Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tony Walker, Vice-chancellor’s fellow, La Trobe University

Xi Jinping’s clean sweep in elevating trusted allies to the commanding heights of the Chinese Communist Party is a political outcome that has implications beyond China’s borders.

Xi sits virtually unchallenged, for the time being, at the apex of a political organisation that oversees a country with the world’s second largest economy, a rapidly modernising military and, perhaps most importantly, global ambitions to match its growing economic and military strength.

In a ritual that would not have been out of place in a traditional Peking opera, the 69-year-old Xi led his new team of seven members of the ruling Standing Committee of the Politburo (SCP) onto the stage in front of the world’s media.

All of those who are to serve on China’s ruling body are Xi loyalists. All six have worked with him over many years.

Most significant is Li Qiang, the Shanghai party secretary. He will replace Premier Li Keqiang, who is being bundled into retirement.

The new SCP reflects the further ascendancy of a harder line Xi faction in the Chinese leadership and a setback for the party’s liberalising wing.

This is a seminal moment in China political history with unpredictable consequences.

Read more:
Has Xi Jinping miscalculated in aligning himself with Vladimir Putin?

Xi in charge

No-one observing deliberations of the 20th National Party Congress could be left in doubt that China under Xi will continue to assert itself forcefully in what he calls “the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation”.

At present, momentous changes of a like not seen in a century are accelerating across the world [in] a significant shift in the international power balance presenting China with strategic opportunities.

This was hardly a subtle reference to Chinese perceptions of a superpower rival beset with challenges at home and abroad against a background of a disrupted global environment. The Ukraine crisis is merely one example of a global order that is fragmenting.

In a “work report” delivered every five years at the most important political gathering on China’s calendar, it would be surprising if a Chinese leader did not avail himself of the opportunity to assert his country’s global ambitions.

However, Xi’s assertiveness – in contrast to his predecessors Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao – is unsettling for China’s regional neighbours, including Australia, and for a US-led western alliance more generally.

The Chinese thrust into the western Pacific in a region long-regarded as free of big power tensions is one example.

China’s aggressive push into the South China Sea, sometimes referred to in propaganda as a “Chinese lake”, is another.

Still another is Beijing’s sabre-rattling towards Taiwan.

Since Xi’s tenure may last well into the 2030’s, Taiwan will remain his most pressing unresolved issue for the foreseeable future. As years pass, pressure for some sort of resolution, whether by force or otherwise, will increase.

Xi’s words will not have eased concerns about China’s intentions.

The wheels of history are rolling on towards China’s reunification […] Complete reunification of our country must be realised, and it can, without doubt, be realised.

Economic woes still loom large

In all of this, the critical question is whether Xi will become a more abrasive global figure unbound by restrictions on his tenure, and surrounded in the leadership by allies who are unlikely to challenge him?

Are there risks that his reach on issues like Taiwan will exceed his grasp?

The short answer is we don’t yet know. But Xi will likely have been further emboldened by his continued rise.

Xi is also a relentless aggregator of power. Since his elevation in 2007 to the Standing Committee of the Politburo, he has moved relentlessly.

In the decade since he was confirmed in 2012 as the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party he has, step by step, consolidated power.

Read more:
Little red children and ‘Grandpa Xi’: China’s school textbooks reflect the rise of Xi Jinping’s personality cult

This all comes with the important caveat that behind the scenes in an opaque Chinese system, politicking can be brutal. Power struggles, sometimes violent, have scarred Chinese Communist Party history since its founding in Shanghai in 1921.

Xi would not need reminding that what the Communist Party giveth, it can also taketh away.

His own family’ experience is a case in point. Xi’s father Xi Zhongxun, a member of the first generation, with Mao Zedong, of Communist leaders, was purged in 1962. He was accused of being a member of a rightist clique.

Xi Jinping tasted the bitterness of that experience. He was shipped off to Shaanxi province, south-west of Beijing, in the early 1960s, where he spent six years in the countryside.

Xi senior was rehabilitated after the Cultural Revolution. Xi junior completed a degree in chemical engineering at Tsinghua University, one of China’s premier universities, before making his way up party ranks with various provincial assignments.

History will not be absent from Xi’s calculations, nor will he overlook the historical significance of the National Party Congress just concluded in Beijing.

In the annals of Communist Party history, the 2022 NPC will likely be regarded as a landmark event. The anointing of Xi as party leader, effectively for life, or at least until his age catches up with him, has echoes in the dominance of Mao Zedong, and to a lesser degree Deng Xiaoping.

Both were described as “paramount” leaders, even though Deng chose not to burden himself with the full panoply of titles that would have been available to him. Apart from his honorary presidency of the Chinese Bridge Association, he served in the powerful position of chairman of the Central Military Commission.

In Xi’s case, he is general secretary of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, chair of the Central Military Commission, and president. This is a “full-house” of leadership positions.

If there is an historical reference point for the 20th NPC, it is the 11th National Party Congress of 1982. This event crowned Deng protégé Hu Yaobang as general secretary of the Communist Party.

What is different this time is that whereas Hu was an economic liberaliser committed to Deng’s mantra of “reform and opening”, Xi Jinping has shown himself to be less of a reformer and more of a consolidator. He has sought to rein in entrepreneurial impulses unleashed under his predecessors in the interests of stabilising China and fighting corruption. This has been in pursuit of his “common prosperity” policy aimed at narrowing a yawning rich-poor gap.

Finally, there is one important respect in which Xi is exposed. This is in his management of the economy.

His “zero covid” policy has weighed heavily with its nationwide shutdowns. This has contributed to a stuttering economy to the point where GDP growth is faltering for the first time in decades.

The World Bank has cut its forecast for 2022 GDP growth to just 2.8%, from a previous forecast of 5.5%. GDP growth in 2021 was 8.1%.

With a collapsing real estate sector weighing on a stretched banking system, the economy is Xi’s vulnerability. Getting the numbers from his comrades to endorse himself and his underlings in leadership roles is one thing; shifting the economy back on track is quite another.

Tony Walker is a board member of The Conversation.

– ref. Xi cements his power at Chinese Communist Party congress – but he is still exposed on the economy – https://theconversation.com/xi-cements-his-power-at-chinese-communist-party-congress-but-he-is-still-exposed-on-the-economy-192847

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By BJ Newton, Senior Research Fellow in Social Policy and Social Work, UNSW Sydney

The ten-year National Plan to End Violence Against Women and Children was launched this week.

It is without doubt an important policy for shaping the actions and priorities of all governments to work across four main areas of prevention, early intervention, response, as well as recovery and healing.

The National Plan states there are key government strategies and policies that need to be engaged to progress this work to address family violence. One significant strategy mentioned is Closing the Gap. The National Plan states,

Addressing the disproportionate rates of violence against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women is an urgent national priority, which is why the commitments in the National Agreement on Closing the Gap are embedded across the National Plan.

Closing the Gap already has an existing target to address family violence. However, according to the Productivity Commission, there has been no new data on this target’s progress since the baseline year, 2018-19.

The current proposed alignment between Closing the Gap and the National Plan therefore has the potential to be problematic – partly due to Closing the Gap’s current lack of reportable progress in addressing family violence, but also because linking the two plans could potentially limit access to family violence services for First Nations women seeking help.

Read more:
Could the Senate inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women and children prevent future deaths?

What does the National Plan say about First Nations people?

Little is known so far about the specific Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Action Plan contained within the National Plan. Action plans detailing how the National Plan’s vision will be enacted are forthcoming, likely in the next year.

The details released so far indicate the plan will respond to the disproportionate rate of violence experienced by members of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, and the specific drivers that contribute to this. These include rising rates of child protection involvement linked to family violence, and women increasingly being misidentified as perpetrators of violence when they seek assistance.

Navigating these multiple forms of oppression and discrimination add to and worsen Indigenous women’s experiences of violence. Indeed, this speaks clearly to the need for a standalone action plan, and Aboriginal women have been calling for this for some time.

The National Plan acknowledges the significant leadership First Nations people have provided in the development of past plans to address violence in our communities, and the roles we will play in the implementation of the National Plan in our communities.

This is an important acknowledgement, given it has not always been recognised that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have been at the forefront of responding to family violence in communities. Despite the heartache that comes with the rising numbers of our women and children dying, Nannas, Aunts, mums, sisters, and also menfolk are providing care and support to those in need when services are unable to do so.

In its intention to align with Closing the Gap, the National Plan aims to directly and indirectly support six Closing the Gap targets in the areas of justice and out-of-home care systems and suicide reduction.

This strategy for addressing violence against Indigenous women and children with two national plans coming together to meet the one overall objective could lead to more sustainable long-term services and programs in this area. This has been requested of government for a long time. As a Gunbalunya resident stated in the Little Children are Sacredreport , “We have a 20-year history of six-month programs.” However, there are also limitations to be considered.

It’s a good idea, but there needs to be caution

We have misgivings about aligning the Closing the Gap strategy with a national plan to address violence against First Nations women and children because Closing the Gap has different objectives to the national plan.

The Closing the Gap objective is to “enable Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and governments to work together to overcome the inequality experienced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, and achieve life outcomes equal to all Australians.” However, the latest progress report shows a lot of these objectives aren’t on track to be achieved by their deadlines, and the data on the progress of addressing family violence isn’t even listed. There is a danger the target to end family violence is being, and will continue to be, lost in this list.

Federal Minister for Indigenous Australians Linda Burney claims the National Plan will be “committed to putting the voices and aspirations of First Nations women and girls at the centre of plans to improve family safety”. This requires a more specific approach.

Currently, the family violence services sector is competing for funding. Although Closing the Gap could get select organisations extra funding, it could mean First Nations women get no choice but to be funnelled into Indigenous-only services. This lack of agency could risk women feeling discouraged from disclosing or escaping violence because these services might not work for them. This is based on a range of factors including access to services, safety and privacy in the aftermath of violence.

The Monash Stakeholder Report speaks to this,

For the National Plan to be successful […] it needs to be something that upholds and preserves the dignity of women. And we do that by centring her as the expert in her life and stepping away, stepping out of the way and allowing her to have choice and agency, that is essential.

This is why we must ensure mainstream services are accessible and culturally safe for First Nations women and children.

The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Advisory Council on family, domestic and sexual violence is currently charged with the responsibility of drafting the First Nations Action Plan. They have been provided with advice from a recent public statement from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner June Oscar AO and delegates at a recent policy forum.

The advice reiterated the importance of Indigenous self-determination. This includes guaranteeing Indigenous women lead in the development and delivery of a standalone plan. Also, the plan should include the voices of First Nations women, gender diverse people, and our families in all their diversity.

Associate Professor, human rights lawyer and Kurin Minang Noongar woman Hannah McGlade has been leading the charge for a standalone strategy for First Nations women for years. She has advocated strongly for this noting,

We will not stay silent. Our lives matter, Black women’s lives matter. Stop this genocide of Indigenous women in our lands and country

The National Plan states it will promote partnerships to ensure culturally safe mainstream services. To achieve this will require Indigenous-led, trauma-informed approaches to working with Aboriginal families. If we’re wanting to end the violence against First Nations women, our voices need to be included in how we do this.

BJ Newton receives funding from the Australian Research Council. Please see her profile page on the UNSW website for the list of current projects.

Kyllie Cripps has received and is receiving funding from the Australian Research Council for research she has undertaken or is presently undertaking. Please see her UNSW website for full list of projects.

– ref. How ‘closing the gap’ may close doors for First Nations women in new plan to end violence – https://theconversation.com/how-closing-the-gap-may-close-doors-for-first-nations-women-in-new-plan-to-end-violence-192620

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By BJ Newton, Senior Research Fellow in Social Policy and Social Work, UNSW Sydney

The ten-year National Plan to End Violence Against Women and Children was launched this week.

It is without doubt an important policy for shaping the actions and priorities of all governments to work across four main areas of prevention, early intervention, response, as well as recovery and healing.

The National Plan states there are key government strategies and policies that need to be engaged to progress this work to address family violence. One significant strategy mentioned is Closing the Gap. The National Plan states,

Addressing the disproportionate rates of violence against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women is an urgent national priority, which is why the commitments in the National Agreement on Closing the Gap are embedded across the National Plan.

Closing the Gap already has an existing target to address family violence. However, according to the Productivity Commission, there has been no new data on this target’s progress since the baseline year, 2018-19.

The current proposed alignment between Closing the Gap and the National Plan therefore has the potential to be problematic – partly due to Closing the Gap’s current lack of reportable progress in addressing family violence, but also because linking the two plans could potentially limit access to family violence services for First Nations women seeking help.

Read more:
Could the Senate inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women and children prevent future deaths?

What does the National Plan say about First Nations people?

Little is known so far about the specific Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Action Plan contained within the National Plan. Action plans detailing how the National Plan’s vision will be enacted are forthcoming, likely in the next year.

The details released so far indicate the plan will respond to the disproportionate rate of violence experienced by members of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, and the specific drivers that contribute to this. These include rising rates of child protection involvement linked to family violence, and women increasingly being misidentified as perpetrators of violence when they seek assistance.

Navigating these multiple forms of oppression and discrimination add to and worsen Indigenous women’s experiences of violence. Indeed, this speaks clearly to the need for a standalone action plan, and Aboriginal women have been calling for this for some time.

The National Plan acknowledges the significant leadership First Nations people have provided in the development of past plans to address violence in our communities, and the roles we will play in the implementation of the National Plan in our communities.

This is an important acknowledgement, given it has not always been recognised that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people have been at the forefront of responding to family violence in communities. Despite the heartache that comes with the rising numbers of our women and children dying, Nannas, Aunts, mums, sisters, and also menfolk are providing care and support to those in need when services are unable to do so.

In its intention to align with Closing the Gap, the National Plan aims to directly and indirectly support six Closing the Gap targets in the areas of justice and out-of-home care systems and suicide reduction.

This strategy for addressing violence against Indigenous women and children with two national plans coming together to meet the one overall objective could lead to more sustainable long-term services and programs in this area. This has been requested of government for a long time. As a Gunbalunya resident stated in the Little Children are Sacredreport , “We have a 20-year history of six-month programs.” However, there are also limitations to be considered.

It’s a good idea, but there needs to be caution

We have misgivings about aligning the Closing the Gap strategy with a national plan to address violence against First Nations women and children because Closing the Gap has different objectives to the national plan.

The Closing the Gap objective is to “enable Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and governments to work together to overcome the inequality experienced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, and achieve life outcomes equal to all Australians.” However, the latest progress report shows a lot of these objectives aren’t on track to be achieved by their deadlines, and the data on the progress of addressing family violence isn’t even listed. There is a danger the target to end family violence is being, and will continue to be, lost in this list.

Federal Minister for Indigenous Australians Linda Burney claims the National Plan will be “committed to putting the voices and aspirations of First Nations women and girls at the centre of plans to improve family safety”. This requires a more specific approach.

Currently, the family violence services sector is competing for funding. Although Closing the Gap could get select organisations extra funding, it could mean First Nations women get no choice but to be funnelled into Indigenous-only services. This lack of agency could risk women feeling discouraged from disclosing or escaping violence because these services might not work for them. This is based on a range of factors including access to services, safety and privacy in the aftermath of violence.

The Monash Stakeholder Report speaks to this,

For the National Plan to be successful […] it needs to be something that upholds and preserves the dignity of women. And we do that by centring her as the expert in her life and stepping away, stepping out of the way and allowing her to have choice and agency, that is essential.

This is why we must ensure mainstream services are accessible and culturally safe for First Nations women and children.

The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Advisory Council on family, domestic and sexual violence is currently charged with the responsibility of drafting the First Nations Action Plan. They have been provided with advice from a recent public statement from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Social Justice Commissioner June Oscar AO and delegates at a recent policy forum.

The advice reiterated the importance of Indigenous self-determination. This includes guaranteeing Indigenous women lead in the development and delivery of a standalone plan. Also, the plan should include the voices of First Nations women, gender diverse people, and our families in all their diversity.

Associate Professor, human rights lawyer and Kurin Minang Noongar woman Hannah McGlade has been leading the charge for a standalone strategy for First Nations women for years. She has advocated strongly for this noting,

We will not stay silent. Our lives matter, Black women’s lives matter. Stop this genocide of Indigenous women in our lands and country

The National Plan states it will promote partnerships to ensure culturally safe mainstream services. To achieve this will require Indigenous-led, trauma-informed approaches to working with Aboriginal families. If we’re wanting to end the violence against First Nations women, our voices need to be included in how we do this.

BJ Newton receives funding from the Australian Research Council. Please see her profile page on the UNSW website for the list of current projects.

Kyllie Cripps has received and is receiving funding from the Australian Research Council for research she has undertaken or is presently undertaking. Please see her UNSW website for full list of projects.

– ref. How ‘closing the gap’ may close the doors for First Nations women in new plan to end violence – https://theconversation.com/how-closing-the-gap-may-close-the-doors-for-first-nations-women-in-new-plan-to-end-violence-192620

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katherine Livingstone, NHMRC Emerging Leadership Fellow and Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Physical Activity and Nutrition, Deakin University

You may have heard of the carnivore diet, and the claims it is beneficial for our health.

Many diet trends, such as the paleo and Atkins diets, advocate high protein and low carbohydrate intake. But the carnivore diet takes this trend to the extreme.

So what is it, and is it bad for your health?

What is the carnivore diet?

As the name implies, the carnivore diet involves only eating meat and animal products.

There is no official definition, but followers of this diet advocate eating red meat, pork, chicken and other poultry, eggs, fish and seafood. Some low-lactose dairy can be included, such as cheese and yoghurt.

All plant foods are typically excluded. So no fruit, vegetables, legumes, grains or nuts and seeds.

An example of what you could eat on a typical day might be:

Breakfast: eggs and bacon (without toast)

Lunch: lamb burger (without the bun)

Dinner: rib eye steak (with no sides)

Are there any nutritional benefits?

The short answer is no.

It may be theoretically possible to get all essential vitamins and mineral from animal products. For example, lean red meat is a good source of iron, zinc and vitamin B12, while oily fish is a good source of essential fatty acids, such as omega-3s.

But unless your diet is very well planned, eating only animal meat could lead to insufficient intake of certain vitamins and minerals. This is especially the case with vitamin C and folate, where the main food sources are fruits, vegetables and wholegrains.

Importantly, dietary fibre is noticeably absent from a carnivore diet. This is a problem because a low-fibre diet can increase your risk of diabetes, heart disease and some cancers.

To avoid any dietary deficiencies, the Australian Guide to Healthy Eating recommends eating from the five core food groups: fruits, vegetables, cereals, lean meats and dairy.

Read more:
What’s this ‘longevity’ diet, and will it really make you live longer?

Is it bad for your health?

Most likely.

Most evidence for benefits of this diet is anecdotal – based on personal experiences, rather than scientific evidence.

A recent article identified self-reported health benefits and high satisfaction among adults who followed a carnivore diet for six months or more. However, since the study involved asking people how much they liked a diet they had chosen to put themselves on, we can’t conclude much from its findings.

When it comes to high protein diets in general, we know the amount and quality of protein matters.

Research tells us sustaining a high protein diet over a long period of time (six months or more) could impair the ability of our liver, intestine and kidneys to detoxify ammonia, which is the waste product made by our body during the digestion of protein.

For example, a 12-month randomised controlled trial looked at how protein affects kidney function. Researchers prescribed adults to either an Atkins diet (30% of total energy intake from protein) or a control diet (15% of total energy intake from protein, which is close to the typical Australian diet).

The trial reported a rise in clearance of creatinine (a product of protein digestion) in adults on the Atkins diet at 12 months, but not 24 months. This could suggest that after a time, the kidneys became less able to clear away potentially harmful byproducts of excess protein, leading to kidney injury.

However, because of the limited food selection, high cost of meat, repetitive nature of many high protein diets, and concerns over whether it would be ethical, there aren’t many long-term trials.

That said, evidence from large and long-term observational studies tells us diets high in red meat and processed meats increase our risk of heart disease and many cancers.

While one person may be able to sustain a carnivore diet for months, or even years, without any health complications, that’s certainly not going to be the case for everyone.

Read more:
What are ‘fasting’ diets and do they help you lose weight?

How much meat is too much?

For an adult, a high-protein diet is generally defined as consuming 2 grams or more of protein per kilogram of body weight per day.

So for an 80kg male, this would be 160g of protein per day. And what does 160g of protein in whole foods look like? It’s about equivalent to six medium lamb chops a day (550g of meat).

When we compare this with national guidelines, the Australian Dietary Guidelines recommend the average adult eats a maximum of 455g of cooked lean red meat per week (or 65g a day, equivalent to one small lamb chop).

For heart health specifically, the Heart Foundation recommends eating less than 350g of cooked unprocessed red meat per week (50g a day).

So what’s the verdict?

The strongest evidence shows eating a diet rich in whole plant foods, such as fruit and vegetables, with a moderate amount of lean and unprocessed red meat, poultry and fish is good for our health.

For this reason, the Mediterranean diet has become ubiquitous with a healthy diet.

If you are considering trying a high-protein diet, it’s recommended to first consult a health professional, such as an accredited practising dietitian.

Dr Katherine Livingstone receives funding from a National Health and Medical Research Council Investigator Grant (APP1173803).

– ref. What is the ‘carnivore diet’ and is it a bad idea? – https://theconversation.com/what-is-the-carnivore-diet-and-is-it-a-bad-idea-189464

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrea La Nauze, Lecturer, The University of Queensland

About 30% of Australian homes have rooftop solar panels installed – the highest uptake of any nation. Their popularity has been helped along by government subsidies that reduce the upfront costs of the technology.

But these subsidies may not always have a positive climate impact. While people like to “keep up with the Joneses” on climate action, my recent research suggests this is not always the case when large solar subsidies are being offered.

It found if someone is perceived as having installed solar panels primarily for a financial benefit, their non-solar neighbours may actually be deterred from reducing their own climate impact – such as by signing up for so-called “green” retail electricity schemes.

Subsidies are often a policy go-to for governments wanting to encourage more climate-friendly behaviours. But my findings indicate they should be used with caution.

A spotlight on buyer behaviour

Examining subsidies for rooftop solar systems is valuable because it can tell us about consumer behaviour more broadly.

For the past 20 years or so, state and federal governments have subsidised the cost of installing rooftop solar by offering a range of rebates and other financial incentives to consumers. In recent years these subsidies have fallen, in part because the cost of the technology has become so cheap that consumers can recoup the cost fairly quickly through reduced power bills.

But some subsidies for rooftop solar and home batteries still exist. Some governments also apply them to energy efficiency measures and electric vehicles.

Such subsidies come at great cost to the public purse. So will they help Australia reach its emissions reduction targets? My research suggests in some cases, they can be counterproductive.

Read more:
Heat pumps can cut your energy costs by up to 90%. It’s not magic, just a smart use of the laws of physics

Signing up for GreenPower

Neighbours influence each other’s behaviour. Living near lots of homes with solar panels can change people’s beliefs about the science of climate change. It also makes people more likely to install solar panels on their own home.

However, research focused on water conservation suggests the “peer pressure” effect is muted if the behaviour change doesn’t also come with a financial benefit.

There remain gaps in our understanding of how neighbours influence each others’ energy use. For example, we don’t know if installing solar panels influences the energy behaviours of people who can’t install panels because, say, they live in an apartment.

My research examined the uptake of GreenPower to help us close that knowledge gap.

GreenPower is government-accredited electricity generated by renewable sources and offered for sale to consumers.

Like installing solar panels, GreenPower can be considered a “public good” in that it helps tackle climate change. But GreenPower is not subsidised and is not visible to neighbours. And users also don’t get the financial benefit of selling surplus electricity from rooftop solar back to the grid.

The number of GreenPower users in Australia has fallen dramatically in recent years: from about 1 million customers in 2009 to 100,000 in 2019.

Much of this may be explained by people switching to rooftop solar during that period. But it was also possible that rooftop solar installations were influencing decisions by non-solar neighbours of whether to sign up to GreenPower schemes. My research aimed to distinguish between these possibilities.

Read more:
Small communities could be buying, selling and saving money on electric power right now – here’s how

What the research found

I studied the electricity plan choices of about 300,000 customers in Victoria from 2009-2016. I matched each contract to the number of solar panels installed in that postcode in the quarter the contract was signed.

I found on average, solar panel installation increases the number of non-solar homes purchasing GreenPower. But economic incentives – like subsidies – actually reduced the peer effect.

During periods of high solar subsidies, an additional 1,000 homes with solar panels reduced the share of GreenPower contracts by 0.08 – or 400 for every 5,000 new electricity contracts taken out by non-solar customers.

During periods of low solar subsidies, an additional 1,000 homes with solar panels increased the share of GreenPower contracts by 0.02, or 100 for every 5,000 new electricity contracts.

This suggests economic incentives compromise the signal that a neighbour is acting in the public good – and so reduces pressure on neighbours to follow their lead.

This may then mean neighbours feel less pressure to address their own electricity-related greenhouse emissions by purchasing GreenPower, or taking other climate-friendly measures.

Other factors are also likely to have contributed to the decline in the popularity of GreenPower. These include its cost relative to electricity from other sources, and debate around the introduction and removal of Australia’s carbon price.

Read more:
So long, Loy Yang: shutting Australia’s dirtiest coal plant a decade early won’t jeopardise our electricity supply

Proceed with care

Subsidies affect technology adoption, and subsidies for “green” technologies such as solar panels do lower carbon emissions.

But subsidies also have indirect effects that must be considered when thinking about the costs and benefits of various policy options.

Alternatives to these subsidies exist. These include an economy-wide price on carbon, emissions ceilings on vehicles, and mandatory renewable energy targets. These policy options could avoid the downsides of subsidies to consumers.

Andrea La Nauze has received funding from the Australian Research Council.

– ref. Not keeping up with the Joneses: the one factor that makes us less likely to emulate our neighbours on climate action – https://theconversation.com/not-keeping-up-with-the-joneses-the-one-factor-that-makes-us-less-likely-to-emulate-our-neighbours-on-climate-action-176372

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christian Moro, Associate Professor of Science & Medicine, Bond University

Urine therapy (or urotherapy) is a longstanding practice based on the concept that urine can be drunk, bathed in, or otherwise applied to bring good health or even heal the body of certain ailments.

Unusual as it may sound to most people, it’s an idea that persists even today. And like most things of this nature, it has taken on a life of its own online. But is there any evidence urine therapy works?

To cut to the chase, no. Urine is waste and should be left excreted from the body.

Early origins

Before modern medicine, various cultures had innovative ways to manage health. The early Egyptians, Chinese, Indians, Aztecs and Romans reportedly used urine as a treatment for various ailments, such as to heal battle wounds or whiten teeth.

There was some logic to these practices. For example, without access to clean water, urine might be used to wash a wound. Or in the absence of a gas mask, a urine-soaked rag could be used to filter out nasties during a chlorine gas attack.

Historically, these uses were only justified in contexts where no medical alternative was available. Nonetheless, some continue to recommend using urine for various ailments today.

With our current health and treatment options, there is no reason to engage with any form of urine treatment. And there is no scientific evidence drinking urine or engaging in any other urine therapy has benefits.

In all modern contexts, there are more hygienic and effective solutions than urine therapy – regardless of what ailment or problem is being addressed.

If you’re seeking a therapeutic benefit from one of the compounds found in urine, it’s best to get this over a pharmacist’s counter and not from a cup in the loo!

Read more:
Why do I need to pee more in the cold?

What is in urine?

Urine is excreted from the kidneys as they filter blood, keeping what the body needs and removing the waste as urine, which is stored in the bladder until we pee.

Urine is 95% water. The remaining ingredients include urea (2%) and creatinine (0.1%) – a breakdown product from muscle and protein metabolism – alongside trace elements of various salts and proteins.

Urea is a safe organic compound, which occurs naturally when proteins are metabolised. Urea-based formulations can be found in skin and nail softening lotions, acting as an effective moisturiser and helping to improve the skin’s barrier function.

However, although urea is present in urine, its concentration is simply too low to offer any therapeutic benefit.

Apart from urea and creatinine, more than 3,000 different compounds have been found in urine. This means, as we learn more about the urinary system, future screening for a wide variety of health issues, including cancers, might be obtained through a simple urine test.

Might urine therapies be harmful?

In some cases public interest in urine therapies has been so strong, governments have had to ban proposed urine-based “health drinks”.

The fact is excreted urine can be quite harmful. There are only a few ways the body can remove waste from its system, and this is done primarily through urine, faeces and sweat.

This means urine might contain environmental toxins and other nasties your body has worked hard to remove. Some medications are also excreted in urine, so drinking it can accumulate toxic levels of these drugs. In some cases urine can also have pathogenic bacteria that, if ingested, can cause serious diarrhoea, nausea, vomiting, an upset stomach and infections.

And no, urinating on the site is not recommended for jellyfish stings. This has the potential to cause even more pain by aggravating the stingers and inducing them to release more venom.

Even drinking urine in a survival situation isn’t as helpful as it’s often touted to be. Although it may make some sense to return fluid to your system, at the same time reintroducing excreted salts will be unhelpful for hydration.

Also, as dehydration sets in you won’t be making much urine anyway, so drinking urine in a survival situation is unlikely to be a viable option.

Read more:
We know hand dryers can circulate germs through the air. Why are they still used everywhere?

Is urine ‘sterile’?

In most cases only very low levels of bacteria are excreted in urine. But the idea urine might be sterile is simply a myth. The word sterile means “completely clean and free from dirt and bacteria”.

Our body is full of resident bacterial colonies that maintain our health and assist with general daily functions. This means most of our body is not sterile, and the bladder is no exception.

A high level of bacteria is usually associated with urinary tract infections. Nonetheless, there’s an ever-growing body of research identifying all kinds of healthy bacteria living in our bladder, which can be excreted in the urine of healthy people.

Peeing in the shower is also a no-no, as urine can cause infections if it comes in contact with cuts or wounds on your legs. This practice can even make disorders such as overactive bladder or incontinence worse, by causing our brains to associate running water with the “need to pee”. This particularly impacts females as their pelvic area anatomy just isn’t designed to pee standing up.

While standing, the muscles may struggle to contract and relax properly, or even slow the stream of urine. This means the bladder may not be completely emptied and increases the chance of infections.

The bottom line is there are no scientifically supported benefits for urine therapies. If you need a particular treatment, you should talk to your doctor rather than turning to a urine-based prospect.

If you accidentally drink urine, call your local poisons information centre for advice.

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. Is urine sterile? Do urine ‘therapies’ work? Experts debunk common pee myths – https://theconversation.com/is-urine-sterile-do-urine-therapies-work-experts-debunk-common-pee-myths-191862

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kylie Soanes, Postdoctoral Fellow, School of Ecosystem and Forest Sciences, The University of Melbourne

It’s the question that baffled scientists for hundreds years – where on Earth do eels come from?

Aristotle’s best guess was that they spontaneously generated. Danish biologist Johannes Schmidt was pretty sure they spawned in the Sargasso Sea – right near the Bermuda Triangle, for a little extra mystery. His extensive biological surveys over 100 years ago found lots of young eels in this area, leading him to conclude they must hatch somewhere nearby.

But eggs or adult eels breeding were never been seen anywhere nearby. So the question remained unanswered … until now.

Last week, a team of researchers were able to confirm that yes, the 1-metre long European eel people knew from their local river really did come from a sub-tropical sea up to 10,000 kilometres away. This team had something history’s biggest thinkers didn’t: cool tech.

Pop-up Satellite Archival Tags are a relatively new type of tracking device that allows scientists to map the movements of marine creatures in a way that simply wasn’t possible before. The tags record where the animals travel, how fast they move, and even how deep they dive. Then, the tags detach and float to the surface where they can transmit data back into the hands of eager scientists.

The European eel’s migration is impressive, but they are still shrouded in mystery. All the eels on the mainland come from the same spawning place – yes, even the eels in backyard ponds, which can slither along land to the sea after only a little rain. Eels can even climb up enormous dam walls! But how do they know where to go? How do they decide when?

Australia, too, has its own illustrious eels. They generally keep to themselves, so much so that most of us wouldn’t even know they’re there. But with all this rain and flooding, there’s a chance you might stumble across one soon.

So I thought this was a good time to share five things you might not know about eels, including in Australia.

1. We have our own marvellous migration story in Australia

While not quite as long as the European eel’s journey, Australia’s short-finned eels undertake a massive migration.

In research published last year, researchers from the Arthur Rylah Institute and Gunditj Mirring Traditional Owner Aboriginal Corporation used satellite tracking tags to map the path of 16 eels from Port Phillip Bay off Melbourne, to the Coral Sea outside the Great Barrier Reef. Some travelled almost 3000km in just five months.

It’s an arduous journey. The tags showed some eels dive to depths of almost 1,000m below the ocean surface, taking advantage of currents and dodging predators. Not all were successful though – at least five of the tracked eels were eaten by sharks or whales.

Read more:
‘The sad reality is many don’t survive’: how floods affect wildlife, and how you can help them

2. Eels are obstacle course masters

When you stop to think about it, there are more than a few obstacles between inland fresh waters and the ocean. Many of the swamps and wetlands that would traditionally have offered safe passage have been filled in, replaced by farms, dams and cities.

And yet, eels find a way. One key feature is their ability to breathe through their skin, meaning even the shallowest drain or puddle-soaked lawn is enough water for them to move through.

According to urban legends, eels have been seen slithering through urban gutters, sports ovals, or over university campus fountains, following ancient pathways back out to sea.

3. Eels are expert transformers

Imagine if you had to go through puberty four or five times, with each bodily change more dramatic than the last. Then you’d have a pretty good understanding of what it’s like to be an eel.

Migrating eels have to go from being a saltwater fish to a freshwater fish and back again, which means they have incredible life cycles. They start out as as tiny larva out in the ocean in the Sargasso or Coral Sea where they spawn, before morphing into translucent “glass eels”.

After that, they shape-shift into darker “elvers” at about one year old as they make their way back to fresh water, where they eventually mature into the adult eels that live in our rives, lakes and dams.

When the time comes, they make their final transformation into lean, mean, migrating machines – known as silver eels.

Their eyes grow larger and their heads becomes pointed and streamlined. They also stop eating, as their stomachs shrink to make way for bigger gonads (all the better to spawn with).

4. Sigmund Freud was an eel fan, too

Speaking of gonads, Sigmund Freud (yes, that Freud) spent the early years of his research career trying to understand the sexual anatomy of eels.

Unfortunately for Freud, and the eels, the only way to tell if an eel is male or female is to dissect it to observe it’s internal reproductive organs.

Despite performing hundreds of dissections, Freud rarely found male eels. Turns out, this is because eels don’t develop reproductive parts until later in life – usually not until they’re at least ten years old.

5) Eels can live very long lives

Yes, these long fish have long lives, with some eels living to be more than 50 years old.

One man in Sweden claimed his backyard eel lived to 155, while another eel reportedly lived to 85 in a Swedish Aquarium.

Eels spend the first few years of life getting from their spawning grounds back to fresh water, and the last few making the return journey out to sea. They only make this spawning once – after that, they die.

Read more:
Meet 5 remarkably old animals, from a Greenland shark to a featherless, seafaring cockatoo

Why is this kind of research important?

There’s still so much we don’t understand about eels around the world. But satellite research such as that published this week, takes us a step closer to pulling all the pieces together.

This has real implications for how we look after eel populations. The European eel (Anguilla anguilla) is critically endangered, with the species experiencing declines of up to 95% in the last 50 years.

We don’t really know how well Australian eels are tracking. If we understand where animals breed and how they get there, it means we can find ways to help, rather than hinder their journey, and protect the places that are important.

The Conversation is grateful for the contribution of Australia’s number 1 eel enthusiast, Dr Emily Finch”, whose twitter thread inspired this article

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

– ref. Eels are some of nature’s weirdest creatures. Here are 5 reasons why they’re such cool little freaks – https://theconversation.com/eels-are-some-of-natures-weirdest-creatures-here-are-5-reasons-why-theyre-such-cool-little-freaks-192862

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hannah Kennedy, Post-doctoral fellow, Department of Psychological Medicine, University of Otago

For many people, the term “eating disorder” will bring to mind its two most familiar forms – anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. What they may not realise, however, is that “binge eating disorder” is more common than the other two combined and can significantly reduce quality of life.

More than just eating too much, which most people will find themselves doing once in a while, binge eating reflects a recurrent behaviour pattern of losing control, bingeing food and feeling associated shame and guilt afterwards.

Binge eating disorder was only recognised as a diagnosis in 2013, much later than anorexia and bulimia. But a lack of awareness about binge eating means people who experience the disorder aren’t getting the help they need from doctors.

As our multinational research project has recently found, people with binge eating disorder are also underrepresented in studies of eating disorders, limiting the ability of researchers to develop treatments.

Understanding the fundamentals of binge eating

Unlike bulimia, or the type of anorexia that involves binge eating and purging, people experiencing binge eating disorder don’t try to compensate with strategies such as purging or excessive exercise following a bingeing episode.

Also unlike anorexia or bulimia, which predominantly affect woman, binge eating disorder affects an estimated 3.5% of women and 2% of men during their lifetimes. In New Zealand, that could mean more than 130,000 people suffer from this particular eating disorder. In Australia, this could affect more than 600,000 people in their lifetimes.

Read more:
When I work with people with eating disorders, I see many rules around ‘good’ and ‘bad’ foods – but eating is never that simple

Although it may first emerge in childhood and adolescence, binge eating more typically occurs in early adulthood. Importantly, bingeing can be observed in people of all body sizes, although many individuals who experience binge eating will be in a higher weight range.

According to the US National Library of Medicine, there are five criteria to diagnose binge eating disorder:

1. Recurrent episodes of binge eating characterised by eating, in a limited period of time, a larger amount of food than most people would eat under similar circumstances, while also experiencing a lack of control over eating during the episode.

2. Binge eating episodes are associated with three or more of the following factors: eating much more rapidly than normal, eating until feeling uncomfortably full, eating large amounts of food when not feeling physically hungry, eating alone due to embarrassment and feeling disgusted, depressed or very guilty afterwards.

3. Marked distress caused by binge eating.

4. Binge eating, on average, at least once a week for three months.

5. The binge eating is separate from other disordered eating behaviours, including vomiting after eating, as happens with bulimia.

Other warning signs of binge eating disorder include:

• frequent weight fluctuations

• fad diets, including eliminating entire food groups (carbs, sugar, dairy, etc)

• extreme concern with body weight and shape

• stealing or hoarding food

• withdrawal from friends and usual activities

• eating in secret and hiding evidence (such as food wrappers).

The longer-term health complications associated with this type of eating disorder include heart disease, type 2 diabetes, obesity and osteoarthritis (due to wearing down of the cartilage that cushions the ends of bones at the joints).

Hidden from view

Despite all this, binge eating is still considered the “hidden” eating disorder.
Without the extreme weight loss or purging behaviours that can accompany other eating disorders, binge eating is less recognisable.

Bingeing may even be dismissed as just an occasional over-indulgence. Media portrayals of eating disorders perpetuate this idea, often focusing on anorexia.

The stigma and shame surrounding binge eating behaviours are significant and may prevent people from accessing help and treatments that could combat the disorder. Fewer than half of those who experience binge eating will seek and receive treatment.

Patients will often not disclose their binge eating symptoms to their doctor, meaning treatments often focus on weight loss and other health complications of binge eating but fail to recognise the eating disorder that drives the behaviour.

This lack of awareness and discussion affects recruitment into research in eating disorders.

The research gap

Recruiting people who have experienced binge eating for eating disorder studies is critical for better understanding of the disorder and improving treatments.

Read more:
Why looking in the mirror is so hard for people with eating disorders

However, our experience of recruiting participants for our own study indicates this can be challenging. Despite our best efforts, the number of participants with anorexia or bulimia far outnumber those with binge eating – a pattern observed in New Zealand, Australia and the US.

Current treatments for adults with binge eating disorder include cognitive behavioural therapy, antidepressants and, in some countries, the drug lisdexamfetamine, which is the only approved medication for the disorder so far.

Visibility will improve treatment options

Awareness and education that binge eating is a prevalent – and potentially life-threatening eating disorder – is desperately needed to combat the current stigma and provide insight into the drivers of the behaviour.

The government announced an additional NZ$3.9 million in funding for eating disorder services in this year’s budget. But if binge eating remains hidden from view, sufferers could miss out on the essential support this boost could provide.

People with binge eating disorder should be supported by their doctors to seek help and encouraged to engage in research that will eventually lead to better outcomes. Until that happens, we are working blind as we try to address a disorder that affects thousands.

Hannah Kennedy 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. Binge eating is more common than anorexia or bulimia – but it remains a hidden and hard-to-treat disorder – https://theconversation.com/binge-eating-is-more-common-than-anorexia-or-bulimia-but-it-remains-a-hidden-and-hard-to-treat-disorder-192596

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ben Wellings, Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations, Monash University

British politics currently exists in a weird time warp. Like some bad special effects from an early episode of Dr Who, time and reality are bent and twisted – only this time it’s all sadly true.

This time warp operates in four main ways.

The first is that lots happens but nothing changes. Another prime minister has gone, but the same party, bereft of ideas, is still in office, clinging to power for its own sake.

It is a measure of the collapse of confidence among Conservative MPs that they fear electoral oblivion from what should be a quite unassailable majority of 71 seats in the current parliament.

The chaos of the management of the vote on fracking – a mischievous ploy by the opposition – should have been a comfortable backhander for the government. Instead, it precipitated the prime minister’s resignation. It’s as if the election victory of 2019 never happened, and we have gone back in time to when the Conservatives only had a slim majority.

The second way the time warp operates relates to the poverty of thinking throughout the party. The fact Boris Johnson is one of the favourites to return to Downing Street suggests how out of touch the grassroots members of the party are with the rest of the country.

The parliamentary party sees the grassroots members as a liability, and is keen to sideline them as much as possible in what will be a speed-dating version of a leadership contest over the coming week. Like Berthold Brecht said of the Communist Party of East Germany: the party needs to dissolve the people and elect a new one.

Read more:
There’s something wrong with British politics. It’s called the Conservative Party

The third time warp is that the Tories now look like the “loony left” of the 1980s. Rather than being a party motivated by competently managing dull but important things like interest rates, it has morphed into an ideological fighting machine, tilting at windmills like the BBC and “critical race theory” (whatever that is).

Its ideological warriors sound like the inverse of beret-wearing, right-on Marxists from 1983: seeking to win an ideological war of position by capturing the commanding heights of cultural institutions like the National Trust. None of this helped the left in the 1980s. It is not helping the Conservatives now.

The fourth and last time warp returns us to an era before there was such a thing as the Conservative Party. During the 19th century, a group of men representing the interests of the landed classes and manufacturers eventually cohered into an organisation we would recognise as a political party. Time is now moving backwards, undoing this slow alchemy of centuries.

Much of the problem with British politics is indeed the Conservative Party. But it is right to ask if there is such a party in the singular anymore? The Conservative Party is riven with factions and overwhelming personal rivalries. It must be the worst place to work in Britain right now. But whatever the causes, it lacks a cohesiveness for even the most broad-church of political organisations.

This will make choosing the new leader an impossible choice. Johnson is possible. He is a great campaigner, but that was back in 2019 before “partygate”. Rishi Sunak could run on an “I told you so” ticket but is a multi-millionaire, which would not go down well in the current context of the politics of cost of living. Penny Mordaunt has kept her nose clean during the Truss tenure, but lacks experience. Suella Braverman is the loudest ideological warrior and not popular among MPs or the British public, so will presumably win.

Finally, bending space as well as time, the United Kingdom has turned into “Britaly”: a Dr Moreau-like hybrid of Britain and Italy where the bond markets are in charge, growth is sluggish, and only one party is in government, although the personnel seem to change constantly.

This all might seem like an open goal for the opposition Labour Party, which after the election loss in 2019 had resigned itself to further decades of permanent opposition. But there is something to be lamented here. After the Republican Party in the USA, the Conservative Party is the oldest – and most successful – party in the world. Both parties have become riven with factions fighting what they see as existential ideological battles. The public in both countries suffers as a result.

It is time for the Conservative Party to have a cup of tea, a Bex and a good lie down. If they were in charge of their time warping trajectory, a return to a time before the lunatics took over the asylum wouldn’t be a bad place to stop and reflect.

Read more:
Boris Johnson says his time as UK PM was ‘mission largely accomplished’. How does that actually stack up?

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

– ref. Do not adjust your sets: with Truss gone, the UK is about to get yet another prime minister – https://theconversation.com/do-not-adjust-your-sets-with-truss-gone-the-uk-is-about-to-get-yet-another-prime-minister-192931

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Joanne Orlando, Researcher: Digital Literacy and Digital Wellbeing, Western Sydney University

A Victorian coroner has cited problematic gaming behaviour as the driver of a mood disorder which contributed to the 2019 death of regional school boy Oliver Cronin.

The findings from Coroner Paresa Spanos’s investigation were released on Wednesday. Spanos wrote in the report:

In the 12 months preceding his death, Oliver appears to have become obsessed or addicted to video gaming. He became irrational and aggressive at times. His parents tried to restrict his access to the gaming devices in an attempt to temper this behaviour, but this led to an escalation in Oliver’s behaviour escalating to verbal and physical abuse against his parents and extreme temper tantrums. In the weeks preceding his death, Oliver was also involved in physical altercations with other students, which resulted in two short suspensions from school.

So what can parents make of this? And is there any evidence problematic gaming in and of itself can lead to depression or aggression?

Correlation or causation?

The coroner found Oliver had a “gaming disorder” as defined by the World Health Organisation, although he was not diagnosed as such during his life. The WHO’s classification of a gaming disorder is based on a person’s attitude towards gaming, rather than time spent gaming. Simply, gaming becomes a disorder when it starts to interfere with a person’s healthy daily functioning.

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We know more than two billion people around the world play games, but less than 1% are thought to have a gaming disorder.

Debates about the potential harms of gaming are often framed around whether violence in gaming can cause violence in real life. For this, there is simply no evidence.

There is some correlation, but these findings must be assessed very carefully. For example, research shows gamers who are already more socially sensitive, or have existing mental health issues, may in turn be more sensitive to violence in games.

Gaming as escapism

There’s a marked difference between a gaming addiction causing aggression or depression, and an already depressed or troubled person turning to games as a form of escapism.

The research tells us gaming has no harmful impacts on healthy young people who don’t have existing mental health problems.

However, negative forces in life may drive some people towards gaming as a way to cope. Specifically, people who already feel a sense of self blame, loss of control in life or social disengagement are more likely to turn to gaming as a coping mechanism – not unlike how some may turn to drugs, alcohol or gambling.

Gaming, however, is much more accessible to young people. And in situations where gaming is used as a form of escapism, the gameplay does not resolve the underlying issue. It simply puts it on hold for a while.

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Cutting off gaming may make it harder to cope

It’s often young people, and namely young men, who tend to be the subject of research investigating the potential harms of gaming. This in an important factor when addressing the findings of this research.

Adolescence is more likely to be a complex and fraught time when compared to other stages in life. It’s therefore not surprising problematic gaming is more commonly found in this group.

But again, this is not the same as gaming itself being the driver of young people’s troubles.

In cases where gaming is used as a coping mechanism – and this is forcibly removed from their life – they may feel an even larger sense of hopelessness or loss.

What we don’t know – and what you can do

The bottom line is there’s no evidence to suggest gaming itself leads to aggression or depression among young people. The reality is, as ever, much more nuanced.

The findings in the Victorian coroner’s report are a reminder we still don’t fully understand exactly how problematic gaming ties into various other factors in a person’s life. We’ll need more balanced and in-depth research to unpack this issue.

We lack experts who are specialised in addressing gaming disorder. And globally we lack consensus on how problematic gaming can and should be classified, or even if it should be considered a disorder at all. Australia’s primary clinical diagnostic guide does not have a specific diagnosis for “gaming disorder”.

For parents who may be concerned about a child’s gaming habits, one approach may be to play some games with the child, and engage in discussion without judgement. For more tips, you can refer to one of my past articles.

Read more:
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If this article has raised issues for you, or if you’re concerned about someone you know, call Lifeline on 13 11 14.

Joanne Orlando 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. Can gaming ‘addiction’ lead to depression or aggression in young people? Here’s what the evidence says – https://theconversation.com/can-gaming-addiction-lead-to-depression-or-aggression-in-young-people-heres-what-the-evidence-says-168847

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Pat Anderson, Chairperson, Batchelor Institute of Indigenous Tertiary Education

Since the advent of colonisation, the absence of an effective process for conducting dialogues between the broader community and First Nations people has been a festering sore at the heart of Australian society.

The notorious doctrine of terra nullius not only led to the denial of the legitimate rights of First Nations people, but also ensured they could never be heard. This malign strategy has produced centuries of unspeakable suffering, sickness and death. Many Australians feel the time has come to start to heal the wound.

The Uluru Statement from the Heart advocates for a process of dialogue to set us on a path towards a new way of living together. The statement was agreed to in 2017 by a convention of more than 250 First Nations people after an inclusive and rigorous process of regional dialogues. It proposes a First Nations Voice to Parliament to guide a passage both to a new “coming together” and to the clear articulation of the long-suppressed truth.

As Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said when announcing the forthcoming referendum that seeks to incorporate these key proposals into the Australian Constitution, the statement is a generous offer to the entire Australian community. It does not harbour grudges and does not seek vengeance. It asks for a secure mechanism whereby the voices of First Nations people can at last be heard – by each other, by the parliament and by the wider Australian public.

While support for the statement is widespread, some sections of the population – both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal – have dismissed the Voice as inconsequential, arguing the focus should instead be on establishing a “treaty”. They have argued a Voice will lead only to talk, whereas the real goal should be a law that guarantees the civil rights of First Nations peoples.

This argument fails to understand the potential power of the Voice. It can not only lay a foundation for a movement towards reconciliation and truth, but also act as a tool to craft novel solutions to the problems created by the unique circumstances of Australia’s history and culture.

In this connection, it is notable the statement does not actually use the term “treaty”. Instead, it proposes the distinctly Aboriginal concept of “Makarrata”, which refers to a process of learning from the past to create new ways of interacting with each other based on dialogue. Voice, Makarrata and Truth are inseparable, but Voice is the motor that drives all of them forward.

Read more:
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Establishing the Voice will lead to immediate, important outcomes. It will set the scene for addressing the centuries of injustice. It will create an effective process to address the intergenerational disadvantage many communities suffer. It will help overcome the historical exclusion of First Nations people from public forums. And crucially, it will offer an important symbolic gesture of acknowledgement and recognition that the days of vox nullius (“voicelessness”), the primary intention and consequence of terra nullius, are at last over.

It is, of course, unlikely that all First Nations people will speak with one voice – indeed, that would be undesirable. However, creation of a secure channel of communication will open up new ways for all members of the Australian community to negotiate their differences and discover novel solutions to our common challenges.

First Nations people will therefore not be the only ones to gain from the Voice. A vibrant, living platform for vigorous dialogue that addresses fundamental political issues will also benefit the wider society. It will help revive the ailing public sphere in Australia, restoring trust in institutions that have been degraded and depleted as a result of a deeply-established focus on personal ambition, vested interests and loss of shared ethical vision.

While some form of treaty will undoubtedly remain an important goal, the joint concepts of Voice, Makarrata and Truth are deeper, and more complex and enduring.

On its own, a treaty would operate only as an element within the system of colonially-derived law. This means it would utilise concepts within a system of thought that few would argue has served our country well in relation to the treatment of First Nations people, let alone of refugees and other vulnerable minorities.

Read more:
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The statement provides an approach to a consensus process that goes much further than this. Drawing on the creative resources of dialogue so fundamental to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures, it will establish a framework that allows us to move forward to create new ethical bonds and fresh communal relationships that reactivate trust, reinvigorate public, cooperative action and support the resolution of conflicts through peaceful dialogue.

As we move towards the referendum, it is important for us to think carefully about the vision we wish to hold for Australia. About whether we are, collectively, ready to accept the invitation offered in the Uluru statement.

We have to decide whether we are ready to break the silence of our shared histories and take up the challenge to talk with each other, openly, frankly and with respect.

Pat Anderson is co-convener of the Uluru Statement and is a member of the Referendum Working Group.

Paul Komesaroff 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. Why a First Nations Voice should come before Treaty – https://theconversation.com/why-a-first-nations-voice-should-come-before-treaty-192388

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gary Sacks, Associate Professor, Deakin University

Australia is falling behind other countries in addressing the unhealthy state of our diets.

Several other countries, including the United Kingdom, Canada and Mexico, have recently taken major steps to help improve population nutrition and prevent obesity.

But our latest assessment, released as part of the International Congress on Obesity, has found major holes in Australian government policy relative to international best practice, with limited policy progress in the past five years.

What we assessed?

Our assessment of the federal government included a scorecard of how Australia is going in 50 policy areas for addressing unhealthy diets. These policy areas include key influences on what we buy and what we eat, including policies that affect the price and affordability of different foods, the types of food available, how food is labelled, and the way food is promoted.

We worked closely with government officials to document current action in each policy area. We then assessed how existing policies compared to international benchmarks.

Finally, we made recommendations to address the gaps, prioritising them based on their relative importance and feasibility. Eighty-four experts from 37 organisations participated in the assessment and prioritisation process.

Read more:
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How does Australia compare to other countries?

We found implementation of globally recommended policies for improving population diets and addressing obesity in Australia falls far short of international best practice.

There has been only limited policy progress in Australia in the past five years.

Areas where Australia is doing well

One of the only areas where Australia fared well was in the area of food labelling, where some of the regulations regarding ingredient lists, nutrition information panels and health claims was rated among the best in the world.

The other area that scored Australia top marks is that the GST does not apply to fresh fruit and vegetables, which helps lower their prices relative to other less healthy products.

What are other countries doing better?

Several other countries have implemented policies to limit the marketing of unhealthy foods and make it easier for people to choose healthier options.

Countries in Latin America are leading the way globally. Chile has put in place comprehensive restrictions on TV advertising for unhealthy food, conspicuous warning labels on the packaging of unhealthy products, as well as taxes on sugary drinks. Mexico has similar policies.

Elsewhere in the world, more than 50 countries now have taxes on sugary drinks. There is clear evidence these taxes have decreased consumption of the taxed products, while also incentivising soft drink manufacturers to reduce the sugar content of their drinks.

Several other governments are taking strong action to protect children from exposure to marketing of unhealthy food. As an example, the United Kingdom is set to ban ads for unhealthy food online, and on TV before 9pm from 2024. Canada has similar laws before their parliament.

The UK also just introduced major changes to how supermarkets operate. Laws that came into effect this month mean unhealthy products can no longer be displayed in prominent in-store locations, such as shop entrances and checkout areas.

In addition, the UK has proposed a ban on price discounts on unhealthy food, although implementation remains uncertain with the recent change in government leadership.

Several other innovative policies are in place internationally. For example, in some parts of Mexico, retailers cannot sell unhealthy food to children. And in Argentina, there are laws dictating maximum sodium (salt) content in a range of products.

Read more:
Sugary drinks tax is working – now it’s time to target cakes, biscuits and snacks

How bad are Australian diets?

Unhealthy diets and obesity are the leading contributors to poor health in Australia.

Less than 7% of people in Australia consume a healthy diet consistent with the Australian Dietary Guidelines.

Nearly 65% of Australian adults, and 25% of Australian children are overweight or obese.

While there isn’t good data on how these statistics have changed in the past few years, things have likely got worse since the start of the COVID pandemic.

Unless we see comprehensive government action to improve population diets, there will be enormous health and financial costs to individuals, communities and the economy overall.

Read more:
BMI is underestimating obesity in Australia, waist circumference needs to be measured too

What actions should Australia take?

Federal government policy action is needed to improve population diets and address obesity. This includes:

• protecting children from exposure to the marketing of unhealthy food and beverages through comprehensive and consistent national legislation

• implementing a health levy on sugar-sweetened beverages (a sugar tax) and other unhealthy food, while addressing the affordability of healthy food

• improving food labelling by mandating the Health Star Rating scheme and requiring warning labels on products high in added sugar, sodium (salt) and/or saturated fat.

What’s holding us back?

In the past 12 months, the former federal government released key strategies in this area, including the National Preventive Health Strategy (2021-2030) and the National Obesity Strategy (2022-2032). But this has yet to result in any changes on the ground.

Critically, there is strong support from the Australian community for governments to impose higher standards on marketing to support children’s health and wellbeing. More than 75% of Australians also back warning labels on unhealthy foods.

It is promising to see momentum building around a legislative ban on the marketing of unhealthy food and beverages to children.

But it’s now time for the federal government to catch up to the rest of the world and implement meaningful policy change to help Australians improve their diets.

Gary Sacks receives funding from the the National Heart Foundation of Australia, National Health and Medical Research Council, Australian Research Council and VicHealth.

Davina Mann 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. Australia is dragging its feet on healthy eating. In 5 years we’ve made woeful progress – https://theconversation.com/australia-is-dragging-its-feet-on-healthy-eating-in-5-years-weve-made-woeful-progress-192393

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katherine Kent, Lecturer, Western Sydney University

We know university students regularly go without food and other necessities because they cannot afford them. This has negative impacts on their learning and physical and mental health.

But what about the food security of those who teach and support students – university academics and professional staff?

In an Australian-first study, we surveyed staff at the University of Tasmania and found nearly one in six are running out of food and unable to buy more.

Our study

Food insecurity is when people or households struggle to put enough healthy food on the table every day because of limited money or other resources.

In April 2022, we surveyed 560 staff and more than 1,200 students about their access to food. The survey was open to all students (undergraduate, postgraduate, and higher degree research) and staff (academic and professional).

The survey was online and asked six questions, looking at whether respondents had run out of food, ate less or lower-quality food, or had gone hungry at any time over the past year.

Some uni staff are going hungry

In total, 16% of staff surveyed reported experiencing food insecurity at some point over the past 12 months.

Of those surveyed 4% also reported being anxious about not having enough food in the house. In other results, 5% of staff were eating cheaper, less healthy foods to cope and 7% were regularly skipping meals and going hungry.

Some staff were at higher risk than others. They included:

• professional staff who provide administrative and support services: one in five (19%) professional staff were food-insecure, which is likely related to their lower incomes relative to other staff.

• casual staff: one-third of surveyed casual staff experienced some degree of food insecurity and were at nearly three times increased risk of food insecurity compared with tenured or permanent staff. This is likely due to the sporadic nature of casual employment.

• length of employment: 31% of recently employed staff were food-insecure, compared with 9% of staff employed for a decade or more.

What about students?

We found high and worrying levels of food insecurity among students.

Of the 1,257 university students surveyed, nearly one in two (42%) reported some degree of food insecurity, which matches research from other universities across Australia.

Some groups of students were at higher risk of food insecurity. These include first-year students (46%), those who attend classes on campus (48%), international students (61%) and students who identify as non-binary (69%).

Read more:
‘God, I miss fruit!’ 40% of students at Australian universities may be going without food

We need better food available on campus

While this study was conducted at one university, the issue is not restricted to Tasmania. We know there are increasing levels of food insecurity in the broader Australian community.

Staff and students cannot do their jobs or complete their studies properly if they are hungry.

Currently, there is not enough healthy, affordable food and self-catering facilities on university campuses.

To date, universities have tended to focus their food security efforts on directing vulnerable students to emergency food relief organisations off campus. But this carries stigma and is not a long-term solution. Staff are also being overlooked.

Most Australian universities don’t have policies to address food insecurity or to create sustainable food environments on campus. This would mean all students and staff having equitable access to pre-made food (like a sandwich for lunch or curry for dinner). But also being able to access fresh, healthy and sustainable produce.

Creating a new approach to food on campus will take effort, money and leadership. But the situation will not improve unless universities have a strategy to increase reliable access to nutritious and affordable food.

Any food programs on campus and universities need to consult staff and students about how they should work. A not-for-profit campus shop could increase food access by involving campus members in growing, cooking and sharing affordable and sustainable food.

Read more:
How are PhD students meant to survive on two-thirds of the minimum wage?

Universities should also conduct regular audits of available food. Does it address people’s dietary and cultural needs, and can everyone access it?

Looking at the bigger picture, as university staff around Australia continue to strike over pay and conditions, universities should also prioritise secure employment to reduce staff food insecurity.

Denis Visentin is a member of the National Tertiary Education Union

Sandra Murray is a member of the National Tertiary Education Union and the Tasmanian Greens.

Katherine Kent 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. It’s not just Australian students who need more food, university staff are also going hungry – https://theconversation.com/its-not-just-australian-students-who-need-more-food-university-staff-are-also-going-hungry-192928

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Damien O’Meara, PhD Candidate, Media and Communications, Swinburne University of Technology

When Bros creator, Billy Eichner made an impassioned plea for people to see his queer-centred romantic comedy, he shared concerns on Twitter that straight people “just didn’t show up.”

The subsequent “flop” discourse surrounding Bros appears to ignore the positive reviews from audiences who have seen the film – focusing more on the failure of a queer romcom to have mainstream appeal, and a corresponding bottom line at the box office.

Variety’s Zack Sharf and William Earl suggest that “the star power just wasn’t there” to support Bros success.

Reporting suggests Bros was expected to earn $8-10 million in its opening weekend in America, but only achieved a disappointing $4.8 million. In three weeks, the queer romcom has barely earned $10 million, earning less-than a million in its third weekend.

It matters that it’s queer

Being an out queer actor is rare in Hollywood. Despite recent advances, it can still mean limited opportunities. While straight, cisgender actors have won Oscars for their portrayals of gay and transgender characters, openly queer actors are rarely cast in Oscar-worthy queer roles.

In analysis of the queer history of The Oscars, Evan Ross Katz notes that: “No out LGBTQ+ actor has ever won an Academy Award for depicting an LGBTQ+ character.”

Billy Porter is a rare example of an out gay man winning an Emmy for portraying a character that aligns with his identity, for his portrayal of Pray Tell in Pose.

Guy Branum, who plays Henry in Bros provides a passionate defence of the film in a Twitter thread, pointing out that it features a central ensemble of out queer actors, who are often overlooked for bigger profile straight and cisgender celebrities.

Still, the Hollywood reliance on star power, particularly in romcoms, has not traditionally been a convention in the queer romcom.

The romantic comedy

Genre theory emerged in the late-1960s and is used to categorise films into their type or kind. Genre is also used by producers to market films, enticing audiences through familiar conventions of their favourite type of film.

A key convention of marketing the romcom is in the pairing of a rising star with an established star – think Katherine Heigl and Seth Rogen in Knocked Up (2007) – which helps build hype for the film and the profile of the rising star.

Just like the romcom, the queer romcom is a comedy where romance provides narrative drive – boy-meets-boy, girl-meets-girl, trans girl-meets-boy, they-meets-them, etc – but they also feature a self-reflexivity about queer cultural politics.

Queer romcom complications (and comedy) can often be grounded in not-coming-out narratives putting our protagonist in awkward situations. Queer romcoms can also look to the politics and tensions within LGBTIQ+ communities for comic observations that resonate with queer audiences.

Queer romcoms have not relied as heavily on the star power, nor had the wide distribution, of their mainstream counterparts. Instead the sub-genre has found a strong home with the dedicated audiences of queer film festivals, which exist, in part, to provide a place for queer people to see themselves reflected onscreen.

Adam & Steve (2005) premiered at the Cardiff Film Festival, but never found a theatrical release. Boy Meets Girl (2014) premiered at the Boston LGBT Film Festival and was released to four theatres. Australia’s Ellie & Abbie (& Ellie’s Dead Aunt) (2020) premiered at the Mardi Gras Film Festival, went on to a number of queer film festivals and had a limited theatrical release.

Read more:
Happiest Season is the first LGBTQ+ Christmas movie from a major Hollywood studio and it’s receiving criticism – is it fair?

Is streaming the new home of the queer romcom?

With the rise of streaming, queer romcoms have begun to find more success with bigger audiences.

Happiest Season (2020) was banked for a theatrical release, starring Kristen Stewart across from Mackenzie Davis. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic the lesbian romcom opted for a streaming release, breaking Hulu streaming records. While hitting the star/rising star pairing, the comedy is born out of the revelation that Davis’ character is not out to her family. Awkward faux pas ensue as Stewart’s character tries – unconvincingly – to play the straight roommate.

Single All The Way (2021) is a first of its kind for Netflix with Michael Urie – known for his recurring role on Ugly Betty – and supporting actor royalty including Jennifer Coolidge and Kathy Najimy. The Christmas romcom reached Number 6 in the Netflix Top 10 in its debut week.

Fire Island (2022), another Hulu success story, was the sixth most streamed movie across all platforms in its debut week. Joel Kim Booster’s queer retelling of Pride and Prejudice features numerous out LGBTIQ+ actors. While stars include Saturday Night Live’s Bowen Yang, Fire Island is a step away from the big names that were at the centre of Happiest Season.

Read more:
How gay men justify their racism on Grindr

Streaming services have shown a mainstream-level appetite for the queer romcom and less reliance on star power.

Hey Bros, does this mean…

While Eichner has shown strong success in his career, he is in the position of a rising star when it comes to the movies. He appears to be resisting the star/rising star convention of the romcom for the community specific conventions of the queer romcom, once relegated to the niche audiences of film festivals.

Bros went for a box office release, meaning there is a higher bar, in terms of cost and effort, for audiences to get through the door. Some have tried to point to Bros as the death knell of the romcom at the box office. However, Bros is using the conventions of the queer romcom to give out queer actors a bigger opportunity, to help build their star power.

As some aspects of queer culture find mainstream prominence, there will inevitably be tension between what queer audiences and mainstream audiences expect. This isn’t the end of the queer romcom at the box office, but a step to it finding its way in the evolving genre.

Damien O’Meara 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. Queer romcom Bros struggled at the box-office. Are mainstream audiences still not ready? – https://theconversation.com/queer-romcom-bros-struggled-at-the-box-office-are-mainstream-audiences-still-not-ready-192717

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alison Lullfitz, Research Associate, The University of Western Australia

Content warning: this article contains distressing information about Stolen Generations and residential schools. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised this article contains images and names of deceased people.

Eliza Woods is standing in the native reserve that was her childhood home. Back then, she recalls, love was everywhere:

This was where I first learned about bushfoods from my grandmother, kurup, kumuk, kooting, and little flat-leaved potatoes we dug. Love of our grannies, aunties and parents surrounded us here. We didn’t have many clothes or fancy things, but we were kept clean, fed and loved.

Eliza is a 73-year-old Goreng Noongar Elder. She is visiting the nine-hectare reserve, sandwiched between industrial grain silos, a creek and a main road on the edge of Borden, a small farming town in Goreng Noongar Country in Western Australia. She is here with her cousins, younger family members and non-Indigenous research collaborator, Alison.

To Alison, a conservation biologist, the place doesn’t look like much – small, scraggly mangaart (jam, Acacia acuminata) and quandong trees (Santalum acuminata), a couple of big, old red morrell trees (Eucalyptus longicornis), and a thick ground layer of grassy weeds.

Eliza and her family invited Alison to listen and record as part of University of Western Australia’s Walking Together project. This project brings Noongar Elders, their families and conservation biologists together to share lessons about protecting and restoring Boodja (Country).

In the reserve, weeds smother native plants and make it hard to walk. It looks like a difficult ecological restoration project for minimal reward: weed seeds continuously enter from next door and upstream, and the native species present seem unremarkable.

But what Alison’s science training doesn’t tell her is how central this place is for many Noongar families who have called it home.

On reserves such as this, ecological restoration holds deep personal meaning for First Nations people. For descendants of those stolen, restoring a special family place enables them to reconnect to the past, to people and identity.

Camping in fertile woodland

Authorities allowed Noongar people to camp here from the early 1950s to late 1970s under provisions of Western Australia’s Aborigines Act 1905.

While it wasn’t a chosen home, it was a sanctuary for Noongar families, where kids could always get a damper feed from an aunty, where stories were yarned, where wattle gum and bardies were gathered and eaten, and where campfires were family epicentres.

We know the last 100 years of its history well, but Noongar families have undoubtedly camped in this fertile woodland for millennia.

Read more:
Friday essay: this grandmother tree connects me to Country. I cried when I saw her burned

Eliza lived on the Borden reserve with her siblings and parents for most of her childhood years, along with most of her mother’s ten siblings and their families. It holds treasured memories.

During the 1950s and 1960s, despite much Boodja being cleared for agriculture and made inaccessible to them, Noongar families could still maintain a rural life, kinship connections and employment on farms. Children could attend school, and families could access basic food and other necessities.

Eliza recalls that Noongar men and women worked hard on farms, burning up and malleeroot picking. Looking around the reserve, Eliza points out one big morrell tree:

that’s where Pa and Granny had a humpy. He was a builder, so he made a little room there from timber and galvanised tin.

And then us kids and Mum and Dad, we pitched a tent near them. They would camp out of town for a job, then come back here. I was 17 when my mum died, and I treasure the short time she was here.

Healing deep wounds

After Eliza’s mother died in 1966, her two youngest siblings were wrenched away, taken to Carrolup Mission 150 kilometres away. So were Eliza’s cousins: Elsie Penny when she was seven, and her little sister.

Operating until the 1970s, Carrolup Mission, later called Marribank, was established in 1915 as part of the state’s assimilation policy to forcibly remove Aboriginal children from their families.

Elsie has some early memories of living on Borden reserve in a tent by the creek with other families in the 1960s.

I remember swimming in the river. We were happy, playing together and we had all our family. That’s what I remember. As kids we just had a lot of fun down the river. We were carefree and felt loved.

Elsie, now in her 60s, has returned to Borden reserve with her children, grandchildren and Eliza to hear stories and begin to heal deep wounds. Eliza describes how it feels to keep coming back to Borden reserve:

it might look like rundown bush but we can write novels of memories made here.

Read more:
‘Although we didn’t produce these problems, we suffer them’: 3 ways you can help in NAIDOC’s call to Heal Country

Elsie reflects on importance of knowing where your roots lie.

Without knowing your history, you sort of feel lost. And I guess I did for a while when I was in the mission. We were disconnected then and that’s why we need to come back to where we grew up.

Eliza’s brother, Eugene Eades, had camped at the reserve the previous night to today’s visit and yarned with his nephew Jeremy, saying:

as I lay in my tent, my thoughts went back to those happiest days of my life, living here. A place set aside for blacks, for us to live on the fringes. For many, it holds sad memories. It’s hard for them to come back.

For me, coming back and facing those memories puts me in the driver’s seat of my own emotions. It heals us all to have young fellas like Jeremy listening and understanding his mother’s pain.

Honouring memory

Jeremy, who is Elsie’s son, explains that when you meet other Noongars they ask about your background – where you’re from, your Country, who your mob is.

For a long time I didn’t quite know. That was part of Mum being taken away. I want to learn from Elders while they’re still around, and hopefully pass that to my kids when they’re older. To hear ‘that’s where your grandmother used to camp’ is amazing. I’d like to spend time here to learn how they lived, and recapture part of that feeling.

Eugene sums up this Boodja-family connection:

it’s not just about burning, weeding, replanting. It’s about demonstrating our deep love and care for our old people through these actions. They did their very best for us and our kids, even when denied the opportunity.

We want to keep coming back as families, listening, learning, having a feed, practising culture here again.

Read more:
Caring for Country means tackling the climate crisis with Indigenous leadership: 3 things the new government must do

For Eliza, it’s important to come back and honour her mother’s memory.

This is her Country so looking after it feels like we’re looking after our mum and our grandparents.

I’ve got a photo of Mum, me and my little sister sitting there [pointing to a big morrell tree]. And the mangaart, they were nice shady trees, they’re wanyarn [sick] now. We can clean up and rejuvenate them with fire.

And that’s what intergenerational and Elder-led restoration is. It’s about rebuilding love and family connections, because they’re still here under all these weeds.

It’s also what the Walking Together project is about. Elders, their families and scientists collaboratively learning to look after and restore important places. The project focuses on Elders’ connection to Country, sharing and recording stories, giving comfort that their knowledge won’t disappear with their passing.

It’s for the next generation who will one day be Elders to learn heritage and cultural skills. And it’s for conservation scientists and practitioners to learn about the deep human history of landscapes and ecosystems they work among, helping us all to understand Country and connect a little deeper.

Alison works on the Walking Together project, which is delivered by UWA in partnership with South Coast NRM and supported financially by Lotterywest. A second project she works on is funded by an ARC Discovery Indigenous grant.

Eugene Eades works on the Nowanup Caretakers of Country project which is financially supported by Lotterywest.

Eliza Woods, Elsie Penny, and Jeremy Lacco 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. ‘We can write novels of memories made here’: Elder-led land restoration is about rebuilding love – https://theconversation.com/we-can-write-novels-of-memories-made-here-elder-led-land-restoration-is-about-rebuilding-love-187855

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Silke Meyer, Professor of Social Work; Leneen Forde Chair in Child & Family Research, Griffith University

Federal, state and territory governments this week released Australia’s ten-year National Plan to end Violence against Women and Children 2022-2032, which is framed by the ambitious goal of ending gender-based violence in one generation.

The plan organises governments’ commitments across four domains: prevention, early intervention, response, and recovery and healing.

But there’s a crucial part of the story you might have missed: how and why the plan acknowledges children and young people as victim-survivors in their own right, and what needs to happen next.

Read more:
Almost 9 in 10 young Australians who use family violence experienced child abuse: new research

Children and young people’s experiences of family violence

Latest Australian data on domestic and family violence show that:

• one in two young people who experience domestic and family violence during childhood go on to use violence in the home during adolescence

• of those who report using violence in the home during adolescence, almost nine in ten report childhood experiences of domestic and family violence and other forms of maltreatment.

This highlights the intergenerational transmission of domestic and family violence.

Ending gender-based violence, including domestic and family violence, requires a clear commitment to ending children’s and young people’s experiences of such violence.

It also requires a clear commitment to providing age-appropriate recovery support and services for children experiencing domestic and family violence.

Childhood experiences of domestic and family violence further increase young people’s risk of:

• poor mental health

• suicide

• educational disengagement

• disability and other chronic health problems.

Many of these are associated with an increased risk of being a victim or perpetrator of domestic and family violence.

We need not just an acknowledgement of children as victim-survivors in their own right, but also a commitment to boost resourcing of child-centred recovery support.

Every child experiencing violence must have access to recovery support.

The status quo: children as an extension of their parent

For too long, system responses to domestic and family violence in Australia have seen children only as extensions of their primary carer. This means we fail to recognise and adequately respond to children’s unique safety, support and recovery needs.

This can make children invisible in relevant risk assessment; assessors may miss the specific risk to children’s safety and wellbeing in the context of domestic and family violence. This can lead to preventable harm, injury or even homicide and suicide.

Approximately one child a fortnight is killed in the context of domestic and family violence in Australia.

More data are needed on the link between domestic and family violence and young people’s suicide. But existing research has identified a link between childhood experiences of domestic and family violence, the impact of unaddressed trauma and an increased risk of suicide.

So embedding short- and long-term recovery support for children affected by domestic and family violence is not only an investment in ending domestic and family violence in one generation. It is also an investment in securing children’s lives.

But it requires long-term government funding and political will.

Building whole-of-system responses for children and young people

Acknowledging children and young people as victim-survivors in their own right is a starting point.

Their specific support needs and how these will be met must be clearly embedded in the first five-year action plan, to be delivered in early 2023.

The rights and needs of children and young people must be considered at each point of the plan – from prevention to early intervention, through to response and recovery.

This includes early childhood- and school-based education targeted at gender equality and respectful relationships.

Responses must recognise the intersecting support needs of young people at risk of using violence in the home.

This includes recognising many young people using violence in the home have childhood trauma themselves.

Recognising this would help build trauma informed responses across education, child and family welfare services, child and young mental health services and youth justice.

Housing needs for children and young people fleeing family violence

The upcoming action plan must address the paucity of crisis housing options for children and young people experiencing domestic and family violence.

Australia currently has minimal domestic and family violence specialist crisis intervention and accommodation services for young people as victim-survivors in their own right.

The current service system is geared towards adult victim-survivors. If a child flees violence without their parent, they are met with a service system that does not cater to them. As a result they face significant risk of homelessness.

The national plan provides an opportunity to address this critical service system gap but young people must be able to access a domestic and family violence informed response, whether they’re with or without a victim-parent. They need protection, housing and recovery support.

Taking children’s risk and safety seriously

In developing the first action plan, governments must consult closely with experts, including practitioners, academics and – most importantly – young advocates who have experienced domestic and family violence.

Interventions for and responses to children and young people experiencing domestic and family violence must be informed by lived experience.

Getting this right won’t be easy and it won’t be cheap. But properly meeting the needs of children and young people experiencing domestic and family violence will help secure a safer future for the next generation.

Read more:
A new national plan aims to end violence against women and children ‘in one generation’. Can it succeed?

Silke Meyer receives funding from Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety, the Australian Institute of Criminology, and the Qld Department for Children, Youth Justice and Multicultural Affairs. In 2021 Silke co-led the National Plan Stakeholder and Victim-Survivor Advocates Consultation Projects.
She is a Subject Matter Expert for the clinical management committee of 1800RESPECT.

Kate receives funding for family violence related research from the Australian Research Council, Australian Institute of Criminology, Australia’s National Research Organisation for Women’s Safety, the Victorian Government and the Department of Social Services. In 2021 Kate led the National Plan Stakeholder and Victim-Survivor Advocates Consultation Projects. This piece is written by Kate Fitz-Gibbon in her capacity as Director of the Monash Gender and Family Violence Prevention Centre and are wholly independent of Kate Fitz-Gibbon’s role as Chair of Respect Victoria.

– ref. To end gender-based violence in one generation, we must fix how the system responds to children and young people – https://theconversation.com/to-end-gender-based-violence-in-one-generation-we-must-fix-how-the-system-responds-to-children-and-young-people-192839

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

Victorian senator Lidia Thorpe has been sacked as a deputy leader of the Greens, after revelations she failed to disclose she was in a relationship with the former president of the Victorian Rebels outlaw motorcyle gang.

At the time she was dating Dean Martin, she was on a parliamentary law enforcement committee that was gathering material about outlaw motorcycle gangs in an inquiry into online drug trading.

Greens leader Adam Bandt did not know of the association until he was approached by the ABC, which broke the story on Thursday.

Bandt said Thorpe had made “a significant error of judgement”.

“At a minimum, Senator Thorpe needed to disclose to me her connection to Mr Martin and her failure to do so showed a significant lack of judgement.”

Bandt said he expected Thorpe to to show better judgement in future and in exercising her portfolio responsibilities, which she has retained. He also pointed out she had not held the justice portfolio since the election.

“Senator Thorpe has important work to do on First Nations justice including on progressing Truth, Treaty and Voice and I want her to be able to do that work,” Bandt said.

Thorpe said in a statement she accepted “I have made mistakes and have not exercised good judgement”.

The ABC reported that Thorpe’s staff, worried about the situation, had taken the matter to Bandt’s office and to an independent parliamentary authority, the Parliamentary Workplace Support Service.

Bandt said his chief of staff had not passed the information on to him, which had been wrong.

“I have a good and competent chief of staff who makes many good decisions. This was not one of them.” He said his staff had thought the issue had been resolved.

“If I read the report correctly, Senator Thorpe’s staff had been told that the relationship had ended, or they thought that the relationship had ended.”

Thorpe told the ABC she and Dean, whom she met through Blak activism, had briefly dated early last year. She said they remained friends and had collaborated on their shared interest of advocating for First Nations peoples. Thorpe is Indigenous.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said that “error of judgement” was “the least description that I would put” on Thorpe’s behaviour.

Bandt indicated Thorpe might face further action from her party room colleagues if they so decided.

The senator has been the centre of controversy on several occasions including over an allegedly combative meeting with an Indigenous woman.

Bandt referred to a finance department review that is under way into the culture of her office, following a complaint by one of her staff.

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

– ref. Lidia Thorpe sacked as a Greens deputy leader after failing to disclose relationship with bikie figure – https://theconversation.com/lidia-thorpe-sacked-as-a-greens-deputy-leader-after-failing-to-disclose-relationship-with-bikie-figure-192947

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Joo-Cheong Tham, Professor, Melbourne Law School, The University of Melbourne

Who should have the right to vote?

A common answer is adult citizens of a country. Indeed, the national electoral laws of most countries – including Australia – adopt this approach.

But what about the approximately 3.4 million permanent residents and temporary visa holders? Many of them call Australia home, having lived and worked in this country for years, and together they amount to more than 13% of the Australian population.

Should they be denied the right to vote because they don’t have citizenship, despite the strong connections they have to the country?

I argue “no”. Not having citizenship shouldn’t mean automatic disqualification from being able to vote.

Permanent residents and long-term holders of temporary visas should be able to vote in federal elections (as they can in most local government elections) because of their social membership of the Australian community.

Citizenship as a floor but not a ceiling

Citizenship is a compelling basis for voting rights. Article 25 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights stipulates “every citizen” shall have rights of political participation including the right to vote.

It is, however, a grave mistake to treat non-citizenship as a basis of exclusion from voting rights. Article 25 guarantees particular political rights to citizens, but it does not deny these rights to non-citizens. Citizenship is a floor not a ceiling for voting rights.

As the United Nations Human Rights Committee recognised, permanent residents may be provided political rights compatibly with Article 25. Indeed, Article 21(3) of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that

the will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government.

The Australian Constitution, which doesn’t expressly mention citizenship, similarly requires members of parliament be “directly chosen by the people”. Both documents clearly point to an understanding of political community broader than one based on citizenship.

Such a broader understanding is evident in many countries where non-citizens are entitled to vote in sub-national elections. In Australia, resident non-citizens are entitled to vote at local government elections in New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania.

In several countries, non-citizens are also entitled to vote in national elections including:

• South Korea where “a non-Korean citizen registered in the relevant local constituency and who has had a resident visa for at least three years has the right to vote” in presidential and National Assembly elections

• New Zealand where permanent residents who have “lived in New Zealand continuously for 12 months or more at some time” can vote in national elections.

‘Social membership’ as a basis for the right to vote

Alongside citizenship, the deep connections one has to a country through family, friends, work and a sense of belonging are also a basis of membership of a political community. These connections and belonging provide both commitment and consequence: they signify caring for the country of residence and being profoundly affected by its laws.

In his book, The Ethics of Immigration, political scientist Joseph Carens captured this insight through his principle of “social membership”. This is where membership arises from “the relationships, interests, and identities that connect people to the place where they live”. As a proxy for these dense connections, Carens proposed length of residence.

This principle of social membership is reflected in countries where non-citizens are entitled to vote (including most Australian local government elections).

Read more:
The new Australian citizenship test: can you really test ‘values’ via multiple choice?

This concept is also suggested in various international documents. The Declaration of the High-level Dialogue on International Migration and Development, a resolution unanimously adopted by the United Nations General Assembly, acknowledges “the important role that migrants play as partners in the development of countries of origin, transit and destination”.

The General Assembly’s Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration lays down a commitment to “foster inclusive and cohesive societies by empowering migrants to become active members of society”.

History provides surprising support. At the heart of the original Commonwealth Franchise bills was a highly progressive principle of inclusion – even by today’s standards. In the words of Senator Richard O’Connor, who had their carriage, they recognised

one ground only, as giving a right to vote, and that is residence in the Commonwealth for six months or over by any person of adult age. That franchise is the broadest possible one. There is no class of the community left out.

Racist opposition, however, resulted in the eventual Commonwealth Franchise Act of 1902 denying Indigenous Australians, Asians, Africans and Pacific Islanders the right to vote.

Reflecting the Australian community

The principle of social membership explains why permanent residents should have the vote in federal elections (perhaps after a brief period of continuous residence, as in New Zealand).

It also provides a strong argument for long-term holders of temporary visas to have the vote in these elections. Long-term can be based on a minimum of three years’ residence, as in South Korea.

Expanding the vote in these ways will make Australia a leader as a democratic and inclusive migrant nation.

This article draws upon a longer submission to the inquiry of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters into the 2022 federal election.

Joo-Cheong Tham has received funding from the Australian Research Council, the Australian Council of Trade Unions, European Trade Union Institute, International IDEA and the New South Wales Independent Commission Against Corruption. He is a Director of the Centre for Public Integrity; the Victorian Division Assistant Secretary (Academic Staff) of the National Tertiary Education Union; and was formerly the Deputy Chair of the Migrant Workers Centre.

– ref. Why permanent residents and long-term temporary visa holders should be able to vote in federal elections – https://theconversation.com/why-permanent-residents-and-long-term-temporary-visa-holders-should-be-able-to-vote-in-federal-elections-192593

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tony Wood, Program Director, Energy, Grattan Institute

It’s the end the line for coal in Victoria, after Victorian Premier Dan Andrews today announced plans for 95% renewables within 13 years. Until now, the industrialised state has been aiming for 50% by 2030.

But it’s also the end of the line for our ailing, mostly privatised, energy market. Public ownership is back in vogue – in a recognition the energy market cannot deliver the transformation required. The Andrews Labor government would bring back the State Electricity Commission (SEC) if re-elected next month and use this to build new renewable energy projects.

At a national level, Labor is aiming for 82% renewables by 2030. So is Victoria’s target even possible? Yes – if the state government can overcome the major stumbling block of transmission. Building solar and wind isn’t the bottleneck – it’s the grid that isn’t fit for purpose.

Still, it’s an encouraging sign that the clean energy floodgates are opening in our eastern coal states. Queensland is now aiming for 70% renewables in a decade. New South Wales is forging ahead with renewable energy zones.

Dizzying pace of change

Why are governments boosting renewable ambitions so dramatically? Several reasons. In Victoria, there’s an election campaign under way. Labor is widely expected to win a fourth term – and infrastructure is one of its strengths. This offers an exciting vision of the future – and any political blowback from cost overruns will come later on.

But other changes are afoot. Operators of ailing and ageing coal plants are looking for the exit. The huge Loy Yang A power plant – responsible for 13% of the state’s emissions – will close in 2035, a decade ahead of schedule.

Climate change is intensifying, with unprecedented floods in Australia and Pakistan, unprecedented droughts in America’s west and China, and marine heatwaves devastating fisheries. Solar is now the cheapest form of newly built power.

Elsewhere around the world, offshore wind turbine technology has matured into 16 megawatt giant turbines, stretching hundreds of metres into the sky. And the Russian war on Ukraine has driven fossil fuel prices skyward, causing hip pocket pain to consumers around the world.

This move will also give Victoria’s emissions reduction target a shot in the arm. Nationally, a third of our emissions come from electricity. In brown-coal capital Victoria, it’s traditionally been 50%. Clean power will get the state about halfway to its emissions targets. The announcement today made no mention of other emissions sources – manufacturing, agriculture and transport.

Read more:
So long, Loy Yang: shutting Australia’s dirtiest coal plant a decade early won’t jeopardise our electricity supply

But is it possible?

Close your eyes tightly and squeeze. Can you see it? Yes, it’s physically possible – just. But I raise two serious caveats.

First, it means coal fired power will have to end. Second, we have to find ways of building the unsexy but crucial part of the clean energy system: transmission and storage. There’s a lot to build in a short time and the cost will tend to offset the low cost on the renewable generation.

When the coal power stations were built in the LaTrobe Valley east of Melbourne – where the coal is mined – state governments footed the bill for the huge transmission towers needed to take the electricity to where people live and work.

Now we need to do that again but on a much larger scale. This poses serious risks. Rural communities are almost guaranteed to push back on large new transmission lines. They may well be in favour of clean energy, but they don’t want big new power lines.

Some might say Australia can’t build like this any more. But we can, as our recent fossil fuel infrastructure builds show. Only a decade or so ago, Queensland built huge new gas export terminals at Gladstone. The cost blew out, but it was done.

We can do it, but it will cost us. The conversion of Snowy Hydro to a pumped hydro plant is way over budget and time. Current transmission projects like EnergyConnect, which will link NSW and South Australia, have seen budgets double.

We’ve done the easy part – solar on rooftops, wind and solar farms in places with good existing grid connections. That got Victoria’s renewables over 20%. Now comes the hard part – transmission, and storage.

Victoria has already announced a renewable storage target equal to half the state’s household use. But it will get harder and more expensive the closer we get to the 95% figure.

Read more:
What is the electricity transmission system, and why does it need fixing?

What does this mean for energy markets?

Some old-timers will shed a tear of joy at the news the SEC is coming back. But why the reversal, after the state government privatised the electricity market in the 1990s?

The reason is the market is not delivering the clean energy transition. For years, we’ve pretended the market can make the shift by itself, but it hasn’t. Continuous government intervention and policy changes certainly didn’t help. Working through the government-appointed Energy Security Board to reform the market market didn’t work either.

We’ve needed these new transmission links for years and the existing regulatory model hasn’t delivered.

The announcement today represents a fundamental change. The energy market is set to change completely. Yes, there are risks in having the state government do it. But governments like Victoria’s have been emboldened by the pandemic, which saw all of us look to them – not the market – to steer us through.

What happens to the workers on coal plants? Victoria is quite well placed already. The closure of the highly polluting Hazelwood plant in 2017 caught the state government by surprise. In response, it created the LaTrobe Valley Authority to help people transition to other work.

Five years later, the authority is still there. That’s good – it’s well placed to help ex-coal workers find jobs in other industries such as wind turbine manufacture or construction.

Read more:
The end of coal-fired power is in sight, even with private interests holding out

It may surprise you, but we’re a role model

When I’m asked which countries Australia should look to on the energy transition, I can’t help but laugh. In reality, we’re at the forefront. Many other countries are looking at us for ideas. Last year, South Australia made history by becoming the first gigawatt scale grid to (briefly) run on 100% renewables.

While we’ve historically been highly dependent on fossil fuels, we have also had a competitive advantage in shifting. After all, we have rather a lot of sun, wind and land.

So, the verdict on Victoria’s upgraded ambition? 10/10 for vision. But there’s a lot of heavy lifting involved in making it a reality. And the issues we often think of – where to build renewables – are no longer the issue. Now we need old-fashioned transmission towers and high voltage powerlines – and fast.

Read more:
The national electricity market is a failed 1990s experiment. It’s time the grid returned to public hands

Through his superannuation fund, Tony Wood owns shares in companies that could have an interest in the topic of this article.

– ref. Victoria signals end of coal by announcing a new 95% renewable target. It’s a risky but vital move – https://theconversation.com/victoria-signals-end-of-coal-by-announcing-a-new-95-renewable-target-its-a-risky-but-vital-move-192941

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Maximilian de Courten, Professor in Global Public Health and Director of the Mitchell Institute, Victoria University

If you have trouble falling asleep or getting a good night’s sleep, it seems intuitive to work harder to solve the problem by using some of the sleep apps, bracelets and other devices that have become increasingly popular.

But could this common practice of self-monitoring your sleep result in a sleep paradox, where instead of fixing the problem we create patterns of stress and arousal that exacerbate it?

Read more:
What is brown noise? Can this latest TikTok trend really help you sleep?

What is a normal sleep?

The amount of sleep we need, as well as our preferences for turning in early or staying up late, varies a great deal within individuals. Some differences are related to age, cultural, environmental, or behavioural factors and some are at least in part genetically driven.

In addition to this variation, within each human there is quite a high degree of normal sleep variation – it’s not expected to be exactly the same every night. Most adults require approximately eight hours of sleep per 24 hours, but sleep needs may range from about six to nine hours.

Read more:
Has COVID affected your sleep? Here’s how viruses can change our sleeping patterns

But this normal variation in sleep isn’t well understood. Some people who think their sleep is somehow inadequate worry so much about getting a good night’s sleep that it becomes a kind of performance anxiety, rendering sleep as a source of dread.

How do sleep apps work?

Most modern sleep tracker apps use input such as sound, heart rate, and motion indicating bed time or wake time to estimate what happens.

For this, many apps use data from wearable devices such as an Apple Watch to calculate a sleep score and create graphs to show changes over time. Thus sleep tracker apps analyse sounds, movement, and heart rate as you sleep to give a snapshot of the duration and quality of your sleep, sometimes aided by questions on the sleep quality as rated by the sleeper.

These apps claim to determine how much time you spend in light sleep, deep sleep and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and how many times you are disturbed throughout the night.

But are they accurate?

Often websites determining the best sleep apps limit their tests to the functionalities and features included – but fall short of testing whether these apps actually measure accurately what they claim.

Although sleep trackers are becoming quite accurate at detecting sleep and wake, the classification of sleep stages remains unreliable and inconsistent.

Are there potential dangers in using sleep apps?

It’s important not to put too much emphasis on data which may be imprecise, set unrealistic and uniformed sleep goals (such as viewing wakings as abnormal), or become overly anxious about sleep.

Relatively few and only small studies have focused on how these wearables can be effectively used to drive positive sleep health behaviour change. The most recent study found a slightly positive effect – but in healthy volunteers with no sleeping problem to start with.

There is a risk the increased focus on optimising these biometric data may lead to unexpected problems, such as a preoccupation and an obsession with getting the numbers right. This is becoming so common there is now a name for this condition – orthosomnia.

What is orthosomnia?

Orthosomnia is not a medical disorder – it is more accurately described as an anxiety phenomenon which is affecting people who obsess over the results of their sleep trackers.

The current knowledge of orthosomnia is based only on small case studies of few participants.

People with orthosomnia believe tracking devices offer highly accurate information about sleep and trust sleep tracker data over more objective testing like an overnight sleep study in a specialised clinic.

This can develop into unhelpful behaviours such as spending a longer time in bed in order to improve their sleep tracker data, which paradoxically worsens sleep quality and quantity.

Read more:
Sleep: here’s how much you really need for optimal cognition and wellbeing – new research

So is it time to uninstall the sleep apps?

Sleep tracking devices might have broad appeal and provide no risk to those people in the general population with good sleep who are interested in tracking bio-data.

But if you feel you might be preoccupied with your sleep, and find that you become anxious about your sleep, then you’re probably not a good candidate for a sleep tracker.

There is no commercially available sleep tracker that sends a stronger signal about whether you’re getting enough sleep than your own brain. If you’re alert (without caffeine), able to concentrate, feeling you’re able to have a good quality of life at work and home, then you’re probably getting enough sleep.

Maximilian de Courten is affiliated with The Mitchell Institute a health and education policy think tank.

Moira Junge is CEO of The Sleep Health Foundation.

Shantha Rajaratnam is Chair of the Sleep Health Foundation. Shantha Rajaratnam consults to Vanda Pharmaceuticals, Circadian Therapeutics, Roche and Avecho Biotechnology through his institution, and has previously consulted to the Alertness CRC. He has received honoraria (through his institution) from the National Sleep Foundation. He has served as an expert advisor/witness in legal cases involving sleep deprivation and/or shift work. He receives funding from Vanda Pharmaceuticals, WHOOP Inc, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Health and Medical Research Council, Australian Research Council, WA Police Force and Hopelab. He previously served as a Program Leader for the Alertness CRC.

– ref. Is tracking your sleep a good idea? – https://theconversation.com/is-tracking-your-sleep-a-good-idea-190231

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By David Caldicott, Senior lecturer, Australian National University

Imagine, if you will, a small plastic baggy containing a mixture of crystals and powder.

The person presenting it thinks “it might be ketamine?”, but admits the subjective effects are different to what they’re used to. How do we find out if it’s what they think it is? And what are the consequences if it isn’t?

This is a typical scenario for the people working at CanTEST – Australia’s first and only fixed-site, face-to-face drug checking service, located in Canberra.

And in this case, it led chemists to discover a drug never before seen in Australia, and with no associated clinical information from anywhere in the world.

Identifying ‘chemical X’

The identification of new psychoactive substances – drugs made to resemble established illicit drugs – presents a major challenge when pill-testing. Testing a chemical provides us with its “fingerprint” that will hopefully match one of the thousands stored in databases available to analysts.

But what happens when a fingerprint doesn’t provide a match and we have come across “chemical X”?

That brings us back to the original baggy of powder.

Patrick Yates, a PhD candidate from the Australian National University’s Research School of Chemistry, ran the sample through the first piece of equipment, the Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectrometer – a workhorse of many drug-checking programs around the world.

Read more:
Pill testing really does reduce the risk of harm for drug users

FTIR works quickly and reliably – even at a bush doof – as long as an electricity supply is available. It shines a laser on the sample, and the “reflection” (a measure of how the drug shakes and wiggles) is captured and compared to a database of more than 30,000 chemicals.

Patrick’s analysis didn’t confirm a ketamine match, but suggested it might be a relatively new ketamine analogue called 2-fluorodeschloroketamine (2-FDCK). However, Patrick’s trained intuition left him doubtful.

PhD student Cassidy Whitefield then turned to an instrument known as ultra-high performance liquid chromatography with photodiode array (UPLC-PDA), humming away in the corner at CanTEST. She ran lab-based standards through it, calibrating the machine to the ten most common drugs we see, including ketamine.

Chemical X had to “run a race” against a known sample, comparing it to already known compounds. The UPLC-PDA test takes about four minutes to run.

While the sample appeared similar to the ketamine standard, Cassie’s trained eye saw something was off. The rate at which chemical X ran its race (known as the retention time) was similar, but its absorption of ultraviolet radiation was off.

Whatever was there was real, quite pure, and neither ketamine nor 2-FDCK.

When in doubt, run more tests

Ketamine is both an invaluable agent in the emergency and pre-hospital environment, and part of an emerging group of illicit drugs known as arylcyclohexamines.

In consultation with ANU chemistry professor Mal McLeod, the CanTEST team arrived at chemical X being “ketamine-like”.

The person who brought it in was advised the substance was not ketamine, and its identity could not be ascertained – our band of peer workers advised extreme caution in using it.

Read more:
Forgotten how to party? Safety tips from a drug and alcohol expert

But that was not the end of the story for analytical chemists – the full inquisition was just beginning.

Next up, chemical X was subjected to a method called gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC-MS), meaning the sample was made to “run another race”, and was then smashed into pieces to further fingerprint it.

The GC-MS data correlated closely with a ketamine derivative known as fluorexetamine, but the presence of an isomer – two compounds with the same molecular formula but arranged differently – could not be ruled out.

It was time to bring out the big guns: a nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer is a chemist’s Book of Runes. Answers can be found, but only by those few who can speak the language well.

Eventually, after a series of multi-dimensional tests, the team figured out there were four hydrogens next to each other around the aromatic ring, meaning it could not be fluorexetamine.

Chemical X could only be something called 2’-fluoro-2-oxo-phenylcyclohexylethylamine. And they had never seen this compound before.

From chemical X to ‘CanKet’

It’s hard to emphasise what a phenomenal piece of work this was. We contacted our offsiders at the UN Office of Drug Control, the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction, as well as several well-positioned researchers in this space from around the world. None had seen the compound before.

Our colleagues at the ACT Government Analytical Laboratory wrote to their international peers; a global forum of forensic and analytical chemists reviewed their locally acquired data and provided information that supported our findings.

We have since found a single further report out of China from a forensically obtained analytical sample, where it was described by another name (2F-NENDCK). As 2’-fluoro-2-oxo-phenylcyclohexylethylamine is a bit of a mouthful, our team has taken to calling it CanKet, as in “Canberra ketamine”.

After this feat of chemical analysis, we are now able to identify CanKet with impunity. We still don’t know its full effects, but thanks to understanding its chemical composition, we have a better idea of what we’re dealing with.

Read more:
Yes, we can do on-the-spot drug testing quickly and safely

David Caldicott has previously been a recipient of an NH&MRC Partnership Grant.
He is the Clinical Lead for Pill Testing Australia, and CanTEST.

Malcolm McLeod is chemistry lead for Pill Testing Australia and the CanTEST Health and Drug Checking Service operated by Directions Health Services and supported the ACT Government. He was awarded a 2020 Churchill Fellowship to visit leading international drug checking services to rapidly improve the analytical chemistry capabilities in Australia.

– ref. An entirely new illicit drug has been discovered by Australian chemists. Here’s how they did it – https://theconversation.com/an-entirely-new-illicit-drug-has-been-discovered-by-australian-chemists-heres-how-they-did-it-192855

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 United States midterm elections will be held in nearly three weeks, on November 8. All 435 House of Representatives seats are up for election, as well as 35 of the 100 senators. Democrats won the House by 222-213 in 2020, and hold the Senate on a 50-50 tie with Vice President Kamala Harris’s casting vote.

Read more:
US Democrats’ gains stall six weeks before midterm elections; UK Labour seizes huge lead after budget

The FiveThirtyEight forecasts currently give Democrats a 61% chance to hold the Senate, but Republicans have a 75% chance to gain control of the House. There’s a 38% chance for Republicans to win both chambers, a 37% chance of Democrats holding the Senate while losing the House, and a 24% chance for Democrats to win both chambers.

Since my last article on the US midterms three weeks ago, Democratic chances of holding the Senate have dropped from 68% to 61%, and Republican chances of gaining the House have increased from 69% to 75%. Democratic chances in the Senate peaked at 71% on September 20.

In the national House popular vote, Democrats’ lead over Republicans has been cut to just a 45.3-45.0 margin in the FiveThirtyEight aggregate; that 0.3% lead has dropped from 1.3% three weeks ago. President Joe Biden’s ratings have also declined since my last article; he’s currently at 53.2% disapprove, 42.3% approve (net -10.9); his net approval was -10.2 three weeks ago.

Of the 35 senators up for election, 21 are Republicans and 14 Democrats. Democrats will probably gain Pennsylvania, where they lead by five points in the FiveThirtyEight averages. To win the Senate, Republicans would then need to gain Nevada, where they lead by one point, and Georgia, where Democrats lead by four.

In every midterm election since 2006, the non-presidential party has easily won the House. But when the US Supreme Court struck down the constitutional right to an abortion in late June, Democrats were galvanised, and they performed well in four federal August byelections, gaining the Alaska at-large seat.

Read more:
US byelections suggest improved prospects for Democrats at midterms, while Liz Cheney suffers huge loss

However, Democrats may have peaked too early. The economic data on inflation is still poor, and there are worries over whether the interest rate rises needed to control inflation will push the US into a recession.

Economic concerns are becoming more important to voters, and this probably explains the Republicans’ recent gains. With nearly three weeks to go, these concerns may lead to further Republican gains.

At the last two presidential elections in 2016 and 2020, polls overstated Democrats. But Donald Trump’s name won’t appear on the ballot paper this year, and polls at the last midterm elections in 2018 were accurate. FiveThirtyEight analyst Nate Silver said on September 16 that the polls at these midterm elections could be wrong in either direction.

If the polls are understating Republicans again, election night will be ugly for Democrats and Biden.

Read more:
The United States is gearing up for midterm elections. What are they and what’s at stake?

Economic data: jobs and inflation

The US September jobs report was released on October 7. There were 263,000 jobs created, and the unemployment rate dropped 0.2% to 3.5%, reversing a 0.2% increase in August. However, the unemployment drop occurred mostly due to a 0.1% drop in participation. The employment population ratio – the share of eligible Americans employed – was unchanged at 60.1%.

Both the employment population ratio and participation rate are 1.1% below their levels before the COVID pandemic began in February 2020. The October jobs report will be released November 4, four days before the election.

The September inflation report was released October 13, and will be the last inflation report before the election. Headline inflation was up 0.4% after a 0.1% increase in August, but inflation excluding food and energy (“core” inflation) was up 0.6%, the same increase as in August.

Since June’s 1.3% increase in headline inflation, this measure has only increased 0.5% in the last three months. But this is due to a fall in energy prices, and central banks are far more concerned about core inflation when setting interest rates.

Real (inflation-adjusted) earnings dropped 0.1% in September after a 0.2% gain in August. In the 12 months to September, real earnings were down 3.0% in hourly pay and 3.8% in weekly pay.

UK polling after Liz Truss sacked Kwasi Kwarteng

Three weeks after the September 23 United Kingdom “horror” budget, Prime Minister Liz Truss sacked Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng on October 14. She also announced a U-turn on budget proposals to not proceed with a corporations tax hike from 19% to 25% next April.

New Chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced on Monday the government would abandon the September 23 budget.

A UK national Redfield & Wilton poll taken Sunday gave Labour its biggest lead in any recent poll, a 36-point lead (56% to 20% over the Conservatives). Truss’ net approval was at a dire -61, with 70% disapproving and just 9% approving.

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. Republicans gain in US midterm polls with three weeks until election – https://theconversation.com/republicans-gain-in-us-midterm-polls-with-three-weeks-until-election-192332

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kaaren Mathias, Senior Lecturer in public health, University of Canterbury

Technological solutions to fill the gap in mental health care are alluring. They can appear to be a cheap, scalable way to solve the knotty problem of mental distress, without requiring investment in people, communities and broader causes of mental ill-health such as racism, poverty or the way we design our cities.

Consequently, there has been huge growth in what’s now termed “e-mental health care” – mental health services and information delivered or enhanced through the internet and related technologies. In 2021, we saw a 6,500% increase in doctors recommending apps to patients.

This growth is a response to growing problems of unmet mental health needs, shortage of clinicians, and a lack of access to mental health care in Aotearoa New Zealand.

But the increasing investment in e-mental health apps can ignore the shortcomings of technology.

As both a practitioner and researcher promoting mental health in communities, I see policy makers and funders dazzled by shiny new apps, which can divert the government’s investment in traditional – but costly – mental health care.

Here’s why we need more conversation and rigorous evaluation of e-mental health.

Technology to help mental health

There are 33 mental health apps listed on Aotearoa’s Health Navigator site, and another new bilingual mindfulness app was launched recently.

App development has accelerated since the pandemic, with three funded through the NZ$500 million COVID-19 response health package in 2020.

Read more:
COVID-19: Mental health telemedicine was off to a slow start – then the pandemic happened

Digital infrastructure and e-medicine is a key priority nationally: this year alone, the New Zealand government earmarked over $600 million to invest in data and digital infrastructure in the health system.

Supporters claim technology can counter isolation, anxiety, provide therapy and accelerate access and quality of care. And while there are some who benefit from e-mental health innovations, more research is needed to develop and test e-mental health interventions.

A key challenge is that individual technological solutions build on the underlying assumption that individuals are responsible for their own health outcomes, without addressing the structural, political and social causes of ill-health.

Dependent on access to technology

Convenience and affordability are described as the most obvious advantages of local and international apps like Aroha Chatbot, Mentemia and Happify.

Yet while mental health apps might be affordable for a middle class resident of Auckland, Ahmedabad or Apia, e-mental health solutions depend on people being able to afford technology platforms (like smart phones) and data plans to drive them.

Digital technologies risk increasing disparities and often exclude the people who most need mental health support – older people, people with low incomes, and those with severe mental health problems. These high-need groups have been identified as those least likely to use e-mental health care.

Even when e-health solutions are provided free to the user through government health funding and investment, the research and development costs for digital health are high. This means mental health funding supports graphic design and tech companies instead of those who provide person-to-person care, which we already know is central for good mental health.

Other challenges that have emerged for large-scale implementation of e-mental health options include complex regulatory issues such as ensuring apps meet quality standards, and how such apps can be used across national borders. Apps also may not keep pace with new evidence and advances in mental health as well as clinicians can. And while there is often strong initial uptake and use, ongoing use of apps is less common.

Do the apps actually work?

Beyond the issues of access, other key questions need to be asked: do mental health apps work, and who do they work for?

There are clearly benefits for some people to have access to some form of immediate assistance via their phone or computer. But most research evaluating e-mental health care only looks at whether apps are appealing and easy to use.

Fewer studies assess whether e-mental health interventions improve mental health status or strengthen mental health long term. When e-mental health interventions are evaluated rigorously, usage in a trial setting is often over-reported compared to usage in the real world.

However pixels are not people, and e-mental health care is not a substitute for the genuine human connection that is core to mental health recovery. Human connection was identified as key in the post-earthquake period for Ōtautahi Christchurch, and globally during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Read more:
Coronavirus: New technologies can help maintain mental health in times of crisis

Apps are not relational and rarely support building social connections and peer friendships. My own research has shown that, most of all, people with mental distress need support to build relationships, be socially included, participate in their communities and have the opportunity to participate in and co-design mental health care.

Addressing mental health also requires moving past the individual to the collective. It requires action to address the social and political factors that contribute to a person’s mental health.

Serious and complex global problems such as obesity, gender inequality, poor housing, colonialism, racism and barriers to social connectedness are the biggest causes of poor mental health. Apps can help some people as an adjunct to psycho-social care, but they cannot replace it.

Kaaren Mathias has received funding from the Economic Social Research Council and the Mariwala Health Initiative and is affiliated with Burans, a non-profit mental health provider based in North India.

– ref. Pixels are not people: mental health apps are increasingly popular but human connection is still key – https://theconversation.com/pixels-are-not-people-mental-health-apps-are-increasingly-popular-but-human-connection-is-still-key-192247

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Stephen Skalicky, Senior Lecturer in the School of Linguistics and Applied Language Studies, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

If you’ve read, watched and enjoyed the work of America’s best-known satirical publication The Onion, you might be surprised by how serious it suddenly became earlier this month. So serious, in fact, that it might end up before the US Supreme Court.

Each year approximately 7,000 appellants peition to have their cases heard before the Supreme Court, but only 100 to 150 of these petitions are reviewed. What are known as amicus curiae briefs can be filed by interested third parties to strengthen the need for a petition to be seen by the court.

Little wonder, then, that it caught the eye of the media when such a brief was filed by The Onion. Despite the publication’s typically absurd claim to a daily readership of 4.3 trillion, the intent of the brief is far from ridiculous. Because The Onion believes the right to use satire is under threat.

The brief was filed to support an appellant named Anthony Novak, who in 2015 was arrested and charged with using a computer to disrupt police operations. The disruption was said to arise from Novak’s decision to create a satirical Facebook page identical in appearance to that of the police department in the city of Parma, Ohio.

At trial, Novak was found not guilty and then sued the city for violation of his civil rights. The city sought qualified immunity for its officers, which shields them from civil litigation unless they had been shown to violate someone’s civil rights – exactly the claim raised by Novak.

A state judge agreed with Novak and rejected the city’s qualified immunity, indicating Novak could sue. The city appealed and the case moved to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. The Sixth Circuit reversed the lower court’s rejection and ruled the officers should be granted qualified immunity because Novak’s actions were not protected speech.

This barred Novak from seeking any damages for his arrest. His last chance for appeal is now in the hands of the Supreme Court.

Satire and protected speech

The purpose of The Onion’s brief is to provide additional information about the nature of satire, and to urge the Supreme Court to hear Novak’s case and reconsider the decision handed down by the Sixth Circuit.

It’s written with humorous and satirical flair, and is indeed a very good read. True to form, though, the playful aspects of The Onion’s brief contain a serious message: if the Supreme Court were not to hear Novak’s case, future satirists (including the writers at The Onion) may face legal prosecution for creating satire.

Therefore, it argues, the Supreme Court must hear Novak’s case to ensure the preservation of satire as a legitimate means of free speech.

Read more:
Ninety years on, what can we learn from reading Evelyn Waugh’s troubling satire Black Mischief?

Yet more than 30 years ago, the Supreme Court decided in Hustler v. Falwell that satire and parody are protected speech under the First Amendment of the US Constitution. Why then did the Sixth Circuit rule in favour of the city if Novak’s page was a form of protected speech?

The reason is simple: the Sixth Circuit limited the boundaries of what it considered to be satire. In its decision, the Sixth Circuit noted that while the Facebook site was satire and thus protected, Novak also deleted spoiler comments from his page and copied a warning from the real page to his own.

The Sixth ruled the police officers could not be expected to extend first amendment protection to these actions and thus granted them qualified immunity, squashing Novak’s civil suit.

The court’s decision presents a quandary: how can the creation of a satirical work be protected speech when the maintenance of the work is not? The seemingly contradictory logic behind the Sixth Circuit’s decision is why The Onion’s brief is so important – it provides a definition of satire from a position of experience and expertise.

Defining how satire works

So, what is satire and how does it work? While there is a tradition of defining it as a literary genre, satire is much more than a category on a bookshelf. Satire can occur in any medium, such as Novak’s Facebook page.

This is because satire is “parasitic” – a satirist appropriates formal features of an existing genre, person or event to create a pretence of authenticity and sincerity. By pretending to be something it is not – such as a news story or a police Facebook page – a satirical work arouses expectations and stereotypes associated with that genre.

At the same time, the satirist provides indirect and subtle clues which, when interpreted correctly, belie the satirical pretence and pull back the curtain to expose the ruse, which distinguishes the satire from the real thing.

Read more:
What makes a good literary hoax? A political point, for starters

The second step must be indirect for satire to work, and it cannot work if the satirical object is labelled “satire” in advance. This point is strongly emphasised in The Onion’s brief: killing the satirical pretence kills the satire. If Novak’s efforts to maintain a satirical pretence are an arrestable offense, then satire is no longer protected speech.

Whether Novak’s case goes to the Supreme Court is still uncertain, and the details of his case are more nuanced than asking whether someone can be jailed for making satire. Instead, the Supreme Court would need to draw new lines defining what satire is and how it works. Agreeing on a universal definition of satire is far from easy.

Fortunately, “America’s Finest News Source” has provided the court with an excellent explanation, demonstrating just how serious satire can be.

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

– ref. 4.3 trillion readers can’t be wrong – why The Onion’s defence of satire should be heard by the US Supreme Court – https://theconversation.com/4-3-trillion-readers-cant-be-wrong-why-the-onions-defence-of-satire-should-be-heard-by-the-us-supreme-court-192730

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laurits Skov, Postdoctoral research associate, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology

Our closest evolutionary relatives, the Neanderthals (Homo neanderthalensis), were once spread across Europe and as far east as the Altai Mountains in southern Siberia.

Yet more than 160 years since the first Neanderthal fossils were unearthed in Europe, little is known about the group size or social organisation of Neanderthal communities.

Using ancient DNA, a new study provides a snapshot of a Neanderthal community frozen in time.

With our colleagues, we show a group of Neanderthals living in the Altai foothills around 54,000 years ago consisted of perhaps 10 to 20 individuals. Many of them were closely related – including a father and his young daughter.

The easternmost Neanderthals

The first genetic clues to Neanderthals were obtained 25 years ago from a fragment of mitochondrial DNA, which is found in cell structures called mitochondria rather than in the cell nucleus.

Subsequent mitochondrial DNA studies and genome-wide nuclear data from 18 individuals have sketched the broad brushstrokes of Neanderthal history, revealing the existence of many genetically distinct groups between about 430,000 and 40,000 years ago.

Our new study is the first to analyse ancient DNA from the teeth and bones of multiple Neanderthals who lived at around the same time. The fossils came from archaeological excavations of Okladnikov Cave in the mid-1980s and Chagyrskaya Cave since 2007.

These caves were used by Neanderthals as hunting camps. The remains of animals such as bison and horses are abundant, and more than 80 Neanderthal fossils were also found in Chagyrskaya Cave – one of the largest such collections anywhere in the world.

Both sites also contain distinctive stone tools that bear a striking resemblance to artefacts found at Neanderthal sites in central and eastern Europe.

Read more:
Stone tools reveal epic trek of nomadic Neanderthals

Family ties

To paint a detailed picture of the genetic makeup and relatedness of these Neanderthals, we analysed mitochondrial DNA (which is passed down the female line), Y-chromosomes (passed from father to son) and genome-wide data (inherited from both parents) for 17 Neanderthal fossils – the most ever sequenced in a single study.

The teeth and bones came from 13 individuals: 11 from Chagyrskaya Cave and two from Okladnikov Cave. Seven of the Neanderthals were male and six were female. Eight were adults and five were children or adolescents.

Among them were the remains of a Neanderthal father and his teenage daughter, as well as a pair of second-degree relatives – a young boy and an adult female, perhaps his cousin, aunt or grandmother.

Although the nearby site of Denisova Cave was inhabited by Neanderthals from as early as 200,000 years ago, the Chagyrskaya and Okladnikov Neanderthals are more closely related to European Neanderthals than to the earlier ones at Denisova Cave.

This finding is consistent with a previous genomic study of a Chagyrskaya Neanderthal and the presence of distinctive stone tools at Chagyrskaya and Okladnikov Caves that closely resemble those found at Neanderthal sites in Europe.

We also found the Chagyrskaya Neanderthals share several heteroplasmies – a special kind of mitochondrial DNA variant that typically persists for less than three generations.

Taken together with the evidence for their close family connections, these indicate the Chagyrskaya Neanderthals must have lived – and died – at around the same time.

On the brink of extinction

Our analyses also revealed this Neanderthal community had extremely low genetic diversity – consistent with a group size of just 10 to 20 people.

This is much smaller than the genetic diversity recorded for any ancient or present-day human community, and is more like that found among endangered species at risk of extinction, such as mountain gorillas.

The Chagyrskaya Neanderthals were not a community of hermits, however. We discovered their mitochondrial DNA diversity was much higher than their Y-chromosome diversity, which can be explained by the predominance of female (rather than male) migration between Neanderthal communities.

Did these migrations involve Denisovans, who occupied Denisova Cave repeatedly from at least 250,000 years ago to around 50,000 years ago?

Read more:
Dirty secrets: sediment DNA reveals a 300,000-year timeline of ancient and modern humans living in Siberia

Denisovans are a sister group to Neanderthals and they interbred at least once. This happened around 100,000 years ago, producing a daughter from a Neanderthal mother and a Denisovan father.

Yet even though Denisovans were present at Denisova Cave at around the same time as the Neanderthals living at Chagyrskaya and Okladnikov Caves, we found no evidence for Denisovan gene flow into these Neanderthals in the 20,000 years leading up to their demise.

Kindred spirits

In recent years, multiple lines of evidence have shown Neanderthals possessed technical skills, cognitive capabilities and symbolic behaviours as impressive as those of our ancient Homo sapiens ancestors.

Our genetic insights add a new social dimension to this picture. They provide a rare glimpse into the close-knit family structure of a Neanderthal community eking out an existence on the eastern frontier of their geographic range, close to the time when their species finally died out.

Richard ‘Bert’ Roberts receives funding from the Australian Research Council.

Laurits Skov 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. First-ever genetic analysis of a Neanderthal family paints a fascinating picture of a close-knit community – https://theconversation.com/first-ever-genetic-analysis-of-a-neanderthal-family-paints-a-fascinating-picture-of-a-close-knit-community-192595

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Christopher D H Thompson, Research Fellow, Marine Futures Lab, The University of Western Australia

Imagine you’re a big yellowfin tuna, miles from shore out in the blue, swimming around carefree, until you start to feel a little itch near your eye. Maybe it’s just a scratch that’s healing, or maybe it’s a tiny crustacean nibbling into your skin.

What do you do? You don’t have hands to pick it off. You don’t have cleaner wrasses nearby to carefully pluck it off for you like you might on a coral reef.

While poring over thousands of hours of video showing the denizens of the open ocean going about their lives, we discovered how tunas and other fishes solve this problem. The answer might be the last thing you’d think of: sharks.

Big fish prefer rubbing shoulders with sharks

In new research published in PLOS One, we found fishes living in the open ocean, like tunas, use sharks to scratch against.

The scratching is likely to remove parasites, dead skin, and other irritants. These fishes are hosts to a diverse array of parasites, but their environment provides them few options for removal.

Our research recorded scraping interactions among several fish and shark species across the Pacific, Indian and Atlantic oceans. We found fish preferred to scrape on sharks rather than on other fish. Size also mattered, with smaller fish being less likely to scrape on bigger sharks, perhaps due to the risk of being eaten.

Shark skin is made up of small tooth-like structures called dermal denticles. It feels like sandpaper (and in pre-industrial times it was used for that purpose), making it a particularly suitable surface against which to scratch.

We found fishes tended to scratch their head and sides more than other parts of their body. This is where many of the areas most heavily impacted by parasite damage are found, including the eyes, nostrils, gills, and the lateral line system down the sides of a fish’s body.

We also found fish species differed in the way they scraped. Tunas were quite orderly, lining up behind the shark and taking turns to brush against the tail. Rainbow runners were unruly, forming a school around the back half of the shark and darting out in turns to bump against its body.

Using underwater cameras to spy on ocean wildlife

We discovered this behaviour while analysing thousands of hours of underwater video taken with baited camera systems left to drift at sea. We reviewed the footage, and identified, counted, and measured all individuals we observed.

The data we gathered is important to determine population trends. But while watching these videos, we also noticed some unusual behaviours.

First we saw a huge yellowfin tuna approaching a silky shark from behind, gently rubbing against its tail before cruising off. Before long saw a similar interaction between another yellowfin and another silky shark.

Eventually, we observed similar interactions between several different fish and shark species from all corners of the globe, and logged the details of each interaction.

Why scraping matters: healthy oceans need healthy shark populations

The open ocean is the largest habitat on the planet, yet it is challenging to study.

As a result, there are very few direct observations of the natural behaviour of animals in the open ocean. Interactions between these animals are not only intriguing because they may be new to us but also because of their possible implications.

Parasite removal has clear fitness benefits, and fitter animals are more likely to reproduce and pass on their genes to the next generation. These fishes may therefore be deriving a benefit from scraping against sharks.

This raises the question of what would happen if shark numbers become too low for fishes to find their scratching posts. Would there be a net loss of fitness in these fishes?

Read more:
Some sharks have declined by 92% in the past half-century off Queensland’s coast

This is an important question given the rapid decline of shark populations in the global ocean. Some species have declined by up to 92% off the Queensland coast of Australia.

The continued decline of shark populations could have knock-on effects through the loss of relationships such as those we describe.

We only observed scraping in remote regions with relatively healthy populations of sharks and large tunas, both of which are heavily exploited in other areas. Remote locations offer a window into the functioning of intact ecosystems and the weird and wild things going on in the ocean that we are still yet to discover.

Marine protected areas have been shown to conserve behaviours in sharks and fishes. The introduction of more of these areas could help restore and preserve these behaviours.

What’s next?

We will continue sampling offshore waters and remote regions.

This work may reveal other species involved in these interactions or other intriguing behaviours with conservation implications. __

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. How do fishes scratch their itches? It turns out sharks are involved – https://theconversation.com/how-do-fishes-scratch-their-itches-it-turns-out-sharks-are-involved-192512

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ben Wellings, Senior Lecturer in Politics and International Relations, Monash University

The current turmoil in British politics needs to be understood not just as a response to Liz Truss’s short time as prime minister, but as the result of problems within the governing Conservative Party since it came to power in 2010.

The Conservative party is a group of about 180,000 people who tend to be wealthier and older than the average UK citizen. It was this group, more than Truss’s fellow MPs, who chose her as leader of the Conservative Party. It was also this group that endorsed the policies she tried to impose on the country, causing outcry from the populace and the markets.

This method of selecting the leader of the party needs to be changed. The current method was designed when the Conservatives were last in opposition (1997-2010). This means it was unwittingly designed for changes of leader while out of government.

Choosing the leader of the Conservative Party is strictly speaking a matter for the Conservative Party. This is fine when in opposition. When in government, a change of leader means a change of prime minister. This narrow franchise weakens the legitimacy of whoever becomes the new prime minister among the wider UK electorate.

Too much emphasis on leaders

The Conservative Party has also given itself up to an over-emphasis on leaders. This is part of the spirit of the times. But it is also the case that the prime minister is no longer “first amongst equals”. Instead, he or she plays an increasingly important part in why people vote for a particular party.

The Conservatives supported Boris Johnson because he promised to “get Brexit done”. However, the 80-seat majority he won in 2019 gave the impression that the electorate was voting for a leader (Johnson) rather than a party (the Conservatives).

But if this new support was about Johnson and Brexit, rather than a more permanent switch to the Conservatives, it also meant it could not be counted on thereafter. This helps explain the urgency to oust Johnson and the poor reception for Truss’s policies.

Read more:
Who is Liz Truss, the new UK prime minister?

Johnson’s new pro-Brexit supporters did not have the same political instincts as most Conservatives. This group of voters likes it when the government intervenes. They liked Johnson when he promised to spend money and address persistent inequalities between northern and southern England – inequalities exacerbated by the actions of Margaret Thatcher’s governments of the 1980s.

So, when he was replaced by Truss, who models herself on Thatcher, the support rapidly evaporated in the north, where memories of the 1984-85 Miners’ Strike persist. In the leafy suburbs of the south, normally rock-solid Conservative voters have seen their mortgage payments and energy bills rise as a result of Truss’s “small state” ideology. They are not amused, and were already drifting away from the Tories as byelections held this year suggest.

No new ideas

Perhaps we should not expect a self-described conservative party to have many new ideas (after all, that’s the point). But the poverty of thinking among its leaders stands out. Brexit had a nostalgic element to it. The Truss-Kwasi Kwarteng mini-budget was more 1980s than Stranger Things. Even the markets couldn’t take the retro infatuation with trickle-down economics.

The Conservatives are stuck in a place where all their ideas are from Britain’s past. In the Conservative Party mindset, the past does not operate as a helpful guide for the future, but as a point of destination. It is a security blanket in the chaos of their own making.

They show no sign of learning from all of this. The instinct of new Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is to return not to the 1980s, but to the 2010s. If you don’t like trickle-down economics, you can have austerity instead.

Austerity is where the current Conservative Party began its time in office back in 2010. Back then, David Cameron promised to address what he called “Broken Britain”. Little did electors realise this was more predictive than descriptive. Cuts to public services punished the worst off while the government claimed “we are all in this together” (in the way that everyone may be on an A380, but some people are in business class).

Admittedly, it has been hard to predict the mood of British voters. Brexit, another product of internal Conservative division and poor party management, bent political loyalties among the electorate out of usual shape. It was this voter volatility that led Theresa May to call an election in 2017 and lost the Conservatives a healthy majority, even though its vote share went up. This was the greatest miscalculation in British politics since as far back as the previous year, when David Cameron lost the Brexit referendum.

Read more:
Liz Truss: what I told European colleagues when they asked me what on Earth is going on in British politics

All of these problems are in some ways internal to the Conservative Party. Voters angered by austerity turned to the right-wing populist party UKIP, forcing Cameron to call a referendum on EU membership. To try to quell the low politics of the militant pro-Brexit wing of the Conservative party, Cameron gambled with the high politics of the UK’s membership of the EU, and lost.

To realise all the illusive and illusionary opportunities that Brexit should in theory create, its most ardent supporters latched onto Johnson to bring down May. Johnson created the parliamentary deadlock of Brexit and then appeared to solve this self-inflicted wound with an election victory built on shifting sands.

However, he soon became embroiled in scandal after scandal, and his behaviour was finally too much even for the vulnerable MPs in “red wall” seats to stomach. Then, just when MPs thought it was safe to go back to their constituencies, Truss damaged already weakening support in the “blue wall” seats in southern England with the mini-budget: perhaps the most spectacular own-goal since Jamie Pollock scored against Manchester City in 1998.

Finally, most Conservatives now think Truss should resign. Yet in a final fling of nostalgia – and harking back to the glory days of the first half of 2022 – their favoured candidate to replace her is Boris Johnson.

The Conservatives have lost sight of where their interests and those of the country depart. By falling back on old certitudes that are no longer fit for purpose, they are behaving like a party that is already in opposition.

Ben Wellings 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. There’s something wrong with British politics. It’s called the Conservative Party – https://theconversation.com/theres-something-wrong-with-british-politics-its-called-the-conservative-party-192729

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marina Reeves, Professor, The University of Queensland

Every year, more than 20,000 Australians – mostly women – are diagnosed with breast cancer. If you’re one of them or know someone who is, the great news is that 92 out of every 100 women will survive for five years or more after their diagnosis.

But women are often surprised by the life-altering side effects from their cancer treatment that can continue for years after, such as pain and fatigue. And many live with the dread of their cancer returning, even after they pass the celebrated five-year survival mark.

So, what can you do to improve your chances of living a longer, healthier life after a breast cancer diagnosis?

1. Stay physically active

Move more and sit less. Ideally, this includes gradually progressing towards and then maintaining about 150 minutes (two and a half hours) of planned, regular exercise a week. This involves a mix of aerobic exercise (such as walking) and resistance exercises (that target specific muscle groups), done at a moderate or high enough intensity to make you huff and puff a bit.

Observational studies show associations between exercise and living longer and prevention of cancer recurrence. And there’s some preliminary evidence from clinical trials to support this too.

Women with breast cancer who exercise and are more active, have better quality of life, strength and fitness, and fewer and less severe side effects during active treatment.

2. Eat a high quality diet

Women with better diets – that include a high intake of vegetables, fruit, legumes, nuts, whole grains and fish – have been shown to live longer after a breast cancer diagnosis than those who have a diet high in refined or processed foods and red meat.

This is due mainly to the benefit of a good diet on reducing the risks of other health conditions, such as heart disease, rather than having a direct effect on the risk of dying from breast cancer.

Many women, particularly older women or those with early stage breast cancer, are actually at higher risk of dying from heart disease than their breast cancer. A high quality diet can help maintain a healthy body weight and heart health.

There has been growing interest in specific diets (such as ketogenic or low-carbohydrate diets) and fasting during cancer treatment. But the most recent guidelines state there’s no evidence yet to say these are of significant benefit.

More research is being done following findings from a 2020 study, which suggested a “fasting mimicking diet” (low calorie, low protein) on the days prior to and of chemotherapy, produced a better response to treatment. However, compliance with the diet was difficult – only one in five women in the study were able to stick to the fasting diet for all their chemotherapy treatments.

3. Maintain a healthy weight

Excess body weight has also been linked to poorer survival after breast cancer diagnosis. But so far there haven’t been any clinical trials to show the opposite: that weight loss following a breast cancer diagnosis can improve survival. Trials are underway to answer this question.

Weight gain is common following breast cancer treatment. The causes for this are complex and carrying extra weight can make some of the side effects of treatment worse. Our recent study of women following breast cancer treatment, found that when they are supported to lose a modest amount of weight (5% of their body weight), they improved their physical quality of life and reduced their pain levels. They also reduced their risk of heart disease and diabetes.

Read more:
Cancer in the under 50s is rising, globally – why?

Besides these well-established tips, a small body of research suggests two more behaviours, related to our body clock, can impact health after a breast cancer diagnosis.

4. Get good sleep

Disrupted sleep – common among women with breast cancer – can remain for years after your treatment has ended.

Women with breast cancer who regularly struggle to fall or stay asleep at night – compared those who rarely or never – are at greater risk of dying from any cause.

And it’s not just about how well, but also how long you sleep. Sleeping longer than nine hours per night – compared to seven to eight hours – is associated with a 48% increased risk of breast cancer returning. But, studies are yet to tease apart the possible reasons for this. Is increased risk of cancer recurrence a result of sleeping longer or is sleeping longer a consequence of progressing or recurrent disease?

5. Be mindful of when you eat

Preliminary research suggests when you eat matters. Delaying the time between the last meal of the day (dinner or supper) and first meal of the next (breakfast) may help reduce the chances of breast cancer returning.

When women reported fasting overnight for fewer than 13 hours – compared to 13 or more hours – after a breast cancer diagnosis, it was linked to a 36% increased risk of breast cancer coming back. But the study’s authors note randomised trials are needed to test whether increasing the amount of time fasting at night can reduce the risk of disease.

Read more:
Olivia Newton-John gave a voice to those with cancer and shifted the focus to the life of survivors

Small steps to big changes

The World Cancer Research Fund has developed a list of recommendations to reduce cancer risk and reduce the risk of cancer coming back. But our research has found most women aren’t meeting these recommendations after their breast cancer diagnosis. Changing habits after breast cancer can also be harder, mainly due to fatigue and stress.

Starting exercise after treatment can be intimidating and even frightening. It’s a good idea to start small, for example: aim to increase exercise by 10 to 15 minutes each week. Having an exercise buddy really helps and there are lots of exercise programs for people who’ve had breast cancer.

Common questions about exercising after a breast cancer diagnosis include how to avoid the swelling and discomfort of lymphoedema, which develops in about 20% of breast cancer
survivors who have had lymph nodes removed. People also worry about exercise and wig discomfort or irritation from radiation. Specific advice is available.

Similar to exercise goals, rather than striving for a perfect diet, you can aim to eat more vegetables each week.

Sleep can be challenging if you’ve been worrying about a cancer diagnosis or treatment but tips for getting the recommended seven to nine hours sleep each night include exercising earlier in the day, avoiding snacks before bed and good sleep hygiene.

Marina Reeves receives funding from Medical Research Future Fund and World Cancer Research Fund. Marina Reeves has previously received funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council and National Breast Cancer Foundation.

Caroline Terranova previously received funding from the University of Queensland Research Scholarships.

Kelly D’cunha receives funding from an Australian Government Research Training Program (RTP) Scholarship.

Sandra Hayes receives funding from Cancer Council Queensland, Medical Research Future Fund, and Cancer Australia.

– ref. After breast cancer: 5 changes you can make to stay healthy – https://theconversation.com/after-breast-cancer-5-changes-you-can-make-to-stay-healthy-190970

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Beth Rounsefell, Casual Academic, The University of Queensland

Many parents worry about the waste created by disposable nappies.

But while baby nappy waste is well known, there’s a hidden waste stream that our research has found is actually a bigger issue. More adult incontinence products go to landfill than baby nappies in Australia.

Adult incontinence is often underreported and undertreated. The social stigma and lack of access to affordable health support may stop people seeking treatment and instead rely on incontinence products.

As Australia’s population ages, this issue will grow. By 2030, we predict adult incontinence waste will be four to ten times greater than baby nappies. We’ll need to get much better at dealing with the waste issues associated with these products.

Adult incontinence is common and long-lasting

The reason these products will soon outstrip baby nappies is because infants usually only need nappies for a couple of years. By contrast, adult incontinence can stay with you for a lot longer – and it can emerge in many different ways.

How common is adult incontinence? It varies widely. The risk of urinary incontinence increases with age, and women experience higher levels of incontinence compared to men across all age groups. Women over 60 experience the biggest issues, with an estimated 30% to 63% of women over 65 living with some degree of urinary incontinence.

It’s common for people to manage their incontinence with single-use absorbent hygiene products, an umbrella term for incontinence products for both babies and adults.

Like baby nappies, adult incontinence products are usually made from a combination of natural fibres, plastics, glues and synthetic absorbent materials.

What happens to these products after use varies around the world, and can range from illegal dumping, to landfill, composting or burning in a waste-to-energy plant.

In Australia, both infant and adult products typically end up in landfill. The problem is, when you deposit organic waste in landfill, it gives off biogas (a mix of methane and carbon dioxide) and leachate, a polluted liquid that can leak through the lining at the bottom of landfills.

Some landfills in Australia are equipped with collection systems for leachate and biogas – but not all. Biogas emissions and leachate leaks can still occur even if there are collection systems in place.

Food and garden waste are the main source of biogas and organic contaminants in leachate. While councils look to remove food and garden waste from landfills, our ageing population will contribute more incontinence product waste to them.

Read more:
Why we need to talk about incontinence

Could we divert adult incontinence products from landfill?

Right now, we estimate about half of all adult incontinence products used in Australia end up in landfills without biogas collection.

The European Union has moved to ban disposal of untreated organic waste – including these products – to landfill. Because adult incontinence products usually contain plastics, the EU requires them to be incinerated where possible rather than biodegraded. Australia has no such laws for this waste.

Could biodegradable incontinence products tackle the waste issue? Only if there are systems in place to manage the waste and recover the resources.

A recycling pathway for biodegradable incontinence products could include anaerobic digestion – systems that harness bacteria to take our waste and make useful products such as renewable natural gas and biofertiliser. This waste stream could also be composted, if the temperature rises high enough to kill off any pathogens and recover the resources.

Problem solving

This is only part of the solution. Tackling the stigma around incontinence and ensuring access to affordable treatment options could cut the waste stream.

Encouraging manufacturers to use biodegradable materials for both adult and baby incontinence products could enable resource recovery, provided policies, systems and infrastructure are put in place to divert and process the waste. And while this is happening, it’s important these improved incontinence products are accessible and affordable to people who need them.

The reason disposable baby nappies and adult incontinence products have come to dominate the market is simple: they’re convenient, despite the environmental impact. This is especially true for the quality of life for our ageing population.

As our population gets older, we’ll need to rethink this. Let’s bring the issue into the open and talk about it. And let’s find alternative solutions that give people dignity and a better quality of life – while minimising landfill waste and the impact on our environment.

Read more:
Urinary incontinence can be a problem for women of all ages, but there is a cure

Beth Rounsefell is a Casual Academic at The University of Queensland, and currently works for EDL.

Emma Thompson-Brewster and Kate O’Brien 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. Right now, more adult incontinence products than baby nappies go to landfill. By 2030, it could be ten times higher – https://theconversation.com/right-now-more-adult-incontinence-products-than-baby-nappies-go-to-landfill-by-2030-it-could-be-ten-times-higher-191585

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michael Vardon, Associate Professor at the Fenner School, Australian National University

Treasurer Jim Chalmers’ federal budget next week will for the first time include a section on wellbeing, which aims to measure how well Australians are doing in life.

The wellbeing budget will, among other things, assess the state of our natural places using a set of environmental indicators. But what indicators? And what environmental information should be used?

Getting meaningful environmental measures into the wellbeing budget won’t be easy. And tokenism won’t do.

We need a system providing comprehensive, regular and up-to-date information that can genuinely inform environmental and economic decisions.

An information ‘grab bag’

Australia has, for too long, relied on the five-yearly State of the Environment reports for updates on how our environment is faring, using a grab-bag of information. As the latest report noted:

Australia currently lacks a framework that delivers holistic environmental management to integrate our disconnected legislative and institutional national, state and territory systems, and break down existing barriers to stimulate new models and partnerships for innovative environmental management and financing.

In other words, we cannot get our environmental act together. Our responses to problems are often piecemeal and ineffective. We do not even have the information we need to fix them.

We’re yet to see what environmental information is included in next week’s wellbeing budget.

The Nine newspapers on Wednesday reported that no indicators have been agreed upon as yet, but the budget papers will contain a chapter on methods used in other jurisdictions, such as the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s long-running wellbeing framework.

Given the dearth of good information, the government must resist the temptation to rely on partial, uninformative or misleading environmental statistics.

These might include the number of listed threatened species (which would be larger if the environment department had been better-resourced) or the extent of the network of protected areas (which is large but significantly under-represents many ecosystems).

There’s no problem starting with what we have. But we must get to what we need.

We could draw inspiration from the giant information and policy apparatus in the public service that helps us track economic progress, and use a United Nations framework called the System of Environmental Economic Accounting (sometimes shortened to SEEA).

Read more:
‘Environmental accounting’ could revolutionise nature conservation, but Australia has squandered its potential

The giant information and policy apparatus

Every day, thousands of public servants work to gauge what the economy is doing and figure out what it means for industry, the government and the public.

Gross domestic product is measured, reported and debated. The Australian Bureau of Statistics releases it to a set schedule, without needing ministerial approval. Good or bad, the data comes out.

Officials from treasury, the finance department and the Reserve Bank pore over the figures. Their analyses and advice are sent to the treasurer, prime minister and cabinet.

If growth is too strong, the Reserve Bank might increase interest rates. If the economy is weak, the government might stimulate it with infrastructure spending.

Compare this to what we have for the environment.

A five-yearly State of the Environment report. In between reports, environmental problems are identified by scientists, environment groups and concerned citizens. Environmental laws are largely reactive. The agencies tasked with responding have limited funding and information.

The result? We consume the environment salami, one slice at a time, without knowing how much is left.

One example is the box-gum grassy woodlands once common across much of southeast Australia. These woodlands were protected under Australia’s most significant environmental law, the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act.

A recovery plan was prepared. But there’s no evidence the plan was delivered and the ecosystem is still no better off.

In his 2020 review of the EPBC Act, Professor Graeme Samuel recommended an overhaul, saying

National Environmental Standards should be immediately developed and implemented to provide clear rules and improved decision-making.

Recognising this couldn’t happen without a system of comprehensive environmental information, Samuel recommended building one including national environmental-economic accounts.

These should be tabled annually in parliament alongside traditional budget reporting.

Samuel’s approach strongly resembles the way governments manage the economy: use regular information to adjust policy settings to stay on trajectory towards desired outcomes.

Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek has hinted she is inclined to follow Samuel, describing his review as “thorough”.

So if environmental management is going to emulate economic management and be informed by the accounts Samuel envisioned, then just what are they?

What is environmental-economic accounting and what’s the UN-backed system?

Environmental-economic accounting is an information system blueprint.

SEEA-based accounts are ready-made to provide information for environmental decision-making, just as the national accounts inform economic decision-making.

This UN-backed system was only completed in 2021, so real-world examples remain few. But one Victorian study shows the potential.

The accounts in the study showed the economic benefit of harvesting Central Highlands native forests for timber were far outweighed by the economic benefit of maintaining the forests for carbon storage and water supply. In other words, the forest is more valuable if you just leave it alone.

Ceasing harvesting would also bring major biodiversity gains. An assessment of all regional forest agreement areas in Victoria gave similar results.

On paper, Australia’s governments in 2018 endorsed the SEEA and adopted a national strategy to implement it.

In practice however, these governments are yet to produce the vision or political will to build a such a system that will actually inform environmental decisions.

Overseas, change is underway. The US, previously a laggard, now has an ambitious strategy to build environmental-economic accounts into their national information system.

An urgent need

Establishing a comprehensive set of environmental-economic accounts is the first step in delivering integrated environmental and economic management.

The United Nation’s System of Environmental-Economic Accounting offers a way forward. Graeme Samuel recommended it. Now government must deliver it. But it will take time and it won’t be cheap.

Early signs are positive but can Plibersek and Chalmers stay the course? Our future depends on it.

Read more:
You probably missed the latest national environmental-economic accounts – but why?

Michael Vardon receives funding from a variety of organisations for the development and application of environmental-economic accounting.

Peter Burnett 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. Our environmental responses are often piecemeal and ineffective. Next week’s wellbeing budget is a chance to act – https://theconversation.com/our-environmental-responses-are-often-piecemeal-and-ineffective-next-weeks-wellbeing-budget-is-a-chance-to-act-188366

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nic Rawlence, Senior Lecturer in Ancient DNA, University of Otago

The impact of deer on Aotearoa New Zealand’s natural environment is never far from the headlines. Most recently, the Southland Conservation Board highlighted the damage the introduced species was doing to native forest on Rakiura Stewart Island.

And despite the government including NZ$30 million for deer and goat control in this year’s budget, the situation remains critical, with considerable disagreement about the best solutions.

The Department of Conservation (DOC) is key to managing deer numbers, but has been strongly criticised by the CEO of the independent Forest & Bird organisation over the climate implications of its wild game animal management framework:

When DOC publishes plans that talk about ‘improving the quality of game animals’ it’s clear they’ve lost their way. Deer, pigs and goats are wrecking native habitats and their stored carbon from the ground up.

On the other side, some hunters and anti-1080 pesticide activists are vehemently opposed to large-scale deer culling.

And central to some of their arguments has been the idea that deer are actually ecological surrogates for extinct moa – large herbivores that control plant growth and keep forests “open”.

But this outdated and false argument ignores the latest evolutionary and ecological research, and misrepresents the current state of scientific evidence. Scientists have made significant progress and now know far more than they did even ten years ago.

Are deer doing what moa did?

Deer were introduced to New Zealand from the mid-19th century as a way to make hunting for food accessible for all. Not long after that, however, conservationists became increasingly concerned about the damage the species caused.

Hunters then became worried deer were going to be controlled or eradicated, and came up with the ecological surrogate theory to justify additional releases. Some have even illegally introduced deer into areas where they had previously been eradicated or where only one species existed.

Moa had a population density of two to ten individuals per square kilometre (of about 0.5 to 2.5 million moa), broadly similar to deer (three to 15 individuals per km²). But this doesn’t mean the two had similar impacts simply because they were or are herbivores.

Read more:
How did ancient moa survive the ice age – and what can they teach us about modern climate change?

The latest evidence shows unequivocally deer are nothing like moa, with completely different ecological impacts.

Moa were more ecologically friendly and unique – the product of 58 million years of evolution. While the ancestors of moa arrived in New Zealand just after the extinction of the dinosaurs, molecular dating suggests the latest evolutionary radiation of moa dates to the past six to seven million years. The nine moa species were ecologically segregated and in tune with their environment due to millions of years of co-evolution with plants.

Deer are not. They eat bare the forest “understorey” (plants beneath the canopy growing on or near the forest floor), including the insulating layer of leaf litter. Deer can eat to near extinction the plants moa browsed, which now only survive in inaccessible areas.

Deer and climate change

Deer browsing pressure also contributes to climate change through CO₂ emissions from trees they kill, which release carbon as they rot, and by preventing forest regeneration that locks in carbon.

Moa had uniquely shaped beaks for cutting, minimising inter-species competition. Deer have teeth and a prehensile tongue to twist and pull plants into the mouth.

The moa digestive system was basic, whereas deer are ruminants and can extract energy from non-palatable foods like bark. Moa had a significantly more diverse diet than deer, including plants that evolved anti-browsing defences that discouraged browsing by moa. Not enough evolutionary time has elasped for New Zealand plants to evolve defences against deer browsing.

Read more:
Nation-building or nature-destroying? Why it’s time NZ faced up to the environmental damage of its colonial past

This indicates that prehistoric forest understories were more diverse and lush – not the open, sparse ones with little regeneration that deer create.

Moa played a role in the dispersal of brightly coloured fungi and the spread of native forest. Deer disperse exotic fungi that help spread wildling pines. Native fungi don’t survive passage through the deer gut.

Moa dissipated their weight through two large feet with splayed toes. Deer trample the forest floor through four small hoofed feet.

Deer have no natural predators, whereas moa had Haast’s eagle and Eyles’ harrier.

Moa bred slowly, whereas deer are boom and bust species. Female red deer reach sexual maturity at two years. Moa took up to nine years to reach adult body size, and probably longer for sexual maturity.

Solving the deer problem

Despite the misinformation, deer are pests causing irreversible damage to remaining ecosystems. But there is not yet the social licence for deer to be included in the Predator Free 2050 plan, which aims to eradicate rats, mustelids and possums.

We need to reframe the ecological damage deer are doing to taonga species and the food web those plants are part of. (This includes the danger of farmed deer escaping.)

If eradication isn’t palatable, consideration must be given to a compromise solution of confining deer to areas of least conservation concern, with drastically reduced populations.

Where those areas are, and whether hunters might pay to shoot deer there (with revenues going back into conservation), could be part of that discussion.

Read more:
NZ is home to species found nowhere else but biodiversity losses match global crisis

Alternatively, deer carcasses from hunting could be left to rot, returning nutrients to the soil, despite arguments this is a waste of food. Forests are already struggling with climate resilience, not helped by the human-induced decline and extinction of seabirds that once brought nutrients in from the sea.

And the use of deer repellents in 1080 drops to control pests needs to be revisited. The pesticide can be highly effective, with up to 90% of local deer populations eradicated in some areas.

Above all, we need to ask what native forests require to be healthy and remain carbon sinks, and how this is monitored. Deer control or eradication policy needs to be timely, evidence-based and not shrouded in misinformation.

Nic Rawlence receives funding from the Royal Society of New Zealand.

– ref. Despite the myth, deer are not an ecological substitute for moa and should be part of NZ’s predator-free plan – https://theconversation.com/despite-the-myth-deer-are-not-an-ecological-substitute-for-moa-and-should-be-part-of-nzs-predator-free-plan-187840