Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amanda Bourgeois, Postdoctoral researcher in the UQ Learning Lab, The University of Queensland

Have you ever asked your child how school was today, only to be told it was “boring”?

It’s a conversation sadly all-too-familiar to a lot of parents. Many are left wondering why and what they can do to help.

It’s important to understand why your child may be feeling bored at school. Here are some possibilities to consider.

Not every aspect of school is engaging

Boredom at school isn’t uncommon. Remember, a child’s learning journey is jagged, not linear. Their learning may progress quickly during some periods, and less so at other times. Sometimes they will be bored.

Research has found Year 9 students reported feeling bored during nearly half of class time, on average, while younger students report feeling bored during about a third of class time.

Our own research, which involved surveying 412 students in Year 10 about their emotions, revealed boredom was the most commonly reported emotion among participants.

This is concerning because students need to be emotionally invested to learn well.

As we argued in our paper, it’s possible there’s a need for some teachers to develop more stimulating lesson plans, and work more with students to find ways to motivate and engage them. Collecting feedback and working with their students to minimise classroom boredom could help some teachers.

Young people are growing up in an era where – thanks to technology – boredom in spare time is rare. This can be quite challenging for teachers, who generally want to encourage their students to reflect, ponder and contemplate.

But research has found closer student-teacher relationships, creating safe and supportive classrooms, and linking learning to real-world contexts relevant to students can often mitigate negative emotions like boredom.

The greater the control the student has over their learning – and the better they see the value of it – the more motivated they’re likely to be.

But lesson content is only part of the picture.

Is your child bored some or all of the time?

If your child is feeling bored in just one class, or one subject, then it could be the lesson content.

But if your child is consistently complaining that all classes and all school is boring – and you’ve noticed their grades are declining – there may be more to consider, such as:

• the possibility of an underlying learning difficulty, such as dyslexia (which relates to reading) or dyscalculia (which relates to maths and numbers)
• the possibility of hearing or vision impairment
• the possibility your child is “gifted”, meaning they learn much faster than their peers.

If you suspect any of these, talk to your GP, and to your child’s teacher.

Is boredom masking other emotions?

When children say they are bored, they might be struggling to identify and express more complex feelings such as sadness or anxiety.

So it’s worth considering if there are friendship issues happening in the playground, or if there is something else going on emotionally for your child.

These stressors can occupy your child’s thoughts in the classroom, taking attention away from learning.

By helping children to understand and articulate their emotions, we can provide them the tools to manage these experiences more effectively.

Some schools offer programs that help children identify their emotions and learn social, emotional and behavioural regulation skills.

Children with good social emotional skills are likely to do better on a range of interpersonal and academic outcomes, which can also benefit parents, teachers and the school in general.

So what should parents do?

Talk openly with your child. Ask more specific questions about their day, instead of just “how was school?”. Instead, you can try questions like:

• what was the most interesting thing you learned at school today?
• can you tell me about something you enjoyed doing at school today?
• was there anything that made you feel frustrated or bored today?
• what do you wish you could change about your day?
• who did you play with today?
• if you were the teacher for the day, what would you do differently?
• what feedback did you receive from your teacher on your work today?

Find out what they mean when they say they’re bored at school, and when they feel bored.

Consider having them assessed for possible learning difficulties, and their eyes and ears checked.

Find out if there any problems with friends, or possible anxieties lurking below the surface.

If your child is particularly high achieving academically, discuss this with the school. Your child may be eligible for further assessment and extension support.

Find ways to relate what your child is learning in school to their own lives and interests.

Consider how you can strengthen your child’s relationship with their teacher, and talk to the teacher, too. They might be able to make simple adjustments to support your child’s motivation and engagement.

Amanda Bourgeois has received an APA scholarship (now referred to as Australian government Research Training Program Scholarship) as well as a top up scholarship from the SLRC (Science of Learning Research Centre), This was an Australian Research Council (ARC) Special Research Initiative (SRI) Grant: ARC-SRI Science of Learning Research Centre (project number SR120300015).

Annemaree Carroll 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. ‘School is boring’: what it means when your child says they’re bored in class, and how you can help – https://theconversation.com/school-is-boring-what-it-means-when-your-child-says-theyre-bored-in-class-and-how-you-can-help-237560

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tom Baker, Associate Professor in Human Geography, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau

Since the end of his three-term New York City mayoralty in 2013, Michael Bloomberg hasn’t shied away from public attention. Presidential ambitions and global climate policy advocacy have kept him busy.

But what is shaping up to be one of the most ambitious projects of the 82-year-old billionaire’s public life is not happening on the highly visible stages of national and international politics. It is unfolding in the stereotypically humdrum halls of city government.

Through Bloomberg Philanthropies – the vehicle for his personal and corporate giving – he has advanced an array of initiatives for city government leaders. The organisation is now providing funding and technical support to around 700 city governments across 150 countries – including Wellington City Council’s new digital community engagement tools.

In the process, Bloomberg has created for himself a historically unique and highly influential quasi-public position.

As a kind of “world’s mayor”, he promotes a burnished version of his self-styled image while New York City mayor: eking out efficiency and effectiveness gains within city government through assiduous managerial control and better use of evidence.

But Bloomberg’s inroads into global local government also raise important questions about the reliability of philanthropy over the long term – and its democratic legitimacy.

A ‘perfect match’?

Bloomberg has described partnerships between philanthropists and government as a “perfect match”. “Philanthropists,” he notes, “have resources that governments need for innovation, and governments have powers that philanthropists need for solving problems.”

City governments are especially short of resources. Most face growing demands but diminishing financial capacity. They often contend with indifferent or actively hostile state and national governments, as well as the slow progress of international agreements.

Without the necessary resources and capabilities, they struggle to address a range of problems felt intensely at the local scale, from unaffordable housing to climate change.

Enter the “government innovation program” from Bloomberg Philanthropies, a pro-bono system of capacity-building initiatives for city governments. It has been growing for over a decade, tentatively at first, and concentrating initially on the United States.

Since 2017, more than 275 mayors and 400 city officials, mainly American, have attended year-long intensive training by the Bloomberg-funded City Leadership Initiative at Harvard University. Last year, one-third of American cities were reportedly led by a participant in the program.

But the “Bloomberg world” – as one of several city officials we interviewed described it – has expanded and diversified over time. It is now one of the most influential global players in urban policy dialogue and practice.

Soft power

Bloomberg Philanthropies’ “Mayors Challenge” competition was initially specific to the US, Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean.

But in 2021 it began to expand globally, receiving entries from 631 cities in 99 countries. Fifteen winning cities, including Wellington, were each awarded US$1 million (NZ$1.57 million) and substantial technical support.

The organisation has established around 40 “innovation teams” within city governments. And its certification system for data-driven decision making has become something city leaders now strive toward. There are over 60 “certified cities” in the US, with plans to expand abroad.

Bloomberg-funded initiatives are now announced with such consistency it would be hard for a city government practitioner to avoid them.

In just one month recently, 20 mayors signed a public declaration of their adherence to data-driven decision making, as part of their induction into the second round of the Bloomberg Philanthropies’ City Data Alliance.

Ten cities won US$1 million each to implement sustainable transport projects; 60 city leaders attended a workshop run by the Bloomberg Harvard City Leadership Initiative on making “procurement an engine of innovation”; and the tenth Bloomberg CityLab summit was announced for Washington DC.

There have been examples of philanthropic foundations using their financial heft as a form of hard power to push city governments around – Detroit’s post-bankruptcy “Grand Bargain”, for example, or New Orleans’ post-hurricane rebuild.

But Bloomberg Philanthropies favours a soft-power model. It gauges and anticipates the needs of city governments, and supports them as they align toward shared goals and methods. They “gently steer”, according to one city government official we interviewed.

Democratic legitimacy

The difference between pushing and steering is evident in Bloomberg Philanthropies’ tendency to avoid advocating for particular policy solutions. Any perception of political interference could dampen cities’ willingness to partner.

Instead, the organisation’s expanding reach and growing indispensability rest on providing know-how: offering access to technical assistance, funding and networks to implement “best process”, informed by better data.

In this sense, its role is one of “meta-governor” – adjudicating, promoting and embedding the practices of good governance.

But while Bloomberg’s philanthropy seems welcomed by city governments, it raises important political issues. Philanthropic funding can be appealing because it comes with fewer strings attached. However, it also comes without democratic accountability. And there are risks in relying on funding streams subject to the whims of billionaires.

As ever, the big question about philanthropy is not whether it is useful to those receiving it, but rather should it even exist? Faced with a forbidding fiscal outlook and mounting policy challenges, it’s a question city governments might not have the luxury of asking.

This article is based on the authors’ forthcoming paper in the International Journal of Urban and Regional Research.

Tom Baker receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Laura Goh receives funding from the Australian Research Council..

Pauline McGuirk receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Sophia Maalsen receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Alistair Sisson 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. The ‘world’s mayor’ – how Michael Bloomberg uses philanthropy to change the way cities are run – https://theconversation.com/the-worlds-mayor-how-michael-bloomberg-uses-philanthropy-to-change-the-way-cities-are-run-237538

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Gaunson, Associate Professor in Cinema Studies, RMIT University

Directed by Akira Kurosawa and starring Toshiro Mifune and Takashi Shimura, 1954’s Seven Samurai (七人の侍, Shichinin no Samurai), is a technical and creative watershed of the action genre and world cinema.

In 2021, Time Out magazine placed it at number three on its list of the best action movies of all time. The film was also named the greatest foreign-language film ever in BBC’s 2018 poll, which surveyed 209 critics across 43 countries.

Set in 16th-century feudal Japan, Seven Samurai follows a beleaguered village that hires seven warriors to defend against marauding bandits. It culminates in one of the greatest and most lengthy action sequences ever put to screen.

Beyond just the magnificence of the film itself – which has undergone an extensive restoration and will have a cinema re-release this month – is Kurosawas’s meticulous approach to the production.

Meticulous production

Before Seven Samurai, Kurosawa had risen to international prominence through his film Rashomon (羅生門) (1950), winning the prestigious Golden Lion at the 1951 Venice Film Festival.

Following its success he became more ambitious with his film choices.

Next came an adaptation of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s 1869 novel The Idiot (白痴) (1951), and Ikiru (生きる) (1952), a loose adaptation of Leo Tolstoy’s 1886 novella The Death of Ivan Ilyich.

For Seven Samurai, his following film, he went to new lengths with his preparation.

For every speaking character, Kuroswara wrote an individual dossier including specific details about clothes, foods, family history and other personal details. Directors such as Michael Mann and Quentin Tarantino have since incorporated this approach to their own productions, citing Kurosawa as their influence.

Part of the film’s appeal is how Kurosawa brings a breadth of vision to the past without dismissing deeper aspects of the farming community he depicts. Within this samurai epic are memorable and poignant moments of comedy, domestic drama and tragedy among the training of the farmers into effective samurai swordsmen.

Kurosawa’s idea for the story was pulled from historical annals, and the film was preceded by a lengthy period of historical research.

He had wanted to make a samurai epic for several years, but was unable to find material he felt would sustain a feature film. Producer Sôjirô Motoki discovered samurai in the “Warring States” period of Japan would volunteer to stand guard at peasant villages in exchange for food and lodging.

Kurosawa liked the idea and felt having local farmers trained as samurai to fight for their own land spoke profoundly to postwar Japan.

A new approach to filmmkaing

In Australia, Seven Samurai initially played at the 1956 Melbourne International Film Festival and wowed audiences in ways it has continued to wow new audiences throughout the past 70 years.

One enthusiastic Kurosawa fan was Australian director George Miller. There had always been a lot of Seven Samurai in the Mad Max movies. Compare the sparse dialogue, the restless camera movements, the invasive close-ups and natural sounds overlapped with the baroque soundtrack.

Mad Max: Fury Road is a more straightforward rethinking of Seven Samurai with the plot itself sharing a clear overlap of villagers required to learn the skills to fight off lawless rogues for their land.

This was the first film in which Kurosawa used multiple cameras, so he could shoot from different angles and directions without stopping the actors every time he wanted a different shot. Kurosawa would subsequently use a multiple-camera setup on every one of his following films.

Longer lenses (most notably the telephoto lens) were used in an unprecedented way with the camera photographing great detail, such as facial expressions and horses’ hooves through the teeming rain and mud splatter.

The epic action sequence to conclude the film is simply masterful. No film since has matched its cinematic physicality on a kinetic level. In Seven Samurai, Kurosawa demonstrated a new style of fight choreography that has never been surpassed.

Refusing to shoot the peasant village at Toho Studios, Kurosawa had a complete set constructed at Tagata on the Izu Peninsula, Shizuoka.

Because of the wet and sludge of the milieu, death is never glamorised or decorative. When they die, they die in the cold mud.

Focus on the individual

The great appeal of the film and why it arrived as a revelation was how Kurosawa presented an action film based on individuals rather than bureaucratic or political ambitions.

It is also worth considering how the film positions itself within postwar Japan as characters reassert themselves and their community without the support of the army.

Ultimately, this is a story about people in power helping those less fortunate. The final moments of the film reinstates this by demonstrating the survival of the farmers and farming community over lionising the individual heroes. People in power have a duty to help those less fortunate.

“The farmers have won. Not us,” the leader of the samurai group, Kambei Shimada (島田勘兵衛) (Takashi Shimura), declares to end the film.

It is hard to think of an action film that resonates so poignantly on an emotional and visceral level with audiences as Seven Samurai, even 70 years later. Its significance and legacy remain unparalleled.

Stephen Gaunson 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. Seven Samurai at 70: the greatest action film of all time – https://theconversation.com/seven-samurai-at-70-the-greatest-action-film-of-all-time-234825

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Markus Moos, Professor, School of Planning, University of Waterloo

Anyone who has driven in Toronto during rush hour can tell you how busy the roads can get. In the face of traffic gridlock and rising commute times, Ontario Premier Doug Ford recently announced his government is exploring the idea of building a roughly 50-kilometre tunnel beneath the 401, North America’s busiest highway.

That announcement came days after the Ford government said it is considering banning new cycling lanes if they result in reductions in car lanes.

Confronted with escalating housing costs and reduced affordability, the government proposed reforms to provincial planning legislation to speed up construction on Greenbelt sites in what many described as weakening local control over the quality of development and its potential environmental impacts.

If the provincial government continues with this agenda, the weight of evidence in planning research points to long-term decreases in the quality of life for Ontario residents. Here’s why.

Issues with car-oriented planning

First, new highways bring more cars and eventually result in the same or even worse gridlock. They also contribute to air pollution and climate change. Therefore, to accommodate new growth, governments need to consider alternative modes of transport.

Second, car-oriented development inherently produces more urban sprawl, making it difficult to accommodate walking, cycling and public transit that are known to have important environmental and health benefits.

When more highways are built, there is usually a desire to separate residential subdivisions from traffic, resulting in more dispersed amenities that are difficult to reach without a car. That can be expensive. Given the rising cost of living, it is not unreasonable to expect that car ownership will become increasingly costly for more people.

This means that not only could Ontario residents face more urban sprawl, but many people will also find it difficult, and time-intensive, to get to where they need to go.

This is not an anti-car argument. There will still be many cars in the future and some of it will be from new growth, but progressive planning policies would help create alternatives.

North America’s car-centred planning

Ford’s emphasis on cars is reminiscent of another time, coincidentally often called the Fordist period by urban researchers — so named after the mass production of Ford automobile plants that became a symbol of the economy and suburban expansion of the times.

At its height between the 1950s and ’70s, original Fordist urban planning focused on the automobile, separating land designated for workplaces, retail stores and homes, and developing large scale subdivisions at the suburban fringe. North America’s heavy car reliance is an artefact of this development model.

Planning decisions have long-term consequences.

In part arising from the social activism of the 1960s, planning began to place more focus on environmental issues. In the ’70s and ’80s, this pertained to the protection of environmentally significant areas; the Niagara Escarpment plan was one important achievement of this movement.

In the 1990s, it became clear, however, that environmental protection would eventually be challenged, and fail, unless development itself was going to use less land and become more co-ordinated.

This was the height of the smart growth movement that emphasized the need for greenbelts to constrain suburban sprawl, and concentrate development into higher density neighbourhoods and more walkable growth centres connected by public transit.

Building better

Public health, the environment and growing pressures on municipal finances are all important reasons to build communities that are more walkable, bikeable and transit-oriented.

However, the Ontario government’s recent announcements do not clearly indicate how prioritizing cars would address health, environmental and municipal fiscal issues.

Connecting communities with better rail service, for example, and putting some restrictions on automobile traffic would be an investment made in preparation for a future where gas prices are expected to rise. Furthermore, there will likely be mounting pressures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as governments face the rising costs of natural disasters and a changing climate.

The Ontario government’s approach to infrastructure development hearkens back in time when urban planning did not incorporate urban planning ideas around environmental protection and smart growth. It’s also an approach without sufficient investments in critical community infrastructure, such as affordable housing.

Hallmarks of the original Fordist period were investments in community centres, schools, transit infrastructure as a social service, and yes, affordable housing. Although the governments at the times focused on car-reliant urban development, there was still significant investment in social infrastructure.

That is not the case today. Governments are pushing for the kinds of policies used in the past that are the very reason why citizens are so reliant on cars today — but without the social infrastructure that was arguably a redeeming feature of original Fordist urban planning.

The Ontario government’s approach is not consistent with the current evidence on best practice planning. Car use and low-density sprawl will continue and perhaps even accelerate because new and proposed policies make it attractive to do so.

The future would likely be more congested, more polluted, and we would see more loss of agricultural and environmentally significant lands. Ontario’s policies of more auto dependence are heading in the wrong direction, and would reduce the quality of life of Ontario residents in the future.

Markus Moos receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

– ref. Doug Ford’s highway tunnel will not improve transport or housing – https://theconversation.com/doug-fords-highway-tunnel-will-not-improve-transport-or-housing-240059

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

The Albanese government, in a fresh strike against the supermarkets, has announced it will work with the states to reform regulations to help boost competition by opening more sites for new stores.

The government also is providing about $30 million to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission to assist it to undertake more investigations and enforcement in the supermarket and retail sectors.

This follows the ACCC’s launch of legal action against Coles and Woolworths for alleged dodgy discounting practices.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Treasurer Jim Chalmers said in a statement present planning and zoning restrictions, including on land use, “are acting as a barrier to competition by inhibiting business entry expansion”.

“They potentially allow land banking, preventing competition and pushing up prices in our local communities.”

The government said it was “taking decisive action to help consumers get fairer prices” from supermarkets.

“Misconduct in the supermarket and retail sector is unfair, unacceptable and makes cost-of-living pressures worse for Australians.”

The government stressed its latest measures followed a series of actions it has taken. Last week it released its mandatory food and grocery code for consultation. It has also banned unfair contract terms and increased penalties for breaches of competition and consumer law, and is reforming the merger provisions.

Land banking, planning regulations used to stifle competition

The interim report of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s year-long supermarkets inquiry released on Friday identified land use restrictions, zoning laws and planning regulations as challenges for aspiring operators attempting to compete with the major chains.

The Commission said it had also received submissions relating to “land banking” which it defined as a supermarket purchasing land without an intention to develop it (or to develop it in a timely manner) in order to stop competitors establishing supermarkets on it.

Information provided to the Commission suggested Woolworths had interests in 110 sites intended for future supermarket use and Coles had interests in 42.

The Commission had not yet formed conclusions about whether land banking was occurring.

It said Coles and Woolworths had also acquired entire shopping centres, including those where competitors operated.

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. Government moves to tighten planning rules to stop land banking and boost supermarket competition – https://theconversation.com/government-moves-to-tighten-planning-rules-to-stop-land-banking-and-boost-supermarket-competition-240121

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

The Albanese government has indicated it will examine the visa status of protesters waving Hezbollah flags at pro-Palestine demonstrations in Sydney and Melbourne over the weekend.

Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said on Monday the government was asking authorities in the two states to “check the visa status of anyone who comes to their attention”.

“I won’t hesitate to cancel the visas of visitors to our country who are spreading hate,” Burke said.

In public comments at the start of Monday’s cabinet meeting, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said: “We’ve seen worrying signs over the weekend. We do not want people to bring radical ideologies and conflict here. Our multiculturalism and social cohesion cannot be taken for granted.”

Opposition spokesman James Paterson said those with Hezbollah flags who are on visas should have them cancelled and they should be deported.

“It’s a breach of the Commonwealth Criminal Code,” Paterson said. “In December last year, the parliament voted unanimously to amend the Commonwealth Criminal Code to make it an offence to display either a Nazi logo or symbol or the symbol of a listed terrorist organisation, and that includes Hezbollah.”

The Australian Federal Police late Monday said it was expecting at least six “reports of crime” from Victoria Police allegedly involving prohibited symbols and chants, that were being investigated by the AFP for potentially breaching the Counter-Terrorism legislation.

“The mere public display of a prohibited symbol on its own does not meet the threshold of a Commonwealth offence,” the AFP said.

“The Criminal Code set outs very specific elements that must be met in order to charge an individual with a prohibited symbol offence.

“The prohibited symbol must be displayed in circumstance where the conduct involves: spreading ideas based on racial superiority or hatred; inciting others to offend or intimidate a person; advocating hatred of a person; advocating inciting others to offend, intimidating or using force or violence against a person or group based upon their race, religion or nationality; or is likely to offend, insult or intimidate people because of a defining characteristic.”

Meanwhile, the government has appointed Aftab Malik, a New South Wales public servant who has worked on promoting social cohesion and countering extremism, as its special envoy to combat Islamophobia.

The announcement comes following a long search, and well after the appointment of a special envoy to combat antisemitism, Jillian Segal.

Albanese and Burke said in a statement Malik, who was born in in Britain to Pakistani parents, is “recognised as a global expert on Muslim affairs by the UN Alliance of Civilisations”.

He has served as the senior advisor to the Abu Dhabi Forum for Promoting Peace, and as a board advisor to the British Council’s “Our Shared Future” project, headquartered in Washington DC.

Albanese and Burke said the appointment was part of the government’s strategy “to ensure all Australians feel safe and included”.

Malik will engage with members of the Muslim community, experts on religious discrimination and all levels of government, in combatting Islamophobia. He is appointed for three years and will report to both Albanese and Burke.

Malik said antisemitism and Islamophobia were “not mutually exclusive – where there is one, you will most likely find the other”.

The appointment was immediately criticised by the Australian Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN).

APAN said these envoys “which single out particular experience of racism for special government investment and attention, failed to address the increasingly frequent and severe forms of racism experienced by Palestinians – not all of whom are Muslims – First Nations peoples and other marginalised communities”.

“APAN calls on the federal government to dissolve both special envoy roles and instead engage in evidence-based, systemic anti-racism efforts that support the entire Australian community in eliminating racism and bigotry.”

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. Hezbollah flag-carriers investigated by police, as government appoints envoy to combat Islamophobia – https://theconversation.com/hezbollah-flag-carriers-investigated-by-police-as-government-appoints-envoy-to-combat-islamophobia-240114

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Milton Speer, Visiting Fellow, School of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, University of Technology Sydney

Water flows in mainland Australia’s most important river system, the Murray-Darling Basin, have been declining for the past 50 years. The trend has largely been blamed on water extraction, but our new research shows another factor is also at play.

We investigated why the Darling River, in the northern part of the basin, has experienced devastating periods of low flow, or no flow, since the 1990s. We found it was due to a decrease in rainfall in late autumn, caused by climate change.

The research reveals how climate change is already affecting river flows in the basin, even before water is extracted for farm irrigation and other human uses.

Less rain will fall in the Darling River catchment as climate change worsens. This fact must be central to decisions about how much water can be taken from this vital natural system.

A quick history of the Darling

The Darling River runs from the town of Bourke in northwest New South Wales, south to the Murray River in Victoria. Together, the two rivers form the Murray-Darling river system.

The Indigenous name for the Darling River is the Baaka. For at least 30,000 years the river has been an Indigenous water resource. On the river near Wilcannia, remnants of fish traps and weirs built by Indigenous people can still be found today.

The Darling River was a major transport route from the late 19th to the early 20th century.

In recent decades, the agriculture industry has extracted substantial quantities of water from the Darling’s upstream tributaries, to irrigate crops and replenish farm dams. Water has also been extracted from Menindee Lakes, downstream in the Darling, to benefit the environment and supply the regional city of Broken Hill.

A river in trouble

Natural weather variability means water levels in the Darling River have always been irregular, even before climate change began to be felt.

In recent years, however, water flows have become even more irregular. This has caused myriad environmental problems.

At Menindee Lakes, for example, fish have died en masse – incidents experts say is ultimately due to a lack of water in the river system.

Periods of heavy rain in recent years have dramatically improved water flows.

But in between those episodes, water levels and quality have declined, due to factors such as droughts, expanded water extraction, salinity and pollution from farms.

Compounding the droughts, smaller flows that once replenished the system have now greatly reduced. Our research sought to determine why.

What we found

We examined rainfall and water flows in the Darling River from 1972 until July 2024. This includes from the 1990s – a period when global warming accelerated.

We found a striking lack of short rainfall periods in April and May in the Darling River from the 1990s. The reduced rainfall led to long periods of very low, or no flow, in the river.

Since the 1990s under climate change, shifts in atmospheric circulation have generated fewer rain-producing systems. This has led to less rain in inland southeast Australia in autumn.

The river system particularly needs rainfall in the late autumn months, to replenish rivers after summer.

The periods of little rain were often followed by extreme floods. This is a problem because the rain fell on dry soils and soaked in, rather than running into the river. This reduced the amount of water available for the environment and human uses.

In addition to the fall in autumn rainfall, we found the number of extreme annual rainfall totals for all seasons has also fallen since the 1990s.

We also examined monthly river heights at Bourke, Wilcannia and Menindee. We found periods of both high and low water levels before the mid-1990s. But the low water levels at all three locations from 2000 onwards were the lowest in the period.

Ensuring water for all

Australia is the driest inhabited continent on Earth. Ensuring steady water supplies for human use has always been challenging.

Falls in Darling River water levels in recent decades have largely been attributed to water extraction for farm dams, irrigation and town use.

But as our research shows, the lack of rainfall in the river catchment – as a result of climate change – is also significant. The problem will worsen as climate change accelerates.

This creates a huge policy challenge. As others have noted, the Murray-Darling Basin Plan does not properly address climate change when determining how much water can be taken by towns and farmers.

Both the environment and people will benefit from ensuring the rivers of the basin maintain healthy flows into the future. As our research indicates, this will require decision-makers to consider and adapt to climate change.

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. New research reveals why the mighty Darling River is drying up – and it’s not just because we’re taking too much water – https://theconversation.com/new-research-reveals-why-the-mighty-darling-river-is-drying-up-and-its-not-just-because-were-taking-too-much-water-239923

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hamish Bradley, Adjunct Lecturer, Anaesthetist and Aeromedical Retrieval Specialist, The University of Western Australia

From the creeks that wind through inner city Melbourne to the far outback in Western Australia, snake season is beginning.

Over the cooler months snakes have been in state of brumation. This is very similar to hibernation and characterised by sluggishness and inactivity. As warmer conditions return both snakes and humans become more active in the outdoors, leading to an increased likelihood of interaction. This may happen when people are hiking, dog-walking or gardening.

The risk of being bitten by a snake is exceptionally small, but knowing basic first aid could potentially save your, or another person’s, life.

When a snake bites

Snake bite envenomation (when venom enters the blood stream) is a significant issue in Australia, with 3,000 cases annually and an average of two deaths.

Snake bite should always be treated as a life-threatening emergency, and if you are bitten in rural or remote Australia, you will often receive an air medical emergency pick up to a regional or metropolitan hospital for advanced care.

The effects of snake bites vary, depending on the species of snake and first aid measures undertaken.

Australian standard first aid guidelines include:

• calling for help (dialing 000 or activating an emergency beacon)
• applying a pressure immobilisation bandage
• resting.

Why pressure is important

Snake venom is carried within the lymphatic system. This is a collection of tiny tubes throughout the body that return fluid outside of blood vessels back to the blood stream.

Muscles act as a “pump” to help the fluid move through this system. That’s why being still, or immobilisation, is vital to slow the spread of venom.

A firm pressure immobilisation bandage, applied as tight as you would for a sprained ankle, will compress these tubes and help limit the venom’s spread.

Ideally bandage the entire limb on which the bite occurred and apply a splint to help further with immobilisation. It is very important that the blood supply to the limb is not limited by this bandage.

Never attempt to capture or kill the snake for identification. This risks further bites and is not required for specialist care. The decision about when to give antivenom (if any) is based on the geographical location, symptoms, the results of blood tests and discussion with a toxicologist.

The tyranny of distance

People living in rural and remote locations may also have limited access to health care, including access to ambulance services, snake bite first aid such as bandages and splints, and to antivenom.

Availability and the prompt use of antivenom have been identified as crucial factors in the effective treatment of snake envenomation – but not studied in detail.

Over one year (as a component of a larger three-year study) we collected information on the pre-hospital care and in-flight care with the Royal Flying Doctors Service Western Operations.

During this time, 85 people from regional, rural, remote and very remote Western Australia were flown by Royal Flying Doctor Service to hospital for suspected or confirmed snake bites. Reassuringly, only five of these patients (6%) ultimately received a toxicologist’s diagnosis of envenomation.

To move or not to move?

Troublingly, 38 (45%) of the 85 snake bite victims continued to move around and be active following their suspected snake bite. This raises questions about whether people lack knowledge of first-aid guidelines, or whether this is a consequence of being isolated, with limited access to health care.

Either way, our as-yet-unpublished research highlights the vulnerability of Australia’s rural and remote people. All patients eventually received a pressure immobilisation bandage, with an average time from bite to application of 38 minutes. Three quarters of the patients made their way to health-care site by foot, or private car, arriving on average 65 minutes after the bite.

Read more:
Breakthroughs and setbacks on the hunt for a universal snakebite antivenom – podcast

What needs to change?

Our results indicate rural and remote Australians need innovative health-care solutions beyond the metropolitan guidelines, particularly when outside ambulance service areas.

Basic snake bite first aid education needs to be not only reiterated but also a pragmatic approach is required in these geographically isolated locations. This would involve being vigilant, staying safe and, when isolated, always carrying emergency technology to call for help.

The authors wish to acknowledge the efforts required through this research project as it continues, including by Fergus Gardiner, Kieran Hennelly, Rochelle Menzies, James Anderson, Alex McMillan and John Fisher. Hamish Bradley is an Aeromedical Retrieval Specialist and Principal Investigator in this project.

Alice Richardson receives funding from NHMRC.

Breeanna Spring is affiliated with Australian College of Midwives, Australian College of Nursing.

Hamish Bradley 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. Snakes are waking up. What should you do if you’re bitten? And what if you’re a long way from help? – https://theconversation.com/snakes-are-waking-up-what-should-you-do-if-youre-bitten-and-what-if-youre-a-long-way-from-help-234365

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Breanna Lepre, Lecturer in Nutrition and Dietetics, The University of Queensland

More than 1.1 million Australians are estimated to be living with an eating disorder. Around one-third of these people are neurodivergent.

So why are neurodivergent people, such as autistic people and those with ADHD, more likely to experience eating disorders than the broader population? And how does this impact their treatment?

First, what is neurodivergence?

Neurodivergence, or the state of being neurodivergent, is a term for people whose cognitive functioning differs from what society considers “typical”. Many conditions broadly fall under neurodivergence, including (but not limited to):

• autism
• attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
• dyslexia
• Tourette’s syndrome.

Our understanding of neurodivergence has come a long way. Neurodivergence used to be considered a linear “spectrum” ranging from less to more neurodivergent.

We now know every neurodivergent person will have a unique experience across a range of dimensions. This includes sensory processing, motor abilities and executive functioning (working memory, cognitive flexibility and inhibition).

Conceptualising these differences ends up looking more like a colour wheel.

What are eating disorders?

Eating disorders are complex and potentially life-threatening mental health conditions. They cause persistent and significant disturbances in thoughts, feelings and behaviours related to body weight, food and/or eating.

Many factors are likely to contribute to the development of an eating disorder. But research shows neurodivergent people are disproportionately affected.

One review found around 22.9% of autistic people had an eating disorder, compared with 2% in the general population. In another review, people with ADHD were four times more likely to be diagnosed with an eating disorder than people without ADHD.

Why are eating disorders more common among neurodivergent people?

Science has not pinpointed an exact reason why eating disorders are more common among neurodivergent people. But here’s what we know so far.

Neurodivergent people are more likely to experience feeding difficulties, sensory sensitivities and disordered eating.

A United States study assessing the eating behaviour of neurodivergent children found around 70% of autistic children displayed “atypical” eating behaviours. This includes food selectivity and a hypersensitivity to food textures. It compares with 4.8% of neurotypical children.

Similarly, autistic children may choose or reject foods based on texture more than other children. They may prefer foods with a consistent texture, bland taste and neutral colour (for example, chicken nuggets, plain pasta and rice).

Selective eating (having limited accepted foods and food aversions) has been associated with avoidant/restrictive food intake disorder (ARFID). This is an eating disorder characterised by avoidance and aversion to food and eating that is not related to body image. ARFID is commonly associated with autism, with one study estimating 21% of autistic people will experience it in their lifetime.

Other neurodivergent traits, such as perfectionism and a preference for routine, have been associated with disordered eating and eating disorders.

Research on adolescent girls found those with anorexia nervosa are more likely to exhibit neurodivergent (in this case, autistic) traits and behaviours. These include developing rules, resistance to change and a hyperfocus on body weight. These features are commonly seen in anorexia nervosa, an eating disorder characterised by restricted food intake, an intense fear of weight gain and body image disturbances.

Meanwhile, impulsivity symptoms in ADHD have been associated with binge eating disorder. This can involve recurrent episodes of eating large amounts of food in a short period of time. Impulsivity may also be linked to bulimia nervosa, characterised by compensatory behaviours to prevent weight gain after binge eating (such as exessive exercise).

Some studies indicate a link between ADHD, alexithymia (difficulty experiencing, identifying and expressing emotions) and overeating behaviours such as emotional eating.

Finally, neurodivergent people are more likely to identify as part of the LGBTQIA+ community, experience trauma and also have a mental health condition. Each of these considerations increases the likelihood someone will experience an eating disorder.

How does this affect treatment?

Despite the overlap between eating disorders and neurodivergence, current treatment approaches don’t meet the diverse needs of those affected.

Eating disorder treatment often has moderate success at best. For neurodivergent people, the outcomes are worse than for their neurotypical counterparts.

Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), a broad range of treatments based on the interaction between thoughts, feelings and behaviours, is less beneficial for neurodivergent people. Yet this is often part of treatment for eating disorders. Autistic women have suggested CBT is less accessible due to its blanket approach and the assumption they have the skills needed to benefit.

There have been calls from organisations such as the National Eating Disorders Collaboration and lived experience advocates to improve access to neurodiversity-affirming care models for neurodivergent people affected by eating disorders.

Such care recognised and safely accommodates the multiple ways neurodivergence is related to feeding and eating behaviour.

Research suggests eating disorder treatment can be successfully adapted for neurodivergent people based on the following principles:

1. equal partnership. Including neurodivergent people as equal partners in their care and as decision-makers, and elevating their own experiences

2. embracing and celebrating differences. Neurodivergent traits should not be considered a deficit, or something to be “treated” or “fixed”. Rather, neurodivergent traits should be celebrated to nourish a positive sense of identity

3. accommodations. Neurodivergent traits and preferences are respected and accommodated. As an example, this might include reducing sensory inputs (the smell, sounds and lights) in a dining area, or a meal plan that is predictable and considers a person’s sensory sensitivities.

Treatment for eating disorders should also be gender-affirming (interventions that support and affirm someone’s gender identity) and trauma-informed.

If this article has raised issues for you, free resources and support is available from the Butterfly National Helpline by calling 1800 ED HOPE (1800 33 4673), or by visiting Eating Disorders Neurodiversity Australia or Autism Connect.

Breanna Lepre works for The University of Queensland and is a member of Dietitians Australia. Breanna is neurodivergent and has lived experience of an eating disorder.

Lauren Ball works for The University of Queensland and receives funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council, Queensland Health and Mater Misericordia. She is a Director of Dietitians Australia, a Director of the Darling Downs and West Moreton Primary Health Network and an Associate Member of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences.

– ref. Autistic people and those with ADHD are more likely to have eating disorders. Here’s why – and how this affects their treatment – https://theconversation.com/autistic-people-and-those-with-adhd-are-more-likely-to-have-eating-disorders-heres-why-and-how-this-affects-their-treatment-238759

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lucy Sparrow, Lecturer in Human-Computer Interaction, The University of Melbourne

Imagine scrolling through social media or playing an online game, only to be interrupted by insulting and harassing comments. What if an artificial intelligence (AI) tool stepped in to remove the abuse before you even saw it?

This isn’t science fiction. Commercial AI tools like ToxMod and Bodyguard.ai are already used to monitor interactions in real time across social media and gaming platforms. They can detect and respond to toxic behaviour.

The idea of an all-seeing AI monitoring our every move might sound Orwellian, but these tools could be key to making the internet a safer place.

However, for AI moderation to succeed, it needs to prioritise values like privacy, transparency, explainability and fairness. So can we ensure AI can be trusted to make our online spaces better? Our two recent research projects into AI-driven moderation show this can be done – with more work ahead of us.

Negativity thrives online

Online toxicity is a growing problem. Nearly half of young Australians have experienced some form of negative online interaction, with almost one in five experiencing cyberbullying.

Whether it’s a single offensive comment or a sustained slew of harassment, such harmful interactions are part of daily life for many internet users.

The severity of online toxicity is one reason the Australian government has proposed banning social media for children under 14.

But this approach fails to fully address a core underlying problem: the design of online platforms and moderation tools. We need to rethink how online platforms are designed to minimise harmful interactions for all users, not just children.

Unfortunately, many tech giants with power over our online activities have been slow to take on more responsibility, leaving significant gaps in moderation and safety measures.

This is where proactive AI moderation offers the chance to create safer, more respectful online spaces. But can AI truly deliver on this promise? Here’s what we found.

‘Havoc’ in online multiplayer games

In our Games and Artificial Intelligence Moderation (GAIM) Project, we set out to understand the ethical opportunities and pitfalls of AI-driven moderation in online multiplayer games. We conducted 26 in-depth interviews with players and industry professionals to find out how they use and think about AI in these spaces.

Interviewees saw AI as a necessary tool to make games safer and combat the “havoc” caused by toxicity. With millions of players, human moderators can’t catch everything. But an untiring and proactive AI can pick up what humans miss, helping reduce the stress and burnout associated with moderating toxic messages.

But many players also expressed confusion about the use of AI moderation. They didn’t understand why they received account suspensions, bans and other punishments, and were often left frustrated that their own reports of toxic behaviour seemed to be lost to the void, unanswered.

Participants were especially worried about privacy in situations where AI is used to moderate voice chat in games. One player exclaimed: “my god, is that even legal?” It is – and it’s already happening in popular online games such as Call of Duty.

Our study revealed there’s tremendous positive potential for AI moderation. However, games and social media companies will need to do a lot more work to make these systems transparent, empowering and trustworthy.

Right now, AI moderation is seen to operate much like a police officer in an opaque justice system. What if AI instead took the form of a teacher, guardian, or upstander – educating, empowering or supporting users?

Enter AI Ally

This is where our second project AI Ally comes in, an initiative funded by the eSafety Commissioner. In response to high rates of tech-based gendered violence in Australia, we are co-designing an AI tool to support girls, women and gender-diverse individuals in navigating safer online spaces.

We surveyed 230 people from these groups, and found that 44% of our respondents “often” or “always” experienced gendered harassment on at least one social media platform. It happened most frequently in response to everyday online activities like posting photos of themselves, particularly in the form of sexist comments.

Interestingly, our respondents reported that documenting instances of online abuse was especially useful when they wanted to support other targets of harassment, such as by gathering screenshots of abusive comments. But only a few of those surveyed did this in practice. Understandably, many also feared for their own safety should they intervene by defending someone or even speaking up in a public comment thread.

These are worrying findings. In response, we are designing our AI tool as an optional dashboard that detects and documents toxic comments. To help guide us in the design process, we have created a set of “personas” that capture some of our target users, inspired by our survey respondents.

We allow users to make their own decisions about whether to filter, flag, block or report harassment in efficient ways that align with their own preferences and personal safety.

In this way, we hope to use AI to offer young people easy-to-access support in managing online safety while offering autonomy and a sense of empowerment.

We can all play a role

AI Ally shows we can use AI to help make online spaces safer without having to sacrifice values like transparency and user control. But there is much more to be done.

Other, similar initiatives include Harassment Manager, which was designed to identify and document abuse on Twitter (now X), and HeartMob, a community where targets of online harassment can seek support.

Until ethical AI practices are more widely adopted, users must stay informed. Before joining a platform, check if they are transparent about their policies and offer user control over moderation settings.

The internet connects us to resources, work, play and community. Everyone has the right to access these benefits without harassment and abuse. It’s up to all of us to be proactive and advocate for smarter, more ethical technology that protects our values and our digital spaces.

The AI Ally team consists of Dr Mahli-Ann Butt, Dr Lucy Sparrow, Dr Eduardo Oliveira, Ren Galwey, Dahlia Jovic, Sable Wang-Wills, Yige Song and Maddy Weeks.

Dr Lucy Sparrow receives funding from the eSafety Commissioner’s Preventing Tech-Based Abuse Against Women grant program for the “AI Ally” project.

Dr Eduardo Oliveira receives funding from the eSafety Commissioner’s Preventing Tech-Based Abuse Against Women grant program for the “AI Ally” project.

Dr Mahli-Ann Butt receives funding from the eSafety Commissioner’s Preventing Tech-Based Abuse Against Women grant program for the “AI Ally” project.

– ref. Online spaces are rife with toxicity. Well-designed AI tools can help clean them up – https://theconversation.com/online-spaces-are-rife-with-toxicity-well-designed-ai-tools-can-help-clean-them-up-239590

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne

The US presidential election will be held on November 5. In analyst Nate Silver’s aggregate of national polls, Democrat Kamala Harris leads Republican Donald Trump by 49.3–46.0 – a slight widening of the competition since last Monday, when Harris led Trump by 49.2–46.2.

President Joe Biden’s final position before his withdrawal as Democratic candidate on July 21 was a national poll deficit against Trump of 45.2–41.2.

There will be a debate on Tuesday evening US time between the vice-presidential candidates, Democrat Tim Walz and Republican JD Vance. Vice-presidential debates in previous elections have not had a significant influence on the contest.

The US president isn’t elected by the national popular vote, but by the Electoral College, in which each state receives electoral votes equal to its federal House seats (population based) and senators (always two). Almost all states award their electoral votes as winner-takes-all, and it takes 270 electoral votes to win (out of 538 total).

The Electoral College is biased to Trump relative to the national popular vote, with Harris needing at least a two-point popular vote win in Silver’s model to be the Electoral College favourite.

In Silver’s polling averages, Harris leads Trump by one to two points in Pennsylvania (19 electoral votes), Michigan (15), Wisconsin (ten) and Nevada (six). If Harris wins all these states, she is likely to win the Electoral College by at least a 276–262 margin. Trump is ahead by less than a point in North Carolina (16 electoral votes) and Georgia (16), and if Harris wins both, she wins by 308–230.

In Silver’s model, Harris has a 56% chance to win the Electoral College, up from 54% last Monday but down from her peak of 58% two days ago. Earlier this month, there were large differences in win probability between Silver’s model and the FiveThirtyEight model, which was more favourable to Harris. But these models have nearly converged, with FiveThirtyEight now giving Harris a 59% win probability.

There are still more than five weeks until election day, so polls could change in either Trump’s or Harris’ favour by then. Harris’ one to two point leads in the key states are tenuous, and this explains why Trump is still rated a good chance to win.

Silver wrote on September 1 that polls in 2020 and 2016 were biased against Trump, but polls in 2012 were biased against Barack Obama. In the last two midterm elections (2022 and 2018), polls have been good. It’s plausible there will be a polling error this year, but which candidate such an error would favour can’t be predicted.

On Sunday, Silver said if there was a systematic error of three or four points in the polls in either Trump’s or Harris’ favour, that candidate would sweep all the swing states and easily win the Electoral College. There are other scenarios in which one candidate underperforms the polls with some demographics but overperforms with other demographics.

I wrote about the US election for The Poll Bludger last Thursday, and also covered bleak polls and byelection results in Canada for the governing centre-left Liberals ahead of an election due by October 2025, a dreadful poll for UK Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer, the new French prime minister, a German state election and a socialist win in Sri Lanka’s presidential election.

Upwardly revised economic data

Last Thursday, a revised estimate of June quarter US GDP was released. There was a large upward revision in real disposable personal income compared to the previously reported figures. This has resulted in the personal savings rate being revised up to 4.9% in July from the previously reported 2.9%, and it was 4.8% in August.

With these upward revisions, Silver’s economic index that averages six indicators is now at +0.25, up from +0.09. As the incumbent party’s candidate, a better economy than was previously believed should help Harris.

Coalition gains narrow lead in Essential

In Australia, a national Essential poll, conducted on September 18–22 from a sample of 1,117 people, gave the Coalition a 48–47 lead (including undecided voters) after a 48–48 tie in early September. It’s the Coalition’s first lead in the Essential poll since mid-July.

Primary votes were 35% Coalition (steady), 29% Labor (down one), 12% Greens (down one), 8% One Nation (steady), 2% UAP (up one), 9% for all Others (up one) and 5% undecided (steady).

Anthony Albanese’s net approval was up five points since August to –5, with 47% disapproving and 42% approving. Peter Dutton’s net approval was down one to net zero.

On social media regulations, 48% thought them too weak, 43% about right and 8% too tough. By 67–17, voters supported imposing an age limit for children to access social media (68–15 in July). By 71–12, voters supported making doxing (the public release of personally identifiable data) a criminal offence (62–19 in February).

By 49–18, voters supported Labor’s Help to Buy scheme, and by 57–13 they supported the build-to-rent scheme. The questions give detail that few voters would know.

Voters were told the Liberals and Greens had combined to delay Labor’s housing policies in the senate. By 48–22, voters thought the Liberals and Greens should pass the policies and argue for their own policies at the next election, rather than block Labor’s policies. Greens voters supported passing by 55–21.

Labor keeps narrow lead in Morgan

A national Morgan poll, conducted September 16–22 from a sample of 1,662 people, gave Labor a 50.5–49.5 lead, unchanged from the September 9–15 Morgan poll.

Primary votes were 37.5% Coalition (steady), 32% Labor (up 1.5), 12.5% Greens (steady), 5% One Nation (down 0.5), 9.5% independents (down 0.5) and 3.5% others (down 0.5).

The headline figure is based on respondent preferences. By 2022 election preference flows, Labor led by an unchanged 52–48.

Adrian Beaumont 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. Kamala Harris the slight favourite to win US election as she narrowly leads in key states – https://theconversation.com/kamala-harris-the-slight-favourite-to-win-us-election-as-she-narrowly-leads-in-key-states-239735

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alister McKeich, Lecturer and Researcher in Law, Criminology and Indigenous Studies, Victoria University, Victoria University

The onslaught in the Middle East has brought to the world’s attention once again the “crime of crimes”, genocide.

Both the the International Court of Justice and International Criminal Court (ICC) have brought allegations of genocide against Israel as a state and Israeli and Hamas leaders as individuals.

The Australian government’s response to the Gaza crisis has included temporarily freezing of A$6 million of funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine. Though funding has been flowing again since March, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has been referred to the ICC by a law firm for being “an accessory to genocide”.

Against this backdrop, Australia’s own genocide legislation is under parliamentary scrutiny. A bill tabled by independent Senator Lidia Thorpe (for whom I work as a casual legal researcher) seeks to change the way Australia deals with genocide.

So what do our current laws say and what’s the case for changing them?

What do our laws say?

Australia ratified the Genocide Convention in 1949.

Yet it was not until 2002, once the ICC was established, that the Commonwealth Criminal Code was amended to create a new division of atrocity crimes.

Through this legislation, Australia may prosecute any person accused of a Rome Statute crime (such as genocide) under Australian law.

At the moment, written consent from the attorney-general is required before legal proceedings about genocide and other atrocity crimes can commence. This is called the “attorney-general’s fiat”.

Further, the attorney-general’s decision is final. It “must not be challenged, appealed against, reviewed, quashed or called into question”.

Thorpe’s bill seeks to overturn these two measures.

The explanatory memorandum in the 2002 amendment did not say why the attorney-general’s consent was necessary.

Consent from an attorney-general (or similar position) is not an international requirement.

Australia is only one of a handful of other countries (including the United Kingdom, New Zealand and Canada) where the fiat also exists.

Why is it a problem?

The Australian government has justified the rule on the basis that prosecutions for atrocity crimes against individuals could affect Australia’s international relations and national security.

However, submissions from legal experts and community groups to a senate inquiry looking at the issue point out flaws.

They say this rule prevents access to justice for victims and survivors of atrocity crimes. It can also create the potential for government bias.

Submissions also say the lack of explanation or appeal process ignores fundamental principles of jurisprudence.

Has the rule been used?

The attorney-general’s fiat has been used in a limited number of cases.

In 2009, Palestinian rights groups Australians for Palestine issued a request for consent for the prosecution of former Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert, who was visiting at the time.

The Australian Centre for International Justice states in its submission how then-attorney-general Robert McClellend denied the request. He cited matters of international state sovereignty and the difficulties of pursuing such a case in an overseas jurisdiction.

Then, in 2011, Arunchalam Jegastheeswaran, an Australian citizen of Tamil
background, sought the attorney-general’s consent for the prosecution of then Sri Lankan President, Mahinda Rajapaksa, who was due to visit Australia.

McClellend again denied the request, saying Rajapaska was protected under “head of state immunity”. This concept is controversial in international law, given it’s often heads of state who commit atrocity crimes.

Head of state protection was also offered to former Myanmar (Burma) leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who was in government when the 2017 genocide against the Rohingya was committed.

With Suu Kyi due to be in Australia for an ASEAN conference in 2018, the Australian Rohingya community sought a prosecution. It was denied by then attorney-general Christian Porter.

And in 2019, retired Sri Lankan General Jagath Jayasuriya visited Australia. Despite concerted efforts to raise evidence to prosecute Jayasuriya of war crimes, delays with the Australian Federal Police meant the case never reached the point of attorney-general consent.

First Nations plaintiffs such as Paul Coe and Robert Thorpe have also sought to bring cases of genocide before the domestic courts, with no success.

What would changing the laws mean?

As it’s unlikely an attorney-general would consent to prosecutions against its own government, submissions to the inquiry argue the rule creates a direct conflict of interest.

For First Nations people seeking justice for crimes of “ongoing genocide” perpetuated by the Commonwealth, any government is hardly going to rule in their favour.

Some Indigenous community groups argue the high rates of First Nations children in protection, deaths in custody, hyper-incarceration and cultural, land and environmental damage amount to genocide crimes.

Submissions to the inquiry recommend instead of requiring the consent of the attorney-general, claims of genocide should be directed to the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions. This would ensure greater independence from government.

The director has a mandate for this sort of work. It already investigates similar crimes such as people smuggling, human trafficking, slavery and child exploitation.

Internationally, the implications of this bill, if passed, will be consequential. The Australian Centre for International Justice estimates up to 1,000 Australian citizens have returned to Israel to fight as part of the Israel Defense Forces. Israel has been accused of serious atrocity crimes in Gaza.

Should any of those citizens return, there could be attempts to mount a case. The government would then have to consider Australia’s political and economic ties with Israel.

Whether the bill is passed will depend on parliament. But the situation highlights a paradox: the state itself will be deciding whether to remove its own inbuilt protections against charges of genocide.

Alister McKeich is a casual legal researcher with the office of Senator Lidia Thorpe.

– ref. Can Australia prosecute foreigners for genocide overseas? Here’s how our atrocity laws work – https://theconversation.com/can-australia-prosecute-foreigners-for-genocide-overseas-heres-how-our-atrocity-laws-work-236394

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Justin Keogh, Associate Dean of Research, Faculty of Health Sciences and Medicine, Bond University

The development of “superhuman” strength and power has long been admired in many cultures across the world.

This may reflect the importance of these physical fitness characteristics in many facets of our lives from pre-history to today: hunting and gathering, the construction of large buildings and monuments, war, and more recently, sport.

Potentially, the current peak of human strength and power is demonstrated in the sport of strongman.

What is strongman?

Strongman is becoming more common, with competitions now available at regional, national and international levels for men and women of different ages and sizes.

Read more:
Strongman used to be seen as a super-human novelty sport. Now more women and novices are turning to it

Strongman training and competitions typically involve a host of traditional barbell-based exercises including squats, deadlifts and presses but also specific strongman events.

The specific strongman events – such as the vehicle pull, farmer’s walk, sandbag/keg toss or stones lift – often require competitors to move a range of awkward, heavy implements either higher, faster or with more repetitions in a given time period than their competitors.

Researching one of the greats

Strongman has enjoyed substantial growth and development since the introduction of the World’s Strongest Man competition in the late 1970s.

However, from a scientific perspective, there are few published studies focusing on athletes at the elite level.

In particular, very little is currently known about the overall amount of muscle mass these athletes possess, how their mass is distributed across individual muscles and to what extent their tendon characteristics differ to people who are not training.

However a recent study sought to shed some light on these extreme athletes. It examined the muscle and tendon morphology (structure) of one of the world’s strongest ever men – England’s Eddie Hall.

Measuring an exceptionally strong person such as Hall – who produced a 500kg world record deadlift and won the “World’s Strongest Man” competition in 2017 – provided the opportunity to understand what specific muscle and tendon characteristics may have contributed to his incredible strength.

What can we learn from a single case study?

A limited number of athletes reach the truly elite level of strongman and even fewer set world records or win premier events.

Because it’s so difficult to recruit even a small group of such rare athletes, conducting a case study with one elite strongman provided a unique opportunity to understand more about his muscle and tendon characteristics.

Case studies have many limitations, including an inability to determine cause and effect or generalise findings to other individuals from the same group.

However, the study of Hall was insightful, as his muscle and tendon results could be compared directly with various groups from the authors’ earlier published research.

These groups included untrained people, people who have regularly resistance trained for several years, and competitive track sprinters.

The inclusion of these comparative populations allowed meaningful interpretation of what makes Hall’s muscle and tendon characteristics so special.

What they found

Hall’s lower body muscle size was almost twice that of an untrained group of healthy active young men.

And the manner in which his muscle mass was distributed across his lower body exhibited a very specific pattern.

Three long thin muscles, referred to as “guy ropes”, were particularly large (some 2.5 to three times bigger) compared to untrained people.

The guy rope muscles connect to the shin bone via a shared tendon and provide stability to the thigh and hips by fanning out and attaching to the pelvis at diverse locations.

Highly developed guy rope muscles would be expected to offer enhanced stability with heavy lifting, carrying and pulling.

Hall’s thigh (quadriceps) muscle structure was more than twice that of untrained people, yet the tendon at the knee that is connected to this muscle group was only 30% larger than an untrained population.

This finding indicates muscle and tendon growth, within this case of extreme quadriceps muscle development, do not occur to the same extent.

What do the results mean?

The obvious implication is, the larger the relevant muscles, the greater the potential for strength and power.

However, sports like strongman and even everyday activities like climbing stairs, carrying groceries and lifting objects off the ground require the coordinated activity of many stabilising muscles as well as major propulsive muscles such as the quadriceps.

While Hall’s quadriceps were substantially bigger than untrained people, the largest relative differences occurred in the calves and the long thin “guy rope” muscles that help stabilise the hip and knee.

These results pose a question about whether additional or more specific training for these smaller muscles may further enhance strength and power.

This could benefit strongman athletes as well as everyday people.

Also, the relatively small differences in tendon size between Hall and untrained populations suggests tendons do not grow to the same extent as muscles do.

As muscular forces are transmitted through tendons to the bones, the substantially greater growth of muscle than tendon may mean athletes such as Hall have a greater relative risk of tendon than muscle injury.

This view is somewhat consistent with the high proportion of tendinitis and strains reported in strength sport athletes, including strongman and weightlifters.

Justin Keogh is the Associate Dean of Research, Faculty of Health Sciences and Medicine, Bond University, an exercise scientist and a former strongman competitor.

Tom Balshaw is a Lecturer in Kinesiology, Strength and Conditioning employed by Loughborough University

– ref. Scientists recently studied the body of one of the world’s strongest men. This is what they found – https://theconversation.com/scientists-recently-studied-the-body-of-one-of-the-worlds-strongest-men-this-is-what-they-found-238873

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Martie-Louise Verreynne, Professor in Innovation and Associate Dean (Research), The University of Queensland

Humans are increasingly engaging with wearable technology as it becomes more adaptable and interactive. One of the most intimate ways gaining acceptance is through augmented reality (AR) glasses.

Last week, Meta debuted a prototype of the most recent version of their AR glasses – Orion. They look like reading glasses and use holographic projection to allow users to see graphics projected through transparent lenses into their field of view.

Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg called Orion “the most advanced glasses the world has ever seen”. He said they offer a “glimpse of the future” in which smart glasses will replace smartphones as the main mode of communication.

But is this true or just corporate hype? And will AR glasses actually benefit us in new ways?

Old technology, made new

The technology used to develop Orion glasses is not new.

In the 1960s, computer scientist Ivan Sutherland introduced the first augmented reality head-mounted display. Two decades later, Canadian engineer and inventor Stephen Mann developed the first glasses-like prototype.

Throughout the 1990s, researchers and technology companies developed the capability of this technology through head-worn displays and wearable computing devices. Like many technological developments, these were often initially focused on military and industry applications.

In 2013, after smartphone technology emerged, Google entered the AR glasses market. But consumers were disinterested, citing concerns about privacy, high cost, limited functionality and a lack of a clear purpose.

This did not discourage other companies – such as Microsoft, Apple and Meta – from developing similar technologies.

Looking inside

Meta cites a range of reasons for why Orion are the world’s most advanced glasses, such as their miniaturised technology with large fields of view and holographic displays. It said these displays provide:

compelling AR experiences, creating new human-computer interaction paradigms […] one of the most difficult challenges our industry has ever faced.

Orion also has an inbuilt smart assistant (Meta AI) to help with tasks through voice commands, eye and hand tracking, and a wristband for swiping, clicking and scrolling.

With these features, it is not difficult to agree that AR glasses are becoming more user-friendly for mass consumption. But gaining widespread consumer acceptance will be challenging.

A set of challenges

Meta will have to address four types of challenges:

1. ease of wearing, using and integrating AR glasses with other glasses
2. physiological aspects such as the heat the glasses generate, comfort and potential vertigo
3. operational factors such as battery life, data security and display quality
4. psychological factors such as social acceptance, trust in privacy and accessibility.

These factors are not unlike what we saw in the 2000s when smartphones gained acceptance. Just like then, there are early adopters who will see more benefits than risks in adopting AR glasses, creating a niche market that will gradually expand.

Similar to what Apple did with the iPhone, Meta will have to build a digital platform and ecosystem around Orion.

This will allow for broader applications in education (for example, virtual classrooms), remote work and enhanced collaboration tools. Already, Orion’s holographic display allows users to overlay digital content and the real world, and because it is hands-free, communication will be more natural.

Creative destruction

Smart glasses are already being used in many industrial settings, such as logistics and healthcare. Meta plans to launch Orion for the general public in 2027.

By that time, AI will have likely advanced to the point where virtual assistants will be able to see what we see and the physical, virtual and artificial will co-exist. At this point, it is easy to see that the need for bulky smartphones may diminish and that through creative destruction, one industry may replace another.

This is supported by research indicating the virtual and augmented reality headset industry will be worth US$370 billion by 2034.

The remaining question is whether this will actually benefit us.

There is already much debate about the effect of smartphone technology on productivity and wellbeing. Some argue that it has benefited us, mainly through increased connectivity, access to information, and productivity applications.

But others say it has just created more work, distractions and mental fatigue.

If Meta has its way, AR glasses will solve this by enhancing productivity. Consulting firm Deloitte agrees, saying the technology will provide hands-free access to data, faster communication and collaboration through data-sharing.

It also claims smart glasses will reduce human errors, enable data visualisation, and monitor the wearer’s health and wellbeing. This will ensure a quality experience, social acceptance, and seamless integration with physical processes.

But whether or not that all comes true will depend on how well companies such as Meta address the many challenges associated with AR glasses.

Martie-Louise Verreynne receives funding from the ARC and NHMRC.

– ref. Meta has launched the world’s ‘most advanced’ glasses. Will they replace smartphones? – https://theconversation.com/meta-has-launched-the-worlds-most-advanced-glasses-will-they-replace-smartphones-240023

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Dennis Del Favero, ARC Laureate Fellow and executive director, iCinema Research Centre, UNSW Sydney

As summer approaches, the threat of bushfires looms. Earlier this month, an out-of-control blaze in Sydney’s northern beaches burnt more than 100 hectares of bushland, threatening nearby homes.

Climate change is making bushfires larger, hotter and faster. Previously unthinkable catastrophes, such as the “Black Summer” megafires in Australia in 2019/2020 and the ones that ravaged Maui, Hawaii, in August 2023, are becoming more common.

Firefighters put their lives on the line to battle these fires. Yet many are not meaningfully and comprehensively prepared to respond to erratic and extreme conflagrations. This increases their chances of being injured, or worse. It may also hinder their ability to make the best decisions.

To help address this, the University of New South Wales’ iCinema Research Centre has created iFire. This cutting-edge training system allows firefighters and emergency responders to virtually teleport into a burning landscape and train for the real thing. It could revolutionise the way we prepare for other natural disasters as well.

Megafires are becoming more common

The rate of extreme fire events has doubled over the past decade. These fires can combine with the atmosphere to produce their own weather systems, generating multiple fire fronts. As the planet continues to warm, this situation will only get worse.

Much current research is focused on understanding these worsening fire threats. This is vital. But data and charts don’t meaningfully prepare firefighters for how to respond to such extreme, unanticipated fires.

“Experiential preparedness” is the missing element.

It helps firefighters prepare by virtually experiencing and rehearsing how to respond to real and future extreme fires through immersive scenarios. This can be done in a large-scale, three-dimensional cinema or on a smart tablet or phone.

Simulating the fireground

The iFire collaboration builds on iCinema’s award-winning iCasts immersive training system for mine workers.

Since it was developed in 2008, iCasts has exposed and trained thousands of miners and planners in simulations of known threats before they go underground. This has resulted in a dramatic reduction in serious injuries at Australian mine sites and many lives saved.

iFire takes a similar approach. It uses a combination of mathematical modelling of actual fires provided by CSIRO’s Data61 research institute, advanced visualisation and artificial intelligence (AI) tools to recreate immersive simulations of three real case studies: a pine plantation fire, a grass fire and the 2020 Bridger-Foothills fire in the United States.

The system puts fire crews in the centre of these simulated firegrounds using immersive cinematic scenarios. The crews feel as though they are physically present. They can experience the fire from any point of view – aerial or on the ground – at any point in time, and interactively engage with it.

Importantly, the scenarios are not static reproductions of past events. Fire crews and incident commanders can adjust variables to experience the influence of changes in conditions. For example, they can change the air temperature or wind direction and see how this affects the dynamic behaviour of the fire in real time.

This allows them to better perceive risks and practise making key decisions in preparation for when they are on the actual firegrounds and under enormous pressure to act fast.

A more advanced system

iFire is already in the hands of those who need it. It has recently been installed at the Fire and Rescue NSW Emergency Services Academy in Sydney using a 130‑degree, three-dimensional, cinematic theatre.

The UNSW iCinema Centre and Fire and Rescue NSW will use iFire to develop training modules for frontline response. These modules will provide simulations where fire crews practise how to be situationally aware in the face of an unpredictable fire situation. They learn how to make the best decisions in managing the unfolding fire.

But the iFire team is working towards building a more advanced AI system that learns the underlying and unforeseen patterns of fire behaviour to create more precise and detailed simulations of these unpredictable fires.

This will enable incident commanders and firefighters to engage with unanticipated fireground threats and better prepare to protect people and property under threat from flames.

The longer-term goal is that the iFire system will ultimately enable firefighters on a tablet or any other smart screen device in any location to experience the look and feel of a possible future fire scenario in real time. This won’t be as immersive, but it will be effective for use in the field when managing a fire and will improve tactical and strategic responses.

Although iFire has been specially designed for firefighters, the technology behind it can be tweaked for many purposes. For example, it can be used to help better train and prepare emergency service workers for other natural disasters such as floods and earthquakes.

Dennis Del Favero receives funding from Australian Research Council Laureate Fellowship

Michael J. Ostwald receives funding from the ARC.

Yang Song 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. A new immersive cinema is helping firefighters to better prepare for megafires – https://theconversation.com/a-new-immersive-cinema-is-helping-firefighters-to-better-prepare-for-megafires-235892

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Esperanza Martinez, Professor of Practice and Head of Health and Human Security, College of Health and Medicine, Australian National University

The head of the World Health Organization (WHO), Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, has warned attacks on health-care workers, patients and facilities “must not become the norm”.

Yet reports from wars across the world frequently show hospitals being bombed and health workers being attacked.

The increased use of explosive weapons in densely populated areas makes the problem worse as they cause widespread harm to civilians and critical infrastructure, including health facilities. Whether these attacks are targeted or seen as “collateral damage”, there is growing concern they are becoming an accepted part of armed conflict – although they violate protections granted under international law.

But are these attacks on health care truly increasing, or are we just getting better at documenting them? More importantly, is the world beginning to see them as normal?

What does the data show?

Collecting accurate data in war zones is challenging. Many attacks on health care go unreported due to fear of reprisals or the dangers involved in gathering information. In some cases, releasing data can be sensitive, as conflicting parties may use it to sway public opinion or escalate tensions.

Despite these challenges, organisations have been tracking attacks on health care for years, including the WHO, the Safeguarding Health in Conflict Coalition (SHCC) and the International Committee of the Red Cross. Their reports show an increase in both the frequency and systematic targeting of health care in certain regions.

The latest SHCC report shows last year was the deadliest for health-care workers since reporting began a decade ago. In 2023, 480 health-care workers were killed during armed conflict – nearly double the previous year.

Between January and September 2024, the WHO has confirmed almost 700 attacks against healthcare facilities and staff in Ukraine and the Occupied Palestinian Territory alone. This has led to more than 500 injuries and nearly 200 deaths among patients and health workers.

In Sudan and Myanmar, hospitals and clinics continue to be targeted, leaving millions without access to basic care.

This violence can lead to near collapse of health-care systems. For example, by January 2024, 84% of health facilities in Gaza had been damaged or destroyed. This leaves people without essential care, worsens chronic conditions and allows diseases to spread unchecked.

The laws that protect health care

The Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Additional Protocols form the backbone of International Humanitarian Law, protecting health workers, hospitals and patients during armed conflict. These laws were established after the second world war to ensure that, even in times of war, people can access medical care without fear of attack. Any deliberate targeting of medical services is a violation of international law and, in some cases, a war crime.

Today, every recognised state in the world has committed to complying with these laws. In 2016, the United Nations Security Council also adopted a resolution which condemns attacks on health care and calls for stronger action to ensure compliance.

Yet attacks on health care continue. Some of the most serious examples have occurred in recent armed conflicts, where hospitals and clinics have been directly targeted, often without consequences for the attackers. Earlier this year, Ukraine asked the International Criminal Court to investigate attacks against a children’s hospital in Kyiv.

The persistence of these attacks raises concerns about whether the issue is weak enforcement of the laws or whether the laws themselves need updating for modern warfare.

Some legal and medical experts argue the laws aren’t strong enough, especially with the rise of non-state armed groups such as militias. Others believe the laws are adequate but are not properly enforced.

There are growing calls from humanitarian and human rights organisations for stronger accountability, including the involvement of the International Criminal Court and national courts. Others propose a broader, more systematic approach that treats attacks on health care as a public health issue, not just a legal one.

Are attacks on health care becoming normalised?

One of the most concerning aspects of this trend is the potential normalisation of such attacks, meaning people might begin to see them as an inevitable part of war.

When hospitals are bombed or ambulances are destroyed without any punishment for the perpetrators, it sends the message health-care workers and patients are acceptable targets. This creates an environment where entire populations may feel there is no safe place to seek care when they need it the most.

Modern conflicts, involving non-state armed groups such as militias – as we’ve seen in Haiti and the Central African Republic – contribute significantly to this issue. These groups often do not adhere to international law.

However, even governments have been accused of attacking health-care facilities despite being parties to the Geneva conventions, including attacks on hospitals by Israel in Gaza, Saudi Arabia in Yemen and the United States in Afghanistan.

When these incidents are not met with strong consequences, it sets a dangerous precedent.

Immediate and long-term impacts

The immediate impact of these attacks is clear and devastating: people injured in conflict or suffering from illnesses can’t get the care they need. Health workers, who are often first responders, are directly targeted, reducing the availability of essential care.

The destruction of hospitals also disrupts routine services such as childbirth and vaccinations, leading to preventable deaths and increasing the risk of disease outbreaks. Outbreaks of mpox in the Democratic Republic of Congo and polio in Gaza have worsened because health workers can’t safely reach affected areas, and necessary supplies have been destroyed.

In the longer term, these attacks gravely affect individuals with chronic conditions such as diabetes, cancer or heart disease, which become life-threatening without treatment. Additionally, people are more likely to leave places without health-care services, which contributes to displacement.

Finally, such attacks erode trust in hospitals and clinics, causing fear around seeking medical help. Over time, this can discourage people from getting care, creating ripple effects that harm entire communities and set back global health progress.

Esperanza Martinez is an advisor to the WHO Foundation and the Global Health Center of the Geneva Graduate Institute. She worked for the International Committee of the Red Cross in various senior roles from 2015 to 2023.

– ref. Attacks on health care during war are becoming more common, creating devastating ripple effects – https://theconversation.com/attacks-on-health-care-during-war-are-becoming-more-common-creating-devastating-ripple-effects-237484

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brianna Chesser, Associate Professor in Criminology and Justice, RMIT University

In October 2023, a Victorian woman, Elodie Aldridge, was driving home from a midwife appointment when her car was hit by a four-wheel drive. Aldridge was 34 weeks pregnant with her son, Remi. She suffered significant injuries including a broken wrist, hip and pelvis. Her son Remi died in utero.

Under current laws in most states and territories, the life of an unborn child is legally indistinguishable from that of the mother. In Victoria, the only criminal charge available for such an offence is “serious injury to the mother”.

If this crash had occurred 50 minutes north in New South Wales, Remi would have been recognised as a legal person and there would have been a separate criminal charge for his death.

Attempts to change these laws in Victoria were recently rejected by parliament. Here’s why these laws should be changed across the country.

When are you legally a person?

Under Australian law, a life is recognised at the point when there is independence from the mother. This means the child becomes a legal person when the child can take its first independent breath, otherwise known as the “born alive rule”. Therefore, unless the child can take an independent breath, the child is not recognised as a legal person and therefore cannot be deemed a victim of the crime of murder or manslaughter.

This legal position is reflected in most jurisdictions in Australia. Victoria, the ACT, the Northern Territory, South Australia, Tasmania and Western Australia do not recognise the life of an unborn child as being separate from that of its pregnant mother.

As a result, any harm done to an unborn child in any of the above jurisdictions could only result in the charge of causing serious harm to the mother.

But it’s a different situation under administrative law. The parents can legally be granted a birth and death certificate for the child. So while there are records of a life created and lost, the criminal law doesn’t see the unborn child as a person.

Legislators and legal scholars in these jurisdictions appear reluctant to recognise the life of the unborn child in utero.

There are fears that doing so will negatively impact reproductive rights or could result in liability for a pregnant mother.

Legal and medical professionals have argued that such laws could have unintended consequences (particularly in jurisdictions where abortions are not legalised) by creating a tension between the rights of the woman to autonomy and self-determination and the rights of the unborn child.

This, in turn, could lead to further marginalisation of vulnerable and disadvantaged women, as has been seen internationally.

While the philosophical issues are unavoidable, the recognition of the legal personhood of an unborn child in particular circumstances need not be in conflict with existing women’s rights and reproductive laws.

The proposed law in Victoria, for example, should only be applied in narrow circumstances: involving the criminal (unlawful) intervention by a third party (not the mother) that results in the death of an unborn child where the child was above 20 weeks gestational age or more than 400 grams in weight.

Exceptions to the rule

There are some states that have made changes.

In 2021, some 12 years after the laws were first introduced to parliament, NSW passed laws that imposed tougher penalties for crimes that result in the loss of an unborn child.

“Zoe’s law” was proposed after Brodie Donegan, then 32 weeks pregnant with Zoe, was hit by a drunk driver on Christmas Day in 2009. The then Attorney-General Mark Speakman said:

these laws give recognition to the unborn children that are lost due to third party criminal acts.

Two offences were subsequently added the NSW Crimes Act: causing the loss of a fetus and causing the death of a pregnant woman.

The death of an unborn child adds an additional charge and penalty of three years more than the maximum penalty under the first offence.

The recognition of the unborn child as a legal person also means the woman or her family members can give victim impact statements in court, and the name of the unborn child can be included on the indictment.

Queensland has also enacted similar laws, although they don’t go quite as far.

Sarah Milosevic was 39 weeks pregnant with Sophie when her car was hit by a driver under the influence in 2014. Sophie died a few days later as a result of injuries sustained in the crash.

The driver was charged and found guilty, but the penalty was a $950 fine. Sophie’s mother campaigned tirelessly for legal change and in September 2023 “Sophie’s law” was passed.

Courts in Queensland are now required to treat the death of an unborn child as an aggravating factor during the sentencing of offenders. The aim is to ensure harsher sentences.

This is in addition to the Queensland Criminal Code, which makes it a crime to unlawfully assault a pregnant woman causing her to lose the child.

While this amendment stops short of recognising unborn children as legal people, it’s at least a step in the right direction.

Call for change

Before the crash, Aldridge had just learned that her son had fully formed lungs. He could arrive healthily any time. She described the heartbreak of discovering Remi wasn’t considered a human being in the eyes of the criminal law.

Failing to recognise the legal status of a unborn child who is killed this way creates significant hardship for families. They’re often already lost in layers of contradictory legal bureaucracy at a very difficult time.

If there can be recognition of legal personhood under administrate law but not under the criminal law, then the legal balance is off and requires readjusting.

NSW faced the same philosophical and moral debates and has been able to pass legislation that successfully addresses concerns. Other states and territories should take note and follow suit.

Legal personhood in Australia should not be determined by postcode.

Brianna Chesser 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. In parts of Australia, unborn babies aren’t legally seen as people. Here’s why that needs to change – https://theconversation.com/in-parts-of-australia-unborn-babies-arent-legally-seen-as-people-heres-why-that-needs-to-change-239591

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Patrick Finnerty, Postdoctoral research fellow in conservation, University of Sydney

When dead animals are left lying around in nature, who takes advantage of the free feed – carnivores or herbivores? The answer may surprise you.

In Australia, people tend to think carnivores – such as dingoes, ravens, foxes and wedge-tailed eagles – lead the clean-up crew.

But our new research shows common brushtail possums – often thought to be herbivores – also dine on animal carcasses.

Understanding when and where brushtail possums scavenge is important. It can improve our knowledge of how carcasses are disposed of in nature, and how nutrients cycle through ecosystems.

Seeking a nutritious meal

Scavenging may provide specific essential nutrients otherwise lacking in herbivore diets.

Carcasses often contain much greater levels of crude protein than leafy greens do. Similarly, chewing on bones, may increase the intake of calcium and phosphorus, two key minerals essential for growth.

Scavenging on carrion may also help herbivores meet nutritional requirements in regions where typical food resources may be restricted during some seasons. Similarly, in times of drought, thirst may also drive herbivores to scavenge in an attempt to extract fluids from carcasses.

Though it may seem gruesome, scavenging is crucial to healthy ecosystems. Clearing carcasses from the landscape by feeding them back into food chains recycles nutrients into living systems.

Our previous research has found native marsupial herbivores feasting on the dead.

In alpine Australia, possums accounted for 61% of all recorded carcass scavenging – a proportion far surpassing species more typically considered carcass consumers.

In our latest research, we wanted to understand the factors that influence carrion consumption by brushtail possums in different ecosystems.

What we did

We monitored fresh eastern grey kangaroo carcasses across both alpine (Kosciuszko National Park) and temperate (Wolgan Valley, Greater Blue Mountains National Park) regions in New South Wales. We also compared sites in both open (grassland with no canopy cover) and closed (woodland) habitats, in cool and warm seasons.

At each carcass, we used a remote camera “trap” to record scavenging behaviours.

We found possums were one of the main scavengers, often feeding from carrion more than typical scavengers such as dingoes and ravens.

Possum scavenging rates varied by habitat and season. Regardless of region, possums scavenged exclusively in closed canopy habitats under the trees, probably for protection from predators and other scavengers such as dingoes, red foxes, and wedge-tailed eagles.

Out in the cold

Possum scavenging activity varied according to the season.

In temperate regions, possums scavenged only in winter when other food resources were limited.

In alpine areas, where food is scarce even in summer, possums scavenged year-round. But they still ate more from carcasses in cooler months. This may be necessary for possums to get the nutrition they need when other normal food resources — such as leaves, flowers and fruit — are limited.

Competition between scavengers may also change with the seasons. For example, in alpine regions, we saw fewer large scavengers such as dingoes in winter, possibly reducing competition and making it easier for possums to access carrion.

During warmer months, insect activity increases. These tiny scavengers often start eating a carcass within minutes of its death, accelerating its decomposition. It means animals such as possums have less time to feed on the carrion.

Flexible ‘herbivores’ around the world

Previous research has shown many herbivore diets are more flexible than previously thought. All over the world, certain plant-eaters have been found scavenging on animal remains – especially when other food sources are limited, such as during drought or after fire.

In Africa, hippopotamuses were found to have consumed flesh from the carcasses of other animals. In the United States, white-tailed deer fed on discarded fish.

Similarly, on a small island off Cape Town, introduced European fallow deer ate dead rabbits. On the Eurasian tundra (treeless plains), reindeer devoured lemming carcasses. In Italy, crested porcupine ate dead pigeons.

These are all still primarily herbivorous animals, they just happen to dip into carcass resources when they need to.

Improving our understanding of ‘bloody hungry’ herbivores

Our study found brushtail possums are an important scavenging species across several Australian ecosystems. It also highlights how scavenging can vary with a region, season and habitat.

Understanding the unusual foraging behaviour of the common brushtail possum could also help inform more effective wildlife management. Specifically, understanding how carcasses can support possum populations during cooler months in places like New Zealand, where they are considered an invasive pest, may lead to more effective control measures.

Our methods could also help scientists understand herbivore scavenging in other environments. This may provide valuable insights into complexities of food webs and how nutrients move through ecosystems.

This research was funded by the Australian Alps Co-Operative Management Program, Australia and Pacific Science Foundation, Australian Geographic, and the Ecological Society of Australia Holsworth Wildlife Endowment Fund. This research also received support from the Australian Government’s National Environmental Science Program through the Threatened Species Recovery Hub and the Australian Academy of Science Margaret Middleton Fund for Endangered Species.

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. ‘Vegetarian’ possums eat meat when the weather’s cold – https://theconversation.com/vegetarian-possums-eat-meat-when-the-weathers-cold-231825

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Breunig, Professor of Economics and Director, Tax and Transfer Policy Institute, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University

Australia’s tax system is needlessly complex, and that’s making it costly in ways that aren’t obvious.

New research from our team at the Australian National University’s Tax and Transfer Policy Institute, in the Journal of Public Economics, has identified one of the unexpected ways it is wasting our time, and found pretty clear evidence of tax evasion along the way – evidence the Tax Office will be able to use.

Here’s what we did.

Examining 27 years of de-identified individual tax files, we noticed a striking number of returns generating “round number” refunds.

By “round number”, I mean refunds whose last digit is zero.

Zeros are exceptionally popular

We found, for instance, far more refunds of exactly $1,000 than of $999 or $995, or even $1,005 or $1,015.

This phenomenon was particularly striking at zero (many fewer people got refunds of slightly less than zero, which would have meant they owed money) and also apparent at tens and hundreds as well as thousands.

Zeros matter: the number of taxpayers getting each refund

Analysing what the returns with round numbers had in common, we found they were more likely than other returns to be

• driven by efforts to evade and minimise tax rather than simply earn income

• driven by things that are costly for the Tax Office to audit (such as work-related expense deductions).

• prepared by agents (zeros were twice as common in agent-prepared returns)

Next, we matched our data about zeros with data from the Tax Office’s random audit program. We found that, when audited, returns with round number refunds were significantly more likely to be wrong. Specifically, they were more likely to overstate the refund that was owed.

More than a quirky preference

This suggests round number refunds are not just a quirky preference – they signal something going on, most likely something going wrong.

That “something” seems to be the manipulation of claims that are costly to verify, principally work-related expense deductions and business income.

Expense deductions and business income are significantly larger in returns with round number refunds than in those without.

It is important to note we found some tax agents got round number returns a lot while others did it very little or not at all.

More like evasion than planning

When taxpayers switch from “low-rounding” to “high-rounding” agents, we see a one-off hike in the returns those people receive, with no further increases thereafter.

This is likely to mean that agents who specialise in round-number returns are not working with their clients over time to rearrange their affairs to minimise tax or to better document legitimate deductions.

Were that the case, we would see the value of these returns increase over time.

This makes the behaviour of these agents more consistent with tax evasion than tax planning.

We can fight it, or use it as a tool

One simple response to this abuse would be to remove many of the deductions and lower tax rates for everyone.

Another would be to copy the United States and offer all taxpayers a large “standard deduction”, inviting only those that want a larger one to go to the effort of itemising their claims. (The US standard deduction is currently US$14,600 for singles and US$29,200 for couples filing jointly.)

In the meantime, the Tax Office might be able to put our findings to good use.

It could identify the clients the agents who get round number returns as targets for audits. They are more likely than others to be improperly claiming.

In the longer term, this strategy won’t work as well. The agents who have been delivering round number returns will become aware that their clients are being targeted and change their behaviour.

This means that after a while nothing will work as well as tax reform. It would save taxpayers time and make the system more fair for everyone.

Nathan Deutscher and Steve Hamilton coauthored the study on which this article is based.

Robert Breunig receives funding from the Australian Research Council, the Australian Treasury and the Australian Taxation Office.

– ref. Rounding up: how our research used round numbers to zero in on tax evasion – https://theconversation.com/rounding-up-how-our-research-used-round-numbers-to-zero-in-on-tax-evasion-239927

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Heather L. Robinson, Research Associate in Cultural Studies, Flinders University. "Beyond the Books: Culture, value, and why libraries matter" will be published late 2024 through Wakefield Press., Flinders University

The past few months has seen the sudden departure of leadership from some of the country’s most prestigious artistic companies: the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, Queensland Ballet, Queensland Theatre, Opera Australia and the Adelaide Festival.

These women cited various reasons for leaving, from job opportunities in government, to funding issues, to disagreements with artists and the board.

It certainly seems like a difficult time for arts organisations and their boards.

Australia’s arts and cultural sector has suffered decades of ongoing funding cuts and, until recently, lack of policy direction. Now, the cost of living crisis means participation in arts and culture is seen as a luxury.

Boards and companies become more risk-averse within these tightened financial constraints.

This may be behind the departure of Leanne Benjamin from Queensland Ballet in July. Her appointment as artistic director only six months prior was celebrated as a “perfect fit”.

She described her reasons for her shock exit as:

Ultimately, as we have worked together to design a vibrant season for 2025, it has become very clear that my artistic aspirations for our company […] is not immediately possible within the funding constraints faced by the company.

Jo Davies was Opera Australia’s first female artistic director, coming on board in December 2022. By August 2024, she described:

a real difference of opinion on how [Opera Australia] should balance its artistic ambitions with its commercial imperative.

Opera Australia chair Rod Sims put it more bluntly:

Obviously any artistic director wants free rein to spend whatever they want and do whatever they want, and that must also always go through a financial filter, in any arts company.

A volunteer board

Emotions can run high in arts companies, where (underpaid) staff and (unpaid) volunteers donate their time, expertise and passion to deliver experiences for their audiences.

While some arts boards in Australia are paid an honorarium, most arts organisations are headed by volunteer-run boards. The makeup of boards has also been changing. Recent decades have seen an increase of leaders from the corporate sector on arts boards, especially on those that are government-appointed.

Research shows most board members enjoy their association with arts companies. However, arts consultant Kate Larsen has found that 58% of members of Australian arts boards “do not understand what their organisations need from them at all”.

Board members tend to come from very different socioeconomic and professional backgrounds than paid members of staff, and have limited exposure to the day-to-day running of an arts company.

They do, however, carry the weight of responsibility for the company’s big-picture strategic and financial directions.

Perhaps this is the mismatch we’re seeing between boards and arts leaders such as Benjamin and Davies.

Capturing what we value

There are three different facets to what we know as “cultural value”: intrinsic value, instrumental value and institutional value. I believe we are currently seeing an imbalance between these three types of value.

Intrinsic value is the intellectual, emotional and spiritual value of experiencing culture for audiences and artists.

Instrumental values are the coincidental impacts or effects, usually recorded in numbers, such as an increase in tourist visits or mental health outcomes. Often embedded in cultural policy, instrumental impacts are given greater weight than artistic outcomes in evaluation and acquittals for government funds.

Institutional value reflects how cultural institutions and organisations relate to and engage with their public over the long term, becoming active agents in the creation or destruction of what the public values.

We are currently witnessing a clashing of priorities.

At Queensland Ballet and Opera Australia, we’ve seen a mismatch between the financial priorities of the board and the artistic priorities of leadership. The storm at the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra can be seen as a risk-averse team, sensitive to current political concerns, overreacting in the absence of board support.

I believe we are seeing a diminishing of institutional value in many corners of the sector. Decades of funding cuts means arts companies and cultural institutions understandably step away from perceived risks to their relationships with audiences and sponsors, and make more conservative programming decisions.

This response limits the public’s opportunities to experience new works, and puts the core creative business of an arts company or institution at risk. Economic performance, rather than artistic endeavour, takes centre stage. If that is the whole company’s priority, all well and good. But at Opera Australia and Queensland Ballet, it seems this priority could have come at the expense of their artistic directors.

Uniting strong governance and artistic risk

No one wants our cultural sector hamstrung by instrumentality and shifting government policy flips. Arts companies and cultural institutions require ongoing support and public understanding of their role so they can be confident to take risks – artistically and financially – and provide the public with opportunities to learn, grow and embrace a diversity of cultures, people and experiences, within the safety of a theatre, gallery, concert hall or festival.

To fulfil their role as mediators and generators of knowledge and understanding for the public, companies must be equipped and backed up by their boards to deal with these responsibilities.

A job position description for the role of artistic director for Queensland Theatre describes the board as “an enabling force of strong governance”.

Arts companies and cultural institutions need the participation and support of an army of advocates, audiences and ambassadors across the community to survive. There are promising steps being made at the federal level to enable artistic vision and courageous leadership for the Australian cultural sector – but there is still a long way to go.

This is both the challenge and opportunity facing everyone across all levels of the Australian cultural sector, and they have to face it together.

Heather L. Robinson 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 behind the spate of arts leadership departures in Australia? Perhaps a mismatch of values – https://theconversation.com/whats-behind-the-spate-of-arts-leadership-departures-in-australia-perhaps-a-mismatch-of-values-238583

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amanda Niland, Lecturer in Early Childhood, University of Sydney

Good girl! Good boy!

Parents, relatives and teachers say these phrases all the time and mean them positively.

They may use it when a child puts on their shoes when asked, when they draw something interesting, or get a maths question correct.

But this kind of language may not always be healthy or helpful. One issue is it doesn’t actually give children clear feedback on what they just did or said.

What could you say instead?

Praise and parenting

Praise has been seen as a key part of raising children for decades. In the 1950s, influential US psychologist B.F. Skinner believed rewards, including praise, positively reinforce desired behaviours.

In the 1970s, amid rising interest in self-esteem, psychologists and other child development experts emphasised the importance of praising children.

But since the 2000s, psychology research has moved away from seeing self-esteem, and hence praise, as central to a child’s wellbeing.

Early childhood education has similarly shifted towards children having a positive sense of identity instead. This means children having a sense of safety, belonging and capability, rather than a strong opinion of themselves.

Nevertheless, praise is still frequently mentioned in popular advice to parents.

Different kinds of praise

Some psychology researchers have defined praise as either informational (telling children about their strengths and actions) or evaluative (telling children whether or not they are good enough).

In a similar vein, US psychologist Carol Dweck categorises praise as “person praise” or “process praise”.

Person praise focuses on stable characteristics such as personality or appearance. Process praise focuses on behaviours or effort directed towards achieving an outcome, such as learning to ride a bike or a baby taking first steps.

Research has found person praise can decrease young children’s motivation to challenge themselves and lead to feelings of helplessness if they fail.

In contrast, a long-term study of children whose mothers used process praise showed these children were more likely to be confident in preschool and later in primary school.

Process praise is informational, giving children feedback on their efforts and strategies in achieving an outcome (“I can see by your puffing how hard you ran in that race”). Person praise tends to be evaluative, often where there is little possibility for change, or only after success (“What a winner!”).

Seeking approval or seeking improvement?

More broadly, constant praise may mean children unconsciously feel they are doing things for adult approval, rather than for themselves.

This can work against the development of self-regulation and a healthy sense of identity.

Adults who over-praise (particularly evaluative or person-focused praise) may assume children need external rewards to do the right thing. This doesn’t enable children to make good choices on their own.

Recent research suggests inflated praise, using words such as “incredible”, “amazing” and “wonderful”, can foster narcissistic traits by causing children to have an unrealistic sense of their own competence.

This can lead children to become upset or angry at failure, partly because they perceive their worth to be conditional on meeting adults’ standards. So, counterintuitively, inflated praise can lower self-esteem.

The gender question

“Good girl/boy” also raises other issues around gender identity and self-esteem.

Research involving adults found men are more likely to see praise as informational (reflecting their competence) whereas women are more likely to see praise as evaluative (implying their need to conform to set ways of behaving).

Studies of children that compared boys’ and girls’ responses to praise also found girls tended to respond more negatively to evaluative praise.

While some of this research is decades old and done in the United States, it is interesting to think about why this might be, and whether it relates to how we socialise children into gender roles. What kind of unconscious messages are we communicating through our praise?

What should parents be doing instead?

Three principles can support a healthy approach to praising kids.

1. Give children realistic feedback about their behaviour or actions. For example, “Well done. I can see you’re trying there with your kicks” as opposed to “Amazing kicking! You’re a superstar!”

2. Focus on children’s own learning or improvement rather than on competing with others For example, “Next time, when you play that piece, how about trying it faster?” rather than “That wasn’t as quick as Sophia can play it”.

3. Use praise that shows children they are valued regardless of what they may or may not do. For example, “Well done! I know you studied every day for this test” as opposed to “You’re Dad’s straight-A angel!”

These approaches all support confidence, empathy and resilience in children – qualities we all need in our complex world.

Amanda Niland 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. Parents say ‘good girl’ and ‘good boy’ all the time. Here’s why you should try and say something else – https://theconversation.com/parents-say-good-girl-and-good-boy-all-the-time-heres-why-you-should-try-and-say-something-else-238893

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

The budget surplus for last financial year has come in at $15.8 billion, well exceeding the $9.3 billion that was forecast in the May budget.

Treasurer Jim Chalmers, just back from talks in Beijing on China’s economic outlook, will announce the result on Monday.

The government says the better-than-forecast outcome has been driven entirely by lower spending. Revenue was also lower than the budget anticipated. Areas of savings included the National Disability Insurance Scheme, payments to the states, and various grant programs that don’t exist anymore.

This is the government’s second consecutive surplus. The May budget has predicted deficits for the coming years.

Across 2022-23 and 2023-24 the budget position has improved by a cumulative $172.3 billion, compared with what was forecast in the official Pre-election Economic and Fiscal Outlook, released immediately before the 2022 election.

The government says it has made $77.4 billion in savings, including $12.2 billion in 2023-24.

Payments were 25.2% of GDP in 2023-24. This compared to the PEFO forecast of 27.1%

Chalmers said this was the “first government to post back-to-back surpluses in nearly two decades”. The surpluses hadn’t come at the expense of cost-of-living relief, he said in a statement.

Speaking in Beijing on Friday Chalmers said it remained to be seen whether China’s just-announced stimulus measures would work.

“But we’ve seen on earlier occasions when the authorities here, the administration here, steps in to support activity in the economy that is typically a good thing for Australia – good for our businesses and workers, our industries, our investors, and good for the global economy as well.

“Like a lot of people around the world, we have been concerned about the softer conditions here in the Chinese economy. Subject to the details [of measures] that will be made public in good time, any efforts to boost growth and support activity here is a welcome one around the world and especially at home in Australia.”

Chalmers on Monday is likely to face further questions on the Treasury’s work on negative gearing, news of which leaked out last week.

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. Final budget outcome shows 2023-24 surplus of $15.8 billion – https://theconversation.com/final-budget-outcome-shows-2023-24-surplus-of-15-8-billion-240093

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Misha Ketchell, Editor, The Conversation

Today we removed an article titled “Should we ditch big exam halls? Our research shows how high ceilings are associated with a lower score”, because the original research has been found to contain errors and has been retracted by the academic journal that published it.

The Conversation’s article, published on July 3, 2024, was based on a study published online by The Journal of Environmental Psychology on June 26, 2024. It looked at the impact of ceiling heights on the exam performance of Australian students, and found that even after accounting for other factors such as age or past exam experience, higher ceiling heights were statistically correlated with poorer exam results.

After the study was published, a query from a reader of the journal article led the authors to review their calculations.

The authors discovered some honest errors in their work, leading them to conclude that the relationship between ceiling heights and exam score was “more nuanced” than presented in the paper.

The revised research manuscript was reviewed by the same anonymous peer-reviewers who looked at the original research. One reviewer did not feel comfortable assessing the statistical corrections, one advised against publishing the corrected manuscript, and a third recommended revisions.

On this basis, the Journal of Environmental Psychology rejected the amended version. The journal’s response can be found here.

The authors, lead by Isabella Bower, apologise for the error, and are working to resubmit their updated research to another journal.

The Conversation has decided that, in light of the current status of the research, the most appropriate option is to retract our coverage of the study. We are committed to providing accurate and reliable information, and to acknowledging errors in an open and transparent way when they occur.

– ref. Retraction: why we removed an article about a link between exam results and ceiling height – https://theconversation.com/retraction-why-we-removed-an-article-about-a-link-between-exam-results-and-ceiling-height-239930

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Parmeter, Research Scholar, Centre for Arab and Islamic Studies, Australian National University

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has claimed a major victory following the assassination of longtime Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, saying it would change “the balance of power in the region for years to come”.

This may be going further than the circumstances warrant, however. Certainly, the killing of Nasrallah is a remarkable personal victory for Netanyahu, who ordered the strike so he could claim direct responsibility for the action. And it goes a long way towards restoring the Israeli public’s faith in Netanyahu as a security guarantor for Israel.

But there are many questions that now follow this action. Will Israel, for example, launch a ground invasion against Hezbollah in Lebanon?

If it does, it would certainly find Hezbollah at its weakest point because of the destruction of its communications network in the Israeli attack on its pagers and walkie-talkies earlier this month.

Israel has also killed eight of Hezbollah’s nine most senior military commanders and about half of its leadership council.

To ensure this is a lasting victory, Israel really needs to follow up somehow. It needs to take the opportunity of Hezbollah’s disarray to destroy as much of the organisation and its arsenal of 150,000 missiles, rockets and drones as it can.

By the same token, Hezbollah would certainly be able to inflict serious losses on Israeli ground forces if they go into southern Lebanon, not least because Hezbollah is reported to have an extensive tunnel network in the border area.

And Hezbollah is a large organisation that claims to have as many as 100,000 fighters, though US intelligence believes it’s probably somewhere closer to 40,000–50,000. Even so, that is a formidable number of militants.

Hezbollah, however, does not want to get involved in further fighting with Israel at this stage, if it can avoid it. It’s significant that, even after Israel’s most recent attacks, Hezbollah has not been firing thousands of missiles, rockets and drones daily into Israel, which it is believed to be capable of doing.

Can Hezbollah regroup?

There is no doubt this is an unprecedented blow to Hezbollah’s leadership and to the organisation itself.

The first thing the group needs to do is re-establish its leadership. There are two names that have already been suggested: Hashem Safieddine, Nasrallah’s cousin, and Naim Qassem, Hezbollah’s deputy secretary-general.

Then, the new leadership needs to investigate how deeply Hezbollah has been penetrated by Israeli intelligence. The killing of Nasrallah and the explosion of the pagers and walkie-talkies illustrate that Israel has extraordinarily good intelligence on the internal workings of Hezbollah.

Lastly, Hezbollah has lost a lot of face in the eyes of the Lebanese public. Those in Lebanon who are against Hezbollah’s standing as a state within a state will oppose it even more now because they’ll say it’s simply not doing what it claims to do, which is protecting Lebanon from Israel.

Hezbollah has never faced a critical situation like this before. That’s why whoever takes over is going to have a massive job to re-establish its credibility as a fighting force.

But that said, it does have the capacity to re-establish itself because Hezbollah is a major organisation and very much a part of the Lebanese political scene. The Hezbollah-led coalition has a bloc of more than 60 seats in the Lebanese parliament – not a majority but significant nonetheless. It also provides social services for poor Shi’a residents in southern Beirut and southern Lebanon.

The other major question is whether Iran, Hezbollah’s military backer, will react to the killing of Nasrallah.

When Israel assassinated Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in July, Iran promised retaliation, but has not taken it yet.

After the US assassination of Qassem Soleimani, the commander of the Quds Force in the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, in Baghdad in 2020, Iran fired more than a dozen missiles at two bases in Iraq housing US troops, and that was it.

In April, its reaction to the Israeli killing of some Islamic Revolutionary Guard personnel in the Iranian consulate in Damascus, Syria, was more intense. Tehran launched about 300 missiles, drones and rockets at Israel. But it also telegraphed its retaliation well in advance, and Israel’s Iron Dome, with the help of US defensive support, was able to prevent any significant damage.

These recent reactions show it is clearly not in Iran’s interest to have a wider war take place at this time.

Read more:
Is Iran’s anti-Israel and American rhetoric all bark and no bite?

Where does the region go from here?

Hezbollah doesn’t have many friends in the Middle East, mainly because it is a militant group from the minority Shi’a sect of Islam, which has been seen as opposed to the interests of more moderate Sunni Arab states, including Egypt, Jordan and the Gulf states.

Essentially, there will be some quiet satisfaction among Sunni Arab leaders that Nasrallah has gone because he was seen as someone who could cause a great deal of trouble for the region.

Briefly, following the 2006 war between Hezbollah and Israel, Nasrallah was the most popular leader in the Arab world, according to opinion polls. That didn’t last very long, but he remained influential across the region.

The other aspect that would make Sunni Arab states and leaders quietly comfortable with the removal of Nasrallah and the disarray (if only temporary) of Hezbollah is that all the fighting in the Middle East – the war in Gaza and now the conflict in Lebanon – is causing anger at street level in countries such as Egypt, Jordan and others in the region. This makes the region more unstable – and Sunni leaders nervous.

At this stage, the elements that would be prepared to support Hezbollah are limited to the Houthi rebels in Yemen and Shi’a militia groups based in Iraq. But they’re both some distance away and aren’t able to materially affect the conflict in the region.

With Iran not wanting an all-out war in the region, it’s not likely its leaders will be encouraging these proxy groups to get involved in a situation that could get further out of hand.

So there are a lot of players who want to restore some sort of normality to the region. That includes the Biden administration, which fears the ongoing conflicts will divide the Democratic vote in the November US presidential election.

This plays into Netanyahyu’s hands, as he is able to act independently of US attempts to rein him in. Whatever he does, he will continue to receive US military support.

Read more:
Does Hezbollah represent Lebanon? And what impact will the death of longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah have?

Ian Parmeter 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. Benjamin Netanyahu is triumphant after Hassan Nasrallah’s assassination. But will it change anything? – https://theconversation.com/benjamin-netanyahu-is-triumphant-after-hassan-nasrallahs-assassination-but-will-it-change-anything-240090

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

Is the government seriously interested in changing arrangements on negative gearing? After days of questions to Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Treasurer Jim Chalmers, who would know?

They’ve engaged in obfuscation at every turn.

Today, Chalmers was asked, at a news conference in Beijing, whether he had told treasury to model reforms of the tax break for property investors.

He replied:

It is not unusual at all for governments or for treasurers to get advice on contentious issues which are in the public domain, including in the parliament. It is not unusual for treasurers to do that. But we have made it very clear through the course of this week that we have a broad and ambitious housing policy already and those changes aren’t part of it.

Not unreasonably, the Australian Financial Review took this as Chalmers owning the request to treasury. But his office contested the interpretation, insisting he’d said nothing he hadn’t said before – taking us back to the position that the request formally remains an orphan.

The story started earlier in the week with a report in the Nine papers that the government had asked treasury for work on options “to scale back negative gearing and capital gains tax concessions”. The report did not specify who’d done the asking, although Albanese later said it wasn’t him, and told reporters to quiz Chalmers instead.

That treasury is working on options has inevitably raised the suggestion that reforms to negative gearing is on the agenda, perhaps as an election commitment.

Given the government’s reaction, the story may have been a genuine “leak” rather than a deliberate balloon (although it’s often hard to be sure who’s holding the sting of balloons).

Anyway, it put Albanese in a very grumpy mood in his television interviews. Fancy journalists trying to insist on a straight answer when he kept dodging and coming up with, in today’s much-used term, “word salads”.

He stressed the government had no plans to change negative gearing. Then he got cross when it was pointed out it had had “no plans” to change the stage 3 tax cuts, until it did suddenly have a plan.

Does the history of the stage 3 change give us any clue to what’s going on here?

In that instance, Chalmers was the one wanting change as far back as soon after the 2022 election. Albanese held out, worried about what a broken promise would do to his reputation for integrity.

In the end, under the pressure of a looming byelection, change came this year. Although the shift was well received, we’re now seeing it did damage him on the integrity front – his word is not automatically believed, and his phrases are carefully parsed.

Thus when he was asked, “are you considering taking negative gearing reform and capital gains tax reform to the next election?” and he replied “No, we’re not”, this was not regarded as a definite “no”.

Could it be that Chalmers is again putting himself at the forefront of seeking to alter policy, while Albanese is equivocal or resisting?

If that is so, it reprises an old story that crosses governments: differences between a treasurer with strong views (Paul Keating, Peter Costello) and a leader (Bob Hawke, John Howard) who is politically more cautious.

If there is any substance to the theory of a difference between Chalmers and Albanese, the treasurer would be very frustrated with his boss for hosing down a change to negative gearing, to the extent he has. And Albanese would be very annoyed if he thought the treasurer was responsible, by seeking options, for landing him in this pickle.

There are strong views among experts about whether negative gearing should be scrapped or capped.

But given that making the change would not significantly add to the total supply of housing, it’s really about the politics.

The Greens are taking skin off Labor on the housing issue, as well as holding up two government housing bills in the Senate. The government is worried the Greens could successfully milk the issue at the election, especially with younger voters, many of whom see house prices rising further out of reach and rents badly stretching their budgets.

Labor is pouring billions into housing but the results are set to fall well short of the numbers needed.

Tackling negative gearing might be a “look over here” policy to undermine the Greens and attract the young. But it would be ripe for a fear campaign from the Coalition and, as Albanese says, it wouldn’t solve the problem of the inadequate supply of homes.

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: Albanese and Chalmers play cat-and-mouse on negative gearing with the public – and possibly with each other – https://theconversation.com/view-from-the-hill-albanese-and-chalmers-play-cat-and-mouse-on-negative-gearing-with-the-public-and-possibly-with-each-other-240020

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Louise Pryke, Honorary Research Associate, University of Sydney

Gilgamesh, a new opera from Opera Australia, Sydney Chamber Orchestra and Carriageworks, gives a visceral retelling of a story from a forgotten age, exploring ideas of love, tyranny and what it means to be human.

This new production reimagines the legend for 21st century audiences, while engaging cleverly with the epic’s timeless themes.

The young king, Gilgamesh (Jeremy Kleeman), starts out as a tyrant and goes on a journey to find the wisdom needed to become a just ruler.

Along the way, he meets his companion, Enkidu (a remarkable Mitchell Riley), a man born in the wilderness and civilised through two weeks of sex with the wise priestess Shamhat (Jessica O’Donoghue).

Together, Gilgamesh and Enkidu fight the monstrous forest guardian Humbaba (Daniel Szeisong Todd) and the mighty Bull of Heaven. They also unwisely provoke the beauteous goddess of love and war Ishtar (Jane Sheldon).

The heroes’ rash actions anger the gods, leading to Enkidu’s untimely death. Gilgamesh seeks eternal life and renewed youth, before finally returning home.

Read more:
Guide to the classics: the Epic of Gilgamesh

A rediscovered story

This production is the first English language opera of the Epic of Gilgamesh, a literary masterpiece from ancient Mesopotamia.

The story was first written down on clay tablets in the cuneiform script more than 4,000 years ago. Although Gilgamesh was famous in the ancient world, his story disappeared from cultural awareness along with the ability to read cuneiform around the 1st century CE.

In a feat of scholarly virtuosity, 19th century scholars deciphered the rediscovered cuneiform script, using a kind of Persian Rosetta Stone known as the Behistun monument.

In 1857, the Royal Asiatic Society held a kind of “cuneiform competition”, where scholars completed secret translations of a previously unseen inscription.

When their translations were found to be very similar, it was clear the secrets of the complex script had finally been unlocked.

Music and myth

In the 150 years since the Epic of Gilgamesh was rediscovered, the legend has inspired music spanning numerous genres, from hip hop, to Australian indie pop, to metal.

As with this new opera, many of these modern adaptations have focused on the loving relationship between the story’s two heroes, Gilgamesh and Enkidu. Their connection has been viewed as the world’s first bromance, or one of the oldest known love stories.

The opera leans into the transformative nature of heroes’ epic love: Enkidu’s wildman innocence is corrupted by Gilgamesh; Gilgamesh is emboldened by the presence of his lover.

There is much to admire in the approach to the text taken by composer Jack Symonds and librettist Louis Garrick.

At times, excerpts of text from an English translation of the epic are incorporated into the score. This use of ancient prose is particularly effective in the scene where Gilgamesh rudely rejects Ishtar’s marriage proposal; it would be difficult to create a more brutal polemic than that employed by Gilgamesh against the goddess in the ancient narrative.

At other times, new scenes and dialogue are crafted to draw deeper from the rich well of narrative ideas. This can be seen where Ishtar and Shamhat plan to civilise Enkidu (engineered by Gilgamesh in the original story), and a scene where Gilgamesh and Enkidu become lovers in the Cedar Forest.

The production

Kleeman gives a heroic turn as a man struggling to comprehend his mortality and his growing love for Enkidu.

Sheldon is divine as Ishtar the vengeful goddess of love, seamlessly blending the deity’s power and unpredictability.

As Utanapishti, the legendary flood survivor often compared with biblical Noah, Jessica O’Donoghue gives a haunting performance suited to one who has witnessed the destruction of most of humanity.

The set (design by Elizabeth Gadsby) uses as its centrepiece a Chinese elm tree with 1,000 gold fabric leaves, mirroring the combination of scale and simplicity seen in the narrative.

This reflects the creative team’s engagement with the epic’s ecological themes. The Cedar Forest is recognised in the original epic for its aesthetic and commercial value. Its destruction by the heroes is an act of sacrilege.

Directed by Kip Williams, Gilgamesh emphasises the violence of environmental destruction through the bloody death of the forest guardian Humbaba in a stomach-turning scene slippery with gore.

The love story between Gilgamesh and Enkidu is at the opera’s heart. Building on the intimate connection between the heroes in the ancient story, the two heroes sing songs of love together. Their vocal performances are matched with a dynamic physicality as they wrestle, embrace and cradle one another.

Those familiar with Gilgamesh will enjoy discovering where new creative directions have been taken in the opera. For those new to the story, the opera gives a vibrant introduction into the power and drama of one of the world’s most ancient masterpieces.

In the Babylonian legend, Gilgamesh finally abandons his quest for immortality. With this exciting new production of the epic, his ancient song of love and loss will continue to live on long into the future.

Gilgamesh,by Opera Australia, Sydney Chamber Orchestra and Carriageworks, is at Carriageworks, Sydney, until October 5.

Louise Pryke was a guest of the Gilgamesh production.

– ref. New Australian opera Gilgamesh captures the power of one of the world’s most ancient masterpieces – https://theconversation.com/new-australian-opera-gilgamesh-captures-the-power-of-one-of-the-worlds-most-ancient-masterpieces-237765

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sara Oscar, Senior Lecturer, Visual Communication, School of Design, University of Technology Sydney

In The Substance, the career of former actor Elisabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore) is diminished to daytime aerobics instructor on a television network. On her 50th birthday, she is made redundant by a network executive, Harvey (Dennis Quaid), who tells her “renewal is inevitable”.

There is no future for ageing women.

In her redundancy, Elisabeth has an accident. At the hospital, she is passed a note from a handsome young doctor for a black-market drug known as “the substance” that promises to generate a younger version of a person with a single injection. Desperate for youthful relevance, Elisabeth takes the substance and gives birth to a stronger version of herself, Sue (Margaret Qualley).

There are strict rules for taking “the substance”. One rule is that Elisabeth and Sue must share time, taking it in turns to live in the world every seven days. While one lives, the other sleeps so their cells may regenerate.

Another rule is they must remember they “are one”, despite being two separate bodies who can never spend time together.

Elisabeth does not re-experience youth through Sue – even though they share the same DNA and are, according to the rules, “one”.

This is where things start to go horribly wrong for Elisabeth/Sue.

Taking aim at the male gaze

The Substance is a satirical body-horror and science fiction film underpinned by feminist critique. The film examines the obsession with female beauty and youth, the invisibility of ageing women, and the voracious consumption of women’s bodies in Hollywood’s star system.

In interviews, director Coralie Fargeat takes aim at both the beauty myth – the belief that a woman’s value is tied to her appearance – and the male gaze – a way of visualising the female body as an object to be looked at for and by men.

Many of the scenes in the film reflect this critique using hammed-up, hyper-sexualised slow pans across female body parts: wet lips, pert breasts, toned butts. Such scenes mimic the male gaze familiar in popular culture, from Hollywood films to twerking arses in music videos.

Yet Fargeat moves beyond mimicry. Throughout the film, she uses mirrors, photographs, cameras and television to draw our attention to the male gaze and to show the trouble – and horror – that ensues when appearances and reality do not align.

The film depicts injecting, vomiting, bleeding, eating, self-harm and violent and grotesque transformations of the body to create psychological tension and disgust.

The uncanny culture of the copy

The Substance has an acute awareness of the motif of the double, through archetypes and psychoanalytic concepts such as the split psyche, mirroring and the evil twin.

In the opening scene, an egg yolk is injected with a syringe and split into two. This doubling recurs quite literally when Elisabeth takes the substance and “gives birth” to the so-called “better version of herself”.

Sigmund Freud’s unheimlich, or the uncanny, haunts the premise of the film.

The uncanny refers to the unsettling feeling that arises when something familiar becomes eerily unfamiliar, often revealing repressed fears or hidden aspects of the self.

Elisabeth, seeing a billboard image of Sue, has a complex response. It exacerbates her self-loathing and envy. Sue triggers Elisabeth’s deepest fears.

As Sue gains increasing fame, Elisabeth’s invisibility and irrelevance only increases – undermining the whole point of taking “the substance”.

Neither woman can reckon with the uncanny spectre of the other in photographs and television footage.

Mother–daughter nexus

For Sue, seeing photographs of Elisabeth triggers disgust — so much so that the mural-sized photograph of Elisabeth in the apartment they share gets hidden, like Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray.

We see further feminist archetypes such as the “old hag” and the “unruly daughter”. The mother–daughter nexus is prevalent. The dynamic of love and conflict, attraction and disgust cannot be underplayed.

Sue is both Elisabeth’s salvation and her doom. Sue represents the younger self to which Elisabeth can never return. Sue also threatens to erase Elisabeth’s life by repeatedly breaking the seven-day rule. This has devastating effects on Elisabeth’s sleeping body, which instantly ages.

Over time, this inflicts the worst kinds of physical horrors on Elisabeth’s body.

The more Elisabeth becomes consumed by Sue’s perfection, the more grotesque her own body becomes, until, in the end, she is a sci-fi mash-up of The Lord of the Rings’ Golem, Star Wars’ Palpatine, and David Lynch’s Elephant Man.

The film pulls from these iconic figures of deformity and monstrosity to underscore how society views ageing women’s bodies: the derision of menopause, the so-called “change” not as a natural part of life, but as something to be feared and reviled.

The scenes of Elisabeth gorging and cooking over a cauldron with wiry grey hair, and fisting a raw chicken carcass accompany scenes of the body’s mutilation.

The film also questions how we consume the female body and how women are conditioned to mutilate themselves for youth and beauty. The false economy of appearances reminds us that beneath the make-up, injectables, botox and fillers, there is always going to be an imperfect body in a process of natural decay.

The Substance offers no redemption for Elisabeth. Her pursuit of a younger, more beautiful self is the horror. Her final realisation is that the more she tries to escape her body, the more she is trapped by it.

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. There is no future for ageing women: how The Substance uses body-horror in a feminist critique – https://theconversation.com/there-is-no-future-for-ageing-women-how-the-substance-uses-body-horror-in-a-feminist-critique-239729

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Allen Cheng, Professor of Infectious Diseases, Monash University

Before the COVID pandemic, the World Health Organization (WHO) had made a list of priority infectious diseases. These were felt to pose a threat to international public health, but where research was still needed to improve their surveillance and diagnosis. In 2018, “disease X” was included, which signified that a pathogen previously not on our radar could cause a pandemic.

While it’s one thing to acknowledge the limits to our knowledge of the microbial soup we live in, more recent attention has focused on how we might systematically approach future pandemic risks.

Former US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld famously talked about “known knowns” (things we know we know), “known unknowns” (things we know we don’t know), and “unknown unknowns” (the things we don’t know we don’t know).

Although this may have been controversial in its original context of weapons of mass destruction, it provides a way to think about how we might approach future pandemic threats.

Influenza: a ‘known known’

Influenza is largely a known entity; we essentially have a minor pandemic every winter with small changes in the virus each year. But more major changes can also occur, resulting in spread through populations with little pre-existing immunity. We saw this most recently in 2009 with the swine flu pandemic.

However, there’s a lot we don’t understand about what drives influenza mutations, how these interact with population-level immunity, and how best to make predictions about transmission, severity and impact each year.

The current H5N1 subtype of avian influenza (“bird flu”) has spread widely around the world. It has led to the deaths of many millions of birds and spread to several mammalian species including cows in the United States and marine mammals in South America.

Human cases have been reported in people who have had close contact with infected animals, but fortunately there’s currently no sustained spread between people.

While detecting influenza in animals is a huge task in a large country such as Australia, there are systems in place to detect and respond to bird flu in wildlife and production animals.

It’s inevitable there will be more influenza pandemics in the future. But it isn’t always the one we are worried about.

Attention had been focused on avian influenza since 1997, when an outbreak in birds in Hong Kong caused severe disease in humans. But the subsequent pandemic in 2009 originated in pigs in central Mexico.

Coronaviruses: an ‘unknown known’

Although Rumsfeld didn’t talk about “unknown knowns”, coronaviruses would be appropriate for this category. We knew more about coronaviruses than most people might have thought before the COVID pandemic.

We’d had experience with severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and Middle Eastern respiratory syndrome (MERS) causing large outbreaks. Both are caused by viruses closely related to SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes COVID. While these might have faded from public consciousness before COVID, coronaviruses were listed in the 2015 WHO list of diseases with pandemic potential.

Previous research into the earlier coronaviruses proved vital in allowing COVID vaccines to be developed rapidly. For example, the Oxford group’s initial work on a MERS vaccine was key to the development of AstraZeneca’s COVID vaccine.

Similarly, previous research into the structure of the spike protein – a protein on the surface of coronaviruses that allows it to attach to our cells – was helpful in developing mRNA vaccines for COVID.

It would seem likely there will be further coronavirus pandemics in the future. And even if they don’t occur at the scale of COVID, the impacts can be significant. For example, when MERS spread to South Korea in 2015, it only caused 186 cases over two months, but the cost of controlling it was estimated at US$8 billion (A$11.6 billion).

The 25 viral families: an approach to ‘known unknowns’

Attention has now turned to the known unknowns. There are about 120 viruses from 25 families that are known to cause human disease. Members of each viral family share common properties and our immune systems respond to them in similar ways.

An example is the flavivirus family, of which the best-known members are yellow fever virus and dengue fever virus. This family also includes several other important viruses, such as Zika virus (which can cause birth defects when pregnant women are infected) and West Nile virus (which causes encephalitis, or inflammation of the brain).

The WHO’s blueprint for epidemics aims to consider threats from different classes of viruses and bacteria. It looks at individual pathogens as examples from each category to expand our understanding systematically.

The US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has taken this a step further, preparing vaccines and therapies for a list of prototype pathogens from key virus families. The goal is to be able to adapt this knowledge to new vaccines and treatments if a pandemic were to arise from a closely related virus.

Pathogen X, the ‘unknown unknown’

There are also the unknown unknowns, or “disease X” – an unknown pathogen with the potential to trigger a severe global epidemic. To prepare for this, we need to adopt new forms of surveillance specifically looking at where new pathogens could emerge.

In recent years, there’s been an increasing recognition that we need to take a broader view of health beyond only thinking about human health, but also animals and the environment. This concept is known as “One Health” and considers issues such as climate change, intensive agricultural practices, trade in exotic animals, increased human encroachment into wildlife habitats, changing international travel, and urbanisation.

This has implications not only for where to look for new infectious diseases, but also how we can reduce the risk of “spillover” from animals to humans. This might include targeted testing of animals and people who work closely with animals. Currently, testing is mainly directed towards known viruses, but new technologies can look for as yet unknown viruses in patients with symptoms consistent with new infections.

We live in a vast world of potential microbiological threats. While influenza and coronaviruses have a track record of causing past pandemics, a longer list of new pathogens could still cause outbreaks with significant consequences.

Continued surveillance for new pathogens, improving our understanding of important virus families, and developing policies to reduce the risk of spillover will all be important for reducing the risk of future pandemics.

This article is part of a series on the next pandemic.

Allen Cheng receives funding from the Australian government for respiratory virus surveillance, and from the National Health and Medical Research Council. He is a member of the Communicable Diseases Network of Australia and the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation. He is an investigator on the REMAP-CAP trial.

– ref. What pathogen might spark the next pandemic? How scientists are preparing for ‘disease X’ – https://theconversation.com/what-pathogen-might-spark-the-next-pandemic-how-scientists-are-preparing-for-disease-x-223193

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Sarah Legge, Professor of Wildlife Conservation, Australian National University

As animals move across the desert, they leave tracks, diggings and droppings. For skilled trackers, reading these signs is like watching a movie. A story of who was there and what they were doing unfolds in front of them.

In this way, many Indigenous Australians know where the goannas (jalangardi in Yawuru) are fat and abundant, when bilby (jitartu in Karajarri) burrows are occupied, and whether the bush turkeys (parrkara in Karajarri) have arrived to take advantage of a freshly burnt patch.

For many years, scientists have been working with Indigenous people in the desert to record these observations in a systematic way. Taking a standard approach enables comparisons between data from different people, times and places, so trends can be detected.

Our new research collates almost 49,000 animal detections during 15,000 surveys at more than 5,300 sites, since 1982. This unique data set reveals new information about desert species. Monitoring animal numbers, locations and responses to environmental change is vital for guiding efforts to support their survival.

Monitoring desert wildlife is a skill

It’s not always easy to see animals in the desert. Most are nocturnal, secretive, and spend much of their time underground. Numbers can fluctuate widely, dwindling during droughts and booming after rain.

This means we need to collect a lot of data — over a long time and over a vast area — to tell what is going on.

Fortunately, Indigenous Australians continue to inhabit and look after desert landscapes using deep knowledge of their Country and exceptional observational skills. Our deserts contain one of the largest networks of Indigenous-managed land in the world.

The Arid Zone Monitoring Project
combines Traditional ecological knowledge and tracking skills with scientific analysis. Indigenous rangers and Traditional Owners from 33 different Indigenous desert groups are involved, along with government agencies, non-government organisations and independent scientists. It’s one of Australia’s largest wildlife monitoring endeavours, spanning nearly half of the country.

Fresh insights

The standard approach is to search a 2-hectare area for signs of animals with at least two people for 20 minutes.

One of us, Braedan Taylor, has performed many dozens of these sign-based surveys. He says: “Within these areas we look for scats (poo), burrows, tracks and record everything that we find.”

The observations are recorded on various apps or paper record sheets.

The method has been widely embraced by Indigenous ranger teams. But, until now, the data has generally stayed within those teams.

By bringing all of the data together for analysis, our research has revealed fresh insights into desert wildlife. We now know more about where species occur and their preferred habitats. We found some species in places where they were not thought to exist before.

For example, it turns out the range of the great desert skink (tjakura in Wiluna Martu Wangka) extends further southwest in Martu Country than previously thought. This chunky, group-living reptile is culturally important to Indigenous people. While local people knew of its presence, sharing that knowledge helps conserve this threatened species.

In the northwestern deserts, Yawuru Country managers and Karajarri rangers recorded many observations of spectacled-hare wallabies (manggaban in Yawuru). This species had not been detected in the region for more than a decade. One of us, Pius Gregory, worked with his countrymen, using careful observation of scats (poo) to distinguish this species from two other wallaby species of similar size (northern nailtail wallabies, agile wallabies; garrabulu, barrjaniny).

Analysing the data has also improved our knowledge of where pest species occur and how they may be affecting native wildlife. For example, we found bilbies have been lost from 70% of their former range, contracting to the northwest deserts where fox density is lowest. Feral cat numbers are also higher here, perhaps also due to fewer foxes.

Some species leave more tell-tale signs

Better monitoring can help ranger teams evaluate their programs to control fires and feral animals.

The data can also help determine the conservation status of threatened species, and whether it’s improving or declining.

Species detection rates, locations and habitat preferences can also inform future monitoring programs. This includes guiding where and how often to survey, to detect population changes for various species.

Overall, we found sign-based surveys are great for monitoring 28 species of mammals, reptiles and birds – including threatened, invasive and culturally significant species. This includes game species that are important to desert people such as kangaroo (mirtimarlu in Karajarri), emu (bijarda in Yawuru) and bush turkey (bustard, barrgara in Yawuru).

We found a national monitoring program for these 28 species would only require visiting 600 strategically located sites twice every five years. Each team involved in the monitoring would need to survey only 10–20 sites a year.

We identified a further 48 species in the records, but found sign-based surveys may not be the best way to monitor them. This is either because detections are too few, or their sign is hard to identify.

For some of those species, extra training by expert trackers may make a difference. For example, the tracks of red kangaroo, euro and grey kangaroo are hard to distinguish for inexperienced trackers, as are perentie, yellow-spotted and sand goanna tracks.

Potential for the future

The Arid Zone Monitoring Project was a proof of concept that showed how much monitoring is already being done by rangers. It also shows the potential for a desert-wide monitoring program, in which Indigenous-led data collection is paired with logistic, analytical and funding support.

Such a program could provide information on biodiversity trends over 40% of the country. This would help inform invasive animal control programs, as well as Indigenous-led recovery strategies for threatened species and culturally significant species.

Sign-based monitoring gives elders and senior rangers an opportunity to share information and skills. This extends beyond tracking, to language, stories, and all aspects of cultural and ecological knowledge. Pius and Braedan can’t overstate how important this is – sign-based surveys are a great way to get out on Country and learn.

The wellbeing of Indigenous Australians is inseparable from the wellbeing of Country: (“healthy Country, healthy people”). Effective monitoring, with strong Indigenous engagement, is a essential for looking after the plants, animals and people of Australia’s desert Country.

We sincerely acknowledge the many people who contributed to this research.

Sarah Legge received funding from the National Environmental Program’s Threatened Species Recovery Hub for the project described here. In related work, she receives funding from the Australian Research Council, and from the Australian Government’s Innovative Biodiversity Monitoring for biodiverisity monitoring with Indigenous organisations. She is a member of the Biodiversity Council.

Braedan Taylor worked for the Karajarri Rangers, Karajarri Traditional Lands Association during this project. He’s now studying Marine Science at the University of Western Australia.

Jaana Dielenberg was a collaborator on the Arid Zone Monitoring project, which was funded by the now-ended Threatened Species Recovery Hub of the Australian Government’s National Environmental Science Program. She is a Charles Darwin University Fellow and is employed by the University of Melbourne and the Biodiversity Council.

Pius Gregory is a Yawuru Traditional Owner. He worked previously for Nyamba Buru Yawuru as a Country Manager, looking after desert and sea country. He is now employed by WWF as the Biocultural Conservation Specialist based in Broome.

Rachel Paltridge was employed by various Indigenous organisations to assist rangers collect track plot data during the period 2000-2020. She now works as an ecologist with the Indigenous Desert Alliance, with support from the Resilient Landscapes Hub of the National Environmental Science Program and also receives funding from the Australian Government’s Saving Native Species program. She is an adjunct Senior Research Fellow with the University of Western Australia.

– ref. Reading desert sands – Indigenous wildlife tracking skills underpin vast monitoring project – https://theconversation.com/reading-desert-sands-indigenous-wildlife-tracking-skills-underpin-vast-monitoring-project-238978

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Vitomir Kovanovic, Associate Professor and Associate Director of the Centre for Change and Complexity in Learning (C3L), Education Futures, University of South Australia

It’s almost two years since ChatGPT burst onto the scene in late 2022. Since then, educators worldwide have been grappling with what generative artificial intelligence might mean for classrooms and learning.

ChatGPT has been met with both anxiety and a sense of optimism. While there has been a lot of discussion about what is happening in universities, there has been less attention given to schools.

We have been looking at trials of AI in schools in South Australia. Here’s what we found.

What has happened so far in Australia?

Most Australian states initially banned ChatGPT and other generative AI tools in government schools (many private schools have been using the technology).

In a different approach, the SA government began a trial of AI in schools in 2023 with its own tool, EdChat.

Other jurisdictions have since reconsidered their stance. For example, at the start of 2024, New South Wales began trialling its own AI tool.

In November 2023, the federal government also published a framework for generative AI in schools, which said AI has “great potential” to help teachers and students, and to reduce administrative workloads.

Last month, a federal parliamentary inquiry recommended generative AI in schools should be a “national priority”, finding the benefits of AI outweigh its significant risks and challenges.

What happened in South Australia?

EdChat is a generative AI tool owned by the SA Department for Education, which was designed with Microsoft. It can be used in classrooms and at home. According to the department, it has “extra safety features” to protect students’ privacy and stop them accessing inappropriate content.

In the first phase of the trial, EdChat was used in eight SA government high schools for eight weeks. In the second phase, a further eight schools were included.

We have been evaluating the trial using survey data from about 90 teachers and 700 students. A journal article on this work is currently under review. In this article, we speak about our results from teachers.

‘It reduces time pressure’

Teachers told us they felt safer using EdChat than other tools such as ChatGPT, because student data is not being used to train generative AI models.

However, teachers still wanted to know more about how the student data is stored and who can access EdChat records.

Teachers also reported significant benefits of the tool. They said it helped save time developing lesson plans and learning materials – allowing for more time with students in the classroom.

One teacher told us how the tool had been adopted by the class.

We nicknamed it Eddy as a class and Eddy is now embedded as part of our class culture.

Teachers also used EdChat to provide personalised learning activities to students and “reduce time pressure and brain power required to create [teaching examples] and plan fun activities”. EdChat also allowed students to get personalised feedback or support when teachers were not around.

‘We need to be careful’

Teachers noted issues with hallucinations (when the AI comes up with nonsense) and incorrect information. This means students need to have the skills to recognise this.

As one teacher told us:

I think we need to be careful since students can treat AI like how they treat anything on the internet, without any critical thinking and taking it at face value.

They also said students need to learn to write better prompts and develop their critical thinking skills for working with AI.

They said content filters could also be challenging. While designed to keep students safe, they sometimes interfered with learning, especially for sensitive topics such as history, reproductive health or politics. For example, one history teacher said the “censorship was difficult to get around”.

Teachers also said it was more difficult to work out whether students’ work was plagiarised or not.

What happens now?

The SA government is looking at ways to expand the use of EdChat in schools.

Our research suggests we need to do more work in several areas.

The first is specific education for students around how to use AI critically and effectively.

We also need more research now about how AI is being used in different schools. There are no large-scale studies yet in Australia but there is growing evidence from other parts of the world, such as
Estonia, the United States and United Kingdom, which show AI is significantly changing the way teachers are teaching. This includes spending more time on students’ critical thinking skills and using AI to generate ideas.

We also need to make sure all students can gain access to AI (not just those who can afford the technology) and that the AI itself it not biased against minorities.

Meanwhile, teachers need more support and professional development, and schools need help to plan and make changes. This includes a wider community awareness of the profound effects these new technologies are having and will have on the teaching profession and student learning.

Vitomir Kovanovic receives funding from the Department for Education of South Australia.

Maarten de Laat receives funding from the Department for Education of South Australia.

Rebecca Marrone receives funding from the Department for Education of South Australia

– ref. ‘We nicknamed it Eddy’: what do schools and teachers think of AI in classrooms? – https://theconversation.com/we-nicknamed-it-eddy-what-do-schools-and-teachers-think-of-ai-in-classrooms-239396

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Lisa French, Professor & Dean, School of Media and Communication, RMIT University

P.J. Hogan’s classic Australian film Muriel’s Wedding is 30 and it plays as well today as it did when it had its world premiere. Muriel might have been “terrible” – but the film was a great success.

Australians love to laugh at themselves, and everyone loves an underdog. Muriel’s Wedding took more than A$15 million at the box office in Australia — making it one of the highest-grossing Australian feature films of all time.

As fun as the film is with its kitsch aesthetic, bold colour palette and garish costumes, it has a unique mix of comedy and serious drama. It slips from the absurd to painful realism, with more depth than your average comedy and a twist in the plot that made it an original take on the genre.

While Australians generally have received it as hilarious, audiences elsewhere were more attuned to the tragedy, such as Muriel’s mother Betty’s suicide following relentless bullying, and Rhonda’s illness and disability. But it worked for audiences everywhere who warmed to the representation of friendship, its emotional compassion and critique of the narrow mindedness of small-town communities.

‘We’re all Muriel’

Sometimes it is the stars who can bring in an audience and make a film successful. However, although there were a lot of experienced actors in Muriel’s Wedding, Toni Collette (Muriel) and Rachel Griffiths (Rhonda) – whose performances were exceptional – were both playing lead and supporting roles for the first time in a feature film.

It was also Hogan’s first feature, so it is unlikely star power drew in audiences (although all of them were to become stars, and Hogan later directed My Best Friend’s Wedding with Julia Roberts, one of the top romantic comedies of all time).

It did, however, have a wonderful trailer.

I asked Rachel Griffiths what she thought was the key to the film’s success and she identified its universality: it translated for an array of audiences and enabled broad identification.

She described the film as having one foot in the grotesque and the other in Ridley Scott’s 1991 getaway heist Thelma & Louise – another film about female friendship, independence and individual growth.

Griffiths gave the example of going with the film to New York on its release and discovering it was wildly meaningful to the LGBTQIA+ community. In conversation with a gay man in his late 20s, he described it as a parable for AIDS, which at that time was in full-blown crisis.

According to Griffiths, he said: “We’re all Muriel. We don’t fit in.”

Growing up in small towns where they are “the freak”, with closet musical tastes, he said:

We’re the outcasts in our family. Our fathers belittle us for being feminine. We escape to the big smoke with the promise of becoming ourselves and following our own journey. We replace our families who have rejected us with our chosen family who celebrate us.

And when one of their own is struck suddenly by this terrible affliction, like Rhonda, they are sent home in humiliation, to be looked after, which is their worst fear. The aspiration is to be rescued by the adopted family and taken back to the big city and shown unconditional love.

Griffiths says:

That’s the ending and the survival story of both Rhonda and Muriel, you go back to that kind of pride moment, to be proud of who you are.

For Griffiths, Rhonda and Muriel have “a kind of blood-sister friendship, a bond that can’t be broken”.

We all long for that deep acceptance. It is a parable of inclusion, where Muriel and Rhonda truly see and accept each other and themselves.

A feminist film

I asked Griffiths if Muriel’s Wedding was received as feminist when it was released. She replied it wasn’t at the time it was made, but more recently this has come up.

Her explanation of why this wasn’t considered 30 years ago is informative regarding film criticism. She elaborated that the critics at the time were 90% male and their take on feminism expected powerful female lead characters who pursue their goals and achieve in the face of competition.

In this story, there is a girl escaping patriarchal control. Muriel’s father, Bill Heslop (Bill Hunter), is a bully and narcissist who blames everyone else – especially the women – for his failures.

Griffiths aligns Muriel to the Cinderella myth because in the beginning she sees her value will only be ascribed to her once she marries. The film, Griffiths said, is “a fundamental kind of feminist journey”.

The central focus is Muriel’s personal growth in rejecting ideology that promotes romantic coupling as the pinnacle of happiness for women. Instead Muriel embraces her own worth and her friendship with Rhonda. Marriage is portrayed as a patriarchal structure that ideologically binds women – the marriages are variously fraudulent, starting with Tanya and Chook, then Muriel and, ultimately, her mother.

There are many elements that make Muriel’s Wedding an Australian classic, from the universal themes and relatability to how the story is able to extend beyond national borders. The film leaves us with admiration for resilience in the face of adversity, signalled by Muriel and Rhonda grinning assuredly at each other in the final scene.

It is a unique and very real comedy/drama with a highly engaging aesthetic and a feminist message. It is an opportunity to laugh at ourselves, despite quite a lot of tragedy and adversity — which is a very Australian thing to do!

The author wishes to thank Rachel Griffiths who was interviewed in Melbourne on August 17 2020.

Lisa French 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. ‘We’re all Muriel’: why we still love Muriel’s Wedding, 30 years on – https://theconversation.com/were-all-muriel-why-we-still-love-muriels-wedding-30-years-on-236793

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brendon Hyndman, Associate Professor of Health & Physical Education (Adj.), Charles Sturt University

The Brisbane Lions are the underdogs for Saturday’s AFL grand final against Sydney.

After defeating Geelong in Victoria for the first time in 20 years, they have reached the grand final from fifth on the ladder, without a rest week or double-chance (as teams that finish in the top four enjoy).

Taking into account the VFL origins of both clubs, this will be the first Lions–Swans grand final for 125 years.

The Lions’ task against the Swans, who finished as minor premiers, is formidable but not impossible.

As history shows, upsets happen. But what have been the greatest shocks in men’s VFL/AFL grand final history?

Sports betting odds are one way to determine an upset, but that is a fairly modern phenomenon, so we delved beyond odds.

Other considerations include comparing the respective ladder positions of the opposing teams, the length of time since a team’s previous premiership, the age and experience of the playing group, or even the team’s record at the venue or against the other team.

We have given greatest weighting to ladder position going into the finals, which we believe is the fairest indicator of the magnitude of an upset, because it signifies a team’s performance and consistency during that season.

Below is our verdict on the biggest grand final upsets of all time, with reference to these various criteria.

Experience of playing group

#10 – 1993 Essendon defeated Carlton

The 1993 “Baby Bombers” premiership was a big surprise after they finished eighth in 1992 (the top five teams made finals).

They were 11th (out of 15 teams) after round seven in 1993 and had to come from 42 points down at half-time in the preliminary final.

The average age of the “Baby Bombers” was just 24 years and 105 days when they defeated Carlton. In comparison, the average age of Carlton’s playing group was 25.4 years.

The average age of premiership teams from the past 20 years has been 26.2 years.

What made this win even more remarkable was Essendon had six players with fewer than 25 AFL games. The average for premiership teams over the past two decades has been 126.7 games.

Track record between clubs or seasons

#9 – 2017 Richmond defeated Adelaide

Richmond completed the greatest one-year turnaround in VFL/AFL history when they won the 2017 decider.

The Tigers rose from 13th on the ladder in 2016 to secure their first premiership in 37 years in 2017.

Richmond upset Adelaide, who finished top of the ladder and were favourites to win the grand final. The Crows had also beaten Richmond by 76 points when they met earlier in 2017.

The relentless pressure of Richmond’s “mosquito fleet” (players shorter than 183cm) was a key to victory on grand final day.

#8 – 1972 Carlton defeated Richmond

Carlton had not beaten Richmond in a final since 1920 and their recent record was ten straight losses to Richmond.

The Blues had also lost all four games against the Tigers that year.

They surprised the highly favoured Richmond team with a “strategic triumph” that involved playing numerous players in different positions.

This was the highest-scoring grand final of all time, with 327 combined points. Carlton kicked 28 goals in their win.

#7 – 1970 Carlton defeated Collingwood

Collingwood was favourite for the grand final, as the Magpies finished top of the ladder and defeated Carlton three times in the 1970 season, including by 77 points in round 19.

This match was also recognised as the greatest grand final comeback in AFL/VFL history, and featured one of the greatest marks of the 20th century. It also had the biggest ever VFL/AFL crowd of 121,696 spectators.

After trailing by 44 points at half-time, Ron Barrassi’s instructions to play on and handball in the second half were credited for helping Carlton’s upset win.

#6 – 2008 Hawthorn defeated Geelong

Geelong won the 2007 premiership by 119 points and would eventually win the 2009 premiership.

Meeting the team with the youngest recorded average playing age in the competition was all that stood in the way for the highly favoured Cats in the 2008 grand final.

Geelong had finished four games clear on top of the ladder in 2008, only losing once all season.

Yet a combination of Geelong’s poor kicking for goal, Hawthorn’s hard running and clever coaching led to an unexpected victory for the team described as “resembling the baby bombers”.

#5 – 1958 Collingwood defeated Melbourne

Between 1955 and 1960, Melbourne blitzed the competition, winning five of the six premierships on offer, two of them over Collingwood.

In the middle of this Melbourne dominance, and having lost to the Demons in their semi-final, Collingwood achieved “the miracle of ‘58”.

Collingwood’s victory stopped Melbourne winning six premierships in a row. It would be the Magpies’ last flag for 32 years, and has been described as their “best ever”.

Ladder positioning

#4 – 1998 Adelaide defeated North Melbourne

Between 1902 and 1971, the VFL had a top four finals system, which expanded to include at least the top five teams from 1972, and evolved to become a top eight from 1994.

Described as imposters and up against the future 1999 premiers, Adelaide became the first team from outside the top four to win the premiership since 1900.

They did so despite facing a deficit of 24 points at half-time.

During the grand final, North Melbourne set the record for the most inaccurate kicking for goal in VFL/AFL grand final history, with eight goals and 22 behinds.

#3 – 1900 Melbourne defeated Fitzroy

During 1900, the regular season positions did not count when finals arrived, meaning all teams qualified to play finals.

Fitzroy was the dominant force in the league and were two games clear on top of the ladder with 11 wins and just three losses.

They were described by most spectators as being a “certainty” to secure their third consecutive premiership.

Yet Melbourne, which finished sixth (out of eight teams) during the regular season with five fewer victories, went on to win all of their finals games and toppled Fitzroy in the grand final.

It was such a surprise that an overhaul of the VFL finals system was made within just two seasons to limit the finals to the top four teams.

#2 – 1916 Fitzroy defeated Carlton

The impacts of war resulted in just four teams playing in 1916.

During the regular season, Fitzroy lost nine in a row and ended up with the wooden spoon.

Despite finishing last on the reduced ladder, Fitzroy won every finals match and overcame ladder leaders Carlton to take the 1916 premiership.

The upset was even more extraordinary considering Fitzroy was without league-leading goalkicker Jimmy Freake and forward Jim Toohey. Both had combined for almost half of Fitzroy’s goals over the preceeding four seasons.

Fitzroy defeated Carlton twice in the finals, having lost three consecutive in-season games to them and overcoming a half-time grand final deficit.

#1 – 2016 Western Bulldogs defeated Sydney

Ending a 62-year premiership drought, the Bulldogs came from seventh on the ladder to claim their first flag since 1954.

The Bulldogs’ journey to the grand final was nothing short of challenging.

After commencing their finals campaign with one of the longest trips in football to take on West Coast in Perth, they then downed the reigning premiers Hawthorn at the MCG, preventing a fourth consecutive premiership for the Hawks.

The next stage of the journey involved travelling to Sydney for an epic preliminary final clash against Greater Western Sydney, resulting in the Bulldogs holding on in a nailbiting finish.

In the grand final, the Bulldogs came up against the top-of-the-table Sydney Swans, who had won eight of their final nine matches of the season. After trailing at half-time, the Bulldogs surged in the second half to victory.

Given the AFL expansions, professional transformation of the modern competition and the journey of finals battles across Australia for the 2016 Western Bulldogs, this ranks as the greatest achievement in the history of grand final upsets.

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. What are the 10 greatest upsets in VFL/AFL grand final history? – https://theconversation.com/what-are-the-10-greatest-upsets-in-vfl-afl-grand-final-history-238976

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ross Lawrenson, Professor of Population Health, University of Waikato

Surviving lung cancer in Aotearoa New Zealand could depend on whether you can access a GP – raising questions about equity in the country’s health system.

Our new research examines the outcomes for patients who are diagnosed with lung cancer through their GP versus those who are diagnosed at the emergency department (ED).

Examining 2,400 lung cancer diagnoses in Waikato between 2011 and 2021, we found those who are diagnosed with lung cancer after ED visits tended to have later-stage disease and poorer outcomes compared to those diagnosed after a GP referral.

We also found diagnosis after ED attendance was 27% higher for Māori than non-Māori and 22% higher for men than women.

These results raise important questions about health inequity in New Zealand and highlight the need to ensure everyone is able to access an early cancer diagnosis.

Limited access to everyday health care

Currently half of all general practices have closed their books to new patients, leaving 290,000 patients unenrolled and reliant on emergency departments for their health care.

Some 80% of practices have closed their books to new patients at some point since 2019.

For those who are enrolled in a practice, the wait times for appointments are often such that the only option is to go to the ED for help.

This is especially true in rural areas where the hospital can become the default route to diagnosis.

Lung cancer is New Zealand’s single biggest cause of cancer deaths, with over 1,800 per year. Some 80% of those who are diagnosed with lung cancer present with advanced disease and very poor prospects of survival.

It’s also the cancer with the largest equity gap. The mortality rate for Māori with lung cancer is three to four times that of people of European descent.

While much of this disparity is due to differences in the rates of smoking among ethnic groups, there is also evidence delays in diagnosis and poorer access to surgery are also major influences on survival rates.

Identifying lung cancer

Lung cancer usually starts in the tissue lining the airways and symptoms can initially be relatively minor – some shortness of breath during exercise, a niggly cough or sharp pains while breathing.

Patients with these sorts of symptoms usually go to a GP to check whether this is something that needs further investigation.

But if someone cannot get an appointment, or does not recognise the symptoms as serious, then they are likely to delay taking action.

Advanced symptoms of lung cancer include coughing up blood or having lumps in the neck due to lymphatic spread of the cancer. People with these alarming symptoms tend to go to the hospital for treatment.

Our study confirms earlier findings that those diagnosed through the emergency department are:

• more likely to have advanced disease
• more likely to have a more aggressive type of cancer (called small cell cancer), and
• have substantially poorer likelihoods of survival.

The median survival for those who never went to the ED was 13.6 months, while the median survival for those with one ED visit was just three months.

That said, attending an emergency department has some advantages. These include being seen by a doctor within a few hours, immediate access to x-rays and, in our major hospitals, access to the definitive diagnostic tool for a lung cancer – a computed tomography (CT) machine.

Our study found 25% of cases went to the ED two or more times in the two weeks before their diagnosis. This was especially true for those going to one of the Waikato rural hospitals, where a second or third visit was more likely before being diagnosed.

Barriers to care

It is clear New Zealand still has several barriers to primary care. This has lead to an over-reliance on emergency departments for diagnosing cancer, despite the long-running faster cancer treatment targets.

The situation is unlikely to improve. Access to GPs is getting worse, in part due to increasing fees.

Māori and Pacific patients with lung cancer were less likely than other ethnic groups to have been enrolled with a primary health organisation when they were diagnosed. They were also less likely to have visited a GP in the three months prior to diagnosis.

Making it easier to see a GP

Making general practice care more accessible is the most effective way of addressing the inequities in our lung cancer statistics.

Currently, New Zealand has only 74 GPs per 100,000 people, compared to 110 in Australia.

It is clear we need to substantially increase the number of GPs. This is a long-term project but needs to be a strategic goal for the health sector.

In the meantime, we need to make primary care more accessible by increasing patient subsidies and reducing the direct patient costs to see a doctor. At the same time, we need to better equip GPs with access to diagnostic facilities, including in our rural hospitals.

Ross Lawrenson receives funding from NZ Health Research Council. He is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal New Zealand College of General Practitioners.

Chunhuan Lao receives funding from NZ Health Research Council.

– ref. Access to a GP can make all the difference in surviving lung cancer – and that is a problem for Māori – https://theconversation.com/access-to-a-gp-can-make-all-the-difference-in-surviving-lung-cancer-and-that-is-a-problem-for-maori-239808

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

Last month, a delegation led by Brendan Crabb, head of the Burnet Institute, a prestigious medical research body, met Anthony Albanese in the prime minister’s parliament house office.

Its members, who included Lidia Morawska from Queensland University of Technology, a world-leading expert on air quality and health, also blitzed ministers and staffers. They were pitching for the federal government to spearhead a comprehensive policy on clean indoor air and for the issue to be put on the national cabinet’s agenda.

They pointed out to Albanese that indoor air is an outlier in our otherwise comprehensive public health framework. Despite people spending the majority of their time inside, indoor air quality is mostly unregulated, in contrast to the standards that apply to, for example, food and water.

There are multiple health and economic reasons to be concerned about this air quality but a major one is to limit the transmission of airborne diseases, such as COVID.

For many of us, COVID has become just a bad memory, despite its lasting and mixed legacies. For instance, without the pandemic, fewer people would now be working from home. More small businesses would be flourishing in our CBDs. Arguably, fewer children would be trying to catch up from inadequate schooling.

While the media have largely lost interest in COVID, and people are now rather blase about it, the disease is still taking a toll.

In 2023 there were about 4,600 deaths attributed to COVID, and almost certainly more in reality, given Australia that year had 8,400 “excess deaths” (defined as actual deaths above expected deaths).

Up to July this year there were 2,503 COVID deaths.

In nursing homes, whilst survival rates from COVID are much improved with vaccination and antivirals, as of September 19, there were 117 active outbreaks with 59 new outbreaks in that past week. There had been 900 deaths for the year so far.

Long COVID has become a serious issue, with varying respiratory, cardiac, cognitive and immunological symptoms. It is estimated between 200,000 and 900,000 people in Australia currently have long COVID.

The Albanese government is presently awaiting the report it commissioned into how the COVID pandemic was handled.

The inquiry has looked at the performance of the Morrison government, but its terms of reference didn’t include the states. That limits its usefulness, but there were politics involved, given high profile state Labor governments.

Not that the state and territory leaders of that time are around anymore (apart from the ACT’s Andrew Barr). Those faces that became so familiar from their daily news conference have disappeared into the never-never: Victoria’s Dan Andrews, Western Australia’s Mark McGowan, New South Wales’ Gladys Berejiklian, Queensland’s Annastacia Palaszczuk.

COVID variously made or tarnished leaders’ reputations. McGowan, in particular, reached stratospheric heights of popularity. Andrews deeply divided people.

In general, however, COVID boosted support for leaders and increased public trust in them and in government. In times of uncertainty, the public looked to known institutions and to authority figures. Since then, trust has eroded again.

Experts came into their own during the pandemic but then found themselves in the middle of the political bickering. In retrospect, some of them were wrong.

In the broad, especially in terms of the death rate and the economy, Australia navigated the crisis well. But drill down, and the story is more complex, as documented by two leading economists, Steven Hamilton (based in Washington and connected to the Australian National University) and Richard Holden (from UNSW).

In their just-published book, Australia’s Pandemic Exceptionalism, their bottom-line conclusion is that Australia was very impressive in its (vastly expensive) economic response but it was a mixed picture on the health side.

While Australia was quick out of the blocks in closing the national border and bringing in other measures, it fell down dramatically on two fronts. The Morrison government failed to order a wide variety of vaccines and it failed to buy enough Rapid Antigen Tests (RATs).

The “vaccine procurement strategy was an unmitigated disaster,” Hamilton and Holden write. This was not just “the greatest failure of the pandemic – it was arguably the greatest single public policy failure in Australian history”.

“We put all our vaccine eggs in just two baskets”, both of which failed to differing degrees. This was “a terrible risk to take. Pandemics are times for insurance, not gambling,” they write.

“And while our tax and statistical authorities marshalled their forces to operate much faster and more nimbly to serve the desperate needs of a government facing a once-in-a-century crisis, our medical regulatory complex repeatedly ignored international evidence and experience, and our political leaders capitulated to their advice. And then the prime minister told us that when it came to getting Australians vaccinated:‘it’s not a race’”.

The failure to order every vaccine on the horizon meant when production or supply problems arose for those that were hoped for or on order, the rollout was delayed.

After this bungle, “stunningly, we turned around and repeated these same mistakes all over again” by not obtaining and distributing freely massive numbers of RATs. In this failure, “our federal government showed the same lack of foresight, the same penny-wise but pound-foolish mindset that it had displayed in the vaccine rollout”.

The authors blame Scott Morrison, then-health minister Greg Hunt, then-chief medical officer Brendan Murphy, the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA), and the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (ATAGI) for the health failures, which prolonged the lockdowns, cost lives and delayed reopening.

Urging better preparation for the next pandemic, Hamilton and Holden have a list of suggestions. They stress we need to ensure we have mRNA vaccine manufacturing capability (on which there is fairly good progress). We must get vaccine procurement “right from the start” regardless of cost. Huge quantities of RATs should be procured as soon as they become available, ready to be used immediately.

A complete overhaul of the medical-regulatory complex should be undertaken. As well, Australia should continue to invest in “economic infrastructure”. In the pandemic, the economic effort was facilitated by having a single touch payroll system. “The first obvious candidate for improvement is a real-time GST turnover reporting capability.”

Perhaps a comprehensive indoor clean air policy could be added to the infrastructure list.

The government’s review will have its own recommendations. Crabb and his colleagues hope they include attention to indoor air quality, following advice from the Chief Scientist and the National Science and Technology Council.

Members of the delegation say they received an attentive hearing from the PM.

Anna-Maria Arabia, chief executive of the Australian Academy of Science, and a member of the delegation, says Albanese “understood that improving indoor air quality is a cornerstone requirement to preparing for future pandemics and [he] was attuned to the practical implications of having good indoor air quality systems, including schools and workplaces being able to stay open and functional, reduce absenteeism and boost productivity”.

What’s needed beyond awareness, however, is timely policy action. Pandemics don’t give much notice of their arrival.

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. Grattan on Friday: Experts want Albanese to lead on indoor air quality as part of pandemic planning – https://theconversation.com/grattan-on-friday-experts-want-albanese-to-lead-on-indoor-air-quality-as-part-of-pandemic-planning-239829