this year. Residents filmed themselves diving and wading into floodwaters, and towing each other on inflatable rafts.

And during ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred, social media was filled with images of people in Queensland surfing dangerous swells and wading in rough surf.

A worrying trend

Our research explores the links between social media and adverse health outcomes.

Selfie-related injury has become a public health concern. People are increasingly venturing off-trail, seeking out attractive but hazardous locations such as cliff edges and coastal rock platforms.

These behaviours can lead to injury and death. They can also put emergency services personnel in harm’s way. In 2021, for example, a woman fell into a swollen river on Canberra’s outskirts while trying to take a selfie with friends, prompting a police official to warn:

There is no photo or social media post that is worth risking your life to get. Any water rescue puts the lives of not only of yourself but those of emergency services personnel at risk.

Getting to grips with the problem

How should the problem be tackled? Previous research by others has recommended “no-selfie zones”, barriers, and signs as ways to prevent selfie incidents. But our research suggests these measures may not be enough.

The phenomenon of selfie-related incidents requires a public health approach. This entails addressing the behaviour through prevention, education, and other interventions such as via social media platforms.

In the latest floods, unsafe behaviour has occurred despite a series of official flood, weather and other warnings. Residents also continue to drive into floodwaters, despite repeated pleas from authorities.

Official warnings compete with – and can lose out to – more emotionally compelling, visually rich content. If the public sees other people behaving recklessly and apparently unharmed, then even clear, fact-based warnings can be ignored.

This is especially true in communities experiencing “alert-fatigue” after having gone through disasters before.

Sometimes, vague terminology in warnings means the messages don’t necessarily cut through. We’ve seen this before in relation to surf safety. Technical phrases such as “hazardous swell” don’t change behaviour if people don’t understand what they mean.

For warnings to work, they need to be clear and provide instruction – stating what the danger actually is, and what to explicitly do, or not do.

For social media users, that might mean spelling out not to go into floodwaters to capture content for social media.

We’ve also previously called on social media companies to be held more accountable for the dangerous content they publish – by flagging risky content and supporting in-app safety messaging, especially at high-risk locations or during extreme weather events.

What to do right now

If you’re in or near a flood zone, follow guidance from emergency services to keep yourself and your loved ones safe.

When it comes to using social media in an emergency:

• stay entirely out of floodwaters, even for a quick photo

• think before you post. Your safety is more important than your content. No post is worth risking your life

• avoid glamourising risk. Sharing risky photos or videos can influence others to do the same, potentially with worse outcomes

• follow official advice. Floodwaters are unpredictable. Warnings are issued for a reason

• use your platform for good. Share verified information, support affected communities and help amplify safety messages.

As extreme weather becomes more frequent in Australia under climate change, so too will the urge to document them. But we risk turning disasters into digital spectacles – at the expense of our lives and that of rescuers.

Samuel Cornell receives funding from Meta Platforms, Inc. His research is supported by a University of New South Wales Sydney, University Postgraduate Award. His research is supported by Royal Life Saving Society – Australia to aid in the prevention of drowning. Research at Royal Life Saving Society – Australia is supported by the Australian government. He has been affiliated with Surf Life Saving Australia and Surf Life Saving NSW in a paid and voluntary capacity.

Amy Peden receives funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council, Meta Platforms, and NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service. She holds an honorary affiliation with Royal Life Saving Society – Australia.

– ref. Disaster or digital spectacle? The dangers of using floods to create social media content – https://theconversation.com/disaster-or-digital-spectacle-the-dangers-of-using-floods-to-create-social-media-content-257350

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Ward, Lecturer, School of Environment and Science, Griffith University

More and more Australian species are being listed as critically endangered – the final stage before extinction in the wild. Hundreds of species of plants and animals are now at this point.

For a species to be critically endangered, it is on death’s door. Its numbers must have shrunk alarmingly and its outlook is bleak. Why? One common reason is habitat loss. If we convert bushland or swamps into farmland or suburbs, we reduce how much space species have to survive.

Our new research examines how much habitat is left for 305 of Australia’s critically endangered species – more than 70% of the total. Alarmingly, we found almost half the remaining habitat is outside the protected area estate. That means the last remaining areas where these species are clinging on could very easily be cleared.

The good news? We now know exactly which areas most need to be safeguarded. If we protected an extra 0.5% of Australia’s land mass, we could slash the risk to hundreds of species approaching the point of no return. This is a relatively small amount compared to the 22.5% of Australia that already has some form of protection. The Australian government has committed to increasing this to 30% by 2030.

What did we do?

Australia now has 426 critically endangered species, including plants, fish, frogs, reptiles, mammals, birds and other animals. We focused on 305 of these species – those clinging to life in six or fewer isolated patches of habitat across Australia.

We then worked with 18 scientists whose expertise covers these 305 species to refine the maps of habitat for species to ensure we used the most accurate and current data available.

Once we had these maps, we compared them to maps of Australia’s network of protected areas. When we found unprotected habitat, we assessed whether it might be appealing for clearing and conversion into farmland.

When we put this data together, we found something startling – and encouraging. Our work found approximately 85,000 square kilometres of habitat (about 1% of Australia’s land area) urgently needs protection and management to halt extinction for these 305 species.

Alarmingly, half of this vital habitat currently lies outside existing protected areas, with 39 species having none of their remaining habitat in the protected area estate. Habitat in protected areas is safer, but not completely safe. Fuel reduction burns, invasive species and even harvesting can affect species inside protected areas.

Consider the Margaret River burrowing crayfish (Engaewa pseudoreducta), Lyon’s grassland striped skink (Austroablepharus barrylyoni) and the Rosewood keeled snail (Ordtrachia septentrionalis). Each of these critically endangered species survives in one or two tiny patches of habitat outside the protected area estate. They could be wiped out by something as simple as a highway expansion or a new suburban development.

Some remaining habitat is especially precious, as it could support several critically endangered species at once. These include areas west of Atherton in Queensland as well as areas around Tumbarumba in New South Wales and Campbell Town in Tasmania.

Other hotspots include Lord Howe Island, Macquarie Island, Christmas Island, Norfolk Island and its neighbour Phillip Island. Many critically endangered species with small ranges survive here, including Suter’s striped glass-snail, Christmas Island spleenwort and the Lord Howe Island phasmid (giant stick insect). While most of these islands are well protected, their conservation programs need to be well funded to deal with ongoing threats.

The last of them

When a species goes extinct, we lose an entire set of genes, traits, behaviours and history. Despite recent headlines, extinction is forever.

In 2022, the Australian government pledged to bring an end to extinction of the continent’s unique species.

This is easier said than done – extinctions are continuing, especially among invertebrates.

Our maps show the last known areas where these 305 species are holding on. If nothing is done, some of these areas of habitat will likely be converted to farming or grazing land. The most logical thing to do is to preserve and manage this habitat as quickly as possible.

The challenge is ownership. At present, much of this habitat occurs on private land (about 17,000 km²) or in state forests (about 7,000 km²) which often does not stop activities that cause habitat destruction, such as native forest logging. Other areas are under different forms of tenure which often lack stringent conservation measures.

Protecting species on private lands requires careful negotiation and incentives for landholders. The government doesn’t have to buy the land – it just has to find ways to conserve it. Australia now has many good examples of conservation on private land.

Agricultural potential poses another challenge. More than half (55%) of the habitat we identified has a clear overlap with lands suitable for farming or grazing. These preferred areas are usually flat and on fertile soils.

Conversion of habitat to farms or paddocks is a major reason why Australia is still one of the top land-clearing nations. In just one year, 6,800 km² of woody vegetation was cleared in Queensland – largely to make way for agriculture.

What can we do?

Our research gives policymakers detailed, geographically specific and actionable information on vital areas of habitat remaining for more than 70% of Australia’s critically endangered species.

These maps can help shape decisions on land management, expansion of protected areas and where biodiversity stewardship programs should be prioritised.

Policymakers must find effective incentives for landowners to preserve species on their land and rigorously enforce regulations to prevent illegal clearing.

Australia stands at a crossroads. The action (or inaction) of decision makers will change the fate of hundreds of critically endangered species. We know where these species are just holding on. The question is whether we can get to them in time.

Michelle Ward has received funding from various sources including the Australian Research Council, the Queensland Department of Environment and Science, WWF Australia, and the federal government’s National Environmental Science Program, and has advised both state and federal government on conservation policy.

James Watson has received funding from the Australian Research Council, National Environmental Science Program, South Australia’s Department of Environment and Water, Queensland’s Department of Environment, Science and Innovation as well as from Bush Heritage Australia, Queensland Conservation Council, Australian Conservation Foundation, The Wilderness Society and Birdlife Australia. He serves on the scientific committee of BirdLife Australia and has a long-term scientific relationship with Bush Heritage Australia and Wildlife Conservation Society. He serves on the Queensland government’s Land Restoration Fund’s Investment Panel as the Deputy Chair.

– ref. Half the remaining habitat of Australia’s most at-risk species is outside protected areas – https://theconversation.com/half-the-remaining-habitat-of-australias-most-at-risk-species-is-outside-protected-areas-256818

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher Yorke, Lecturer in sport management, Western Sydney University

Created in Australia, “Run It Straight” is a new, ultra-violent combat sport.

Across a 20×4 metre grassed “battlefield,” players charge at full speed toward one another.

Alternating between carrying the ball (ball runner) and defending (tackler), victory is awarded via knockout (a competitor cannot continue), or a judge’s decision based on an athlete’s dominance during the collisions.

Despite neuroscientists issuing grave warnings about the brutal sport’s risks, Run It Straight’s viral popularity, including endorsement among high profile athletes, is accelerating.

A growing scene

This month, Melbourne hosted the inaugural “RUNIT Championship League” event.

Footage showed some participants convulsing after their collisions as the winner celebrated, surrounded by children.

Drawing hundreds of spectators and millions of online views, the full-speed collision challenge is already turning its violence and social media footprint into commercial success abroad, securing interest in the United States.

The sport held some events in New Zealand this week, but one was was halted by Auckland Council due to safety concerns and failure to secure necessary permits.

A history of sport and violence

In ancient times, symbolic cultural displays of power and physical dominance featured in combat sports such as wrestling, boxing, pankration (a mixed martial art combining boxing and wrestling) and even armoured foot races.

This brutal entertainment is reflected in contemporary collision sports such as the National Rugby League (NRL) and Australian Football League (AFL).

In recent decades however, the danger of concussion has resulted in most contact sports changing rules and regulations to protect athletes from head injuries.

Various measures have been implemented to mitigate, eliminate and treat head trauma.

The Australian government is exerting influence and committing material resources to support athletes living with brain issues such as chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE).

Read more:
When does the love of the game outweigh the cost? ABC’s Plum brings rugby league’s concussion crisis to the fore

Considering this multi-pronged effort to make contact sports safer, the violence of Run It Straight is jarring.

Why are these new sports so popular?

With its origins as a social media challenge, Run It Straight is perfect content for short-form social media platforms: an entire competition can be distilled into a 30-second highlight.

Run It Straight’s accessible and minimalist format is also attractive to fans compared to many collision sports that have complex rules and strategies. This can be a barrier to interest, engagement and commercial returns.

Run It Straight and other emerging, violent sports such as Power Slap (a fight sport where contestants slap each other so hard they can be knocked unconscious) are simplistic and brutal.

But athletes in most traditional collision sports use their physical ability and skill to evade contact. Similarly, boxing is not just about strikes to the head, it is punch evasion, physical fitness and point scoring.

But the visual spectacle and shock of two people running toward one another for an inevitable collision is a form of violence that appeals to an increasing number of sport fans.

The risks involved

Run It Straight is a new sport, and to our knowledge there is no empirical peer-reviewed research focusing on it.

But many neurologists have expressed concerns about its total disregard for scientific evidence showing repeated head trauma damages brain health.

With Run it Straight appearing to lack the medical resources and infrastructure of professional sports organisations, and with the competition’s expressed intent to have participants collide at high speed, the risk of significant injury is high.

Power Slap, though, has been the subject of empirical research. A 2024 study reported many of the sport’s combatants showed visible signs of concussion (motor incoordination, slowness to get up and blank and vacant looks during bouts).

An opportunity for ‘traditional’ sports?

The rise of Run It Straight and Power Slap creates a unique opportunity for the governing bodies of contact codes such as AFL, NRL and rugby union to highlight what sets them apart.

Key to this is athlete safety. For years, governing bodies in these codes have invested time and resources to implement concussion management protocols at professional and community levels.

Currently, the tournament-based format for individual adult participants allows Run It Straight to operate without the broader governance responsibilities of football codes.

However, it is because of those governance responsibilities that the football codes can amplify their athlete wellbeing credentials to reassure participants and parents who may be nervous about concussion risks.

Second, the football codes are organised team sports played with multiple players on a team, facilitating skill acquisition, teamwork, mental wellbeing and physical fitness. While there appears to be a degree of camaraderie during Run It Straight events, it is evidently a one-on-one competition.

Ultimately, the rise and evident popularity of Run It Straight and Power Slap provides a stark reminder there will always be a section of society that is drawn to high-risk behaviours.

In turn, the football codes should look to highlight the value of balance and their athlete wellbeing credentials.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Head knocks and ultra-violence: viral games Run It Straight and Power Slap put sports safety back centuries – https://theconversation.com/head-knocks-and-ultra-violence-viral-games-run-it-straight-and-power-slap-put-sports-safety-back-centuries-256473