Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Richard Holden, Professor of Economics, UNSW

In an age of hyperpartisan politics, the Biden presidency offers a welcome centrism that might help bridge the divides.

But it is also Biden’s economic centrism that offers a chance to cut through what has become an increasingly polarised approach to economic policy.

On the Republican side of politics, there is strong support for neoliberal economic policies – that is, economic policies that don’t just emphasise the importance of markets but represent a kind of free-market fanaticism. Ronald Reagan aptly expressed this view in his 1981 inaugural speech, in which he said “government is not the solution to our problem, government is the problem”.

On the Democratic side, the centrism of the Bill Clinton era (1993- 2001) has given way to much more left-wing policies. Indeed the democratic socialism of Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez have been in the ascendancy for several years.

If you have any doubt about this, consider two facts.

First, Sanders came very close to being the Democratic Party’s presidential nominee in 2016. Second, the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries were dominated by candidates with similar views – such as Senator Elizabeth Warren.

Biden, of course, ran on a much more centrist economic platform.

This was perhaps best captured by his approach to health care – seeking to build on Obamacare (the Affordable Care Act) and insure more people, rather than adopt the “Medicare for All” policy advocated by Sanders and Warren.

In a whole range of areas Biden and his nominees for important cabinet posts have signalled the new administration’s economic policies will be responsive to the demands of the left but still be sensitive to the concerns of the right.

Read more: Who’s who in Joe Biden’s cabinet

Big spending, but within limits

One of the most important things the administration will do in its early days is to orchestrate a large spending package to help deal with the fallout of the coronavirus pandemic.

This will include spending on the vaccine roll-out, helping schools reopen, extending unemployment insurance and cheques to households.

So the spending package is likely to be huge. But the administration is not going to spend with complete abandon and without acknowledging constraints.

As Biden’s pick for Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen, said in her confirmation hearing:

Neither the president elect, nor I, proposed this release relief package without an appreciation for the country’s debt burden. But right now, with interest rates at historic lows, the smartest thing we can do is act big. In the long run, I believe the benefits will far outweigh the costs, especially if we care about helping people who’ve been struggling for a very long time.

Read more: Vital Signs: Janet Yellen, the very model of a modern Madam Secretary

Treading cautiously on health care

Sanders and others’ “Medicare for All” plan involves single-payer (i.e. the government) universal coverage and ending private health insurance. This would be similar to the approach in Scandinavia, Canada and Britain.

Biden has strongly resisted this on two fronts.

One, it would be incredibly expensive, costing US$30-40 trillion over a decade. Two, it would involve more than 150 million Americans losing their current insurance.

Instead, Biden wants to expand the Affordable Care Act with more incentives to push towards truly universal coverage. This is something Mitt Romney (the Republicans’ 2012 presidential candidate) might easily have proposed. Don’t forget that as governor of Massachusetts (from 2003 to 2007) he enacted a plan almost identical the Affordable Care Act – an idea championed by the conservative Heritage Foundation.

Likewise with tax reform

Biden’s tax plan certainly involves raising taxes but not to anywhere near the levels called for by the democratic socialist wing of his party. Nor will he embrace a wealth tax like Warren championed. Under her plan, people with assets of more than US$50 million would be taxed 2% of that amount a year (and 3% for more than US$1 billion).

But he does plan to raise the top income tax rate (on income more than US$400,000) from 37% to 39.6%. He will raise the flat 21% corporate tax rate introduced by Trump to 28%.

US companies will need to pay a minimum tax of 21% on foreign income – addressing the issue of companies avoiding taxes through legal set-ups in low-tax overseas jurisdictions (such as Apple in Ireland).

Biden will even introduce a tax penalty on companies that move jobs overseas if their products are sold in the US.

This is not a package any Republican administration would be likely to introduce. On the other hand, it falls dramatically short of what Sanders, Warren and Ocasio-Cortez want.

Responsive but responsible

The Biden economic plan is responsive to the current – almost shocking – state of the US economy. His health care and tax policies are sensitive to concerns about inequality.

Read more: Joe Biden sends a clear message to the watching world – America’s back

His approach acknowledges, rightly, that with interest rates at historic lows there is room for considerably more spending than in the past, despite already huge deficits. But it also acknowledges there are limits to what the government can or should do.

In that sense it is something even conservative Republicans ought to be able to live with – and common ground is something the US desperately needs to find.

– ref. Biden’s economic centrism isn’t exciting, but right for these divisive times – https://theconversation.com/bidens-economic-centrism-isnt-exciting-but-right-for-these-divisive-times-153647

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Gary Mortimer, Professor of Marketing and Consumer Behaviour, Queensland University of Technology

Twenty years ago, on January 25 2001, a virtually unknown German supermarket chain quietly opened its first stores in Australia.

The two stores – one in Sydney’s inner-west suburb of Marrickville, the other in the outer south-west, near Bankstown Airport – were small, about a quarter the size of a mainstream supermarket. Each stocked just 900 products, 90% of which were unknown brands.

Shoppers had to bring and pack their own bags themselves. To use a trolley required a “gold coin”. They didn’t seek to entice customers with “loyalty” rewards or other gimmicks.

Few Australian supermarket executives at the time would have considered them models for success. They couldn’t imagine the impact Aldi would have on Australia’s retail sector and shopping habits.

Aldi’s history

Aldi’s story began in 1913, when Anna Albrecht opened a small grocery store in 1913 in the city of Essen, western Germany.

Her two sons, Karl and Theo, took over the business after World War II. In the impoverished conditions that followed Germany’s defeat, they focused on keeping costs, and prices, low. Among their strategies were to stock only the most popular items and avoid perishable items.

By the end of the decade they had more than a dozen stores, and by the end of the 1950s more than 300.

The brothers adopted the the name Aldi – combining the first two syllables of Albrecht Diskont (“discount” in German) – in 1961 (though accounts differ on the year).

At about the same time (again, accounts differ on the year) they had a major disagreement over whether to sell cigarettes. They resolved the dispute by splitting the business into two geographic entities: Aldi Nord (“North”), run by Theo (and selling cigarettes), and Aldi Süd (“South”), run by Karl. The split was amicable, and they managed the two divisions collaboratively.

From the late 1960s Aldi began to expand across Europe, beginning with the acquisition of Austrian grocery chain Hofer. It opened its its first US store, in Iowa City, in 1976, and its first British store, in Birmingham), in 1990.

So by the time Aldi opened its first stores in Australia, it was a booming multinational. It now has more than 10,000 stores in 20 countries, including China.

Aldi’s growth in Australia

In coming to Australia, Aldi pounced on a gap in the grocery retail market.

The “food discounter” model had been dominated by now defunct Franklins and Bi-Lo (owned by Coles). By the late 1990s, however, these chains had messed with their “no-frills” model through attempts to go upmarket. It proved disastrous. Franklins went into terminal decline. Coles abandoned the Bi-Lo brand in 2006.

Aldi expanded quickly. By mid-2003 it had 38 stores in New South Wales and six in Victoria. By 2011, it had 251 stores. By early 2013, more than 280, and had expanded to Canberra.

It overtook the IGA group to become the third-biggest player in Australia’s supermarket sector by the end of 2013 – taking 10.3% of all grocery dollars (with Coles having 33.5% and Woolworths 39%). Its first stores in South Australia and Western Australia came in 2016.

It now has more than 500 stores and a 12.4% share of Australia’s A$110 billion food and grocery sector (according to the most recent data from Roy Morgan).

In 2020 Aldi was named Australia’s best supermarket by consumer review website Canstar Blue (the seventh time in a decade), and second-most trusted brand (after Bunnings) by Roy Morgan.

Its practices have influenced how the other supermarkets do business. In particular it has forced competitors to increase their own “private label” (or home-brand) products, introduce “phantom brands”, and promote ever-changing “special buy” general merchandise ranges.

Private and phantom labels

In 2004 private labels comprised an estimated 9% of the products Coles and Woolworths stocked. By 2019 they made up 30% of Coles’ sales. Woolworths has similarly increased its private-label range, due explicitly to pressure from Aldi’s arrival and expansion.

Read more: Love them or loathe them, private label products are taking over supermarket shelves

Notably, Aldi sells no “ALDI” branded products. Instead it trades in phantom brands, such as “Belmont” ice cream, “Radiance” cleaning product and “Lacura” skin care. These brands are intended overcome perceptions of private label items being lower quality.

In 2016, Woolworths launched its own range of phantom brands. Coles followed suit in 2020 with brands including “Wild Tides” tuna and “KOI” toiletries.

Read more: Phantom brands haunting our supermarket shelves as home brand in disguise

Special buys

The bigger supermarkets have also been forced to emulate Aldi’s drawcard of bi-weekly “special buys” – heavily discounted items not normally sold in supermarkets. These have included televisions, lawn mowers, vacuum cleaners, motorcycle jackets, luggage and (curiously for a country like Australia) ski gear.

There are always limited quantities and shoppers regularly experience disappointment. Despite this – indeed because of this – shoppers will queue and keep coming back. These quirky, seasonal, limited-stock items create excitement and FOMO – fear of missing out.

In June 2020, Coles launched its own fortnightly “special buys”.

Unapologetically Aldi

While its competitors have emulated Aldi in several ways, the German chain remains a very different no-frills operation.

It hasn’t bothered with investing in the self-service checkouts that are now ubiquitous in other stores. It continues to offer only long conveyer belts and seated register operators.

Read more: The economics of self-service checkouts

Nor does Aldi have plans to facilitate online deliveries, in which the two supermarket giants have invested heavily.

It never had to cope with customer backlash over phasing out free single-use plastic bags either. Because it never offered free shopping bags, always charging 15 cents for them.

So Aldi continues to be an exception to the rule in Australian supermarket retailing. It history suggests that’s a recipe for continued success.

– ref. The rise and rise of Aldi: two decades that changed supermarket shopping in Australia – https://theconversation.com/the-rise-and-rise-of-aldi-two-decades-that-changed-supermarket-shopping-in-australia-152822

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Liz Giuffre, Senior Lecturer in Communication, University of Technology Sydney

Bluey is easily the most successful Australian television show of the last decade. A record-breaking success for its local broadcaster the ABC, as well as production partners BBC Studios and Screen Australia, Bluey now has a global stage via Disney.

There are many factors behind Bluey’s success, including beautiful animation, nuanced storytelling, and insightful reflections of family life. One element that is integral but not spoken about enough is the show’s music.

Many children’s programs approach music and sound with a directness and lack of complication — think Play School’s wonderfully simple piano.

Bluey is distinct because it sounds rich and intertextual. Finally, fans of the Bluey sound can appreciate it fully, with the soundtrack released today.

Composer Joff Bush and his colleagues have created a world of original and repurposed works that develop characters, plot and narrative across episodes. The music, like the visuals, provides hooks to keep audiences of all ages engaged.

Here are three musical signatures to listen for:

1. The opening theme

The best television themes of any genre set the mood and expectation of the show, as well as introducing the characters. In this case, the tune literally tells us who’s coming, singing “Mum! Dad! Bluey! Bingo!” along with the characters on screen.

Bush’s musical economy is brilliant, immediately setting the mood for the show. The theme instantly indicates something childlike with the melodica, an instrument second only to the recorder in the way it recalls primary school music rooms. The melody dances up and down the scale as the show’s characters dance on screen, punctuated with the delightful roll call of names and the show’s title.

Read more: TV’s top ten ear worms, from a television tragic

The new soundtrack album features three versions of the show’s opening theme tune, including an extended version and an instrument parade, adding a list of instruments for listeners to respond to. After “Mum!, Dad! Bingo! Bluey!” come new calls, like “violins!” and “trumpet!”.

2. Character themes

In an early episode, Grannies, Bluey and Bingo dress up as grannies “Rita” and “Janet” to keep themselves amused while their parents complete household chores.

With Bush’s character theme for the girls’ dress ups, the episode becomes something more than a story of play and distraction. The music is catchy, but also cheeky and a bit naughty, setting up the episode to sound more like a mainstream sitcom than a children’s show.

The Grannies theme works in short sharp bursts throughout the episode, similar to American sitcom soundtracks — like the quirky wonderfulness David Schwartz brought to Arrested Development (2003-19) — and the unusual (and funny) tempo and instrument combinations used by Ronny Hazelhurst BBC comedies like Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em (1973-78) and The Two Ronnies (1971-87).

Throughout the series, Bush’s music isn’t simply used as colour. Instead, Bluey uses music to advance story, place and character. The grannies theme comes and goes as Bluey and Bingo move in and out of their fantasy world, and returns in a later episode where the girls play the game again.

Using the soundtrack in this way rewards adult viewers who know this screen soundtrack recall technique: the Imperial March is sonic shorthand for everything Darth Vader; Isobel Waller-Bridge’s choral theme for the Priest in season two of Fleabag (2016-19).

Read more: ‘Making up games is more important than you think’: why Bluey is a font of parenting wisdom

3. Classical references

Bluey’s season two finale, Sleepytime, was named by the New York Times as one of the Best Television Episodes of 2020.

Mum puts little sister Bingo to bed by reading a bedtime story about space, followed by a dream sequence where the solar system story comes to life.

In this episode, Bush uses Gustav Holst’s Jupiter as the main theme. The music instantly takes us out of the normal Bluey world, supporting the visuals as Bingo leaves earth, too.

The scale of the orchestrated sounds reflects the scale of the story of the child and parenting learning to leave each other at night. The soundtrack also serves a musical joke — what sounds like the solar system but Holst?

Other episodes also use existing music in nuanced ways. Ice Cream references Fantasia with a hilarious appearance of Tchaikovsky’s Waltz of the Flowers as the girls twirl around dripping ice cream cones; Fancy Restaurant uses Vivaldi’s Spring for atmosphere as the girls create a well-meaning (but doomed) date night for their parents; The Magic Xylophone uses Mozart’s Ronda Alla Turca for a game of musical statues.

Much of Bluey’s success is in the way it is designed for children and adults watching together. In Bush’s composition, children are given original and iconic music that satisfies story and character in a way that is new to them, while older viewers are given musical reminders of a variety cultural favourites from television and film.

Of course, the genius of Bluey is that all audiences can pick up any of the musical clues at any time, with repeat viewing revealing more and more.

– ref. The subtle sophistication of Bluey’s soundtrack helped propel it to stardom – https://theconversation.com/the-subtle-sophistication-of-blueys-soundtrack-helped-propel-it-to-stardom-153102

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Marco Rizzi, Senior Lecturer in Law, University of Western Australia

Some Australians could be receiving a COVID-19 vaccine within weeks.

Amid the continued spread of the virus and emergence of highly contagious variants, the federal government has accelerated the start of the roll out — initially set for March 2021 — to February.

Read more: The Oxford vaccine has unique advantages, as does Pfizer’s. Using both is Australia’s best strategy

Other countries, who have been less successful in containing the virus, have already begun vaccination programs. While this has been met by celebration around the world, there have also been concerns about possible side-effects.

It is expected the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) will approve the Pfizer vaccine for use in Australia any day now. Approval for the AstraZeneca vaccine is expected in early February.

Given the uncertainty surrounding the virus and the speed at which vaccines have been developed, what processes are in place to assure Australians’ safety?

What is the TGA?

The TGA is part of the federal Health Department. Its job is to regulate any product that carries a therapeutic claim. This includes prescription drugs, medical devices, certain food supplements, and of course vaccines.

It maintains the Australian Register of Therapeutic Goods (ARTG), which records every therapeutic good available in the country.

The TGA regulates therapeutic goods in two main ways. First, it authorises products so they can be put on the ARTG and distributed. This involves its experts reviewing safety and efficacy data.

It then monitors products once they are in use. This includes collecting, analysing and reacting to data from health-care providers, patients, manufacturers, and overseas regulatory authorities.

How does it work?

The TGA says it adopts a “risk-based approach”. That is, it must be satisfied a vaccine or medication’s benefits outweigh its risks.

The TGA therefore is not tasked with the impossible goal of avoiding all risks. Rather, it must make sure that only products carrying acceptable risks can be marketed.

Read more: Bad reactions to the COVID vaccine will be rare, but Australians deserve a proper compensation scheme

So, for example, common minor side effects (such as a stomach ache) associated with certain painkillers are deemed acceptable compared to their benefit. Similarly, a severe but rare side effect can be acceptable where the medical benefit is significant. This is the case with vaccines.

Along with internal scientific and medical staff, the TGA is advised by seven committees, providing independent expert advice on scientific and technical matters. There includes a specific committee for vaccines.

Vaccine approval under ‘normal’ circumstances

The TGA requires a manufacturer or importer (the “sponsor”) to demonstrate the safety and efficacy of their product.

That is, companies need to show not only that their product is not harmful, but it does what it is supposed to do.

Sponsors must submit a substantive body of clinical data, gathered according to Good Clinical Practice guidelines, which are developed in keeping with world’s best practice.

The TGA also reviews the data using internationally recognised guidelines from the European Medicines Agency.

Read more: Australia’s vaccine rollout will now start next month. Here’s what we’ll need

The key data for approval arises from the third phase of clinical trials. These test a new product on very large groups, which can number in the tens of thousands. The TGA review can take up to eleven months.

If a therapeutic good is approved, but a problem later emerges, the TGA can recall it.

Special provisions for COVID-19 vaccines

The devastating speed of the COVID-19 pandemic has prompted regulatory authorities across the world to speed up approval processes.

Almost all have used existing special provisions to fast-track their reviews. Importantly, clinical trials have been conducted at unprecedented speed thanks to unlimited funding and motivated volunteers.

The scientific consensus is that the rigour of clinical evaluation has not been compromised.

Similarly, the TGA can conduct a speedier review of clinical data.

Instead of reviewing all the data prior to registration, the TGA conducts a preliminary assessment. This is followed by rolling submission of clinical data, leading to provisional registration. In other words the process is accelerated by allowing the TGA to look at data on an ongoing basis.

This special pathway is in place for treatments or vaccines for life-threatening diseases.

A provisional registration means the vaccine is approved for a set period of time (to be determined by the TGA), during which vaccinations can start under close monitoring. Following this, the vaccine proceeds to full registration.

Benefits outweigh risk

Both the Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines have conducted phase three trials on tens of thousands of participants. Additionally, the TGA stresses it will only approve provisional registrations when the data so far makes clear

the benefit of early availability of the medicine outweighs the risk inherent in the fact that additional data are still required.

In the context of COVID-19 vaccines, provisional registration reduces bureaucratic hurdles, while maintaining the highest possible scientific rigour.

Working with the international community

The TGA does not operate in a vacuum either.

Regulatory authorities worldwide and the World Health Organisation have committed to work together on COVID-19 vaccines and medicines to improve “regulatory alignment”.

The TGA is a member of the International Coalition of Medicines Regulatory Authorities, which has committed to full cooperation and transparency between its members, particularly with regard to sharing data.

The TGA is also part of the Access Consortium alongside regulatory authorities from Singapore, Canada, Switzerland and the United Kingdom.

So, while the speed of development of the first COVID-19 vaccines is unprecedented, so is the level of global monitoring over their safety and efficacy.

– ref. How will COVID-19 vaccines be approved for use in Australia? – https://theconversation.com/how-will-covid-19-vaccines-be-approved-for-use-in-australia-153640

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Euan Ritchie, Professor in Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, Centre for Integrative Ecology, School of Life & Environmental Sciences, Deakin University

Australia’s Threatened Species Strategy — a five-year plan for protecting our imperilled species and ecosystems — fizzled to an end last year. A new 10-year plan is being developed to take its place, likely from March.

It comes as Australia’s list of threatened species continues to grow. Relatively recent extinctions, such as the Christmas Island forest skink, Bramble Cay melomys and smooth handfish, add to an already heavy toll.

Now, more than ever, Australia’s remarkable species and environments need strong and effective policies to strengthen their protection and boost their recovery.

So as we settle into the new year, let’s reflect on what’s worked and what must urgently be improved upon, to turn around Australia’s extinction crisis.

Read more: Let there be no doubt: blame for our failing environment laws lies squarely at the feet of government

How effective was the first Threatened Species Strategy?

The Threatened Species Strategy is a key guiding document for biodiversity conservation at the national level. It identifies 70 priority species for conservation, made up of 20 birds, 20 mammals and 30 plants, such as the plains-wanderer, malleefowl, eastern quoll, greater bilby, black grevillea and Kakadu hibiscus.

These were considered among the most urgent in need of assistance of the more than 1,800 threatened species in Australia.

The strategy also identifies targets such as numbers of feral cats to be culled, and partnerships across industry, academia and government key to making the strategy successful.

The original strategy (2015-20) was eagerly welcomed for putting the national spotlight on threatened species conservation. It has certainly helped raise awareness of its priority species.

However, there’s little evidence the strategy has had a significant impact on threatened species conservation to date.

The midterm report in 2019 found only 35% of the priority species (14 in total) had improving trajectories compared to before the strategy (pre-2015). This number included six species — such as the brush-tailed rabbit-rat and western ringtail possum — that were still declining, but just at a slower rate.

On average, the trends of threatened mammal and bird populations across Australia are not increasing.

Other targets, such as killing two million feral cats by 2020, were not explicitly linked to measurable conservation outcomes, such as an increase in populations of threatened native animals. Because of this, it’s difficult to judge their success.

Read more: Feral cat cull: why the 2 million target is on scientifically shaky ground

What needs to change?

The previous strategy focused very heavily on feral cats as a threat and less so on other important and potentially compounding threats, particularly habitat destruction and degradation.

For instance, land clearing has contributed to a similar number of extinctions in Australia (62 species) as introduced animals such as feral cats (64).

In fact, 2018 research found agricultural activities affect at least 73% of invertebrates, 82% of birds, 69% of amphibians and 73% of mammals listed as threatened in Australia. Urban development and climate change threaten up to 33% and 56% of threatened species, respectively.

Read more: The buffel kerfuffle: how one species quietly destroys native wildlife and cultural sites in arid Australia

Other important threats to native Australian species include pollution, feral herbivores (such as horses and goats), very frequent or hot bushfires and weeds. Buffel grass was recently identified as a major emerging threat to Australia’s biodiversity, with the risk being as high as the threat posed by cats and foxes.

Five vital improvements

We made a submission to the Morrison government when the Threatened Species Strategy was under review. Below, we detail our key recommendations.

1. A holistic and evidence-based approach encompassing the full range of threats

This includes reducing rates of land clearing — a major and ongoing issue, but largely overlooked in the previous strategy.

2. Formal prioritisation of focal species, threats and actions

The previous strategy focused heavily on a small subset of the more than 1,800 threatened species and ecosystems in Australia. It mostly disregarded frog, reptile, fish and invertebrate species also threatened with extinction.

To reduce bias towards primarily “charismatic” species, the federal government should use an evidence-based prioritisation approach, known as “decision science”, like they do in New South Wales, New Zealand and Canada. This would ensure funds are spent on the most feasible and beneficial recovery efforts.

3. Targets linked to clear and measurable conservation outcomes

Some targets in the first Threatened Species Strategy were difficult to measure, not explicitly linked to conservation outcomes, or weak. Targets need to be more specific.

For example, a target to “improve the trajectory” of threatened species could be achieved if extinction is occurring at a slightly slower rate. Alternatively, a target to “improve the conservation status” of a species is achieved if new assessments rate it as “vulnerable” rather than “endangered”.

4. Significant financial investment from government

Investing in conservation reduces biodiversity loss. A 2019 study found Australia’s listed threatened species could be recovered for about A$1.7 billion per year. This money could be raised by removing harmful subsidies that directly threaten biodiversity, such as those to industries emitting large volumes of greenhouse gases.

The first strategy featured a call for co-investment from industry. But this failed to attract much private sector interest, meaning many important projects aimed at conserving species did not proceed.

5. Government leadership, coordination and policy alignment

The Threatened Species Strategy should be aligned with Australia’s international obligations such as the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals and the federal Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (which is also currently being reviewed). This will help foster a more coherent and efficient national approach to threatened species conservation.

There are also incredible opportunities to better align threatened species conservation with policies and investment in climate change mitigation and sustainable agriculture.

The benefits of investing heavily in wildlife reach beyond preventing extinctions. It would generate many jobs, including in regional and Indigenous communities.

Protecting our natural heritage is an investment, not a cost. Now is the time to seize this opportunity.

Read more: Scientists re-counted Australia’s extinct species, and the result is devastating

– ref. It’s not too late to save them: 5 ways to improve the government’s plan to protect threatened wildlife – https://theconversation.com/its-not-too-late-to-save-them-5-ways-to-improve-the-governments-plan-to-protect-threatened-wildlife-147669

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Arosha Weerakoon, Lecturer, General Dentist & PhD Candidate, The University of Queensland

Baby teeth, or milk teeth, act like lighthouses to guide the adult ones to their correct destination. A baby tooth will become wobbly and fall out because the adult tooth that follows pushes through to break down the roots of the baby tooth.

To lose baby teeth, particularly the first one, is a rite of passage for children. And while most baby teeth do fall out, some kids won’t lose all their baby teeth.

Sometimes, the adult teeth simply don’t form. In an average class, one or two students, or 6% of children, will not form at least one adult tooth (this doesn’t include those with missing wisdom teeth). A missing adult tooth will often mean the baby tooth remains in place into adulthood.

For this and other reasons, it’s important to look after your child’s baby teeth. Healthy baby teeth are paramount to children’s health and well-being both in the present and into adulthood.

Kids get cavities too

Just like in adult teeth, baby teeth can develop cavities (holes). Factors including cavity-causing bacteria in the mouth, regular consumption of sugary drinks and snacks, and not brushing well can make cavities more likely.

Untreated cavities can grow to affect or even kill the nerves and blood vessels inside the tooth. If this happens, your child can suffer from severe toothache and infection. These are among the most common preventable reasons for children to require dental treatment under general anaesthetic.

In some instances, it may be necessary to remove a baby tooth if it’s infected or has a very large cavity. This can potentially cause overcrowding.

If a baby tooth is lost before the adult successor is ready, the teeth on either side drift into the space. Lacking space, the adult tooth may eventually come through in the wrong place. In such cases, your child is more likely to need braces.

Read more: Curious Kids: why do we lose our baby teeth?

Dental problems can lead to bigger problems

Left untreated, infected baby teeth can affect your child’s health and well-being.

Children with healthy smiles fare better at school relative to those who suffer with dental problems. Children who experience dental pain may lose sleep, have difficulty concentrating and participating in class, and miss school altogether.

Poor dental health also affects children’s physical development. Children with sore teeth may skip meals or eat less, which can affect their nutrition and growth.

We also know cavities in baby teeth are associated with an increased risk of suffering from the same issues into adulthood.

Some signs your child may have dental problems

A child will describe and experience a toothache differently to adults, but there are a few signs you can look out for. Your child may:

• complain of a sharp poking pain, an annoying, sore or itchy tooth, or even an earache

• avoid hot, cold, sweet or hard, chewy foods

• take longer than usual to finish a meal

• complain about food getting stuck in their teeth

• have difficulty brushing their teeth

• have trouble falling asleep or wake up during the night more often than usual

• be too tired to participate in class

• perform poorly at school

• experience difficulty socialising and speaking

• be more irritable or grumpy than usual.

Read more: Do I need to floss my teeth?

The good news is, once children’s dental issues are diagnosed, most if not all problems can be fixed or managed.

Visiting the dentist

You should book a dental check-up when your child’s first tooth comes through, or by their first birthday — whichever comes first.

After that, schedule check-ups regularly, depending on how frequently your dentist recommends. While your child’s teeth may be OK, frequent visits will help them get comfortable with the dentist, and allow for any issues to be dealt with early.

It’s no secret some children (and even adults) find the prospect of visiting the dentist daunting. It’s important parents of young children establish the dentist in a positive light.

These tips can help you and your child prepare for their first and subsequent visits:

• use positive, child-friendly terms when referring to the dentist, such as “the tooth fairy’s friend”

• avoid emotionally laden words such as “needle”, which may frighten children

• avoid threatening children with consequences for poor behaviour

• avoid sharing poor dental experiences

• make the visit fun by role playing going to the dentist at home beforehand, or likening the visit to a play date.

Read more: Child tooth decay is on the rise, but few are brushing their teeth enough or seeing the dentist

Dental care at home

Alongside regular dental checks, it’s important to set up good habits with your children around looking after and brushing their teeth:

• talk about teeth and why they’re important

• help your children brush their teeth with a soft, age-appropriate toothbrush

• let your children have fun (for example, use toothbrushes that feature their favourite characters).

Generally, Australian guidelines recommend you use fluoridated toothpaste by the time the child reaches 18 months (before this, you can just use water). But you can discuss which toothpaste is appropriate for your child at their next dental appointment.

Parents who have dental issues may worry their child will suffer the same fate. But as a parent or guardian, you can influence your child’s dental habits and attitudes to help them now and into their future.

– ref. Yes, baby teeth fall out. But they’re still important — here’s how to help your kids look after them – https://theconversation.com/yes-baby-teeth-fall-out-but-theyre-still-important-heres-how-to-help-your-kids-look-after-them-148190

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Tama Leaver, Professor of Internet Studies, Curtin University

The inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners-Lee, has raised concerns that Australia’s proposed News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code could fundamentally break the internet as we know it.

His concerns are valid. However, they could be addressed through minor changes to the proposed code.

How could the code break the web?

The news media bargaining code aims to level the playing field between media companies and online giants. It would do this by forcing Facebook and Google to pay Australian news businesses for content linked to, or featured, on their platforms.

In a submission to the Senate inquiry about the code, Berners-Lee wrote:

Specifically, I am concerned that the Code risks breaching a fundamental principle of the web by requiring payment for linking between certain content online. […] The ability to link freely — meaning without limitations regarding the content of the linked site and without monetary fees — is fundamental to how the web operates.

Currently, one of the most basic underlying principles of the web is there is no cost involved in creating a hypertext link (or simply a “link”) to any other page or object online.

When Berners-Lee first invented the World Wide Web, he effectively gave it away for free to ensure nobody would or could charge for using its protocols.

He claims if the code sets a legal precedent allowing someone to charge for linking, then the genie would escape the bottle — and plenty more attempts to charge for linking to content would appear.

If the precedent was set that people could be charged for simply linking to content online, it’s possible the underlying principle of linking would be disrupted.

As a result, there would likely be many attempts by both legitimate companies and scammers to charge users for what is currently free.

While supporting the “right of publishers and content creators to be properly rewarded for their work”, Berners-Lee asks the code be amended to maintain the principle of allowing free linking between content.

Read more: Google News favours mainstream media. Even if it pays for Australian content, will local outlets fall further behind?

Google and Facebook don’t just link to content

Part of the issue here is Google and Facebook don’t just collect a list of interesting links to news content. Rather the way they find, sort, curate and present news content adds value for their users.

They don’t just link to news content, they reframe it. It is often in that reframing that advertisements appear, and this is where these platforms make money.

For example, this link will take you to the original 1989 proposal for the World Wide Web. Right now, anyone can create such a link to any other page or object the web, without having to pay anyone else.

But what Facebook and Google do in curating news content is fundamentally different. They create compelling previews, usually by offering the headline of a news article, sometimes the first few lines, and often the first image extracted.

For instance, here is a preview Google generates when someone searches for Tim Berners-Lee’s Web proposal:

Evidently, what Google returns is more of a media-rich, detailed preview than a simple link. For Google’s users, this is a much more meaningful preview of the content and better enables them to decide whether they’ll click through to see more.

Another huge challenge for media businesses is that increasing numbers of users are taking headlines and previews at face value, without necessarily reading the article.

This can obviously decrease revenue for news providers, as well as perpetuate misinformation. Indeed, it’s one of the reasons Twitter began asking users to actually read content before retweeting it.

A fairly compelling argument, then, is that Google and Facebook add value for consumers via the reframing, curating and previewing of content — not just by linking to it.

Can the code be fixed?

Currently in the code, the section concerning how platforms are “Making content available” lists three ways content is shared:

1. content is reproduced on the service
2. content is linked to
3. an extract or preview is made available.

Similar terms are used to detail how users might interact with content.

If we accept most of the additional value platforms provide to their users is in curating and providing previews of content, then deleting the second element (which just specifies linking to content) would fix Berners-Lee’s concerns.

It would ensure the use of links alone can’t be monetised, as has always been true on the web. Platforms would still need to pay when they present users with extracts or previews of articles, but not when they only link to it.

Since basic links are not the bread and butter of big platforms, this change wouldn’t fundamentally alter the purpose or principle of creating a more level playing field for news businesses and platforms.

Read more: It’s not ‘fair’ and it won’t work: an argument against the ACCC forcing Google and Facebook to pay for news

In its current form, the News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code could put the underlying principles of the world wide web in jeopardy. Tim Berners-Lee is right to raise this point.

But a relatively small tweak to the code would prevent this, It would allow us to focus more on where big platforms actually provide value for users, and where the clearest justification lies in asking them to pay for news content.

For transparency, it should be noted The Conversation has also made a submission to the Senate inquiry regarding the News Media and Digital Platforms Mandatory Bargaining Code.

– ref. Web’s inventor says news media bargaining code could break the internet. He’s right — but there’s a fix – https://theconversation.com/webs-inventor-says-news-media-bargaining-code-could-break-the-internet-hes-right-but-theres-a-fix-153630

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kate Cantrell, Lecturer, Creative Writing & English Literature, University of Southern Queensland

Described as “the world’s greatest storyteller”, Roald Dahl is frequently ranked as the best children’s author of all time by teachers, authors and librarians.

However, the new film adaptation of Dahl’s controversial book, The Witches, warrants a fresh look at a recurrent contrast in Dahl’s work: child protection and care on one hand and a preoccupation with child-hatred, including child neglect and abuse, abandonment, and torture on the other.

Dahl himself once admitted he simultaneously admired and envied children. While his stories spotlight children’s vulnerability to trauma, his child protagonists show how childhood can be an isolating but ultimately triumphant experience.

Read more: The man behind Matilda – what Roald Dahl was really like

Anti-child or child-centred?

While Dahl’s fans champion his “child-centredness” — arguing that anarchy and vulgarity are central to childhood — Dahl’s critics have ventured to suggest his work contains anti-child messages.

In Dahl’s fiction, children are often described unfavourably: they are “stinkers”, “disgusting little blisters”, “vipers”, “imps”, “spoiled brats”, “greedy little thieves”, “greedy brutes”, “robber-bandits”, “ignorant little twits”, “nauseating little warts”, “witless weeds”, and “moth-eaten maggots”.

With the exception of Bruce Bogtrotter, “bad” children are usually unpleasant gluttons who are punished for being spoiled or overweight. Augustus Gloop is ostracised because of his size. After he tumbles into Willy Wonka’s chocolate river and is sucked up the glass pipe, he’s physically transformed. “He used to be fat,” Grandpa Joe marvels. “Now he’s as thin as straw!”

From Miss Trunchbull to the Twits, Aunts Spiker and Sponge, and even Willy Wonka, many of Dahl’s adult characters are merciless figures who enjoy inflicting physical and emotional pain on children.

In Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Wonka not only orchestrates the various “accidents” that occur at the factory, but he stands by indifferently as each child suffers.

In Wonka’s determination to make the “rotten ones” pay for their moral failings, he not only humiliates the children (and their parents), but permanently marks the “bad” children through physical disfigurement. When gum-chewing champion Violet Beauregarde turns purple, Wonka is indifferent. “Ah well,” he says. “There’s nothing we can do about that”.

Red-hot sizzling hatred

The Witches is centred around the theme of child-hatred.

“Real witches,” we are told, “hate children with a red-hot sizzing hatred that is more sizzling and red-hot than any hatred you could possibly imagine”. At their hands (or claws), young children are not only mutilated but exterminated.

Indeed, the ultimate goal of The Grand High Witch is filicide: she plans to rid the world of children — “disgusting little carbuncles” — by tricking them into eating chocolate laced with her malevolent Formula 86: Delayed Action Mouse-Maker.

In The Witches, as in many of Dahl’s fictions for children (he also wrote adult erotica), authoritarian figures are revealed as bigoted and hypocritical, or violent and sadistic. Primary caregivers are neglectful or absent.

So the real threats to the child protagonists of The Witches, Matilda and James and The Giant Peach are not monsters under the bed, but adults whose hatred of children is disguised behind a mask of benevolence.

In The Witches, the young narrator initially finds comfort in the fact he has encountered such “splendid ladies” and “wonderfully kind people”, but soon the facade crumbles.

“Down with children!” he overhears the witches chant. “Do them in! Boil their bones and fry their skin! Bish them, sqvish them, bash them, mash them!”

Read more: The BFG reminds us that wordplay is part of learning and mastering language

Necessary evil

Although the violence present in Dahl’s work can be easily perceived as morbid, antagonism towards children is a necessary part of Dahl’s project.

The initial disempowerment of the child lays the groundwork for the “underdog” narrative. It allows downtrodden children to emerge victorious by outwitting their tormentors through their resourcefulness and a little magic.

Initially, violence is used to reinforce the initial “victimhood” of the child, then it is repurposed in the latter stages of each tale to punish and overcome the perpetrator of the mistreatment.

James’s wicked aunts get their comeuppance when they’re squashed by the giant peach. In The BFG, kidnapped orphan Sophie emerges as the unlikely hero, saving herself and exerting a positive influence on her captor.

Dahl’s fiction is perhaps considered dangerous for a different reason: it takes children seriously.

The author dispenses humour alongside his descriptions of violence to create a less threatening atmosphere for young readers. Children revel in the confronting depictions even while being shocked or repulsed. Dahl — perhaps drawing on childhood trauma of his own — creates a cathartic outlet for children to release tension through laughter, especially at situations that may tap into the reader’s experiences of helplessness.

Such fiction provides children a means of empowerment. Seeing themselves reflected in literature can be an important part of a child’s processing of adversity.

Dahl’s work raises important questions about the safety of children, encouraging them to find their power in the most disempowering situations.

– ref. Abused, neglected, abandoned — did Roald Dahl hate children as much as the witches did? – https://theconversation.com/abused-neglected-abandoned-did-roald-dahl-hate-children-as-much-as-the-witches-did-152813

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Zareh Ghazarian, Senior Lecturer, School of Social Sciences, Monash University

Despite many young Australians having a deep interest in political issues, most teenagers have a limited understanding about their nation’s democratic system.

Results from the 2019 National Assessment Program – Civics and Citizenship (NAP-CC) released today show the proportion of young people demonstrating the expected level of knowledge about topics such as democracy and government has not improved since three years ago.

Read more: 3 ways to help children think critically about the news

Only 38% of year 10 students reached the standard of knowledge on civics and citizenship required for their year level in 2019, the same percentage as in 2016. In year 6, 53% achieved the benchmark, which is down from 55% in 2016.

This has implications for the confidence and preparedness of young people to participate in shaping society now, and into the future.

What is the civics and citizenship test?

The national assessment program on civics and citizenship has been held every three years since 2004. It is administered to a sample of year 6 and year 10 students across Australia. Around 13,250 students sat the assessments in 2019.

The NAP-CC seeks to assess students’ understanding of topics including Australian politics, government, history and the legal system. It also captures students’ knowledge of their rights and responsibilities as citizens.

The NAP-CC aligns with educational aims agreed to by national, state and territory education ministers.

The Alice Springs (Mparntwe) Education Declaration, established in 2019, has two goals, the second of which is that:

young Australians become confident and creative individuals, successful lifelong learners, and active and informed members of the community.

What do the latest results show?

For year 6 students, the proficiency standard expects they can demonstrate knowledge of core aspects of Australian democracy. This includes awareness of the connection between fundamental principles (such as fairness) and their manifestation in rules and laws. They should also be able to demonstrate awareness of citizenship rights and responsibilities.

For example, students in year 6 should be able to identify the role of the prime minister, understand the origins of the Westminster system, and recognise that a vote on a proposed change to the constitution is a referendum.

At year 6, the percentage of students achieving the proficient standard has fallen slightly to 53% from 55% in 2016. This result maintains the established pattern where, since 2004, the percentage of year 6 students meeting the proficient standard has remained within the 50-55% range.

Read more: Schools are not adequately preparing young Australians to participate in our democracy

To meet the proficiency standards in year 10, students should be able to demonstrate knowledge of specific details of Australian democracy, make connections between the processes and outcomes of civil and civic institutions, and demonstrate awareness of the common good as a potential motivation for civic action.

Only 38% of year 10 students reached the proficient standard in 2019. This is the same as the last testing round in 2016, but well down on the 49% high achieved in 2010.

The NAP-CC 2019 results also showed:

• at both year levels, female students outperformed males

• there were large statistically significant differences between the achievements of non-Indigenous and Indigenous students

• students with parents who were senior managers or professionals had significantly higher scores than students with parents who were classified as unskilled labourers, or office, sales or service staff

• the scores of students from metropolitan schools were significantly higher than those of students from regional and remote schools at both year levels

• students who had a parent with a bachelor’s degree or above achieved more than 130 scale points (one proficiency level) higher than students whose parents completed year 10 or year 9 as their highest level of education.

What we need to do

Year 10 is the last year of compulsory schooling in Australia. It is also the final year in which the national civics and citizenship curriculum is delivered.

This means year 10 can be the last opportunity for students to learn about their nation’s political system and their responsibilities as citizens.

Previous research has also shown young people would like to consolidate their knowledge about Australia’s democracy before leaving school.

A national civics and citizenship curriculum was developed by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority in 2012-2013. But states retain the constitutional authority over education, which results in variation in how civics and citizenship is taught across jurisdictions.

The latest data suggests now is the time to build on these investments and introduce targeted strategies.

When we spoke to school leavers in 2017, many told us they wanted additional lessons that concentrated on building their understanding of Australian democracy before they left school. In light of the consistently low performance at the year 10 level, it is now the time to capture and respond to the student voice.

Read more: Ignoring young people’s climate change fears is a recipe for anxiety

We also need to support teachers. Young Australians have said what they learn at school about civics and citizenship is highly dependent on the preparedness of their teachers.

Teachers who are confident about exploring politics and government in class can have a positive impact on the learning outcomes of their students.

In what is often seen to be a “crowded curriculum”, teachers confront a range of challenges in delivering civics and citizenship lessons. As a result, there is value in providing opportunities to build their confidence and capacity in this space.

These latest figures show the previous results were no mere aberration and that student performance in civics and citizenship has remained low. The steps we take now will have an impact on Australian democracy for years to come.

– ref. Young people remain ill-equipped to participate in Australian democracy – https://theconversation.com/young-people-remain-ill-equipped-to-participate-in-australian-democracy-153536

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Denis Muller, Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Advancing Journalism, University of Melbourne

Terrorism, political extremism, Donald Trump, social media and the phenomenon of “cancel culture” are confronting journalists with a range of agonising free-speech dilemmas to which there are no easy answers.

Do they allow a president of the United States to use their platforms to falsely and provocatively claim the election he has just lost was stolen from him?

How do they cover the activities and rhetoric of political extremists without giving oxygen to race hate and civil insurrection?

How do they integrate news-making social media material into their own content, when it is also hateful or a threat to the civil peace?

Should journalists engage in, or take a stand against, “cancel culture”?

How should editors respond to the “assassin’s veto”, when extremists threaten to kill those who publish content that offends their culture or religion?

The West has experienced concrete examples of all these in recent years. In the US, many of them became pressing during the Trump presidency.

When five of the big US television networks cut away from Trump’s White House press conference on November 6 after he claimed the election had been stolen, they did so on the grounds that he was lying and endangering civil peace.

Read more: To stay or cut away? As Trump makes baseless claims, TV networks are faced with a serious dilemma

Silencing the president was an extraordinary step, since it is the job of the media to tell people what is going on, hold public officials to account, and uphold the right to free speech. It looked like an abandonment of their role in democratic life.

Against that, television’s acknowledged reach and power imposes a heavy duty not to provide a platform for dangerous speech.

Then on January 6 – two months later to the day – after yet more incitement from Trump, a violent mob laid siege to the Capitol and five people lost their lives. The networks’ decision looked prescient.

They had acted on the principle that a clear and present danger to civil peace, based on credible evidence, should be prioritised over commitments to informing the public, holding public officials to account and freedom of speech.

This case also raised a further dilemma. Even if the danger to peace did not exist, should journalists just go on reporting – or broadcasting – known lies, even when they come from the president of the United States?

Read more: No, Twitter is not censoring Donald Trump. Free speech is not guaranteed if it harms others

Newspaper editors and producers of pre-recorded radio and television content have the time to report lies while simultaneously calling them out as lies. Live radio and television do not. The words are out and the damage is done.

So the medium, the nature and size of the risk, how the informational and accountability functions of journalism are prioritised against the risk, and the free-speech imperative all play into these decisions.

Similar considerations arise in respect of reporting political extremism.

The ABC’s Four Corners program is about to embark on a story about the alt-right in the US. Having advertised this in a promotional tweet, the ABC received some social media blow-back raising the question of why it would give oxygen to these groups.

The influence of the alt-right on Western politics is a matter of real public interest because of the way it shapes political rhetoric and policy responses, particular on race and immigration.

To not report on this phenomenon because it pursues a morally reprehensible ideology would be to fail the ethical obligation of journalism to tell the community about the important things that are going on in the world.

It is not a question of whether to report, but how.

The Four Corners program will not be live to air. There will be opportunity for judicious editing. Journalists are under no obligation to report everything they are told. In fact they almost never do.

Motive matters

Whether the decision to omit is censorship comes down to motive: is it censorship to omit hate speech or incitement to violence? No. Because the reporter doesn’t agree with it? Yes.

Integrating social media content into professional mass media news presents all these complexities and one more: what is called the news value of “virality”.

Does the fact something has gone viral on social media make it news? For the more responsible professional mass media, something more will usually be needed. Does the subject matter affect large numbers of people? Is it inherently significant in some way? Does it involve some person who is in a position of authority or public trust?

Trump’s use of Twitter was an exploitation of these decision-rules, but did not invalidate them.

Social media is also the means by which “cancel culture” works. It enables large numbers of people to join a chorus of condemnation against someone for something they have said or done. It also puts pressure on institutions such as universities or media outlets to shun them.

It has become a means by which the otherwise powerless or voiceless can exert influence over people or organisations that would otherwise be beyond their reach.

There are those who are worried about the effects on free speech. In July 2020, Harper’s magazine published a letter of protest signed by 152 authors, academics, journalists, artists, poets, playwrights and critics.

While applauding the intentions behind “cancel culture” in advancing racial and social justice, they raised their voices against what they saw as a new set of moral attitudes that tended to favour ideological conformity.

In the aftermath of the police killings of black people in 2020 and the law-and-order response of the Trump administration, “cancel culture” began to affect journalism ethics. Some journalists on papers such as The Washington Post and The New York Times began taking public positions against the way their papers were reporting race issues.

It led to a lively debate in the profession about the extent to which moral preferences should shape news decisions. The riposte to those who argued that they should, was: whose moral preferences should prevail?

This was yet another illustration of the complexities surrounding free speech issues arising from the social media phenomenon, the Trump presidency and the combination of the two.

Terrorism has also added its contribution. Over the decade 2005-2015, what became known as the Danish cartoons confronted journalists and editors with life-and-death decisions.

In 2005, the Danish newspaper Jyllands Posten (Jutland Post) published cartoons lampooning the Prophet Mohammed. It was a conscious act of defiance against “the assassin’s veto”, violent threats to free speech by Islamist-jihadis.

In 2009, a Danish-born professor of politics wrote a book, The Cartoons that Shook the World. Yale University Press, which published it, refused to re-publish the cartoons after having taken advice from counter-terrorism experts about the risks.

In November 2011, the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo published an issue called Charia Hebdo, satirically featuring the Prophet as editor. The real editor was placed on an Al-Qaeda hit list and in January 2015, two masked gunmen opened fire on the newspaper office, killing 12 people, including the editor.

Read more: Charlie Hebdo: the pen must defy the sword, Islamic or not

The world’s media were confronted with the decision whether to re-publish the cartoons again in defiance of “the assassin’s veto”. Some did, but most – including Jyllands Posten – did not.

The necessary limits of free speech

Free speech is an indispensable civil right under assault from all these forces. But none of the philosophers whose names we immediately associate with free speech have claimed it to be absolute.

The social media platforms, having for years proclaimed themselves extreme libertarians, have in recent times begun to recognise this is indefensible, and strengthened their moderating procedures.

Some of Australia’s senior politicians seem baffled by the issue.

When Twitter shut down Trump’s account, acting Prime Minister Michael McCormack didn’t seem to know where he stood, saying in one breath it was a violation of free speech to shut down Trump while in the next that Twitter should also take down the false image of an Australian soldier slitting the throat of an Afghan child.

And he is a former country newspaper editor.

This was followed by Treasurer Josh Frydenberg’s remark that he was “uncomfortable” with the Twitter decision. He quoted Voltaire as saying something Voltaire never said: the famous line that while he disagreed with what someone said, he would defend to the death his right to say it. It was a fabrication put into Voltaire’s mouth by a biographer more than 100 years after his death.

Voltaire, Milton, Spinoza, Locke and Mill, to say nothing of the US Supreme Court, have not regarded free speech as an absolute right.

So while the media face some extremely difficult decisions in today’s operating environment, they do not need to burden themselves with the belief that every decision not to publish is the violation of an inviolable right.

– ref. To publish or not to publish? The media’s free-speech dilemmas in a world of division, violence and extremism – https://theconversation.com/to-publish-or-not-to-publish-the-medias-free-speech-dilemmas-in-a-world-of-division-violence-and-extremism-153451

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Nial Wheate, Associate Professor of the Sydney Pharmacy School, University of Sydney

You’ve just come from your monthly GP appointment with a new script for your ongoing medical condition. But your local pharmacy is out of stock of your usual medicine. Your condition is serious, and without it, your health is likely to suffer. What can you do?

While medicine shortages happen from time to time, researchers and the media report COVID-19 is causing more shortages than normal for many life-saving medicines. In Australia, media reports indicate this includes some medications used to treat hyperthyroidism, high blood pressure, or allergies.

Unfortunately, you’ll only likely find out if this applies to you when you reach the pharmacy. If that happens, there are a few ways you may be able to obtain your prescription.

But if the stock shortage will last for an extended period of time, and you cannot find a supply, your doctor may need to consider prescribing a different medication.

Why are there shortages?

Unfortunately, medicine shortages are an all too common problem of the modern health-care system. When our medicines come from a global supply chain — where raw ingredients are made in one country, processed into medicines in another, then freighted by sea or air to Australia — a single break in the supply chain can result in medicines going out of stock.

So there have been calls for Australia to set up its own medicines manufacturing base. But even if we do, that doesn’t help now during COVID.

Medicines shortages is a growing issue globally. That’s because of increasing demand, higher quality standards and fewer manufacturing sites.

Shortages have also been exacerbated in 2020 due to COVID-19. When workers are locked out of the factory because of a local outbreak, medicines don’t get made. And when we restrict the number of flights into Australia, that prevents medicines from arriving.

Read more: New law won’t safeguard medicine supply – it’ll only ensure we know there’s a shortage

When a manufacturer knows there is likely to be a medicine shortage, for any reason, they are required to inform the Australian Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) so pharmacies can make other arrangements, such as stocking up on alternatives or sourcing supply from other companies.

When the medicine shortage is considered to have a critical patient impact, or if it is in the interest of the public to know about the shortage, then the information is added to the TGA’s shortages website, which the public can search.

But this information is only useful at the government and wholesaler level; local GPs and community pharmacists don’t have the time to check the site every day.

Dealing with shortages efficiently is important because their impacts are wide ranging. Shortages result in higher costs to patients when they have to buy branded rather than generic formulations; more drug errors due to the different strengths and brands dispensed; more side-effects and higher death rates because of changes to less appropriate medicines; and more complaints from patients.

What if your local pharmacy is out of stock?

It is best to speak to your pharmacist about your options when your medication is out of stock. There may be other brands still available and appropriate to swap. Alternatively, your pharmacist could dispense a different strength of the same medication. Regulations brought in during the pandemic have allowed pharmacists to do this to help with medicine supply.

If there are no appropriate substitutes, in rare instances a local compounding pharmacy can manufacture certain products in store.

Read more: How to manage your essential medicines in a bushfire or other emergency

If none of your local pharmacies stock your medicine, your next option is for an Australian online pharmacy to fill your script. It may be able to ship your medicine from another city or state.

It is not legal or safe for you personally to order prescription medications from online overseas suppliers. This is because they may not have been manufactured to Australian standards, and may be unsafe. But your pharmacist may do so on your behalf, under a special provision called section 19A.

If all else fails, you may need to contact your doctor about changing to a different medication. There are often many alternatives in the same drug class that work in the same, or very similar, way.

Read more: Health Check: what should you do with your unused medicine?

Finally, and especially during COVID-19, for a large number of medicines pharmacists are only allowed to provide a maximum of one month’s supply to each patient.

So if your medicine is actually in stock and you want extra, just in case, then by law they may not be able to dispense it to you. This is to prevent panic buying and to ensure the wider community has steady access to medicine; that is, to prevent further shortages.

Read more: Why are people stockpiling toilet paper? We asked four experts

– ref. I’ve heard COVID is leading to medicine shortages. What can I do if my medicine is out of stock? – https://theconversation.com/ive-heard-covid-is-leading-to-medicine-shortages-what-can-i-do-if-my-medicine-is-out-of-stock-153628

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Deanna D’Alessandro, Professor & ARC Future Fellow, University of Sydney

On Wednesday this week, the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere was measured at at 415 parts per million (ppm). The level is the highest in human history, and is growing each year.

Amid all the focus on emissions reduction, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) says it will not be enough to avoid dangerous levels of global warming. The world must actively remove historical CO₂ already in the atmosphere – a process often described as “negative emissions”.

CO₂ removal can be done in two ways. The first is by enhancing carbon storage in natural ecosystems, such as planting more forests or storing more carbon in soil. The second is by using direct air capture (DAC) technology that strips CO₂ from the ambient air, then either stores it underground or turns it into products.

US research published last week suggested global warming could be slowed with an emergency deployment of a fleet of “CO₂ scrubbers” using DAC technology. However a wartime level of funding from government and business would be needed. So is direct air capture worth the time and money?

What’s DAC all about?

Direct air capture refers to any mechanical system capturing CO₂ from the atmosphere. Plants operating today use a liquid solvent or solid sorbent to separate CO₂ from other gases.

Swiss company Climeworks operates 15 direct air capture machines across Europe, comprising the world’s first commercial DAC system. The operation is powered by renewable geothermal energy or energy produced by burning waste.

The machines use a fan to draw air into a “collector”, inside which a selective filter captures CO₂. Once the filter is full, the collector is closed and the CO₂ is sequestered underground.

Read more: Net-zero, carbon-neutral, carbon-negative … confused by all the carbon jargon? Then read this

Canadian company Carbon Engineering uses giant fans to pull air into a tower-like structure. The air passes over a potassium hydroxide solution which chemically binds to the CO₂ molecules, and removes them from the air. The CO₂ is then concentrated, purified and compressed.

Captured CO₂ can be injected into the ground to extract oil, in some cases helping to counteract the emissions produced by burning the oil.

The proponents of the Climeworks and Carbon Engineering technology say their projects are set for large-scale investment and deployment in coming years. Globally, the potential market value of DAC technology could reach US$100bn by 2030, on some estimates.

Big challenges ahead

Direct air capture faces many hurdles and challenges before it can make a real dent in climate change.

DAC technology is currently expensive, relative to many alternative ways of capturing CO₂, but is expected to become cheaper as the technology scales up. The economic feasibility will be helped by the recent emergence of new carbon markets where negative emissions can be traded.

DAC machines process an enormous volume of air, and as such are very energy-intensive. In fact, research has suggested direct air capture machines could use a quarter of global energy in 2100. However new DAC methods being developed could cut the technology’s energy use.

Read more: The Morrison government wants to suck CO₂ out of the atmosphere. Here are 7 ways to do it

While the challenges to direct air capture are great, the technology uses less land and water than other negative emissions technologies such as planting forests or storing CO₂ in soils or oceans.

DAC technology is also increasingly gaining the backing of big business. Microsoft, for example, last year included the technology in its carbon negative plan.

Opportunities for Australia

Australia is uniquely positioned to be a world leader in direct air capture. It boasts large areas of land not suitable for growing crops. It has ample sunlight, meaning there is great potential to host DAC facilities powered by solar energy. Australia also has some of the world’s best sites in which to “sequester” or store carbon in underground reservoirs.

Direct air capture is a relatively new concept in Australia. Australian company Southern Green Gas, as well as the CSIRO, are developing solar-powered DAC technologies. The SGG project, with which I am involved, involves modular units potentially deployed in large numbers, including close to sites where captured CO₂ can be used in oil recovery or permanently stored.

If DAC technology can overcome its hurdles, the benefits will extend beyond tackling climate change. It would create a new manufacturing sector and potentially re-employ workers displaced by the decline of fossil fuels.

Looking ahead

The urgency of removing CO₂ from the atmosphere seems like an enormous challenge. But not acting will bring far greater challenges: more climate and weather extremes, irreversible damage to biodiversity and ecosystems, species extinction and threats to health, food, water and economic growth.

DAC technology undoubtedly faces stiff headwinds. But with the right policy incentives and market drivers, it may be one of a suite of measures that start reversing climate change.

Read more: Earth may temporarily pass dangerous 1.5℃ warming limit by 2024, major new report says

– ref. Engineers have built machines to scrub CO₂ from the air. But will it halt climate change? – https://theconversation.com/engineers-have-built-machines-to-scrub-co-from-the-air-but-will-it-halt-climate-change-152975

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Renwick, Professor, Physical Geography (climate science), Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

It might be summer in New Zealand but we’re in for some wild weather this week with forecasts of heavy wind and rain, and a plunge in temperatures.

Long term, though, New Zealand is definitely warming up, along with the rest of the globe.

The National Institute of Water & Atmosphere Research (NIWA) says 2020 was our 7th warmest in the 112-year record since 1909.

The national average temperature was 0.63℃ above the 1981-2010 normal (more on that later). Six of the eight warmest years in the record have all occurred since 2013.

Up a degree

The overall linear trend in New Zealand’s Seven Station temperature record — an average of readings taken at seven locations across the country — is a warming rate of about 1℃ per century, close to the global rate over the same period.

Read more: Climate explained: what caused major climate change in the past?

That does not mean temperatures just become a little warmer each year, though. There are many ups and downs in a small country like New Zealand as we are exposed to influences from the tropics and the Southern Ocean.

The year 2016 still stands as our warmest on record and as recently as 2012 we had a year that was a little cooler than normal.

When we look at the chances of a warm or a cool year, that is where the warming trend is most obvious.

In the past 25 years of the record, six of the years were cooler than normal and 19 were warmer than normal. That’s a ratio just over three to one in favour of warm years.

In the first 25 years of the record, from 1909, 21 of the years were cooler than normal and four were warmer than normal, a ratio of about five to one in favour of cool years.

Prior to the 1970s, a year warmer than the 1981-2010 normal would have been exceptional. Now it’s what we expect every year.

The rise of the ‘new normal’

We all talk about a “new normal” but that is literally what will be happening this year.

The normals, the 30-year averages that countries use to define their climates, will be recalculated this year.

The World Meteorological Organization sets the rules for climate normals that are used all over the world.

These normals are averages of temperature, rainfall and other quantities, calculated over the most recent three full decades.

From 2011 until last year, that was the 1981-2010 normal period. Now that 2020 is over, the meteorological services and climate centres of the world can calculate the new 1991-2020 normals that will be the standard until 2031.

Based on the Seven Station series numbers for New Zealand, the 1991-2020 temperature normal will be 0.14℃ higher than the 1981-2010 normal.

That means the past eight years are at or above the new normal (see Warmer years 1996-2020 figure, above) with the most recent five years averaging about 0.6℃ above the new normal.

Over the next few years, it is unlikely but still possible we will see a year cooler than the 1991-2020 normal, if we get a lot of southerly winds or if there was to be a large volcanic eruption in the tropics.

Another degree warmer

If greenhouse gas emissions are not reduced rapidly and future normals were successively around 0.14℃ warmer, New Zealand would be another degree warmer overall by the end of the century, beyond the degree of warming we have seen in the past 100 years.

Two degrees of warming would lock in major changes in our climate and at least a metre of sea level rise in the next century.

This year will feel the effects of the La Niña event in the tropical Pacific. La Niña events cool the globe a little on average, so 2021 is expected to come in around one tenth of a degree cooler globally than 2020, but still more than 1.1℃ above pre-industrial temperatures.

On the other hand, because they bring more subtropical air our way and tend to go along with warmer than normal sea temperatures, La Niña events tend to warm New Zealand a little, even while they cool the globe.

Read more: Net-zero, carbon-neutral, carbon-negative … confused by all the carbon jargon? Then read this

Another important factor is how the Southern Annular Mode (SAM) behaves this year, a measure of climate variability that encircles the South Pole and extends up to New Zealand.

A positive SAM warms New Zealand and a negative brings cooler and stormier weather. It is very hard to predict in advance how the SAM will behave because there is a lot of randomness in teh way it changes. But it was positive for much (61%) of last year.

There are many other things that influence New Zealand’s climate and average temperatures so it is hard to say exactly where the 2021 temperature will land. But it will almost certainly be warmer than normal — even warmer than the new normal.

– ref. Expect the new normal for NZ’s temperature to get warmer – https://theconversation.com/expect-the-new-normal-for-nzs-temperature-to-get-warmer-153291

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Zareh Ghazarian, Senior Lecturer, School of Social Sciences, Monash University

Despite many young Australians having a deep interest in political issues, most teenagers have a limited understanding about their nation’s democratic system.

Results from the 2019 National Assessment Program – Civics and Citizenship (NAP-CC) released today show the proportion of young people demonstrating the expected level of knowledge about topics such as democracy and government has not improved since three years ago.

Read more: 3 ways to help children think critically about the news

Only 38% of year 10 students reached the standard of knowledge on civics and citizenship required for their year level in 2019, the same percentage as in 2016. In year 6, 53% achieved the benchmark, which is down from 55% in 2016.

This has implications for the confidence and preparedness of young people to participate in shaping society now, and into the future.

What is the civics and citizenship test?

The national assessment program on civics and citizenship has been held every three years since 2004. It is administered to a sample of year 6 and year 10 students across Australia. Around 13,250 students sat the assessments in 2019.

The NAP-CC seeks to assess students’ understanding of topics including Australian politics, government, history and the legal system. It also captures students’ knowledge of their rights and responsibilities as citizens.

The NAP-CC aligns with educational aims agreed to by national, state and territory education ministers.

The Alice Springs (Mparntwe) Education Declaration, established in 2019, has two goals, the second of which is that:

young Australians become confident and creative individuals, successful lifelong learners, and active and informed members of the community.

What do the latest results show?

For year 6 students, the proficiency standard expects they can demonstrate knowledge of core aspects of Australian democracy. This includes awareness of the connection between fundamental principles (such as fairness) and their manifestation in rules and laws. They should also be able to demonstrate awareness of citizenship rights and responsibilities.

For example, students in year 6 should be able to identify the role of the prime minister, understand the origins of the Westminster system, and recognise that a vote on a proposed change to the constitution is a referendum.

At year 6, the percentage of students achieving the proficient standard has fallen slightly to 53% from 55% in 2016. This result maintains the established pattern where, since 2004, the percentage of year 6 students meeting the proficient standard has remained within the 50-55% range.

Read more: Schools are not adequately preparing young Australians to participate in our democracy

To meet the proficiency standards in year 10, students should be able to demonstrate knowledge of specific details of Australian democracy, make connections between the processes and outcomes of civil and civic institutions, and demonstrate awareness of the common good as a potential motivation for civic action.

Only 38% of year 10 students reached the proficient standard in 2019. This is the same as the last testing round in 2016, but well down on the 49% high achieved in 2010.

The NAP-CC 2019 results also showed:

• at both year levels, female students outperformed males

• there were large statistically significant differences between the achievements of non-Indigenous and Indigenous students

• students with parents who were senior managers or professionals had significantly higher scores than students with parents who were classified as unskilled labourers, or office, sales or service staff

• the scores of students from metropolitan schools were significantly higher than those of students from regional and remote schools at both year levels

• students who had a parent with a bachelor’s degree or above achieved more than 130 scale points (one proficiency level) higher than students whose parents completed year 10 or year 9 as their highest level of education.

What we need to do

Year 10 is the last year of compulsory schooling in Australia. It is also the final year in which the national civics and citizenship curriculum is delivered.

This means year 10 can be the last opportunity for students to learn about their nation’s political system and their responsibilities as citizens.

Previous research has also shown young people would like to consolidate their knowledge about Australia’s democracy before leaving school.

A national civics and citizenship curriculum was developed by the Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority in 2012-2013. But states retain the constitutional authority over education, which results in variation in how civics and citizenship is taught across jurisdictions.

The latest data suggests now is the time to build on these investments and introduce targeted strategies.

When we spoke to school leavers in 2017, many told us they wanted additional lessons that concentrated on building their understanding of Australian democracy before they left school. In light of the consistently low performance at the year 10 level, it is now the time to capture and respond to the student voice.

Read more: Ignoring young people’s climate change fears is a recipe for anxiety

We also need to support teachers. Young Australians have said what they learn at school about civics and citizenship is highly dependent on the preparedness of their teachers.

Teachers who are confident about exploring politics and government in class can have a positive impact on the learning outcomes of their students.

In what is often seen to be a “crowded curriculum”, teachers confront a range of challenges in delivering civics and citizenship lessons. As a result, there is value in providing opportunities to build their confidence and capacity in this space.

These latest figures show the previous results were no mere aberration and that student performance in civics and citizenship has remained low. The steps we take now will have an impact on Australian democracy for years to come.

– ref. Young Australians remain ill-equipped to participate in Australian democracy – https://theconversation.com/young-australians-remain-ill-equipped-to-participate-in-australian-democracy-153536

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle O’Shea, Senior Lecturer, School of Business, Western Sydney University

Last week, the McIver’s Ladies Baths in Sydney came under fire for their (since removed) policy stating “only transgender women who’ve undergone a gender reassignment surgery are allowed entry”. The policy was seemingly in defiance of New South Wales’ anti-discrimintation and sex discrimination acts.

Managed since 1922 by the Randwick and Coogee Ladies Amateur Swimming Club, the baths are a haven for women, and the last remaining women’s-only seawater pool in Australia.

Just over 100 public ocean pools sit on Australia’s rocky coast, most in New South Wales. Segregated baths gave women a place to experience the water, prohibited from most beach access until “continental” (or mixed gender) bathing was introduced in the early 20th century.

The council removed the wording on the website, and put out a statement saying they have “always supported the inclusion of transgender women at McIver’s Ladies Baths”. But this weekend, trans women and allies gathered at the baths, calling for a specifically inclusive policy to be drawn up.

Writing for Pedestrian, Alex Gallagher called the baths were “a queer haven”. Of beaches, they wrote:

There’s likely no other place I feel such an undercurrent of anxiety that I’ll face scrutiny for not conforming to a sexist ideal of what a body “should” look like than the beach.

This is the latest in a long history of discrimination at Australia’s public beaches. Indeed, Australia’s beaches and ocean pools are a window into deep divisions.

Sites of contest

With Captain Cook’s arrival in 1770, coastal beaches were the first sites of early interactions and confrontations between the Aboriginal people and the colonisers.

Indigenous women, such as the Palawa women of Tasmania, once had an intimate relationship with water environments. Water was a playground as well as a source of nourishment and socialisation.

Read more: Hidden women of history: Wauba Debar, an Indigenous swimmer from Tasmania who saved her captors

The colonial erasure of these histories and knowledge has contributed to a culture where Aboriginal swimmers who defied convention – by participating in formal competition or by serving as lifeguards — were swimming against a tide of discrimination.

Aboriginal people were commonly caricatured at surf carnivals in degrading, costumed representations. The development of organised competitive swimming associations in Sydney in the late 1800s saw segregated “Natives’ Races”: scarcely mentioned in the media, except to demonstrate perceived white superiority in the baths.

As recently as the 1960s, it was routine for Aboriginal people to be banned from public swimming pools.

Owing to this discriminatory legacy, Aboriginal people — despite a history of a strong water culture — have historically rarely participated in organised swimming. But positive changes are beginning to emerge. In the past ten years, there has been a 47% reduction in drowning deaths in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, reflecting the development of programs specifically tailored for remote communities.

Read more: From segregation to celebration: the public pool in Australian culture

Ocean freedoms and fears

The first year women competed in swimming at the Olympic games, 1912, Australians Sarah “Fanny” Durack and “Mina” Wylie won medals. The McIver’s Ladies Baths were an important venue for their preparations.

But even as beaches and pools became desegregated along gender lines, women weren’t admitted as full members of Surf Lifesaving Australia until 1980.

Muslim people, in particular those women who wear the hijab, have also long faced discrimination on Australian beaches. This was brought to the fore at the Cronulla riots of December 2005, when a crowd of 5,000 mostly white young men rioted on Cronulla beach in a “”Leb and Wog bashing day”.

Programs such as Western Sydney’s Swim Sisters challenge Islamophobia at Australia’s beaches. A sisterhood of religiously diverse women, the program allows women a space to challenge themselves and support each other. And 40 years after white women could join Surf Lifesaving, highly skilled Muslim women lifesavers are furthering the tides of change.

Physical access

Australians living with a disability often face poor beach access and a lack of specialised facilities such as beach matting, access ramps and beach wheelchairs.

Without easy access to the beach, many with a disability lack confidence in swimming in the ocean, and there are few training opportunities for carers to develop the skills to assist.

Here, too, there are positive signs of change, with Accessible Beaches Australia aiming to open all patrolled beaches to people with disability.

Despite our history, the myth Australia’s beaches are egalitarian spaces persists. We remain a long way off inclusivity for all in our public blue spaces.

The story of the McIver’s Ladies Baths is only the latest in a long history of discrimination. We must ensure everyone can find an ocean pool or beach where they belong.

– ref. The open Australian beach is a myth: not everyone can access these spaces equally – https://theconversation.com/the-open-australian-beach-is-a-myth-not-everyone-can-access-these-spaces-equally-153378

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

How do scabs form? — Talila, aged 8

Great question, Talila!

Our skin has many different jobs. One is to act as a barrier, protecting us from harmful things in the outside world.

Sometimes when we cut or graze ourselves, we tear away some layers of our skin. When the skin is damaged, it can’t do its job of protecting us quite as well. What’s underneath the skin, called tissue, can be left exposed, and germs and other nasty things may get in.

So when we get a cut or a graze, it’s a race against time for our bodies to stop any bleeding, protect the area, and start the repair process. And this is where scabs come in.

Read more: Curious Kids: how do wounds heal?

What happens when you cut yourself?

To understand how this all works, let’s look at what would happen if you were to, say, graze the skin on your knee. You’ve probably done it before!

When you graze or cut yourself, blood vessels near the wound burst, causing you to bleed (blood vessels are the tubes which transport blood around your body).

Usually, if the wound isn’t too serious, it won’t be long before the bleeding stops. That’s because fortunately, our bodies have some clever ways of healing themselves.

After you cut yourself, any damaged blood vessels quickly contract, closing some of their openings so that less blood flows out.

Next, tiny cells in your blood called “platelets” kick into gear. These platelets start to stick together, making a sort of plug that helps stop the bleeding and seal the cut. Other good guys in your blood also step in to help, working with the platelets to make the plug stronger.

Something called a “clot” then forms. This can block the damaged blood vessels completely for some time, giving the body a chance to start the healing process for both the skin and the vessels.

White blood cells, which help our bodies fight infections and diseases, also move into the damaged area. These cells work to kill any invading bad guys that may have entered your body through the wound, and help clean up the area.

Read more: Curious Kids: why do our toes and fingers get wrinkly in the bath?

Forming the scab

The clotted blood at the surface of the wound starts to dry out and forms a hardened scab. This may happen quickly, or take a few days.

This scab forms a protective layer, while allowing cells to move around underneath it so they can continue repairing the skin.

If you have a scab, it’s best not to pick it or scratch it off. If you remove the scab while it’s still doing its work, you could expose the wound to the outside world, increasing the risk of infection or slowing down healing.

If you leave it alone, after about one to two weeks the scab will eventually fall off and reveal the new, repaired skin underneath.

Sometimes, depending on the type of tissue damaged or how serious the injury is, a cut to the skin can leave a scar. This is normal.

Scabs are good

So Talila, don’t worry if you have a small scab on your skin after a cut or graze. Scabs are one of the good guys; they protect your body and help your wound to heal.

Read more: Curious Kids: why do we have boogers?

Hello, curious kids! Have you got a question you’d like an expert to answer? Ask an adult to send your question to curiouskids@theconversation.edu.au

– ref. Curious Kids: how do scabs form? – https://theconversation.com/curious-kids-how-do-scabs-form-151586

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Denise Buiten, Senior Lecturer in Social Justice and Sociology, University of Notre Dame Australia

On average, one child is killed by a parent almost every fortnight in Australia.

Last week, three children — Claire, 7, Anna, 5, and Matthew, 3 — were included in this terrible number. Homicide investigators have formed the “preliminary view” that their mother, Katie Perinovic, was responsible for their deaths before killing herself.

Their grieving father, Tomislav Perinovic, and Katie Perinovic’s parents have reportedly accepted the police’s version of events.

It was less than a year ago that Hannah Clarke and her children Aaliyah, Laianah and Trey were killed by their father, Rowan Baxter, who doused their car in petrol and set it alight.

In 2019, Anthony Harvey was sentenced to life in prison in Perth for killing his small children Charlotte, Alice and Beatrix, his wife Mara and her mother Beverley.

Also that year, Charmaine McLeod is suspected to have deliberately caused the head-on collision in Queensland that killed her and her four young children, Aaleyn, Matilda, Wyatt and Zaidok.

How do we make sense of such unfathomable crimes, and what do we know about why they happen?

How many children are killed by parents in Australia?

Filicide is the murder of a child by a parent. Despite making up approximately 18% of all domestic homicides each year, precise data on the characteristics of filicide are difficult to establish due to the smaller numbers and varied cases.

However, one of the most recent comprehensive national filicide studies in Australia documented 238 cases between 2000 and 2012. This study mirrored trends elsewhere, with male and female perpetrators represented in roughly equal numbers.

Common precursors to filicide included a history of domestic and family violence, parental separation and mental illness.

Read more: Why do parents kill their children? The facts about filicide in Australia

How the media and public view filicide

On social media, some commentators on this latest case involving Katie Perinovic have been quick to criticise what is perceived as more sympathetic media coverage of women who kill their children. And for some, the fact women and men commit filicide in roughly equal numbers suggests that family violence has no gender.

But filicide is a relative outlier as a form of violence committed by women in relatively equal numbers to men.

Men commit almost all forms of violence at higher rates. And the most common form of domestic homicide — intimate partner homicide — is committed far more by men against women in the context of domestic violence.

Women who kill their children

Research indicates that gender does, in fact, play a role in the type of crime committed and the motivations behind it.

Accidental killings of children, for instance, are more likely to be the result of neglect among mothers and abuse among fathers and stepfathers. This reflects what we know about gender patterns in childcare responsibility and domestic and family violence.

In cases where children are killed intentionally, women are more likely to kill babies and newborns, particularly in circumstances of unwanted pregnancies. Such offenders are more likely to be young and have low levels of social support, although it is increasingly reported among older women.

Read more: Understanding the triggers for filicide will help prevent it

Mothers are also more likely to kill their children during a psychotic episode.

For example, in 2017, a court found Raina Thaiday of Queensland, who killed her seven children and niece, had been experiencing a severe psychotic episode linked to schizophrenia triggered by long-term cannabis use. The court ruled she could not be found criminally responsible for her actions.

Women are also more likely to kill children out of a warped belief they are sparing them pain – for instance, of losing a parent to suicide.

Why men commit filicide

Fathers who kill their children, meanwhile, are more likely to have a history of domestic and family violence. They are more likely to kill out of revenge towards a partner or former partner in the context of family separation.

When John Edwards shot his teenage children, Jennifer and Jack, in Sydney in 2018, his actions followed a history of domestic abuse and separation, and ended in his ex-partner Olga’s death by suicide five months later. A senior police source called her death a “slow murder”.

And familicide, in which both a partner and children are killed, is committed almost exclusively by men. Researchers suggest this indicates that men are more likely to have proprietary attitudes to both women and children, and women primarily towards children.

While gender patterns around filicide are important to research in order to understand why these crimes happen, not all cases fit neatly into these boxes. Mental illness is often a common interacting factor in both maternal and paternal filicide, and the causes are often complex and multiple.

Read more: Why do men kill their families? Here’s what the research says

Remembering the children

When a parent kills, the focus is often on the mindset of the perpetrator rather than the children.

In my ongoing research into media coverage of family murder-suicide cases, I have observed a notable silence around the lives of children and how they experienced violence. It is an uncomfortable topic, but we need to keep children at the centre of these discussions.

While some parents who kill may indeed have been loving parents, the act of filicide should never be framed as an act of love. It is never excusable. As such, many researchers are uncomfortable with the term “altruistic” filicide, which places the emphasis on the parent’s experiences, rather than the child’s.

We also need to address the cultural beliefs that children belong to their parents. This attitude that children are “property” contributes to filicide.

What can be done?

More comprehensive research and consistent data are key starting points. The Monash Deakin Filicide Research Hub is an excellent example of collaboration towards this goal. The Australian Domestic Violence Death Review Network is also working to produce a data-set on filicide in the context of domestic and family violence.

Greater collaboration between support service providers is also important. We need to recognise how issues affecting parents, such as mental illness or domestic violence, can have important consequences for children.

We also need to keep the best interests of children front and centre, rather than viewing them as mere witnesses to family conflict.

– ref. Men and women kill their children in roughly equal numbers, and we need to understand why – https://theconversation.com/men-and-women-kill-their-children-in-roughly-equal-numbers-and-we-need-to-understand-why-153527

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ilan Noy, Professor and Chair in the Economics of Disasters and Climate Change, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington

We will not be able to put the COVID-19 pandemic behind us until the world’s population is mostly immune through vaccination or previous exposure to the disease.

A truly global vaccination campaign, however, would look very different from what we are seeing now. For example, as of January 20, many more people have been immunised in Israel (with a population less than 10 million) than in Africa and Latin America combined.

Notwithstanding recent questions about the effectiveness of the initial single dose of the vaccine, there is a clear disparity in vaccine rollouts internationally.

That is a problem. As long as there are still existing reservoirs of a propagating virus it will be able to spread again to populations that either cannot or would not vaccinate. It will also be able to mutate to variants that are either more transmissible or more deadly.

Counterintuitively, an increase in transmissibility, such as has been found with the new UK variant, is worse than the same percentage increase in mortality rate. This is because increased transmissibility increases the number of cases (and hence the number of deaths) exponentially, while an increase in mortality rates increases only deaths, and only linearly.

Evolutionary pressure on the virus will inevitably favour mutations that make the disease more transmissible, or the virus itself more vaccine-resistant. It is clear, therefore, that every nation’s interest is in universal vaccination. But this is not the trajectory we are on.

Politics and profits

Fortunately, in the countries already vaccinating, the vaccine is (mostly) not allocated by wealth or power, but by prioritising those facing the highest risk. At a country level, however, national wealth is determining vaccine roll out.

Yet in the past we have managed to eradicate diseases worldwide, including small pox, a viral infection with much higher death rates than COVID-19.

There are two barriers that prevent us from rapidly pursuing a similar goal for the current pandemic:

• big pharma is profit-driven and therefore keeps a tight lid on the intellectual property it is developing in the new vaccines

• countries find it difficult to see beyond their national interest; not surprisingly, politicians are committed only to their own voters.

At this point, we don’t have a global system to confront either of these problems. Each vaccine’s patent is owned by its developer, and the World Health Organisation (WHO) is too weak to be the world’s Ministry of Health.

Read more: Should children get the COVID-19 vaccine?

The polio vaccine model

Overcoming big pharma’s profit motive has been achieved before, however.

In 1955, Jonas Salk announced the development of a polio vaccine in the midst of a huge epidemic. The news initially met with scepticism. Even employees of his own laboratory resigned, protesting that he was moving too fast with clinical experimentation.

When a huge placebo–controlled clinical trial involving 1.6 million children proved him right, however, he declared that in order to maximise the global distribution of this lifesaving vaccine his lab would not patent it. Asked who owned the patent, he famously replied:

Well, the people I would say. There is no patent. Could you patent the sun?

In an echo of the current moment, Israel (then a new state) was also experiencing a rapidly spreading polio epidemic. Efforts to purchase vaccines from the US were unsuccessful, as not all American children were yet vaccinated. So a scientist named Natan Goldblum was sent to Salk’s laboratory to learn how to make the new vaccine.

No lawyers were involved and no contracts signed. The young Dr Goldblum spent 1956 setting up manufacturing facilities for Salk’s vaccine in Israel and by early 1957 mass vaccination was underway.

Suspend patent rights

Israel, a small and relatively poor country in the 1950s, became the third country in the world (after the US and Denmark) to produce the vaccine locally and eventually eradicate polio. It took a handful of scientists, a modest budget and, most importantly, no patenting.

Like Salk, Goldblum was aware viruses have complete disregard for political borders. He was also involved in a very successful Palestinian polio vaccination campaign in Gaza.

Read more: The great polio vaccine mess and the lessons it holds about federal coordination for today’s COVID-19 vaccination effort

More recently, a highly successful international campaign in the early 2000s saw AIDS treatments distributed in poorer countries. Pharmaceutical companies that owned the patented drugs were forced to supply them at cost or for free, not at market prices set in the rich countries. This was achieved through public pressure and the willingness of governments to support the required policies.

A temporary withdrawal of the patenting rights to the successful COVID-19 vaccines, with or without compensation for the developers, seems a small price to pay for an exit strategy from this global and incredibly costly crisis.

Act local, think global

Overcoming national interest is perhaps more complicated. Clearly, countries have an interest in vaccinating their most vulnerable populations first. But at some point, well before everyone is vaccinated, it becomes more efficient for countries to start vaccinating their neighbours (the countries they are most exposed to through movements of people and trade).

Disappointingly, rich countries today behave as though they will reach 100% vaccination rates before they give away a single dose, with many having bought well in excess of what is needed for 100% coverage.

Read more: COVID vaccine: some waste is normal – but here’s how it is being kept to a minimum

The COVAX plan to distribute vaccines in poorer countries has so far been an under-funded effort that has not yet delivered a single dose of vaccine. Even if COVAX were to be fully funded, it mostly aims to donate an insufficient number of vaccine doses to the poorest countries, rather than really bring about a universal vaccination programme.

Nevertheless, overcoming the profit-maximising interest of big pharma and the national focus of governments is not a pipe dream. The world has done it before.

– ref. The big barriers to global vaccination: patent rights, national self-interest and the wealth gap – https://theconversation.com/the-big-barriers-to-global-vaccination-patent-rights-national-self-interest-and-the-wealth-gap-153443

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

At 4am Thursday AEDT, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris will be inaugurated as president and vice president of the United States, replacing Donald Trump and Mike Pence. What follows is a discussion of US political events over the past two weeks.

On January 5, Democrats won the two Georgia Senate runoffs. Raphael Warnock (D) defeated Kelly Loeffler (R) by 2.0%, and Jon Ossoff (D) defeated David Perdue (R) by 1.2%.

After November’s elections, Republicans held a 50-48 Senate lead, so these results enabled Democrats to tie the Senate at 50-50, with Harris to cast the tie-breaking vote. Democrats gained a net three Senate seats from the pre-November Senate.

On January 6, pro-Trump rioters stormed Congress as it met to certify Biden’s Electoral College victory. The rioters were clearly influenced by Trump’s baseless claims of election fraud. Despite the riots and the courts’ resounding rejections of Trump’s claims, two state certifications were contested: Pennsylvania, which Biden won by 1.2% and Arizona (Biden by 0.3%).

Seven Republican senators out of 51 objected to Pennsylvania’s certification, as did 138 Republicans in the House of Representatives, with smaller numbers objecting to Arizona. The House objectors included House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy.

Just 64 House Republicans opposed the objection, so of those who cast a Yes/No vote on objecting to Pennsylvania, 68% supported the objection. Democrats were unanimously opposed.

It is not just Trump or the rioters, but also these Republicans in Congress who objected to the certifications on baseless election fraud claims who deserve to be condemned for anti-democratic behaviour.

I had two articles for The Poll Bludger about Georgia and the anti-democratic nuttiness of Trump and Republicans. The first was a preview, while the second was a live blog on the Georgia results and the events in Congress the next day.

In response to the riots, on January 13 the Democrat-controlled House impeached Trump for the second time by a 232-197 margin. All Democrats and ten Republicans supported impeachment. It requires a two-thirds majority in the Senate to convict. Trump’s Senate trial will not start until after he leaves office.

Since the riots, social media companies like Twitter and Facebook have blocked Trump’s accounts. But for two months after the election result was called by the media, Trump was able to use his Twitter account to rant that the election was stolen from him.

It is not surprising Trump’s supporters believe him: in a recent poll for the US ABC News and the Washington Post, over 70% of Republicans do not believe Biden was legitimately elected.

In the wake of the riots, Trump’s ratings have slumped. In the FiveThirtyEight aggregate, 38.5% approve of Trump’s performance and 57.9% disapprove, for a net approval of -19.4%. His net approval has dropped nine points since the riots. Trump’s net approval is his worst since December 2017.

FiveThirtyEight has charts of presidential approval since Harry Truman (president from 1945-53). Two previous presidents (Gerald Ford and John F. Kennedy) did not reach Trump’s four years as president. Of those who had at least four years, Trump’s final net approval is worse than all except Jimmy Carter at this point in their terms.

In a Marist poll, 47% thought Trump would be remembered as one of the worst presidents, while 16% thought he would be remembered as one of the best.

Detailed US election report

After results are finalised, I have published a detailed report on every US presidential election since 2008. My 2008 and 2012 reports are at The Green Papers here and here, and my 2016 report is at The Conversation. My 2016 report had a massive surge in views in October and November last year.

My 2020 election report, published December 11, is at The Poll Bludger. Here are the highlights:

• Biden won the Electoral College by 306 to 232, but he only won the tipping-point state (Wisconsin) by 0.6%. The tipping-point state is the state that puts the winning candidate over the magic 270 Electoral Votes needed to win.

• Biden won the national popular vote by 4.5% or just over 7 million votes. So the tipping-point state was 3.9% more pro-Trump than the popular vote.

• Trump’s vote held up well with the non-University educated whites who had given him his upset 2016 win. Biden owed his Electoral College victory to gains in the suburbs, where there is a higher amount of university education.

• Trump improved greatly from 2016 with Hispanics, leading to large swings in his favour in diverse places like Miami-Dade county, Florida and New York City.

• There was disappointment for Democrats relative to expectations in Congressional races, although the Georgia runoff results have improved this.

– ref. After riots, Donald Trump leaves office with under 40% approval – https://theconversation.com/after-riots-donald-trump-leaves-office-with-under-40-approval-153442

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Britta Denise Hardesty, Principal Research Scientist, Oceans and Atmosphere Flagship, CSIRO

Illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing costs economies up to US$50 billion globally each year, and makes up to one-fifth of the global catch. It’s a huge problem not only for the 59.5 million people who depend on fisheries for their livelihoods, but also for the environment.

Many philanthropic and environmental organisations think of illegal fishing as a “transnational crime”, involving organised criminals operating vessels on the high seas, smuggling drugs, weapons and people.

But our research found this depiction is, by and large, not true.

When illegal fishing is falsely represented like this, it can lead to ineffective investments and misguided policies, such as the requirement of over-the-top transparency and the criminalisation of desperate fishers.

The reality at sea looks very different

Most crimes associated with fishing are actually related to increasing fishing revenues or decreasing operating costs — not human, weapons and drug trafficking.

We looked at more than 300 events of illegal fishing reported in the media across the Asia-Pacific region, where over 50% of the world’s seafood comes from. And we found only six events involved additional associated crimes like drug possession.

Serious crimes still do occur on fishing vessels, such as human rights abuses linked to reducing labour costs, or the use of illegal gear to increase catches and revenue. However, these crimes fall within a fishing business model where, ultimately, a lack of profitability drives illegal behaviour.

This lack of revenue is a result of the over-exploitation and mismanagement of fish stocks, and is exacerbated by the effects of climate change on the distribution of fish.

Read more: It might be the world’s biggest ocean, but the mighty Pacific is in peril

Such illegal behaviour does have serious consequences, as shown in Buoyancy, a 2019 film about forced labour on Thai fishing boats.

While the film is fictional, it’s inspired by the true conditions and events that can happen at sea, after the writer-director interviewed fishers who’d been trafficked on trawlers. He said while the ill treatment of workers portrayed in the film is extreme, it’s a mild version of the reality.

We surveyed Vietnamese fishers for our research. They told us fish stock depletion in domestic waters and their displacement from disputed waters in the South China Sea means they’re driven as far afield as Palau and Australia in search of catches.

This is illegal, as these fishers are not permitted to catch fish in these countries.

The fishers say they are aware of the high chance of being caught, and feel shame at home when they’re convicted for illegal fishing. Still, the need to make a living forces these marginalised people to make risky choices.

When transparency is too radical

A popular proposal for addressing illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing has been increasing the transparency of fisheries. For example, environmental NGOs are pressing countries to share vessel tracking data and, in some cases, making this data publicly available.

While transparency can help reduce illegal fishing, the key question is: transparency at what cost?

Public ship-tracking data reveals fishing locations to competitors. For fishers, knowledge of these locations informs their business, and being forced to share it undermines their competitive advantage.

Likewise, the use of surveillance also comes with big caveats. Organisations working to fight illegal fishing commonly use anti-collision messages that vessels send each other to track vessels without their consent.

Re-purposing this safety system for the surveillance of fishing vessels may undermine its effectiveness for increasing safety at sea. Even vessels operating legally may not want their positions posted on publicly available websites.

Read more: Poor Filipino fishermen are making millions protecting whale sharks

Yes, data sharing and oversight is necessary among consumers, the supply chain and the regulators. But it’s unclear why outside parties, indeed the public, need access to this data.

Compare this to online fraud: web servers aren’t required to make all data on users and content publicly available. Just as e-commerce is a legitimate activity, and those in the system are entitled to protect their commercial advantages, so is fishing a legitimate activity with similar rights, within a well-regulated system.

In the end, oversight is essential for a well-functioning regulatory system, but so-called “radical transparency” is counterproductive.

Investing wisely

The member countries of the United Nations have committed to address illegal fishing as a component of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. But as the clock is ticking toward the 2030 delivery date, a clear-eyed assessment of the link between the problem and solutions is needed.

All those involved in combating illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing should have a clear understanding of what illegal fishing is, its drivers and participants, what crimes are likely associated with it, and what the most effective solutions are.

Confusing smugglers using former fishing vessels with fishers, or making investments in radical transparency and surveillance that make enforcement more complicated, are counterproductive.

Read more: US-China fight over fishing is really about world domination

To help government and industries across the world address illegal fishing, we need more investment in better targeted data analysis and technologies and to build the skills of surveillance officers to improve identification of illegal fishing.

This would allow us to focus money and time to understand and solve the complex challenge illegal fishing poses. Given the limited scale of funding for combating illegal fishing and meeting the UN Sustainable Development Goals, it’s critical the global community invests wisely.

– ref. Crimes at sea: when we frame illegal fishers as human and drug smugglers, everyone loses – https://theconversation.com/crimes-at-sea-when-we-frame-illegal-fishers-as-human-and-drug-smugglers-everyone-loses-152231

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Verica Rupar, Professor, Auckland University of Technology

“The lie outlasts the liar,” writes historian Timothy Snyder, referring to outgoing president Donald Trump and his contribution to the “post-truth” era in the US.

Indeed, the mass rejection of reason that erupted in a political mob storming Capitol Hill mere weeks before the inauguration of Joe Biden tests our ability to comprehend contemporary American politics and its emerging forms of extremism.

Much has been written about Trump’s role in spreading misinformation and the media failures that enabled him. His contribution to fuelling extremism, flirting with the political fringe, supporting conspiracy theories and, most of all, Twitter demagogy created an environment in which he has been seen as an “accelerant” in his own right.

If the scale of international damage is yet to be calculated, there is something we can measure right now.

In September last year, the London-based Media Diversity Institute (MDI) asked us to design a research project that would systematically track the extent to which US-originated conspiracy theory group QAnon had spread to Europe.

Titled QAnon 2: spreading conspiracy theories on Twitter, the research is part of the international Get the Trolls Out! (GTTO) project, focusing on religious discrimination and intolerance.

Twitter and the rise of QAnon

GTTO media monitors had earlier noted the rise of QAnon support among Twitter users in Europe and were expecting a further surge of derogatory talk ahead of the 2020 US presidential election.

We examined the role religion played in spreading conspiracy theories, the most common topics of tweets, and what social groups were most active in spreading QAnon ideas.

We focused on Twitter because its increasing use — some sources estimate 330 million people used Twitter monthly in 2020 — has made it a powerful political communication tool. It has given politicians such as Trump the opportunity to promote, facilitate and mobilise social groups on an unprecedented scale.

Read more: QAnon and the storm of the U.S. Capitol: The offline effect of online conspiracy theories

Using AI tools developed by data company Textgain, we analysed about half-a-million Twitter messages related to QAnon to identify major trends.

By observing how hashtags were combined in messages, we examined the network structure of QAnon users posting in English, German, French, Dutch, Italian and Spanish. Researchers identified about 3,000 different hashtags related to QAnon used by 1,250 Twitter profiles.

An American export

Every fourth QAnon tweet originated in the US (300). Far behind were tweets from other countries: Canada (30), Germany (25), Australia (20), the United Kingdom (20), the Netherlands (15), France (15), Italy (10), Spain (10) and others.

We examined QAnon profiles that share each other’s content, Trump tweets and YouTube videos, and found over 90% of these profiles shared the content of at least one other identified profile.

Seven main topics were identified: support for Trump, support for EU-based nationalism, support for QAnon, deep state conspiracies, coronavirus conspiracies, religious conspiracies and political extremism.

Read more: Far-right activists on social media telegraphed violence weeks in advance of the attack on the US Capitol

Hashtags rooted in US evangelicalism sometimes portrayed Trump as Jesus, as a superhero, or clad in medieval armour, with underlying Biblical references to a coming apocalypse in which he will defeat the forces of evil.

Overall, the coronavirus pandemic appears to function as an important conduit for all such messaging, with QAnon acting as a rallying flag for discontent among far-right European movements.

Measuring the toxicity of tweets

We used Textgain’s hate-speech detection tools to assess toxicity. Tweets written in English had a high level of antisemitism. In particular, they targeted public figures such as Jewish-American billionaire investor and philanthropist George Soros, or revived old conspiracies about secret Jewish plots for world domination. Soros was also a popular target in other languages.

We also found a highly polarised debate around the coronavirus public health measures employed in Germany, often using Third Reich rhetoric.

New language to express negative sentiments was coined and then adopted by others — in particular, pejorative terms for face masks and slurs directed at political leaders and others who wore masks.

Accompanying memes ridiculed political leaders, displaying them as alien reptilian overlords or antagonists from popular movies, such as Star Wars Sith Lords and the cyborg from The Terminator.

Most of the QAnon profiles tap into the same sources of information: Trump tweets, YouTube disinformation videos and each other’s tweets. It forms a mutually reinforcing confirmation bias — the tendency to search for, interpret, favour, and recall information that confirms prior beliefs or values.

Read more: Despite being permanently banned, Trump’s prolific Twitter record lives on

Where does it end?

Harvesting discontent has always been a powerful political tool. In a digital world this is more true than ever.

By mid 2020, Donald Trump had six times more followers on Twitter than when he was elected. Until he was suspended from the platform, his daily barrage of tweets found a ready audience in ultra-right groups in the US who helped his misinformation and inflammatory rhetoric jump the Atlantic to Europe.

Social media platforms have since attempted to reduce the spread of QAnon. In July 2020, Twitter suspended 7,000 QAnon-related accounts. In August, Facebook deleted over 790 groups and restricted the accounts of hundreds of others, along with thousands of Instagram accounts.

Read more: Trump’s Twitter feed shows ‘arc of the hero,’ from savior to showdown

In January this year, all Trump’s social media accounts were either banned or restricted. Twitter suspended 70,000 accounts that share QAnon content at scale.

But further Textgain analysis of 50,000 QAnon tweets posted in December and January showed toxicity had almost doubled, including 750 tweets inciting political violence and 500 inciting violence against Jewish people.

Those tweets were being systematically removed by Twitter. But calls for violence ahead of the January 20 inauguration continued to proliferate, Trump’s QAnon supporters appearing as committed and vocal as ever.

The challenge for both the Biden administration and the social media platforms themselves is clear. But our analysis suggests any solution will require a coordinated international effort.

– ref. Trump’s time is up, but his Twitter legacy lives on in the global spread of QAnon conspiracy theories – https://theconversation.com/trumps-time-is-up-but-his-twitter-legacy-lives-on-in-the-global-spread-of-qanon-conspiracy-theories-153298

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rob Brooks, Scientia Professor of Evolutionary Ecology; Academic Lead of UNSW’s Grand Challenges Program, UNSW

The views of women and men can differ on important gendered issues such as abortion, gender equity and government spending priorities. Surprisingly, however, average differences in sex on this front are usually small. Many women adopt social and political positions that favour men and many men favour women-friendly positions.

In our latest research we tried to make sense of this “paradox”. We did so by understanding how people’s politics and practices don’t just track what’s good for them, but also what’s good for their relatives.

Election campaign games

A mere three days after his 2016 inauguration, US President Donald Trump reinstated the Mexico City policy, also called the “global gag rule” — which Joe Biden is expected to rescind soon after being inaugurated this week.

The rule denies US health funding to foreign non-governmental organisations that provide abortions, refer patients for abortions, offer abortion-related counselling or advocate for more liberal abortion laws.

It wasn’t just Trump’s haste to reinstate the rule that galled pro-choice Americans. It was also the supporting cast of men Trump lined up for the photo-op.

Access to abortion is seen as a women’s issue as it impinges on women’s bodily autonomy and reproductive rights. Had Trump not been appealing to male voters, he could have gathered several prominent anti-choice women to stand behind him instead.

But despite expectations and rhetoric, support for abortion is far more complicated than a simple tussle between the interests of women and men.

Think of the children

Polling conducted in the US by Gallup between 2018 and 2020 found 49% of men and 46% of women identified as “pro-life”. A similar gap was observed between “pro-choice” men and women, at 46% and 48% respectively.

“Pro-choice” policies give women options to control their own reproduction and, therefore, an important part of their lives. It would seem rational then for women to support these policies more than men.

Other policies relating to gender equity, sexual harassment, health-care spending and education also impact women and men differently. And while both genders’ views on these topics differ, the difference is quite small on average – in the order of 5%.

Variation of social and political views within a sex group is actually far greater. While this is commonly thought to be due to differences in experience, we wanted to know whether the composition of a person’s family might change their views.

Our line of inquiry was inspired by a range of studies that have shown a child’s gender can change their parents’ views.

For instance, firms led by male CEOs with daughters tend to adopt more socially and environmentally-progressive corporate policies. They’re also more likely to appoint female directors and hire female partners, with positive effects on firm performance.

On the other hand, male CEOs of Danish firms who fathered a son, rather than a daughter, paid their employees less generously and paid themselves more generously.

A similar pattern emerges in politics. In the US, legislators with daughters are more likely to vote for “pro-woman” laws than those with sons. And in both the US and Canada, parents with daughters favour gender equity more than those with sons.

Sometimes the effects become visible even before offspring have had much chance to experience the world.

In one study, the birth of a son caused parents’ voting intentions to swerve immediately to the right, while a daughter prompted a swerve to the left. In another, the effects kicked in as soon as the parents learned their child’s sex at a prenatal ultrasound.

How your family’s composition can impact you

Research published in 1992 found people’s attitudes towards abortion varied depending on how many of their female relatives were in the age group considered “at risk” of unwanted pregnancy.

The more female relatives someone had aged between 15–50, the more likely they were to favour pro-choice policies. In turn, the more male relatives they had of a reproductive age, the more likely they were to support pro-life policies.

This study inspired us to consider whether gendered issues might depend not only on an individual’s own sex, but also the sex composition of their family. Humans, like other animals, are more invested in their close genetic relatives.

Read more: Origins of altruism: why Hamilton still rules 50 years on

We propose a new metric called “gendered fitness interests”. This not only looks at how many genetic relatives of each sex a person has, but also how closely related they are and how many potential reproductive years remain for them.

People with many close, younger female relatives (such as daughters and sisters) have a pro-female bias, while those with plenty of young brothers, sons or grandsons have a bias that favours males.

For her PhD studies at the University of New South Wales, Maleke Fourati gathered data on attitudes towards Islamic veiling practices in Tunisia — specifically on mandatory veiling — which provided an early test of our idea of gendered fitness interests.

As predicted, men were more likely than women to support mandatory veiling. But women with more sons were more likely to wear veils themselves and to think other women should too. These mothers, we argue, take this position as it serves their sons over their daughters-in-law.

In our model, sex differences in social and political attitudes are likely to be greatest in young adulthood, when a person’s own gender impacts them greatly. However, as an individual’s potential to have children diminishes, their current children and other relatives start to have a greater influence. Since most people have a balance of male and female relatives, this means a shift towards the centre.

Separating sex from identity

The web of conflicting interests that give shape to our social and political attitudes is never easy to trace and there are always multiple factors at play.

Perhaps the most interesting implication of our proposal is it undermines the idea that the interests of women and men sit at odds with one another. Some individuals’ values will align more with the opposite sex than with their own, weakening the importance of gender as a distinct part of social and political identity.

Read more: Expanding the definition of family to reflect our realities

– ref. Family matters: why people can hold political views that disadvantage their own sex – https://theconversation.com/family-matters-why-people-can-hold-political-views-that-disadvantage-their-own-sex-153302

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jennifer S. Hunt, Lecturer in National Security, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University

Every four years on January 20, the US exercises a key tenant of democratic government: the peaceful transfer of power. This year, the scene looks a bit different.

If the last US presidential inauguration in 2017 debuted the phrase “alternative facts”, the 2021 inauguration represents their deadly consequences. After conspiracy-theory inspired violence laid siege to the Capitol Building where lawmakers met to confirm the election results, more than 20,000 troops now patrol the US Capitol to ensure the transition goes ahead smoothly against calls for insurrection.

The threat of disinformation and alternative facts has taken many forms over the past several years, from conspiracy theories about climate change to COVID-19, culminating in a 2019 FBI memo warning about the threat of “conspiracy-theory driven domestic extremists”, particularly around elections.

It follows years of warnings from national security practitioners and scholars about the growing risk of domestic extremists. More recently, as reported by the FBI and ASIO, these groups have used the global pandemic to recruit and radicalise new members, seizing on the isolation and uncertainty to offer a sense of community and clarity of purpose.

The conspiracy theory that drove the violence at the Capitol Building has been building for the past four years. During this time, US President Donald Trump has decried any contest he does not win as fraudulent.

More recently, he has called his supporters to action, warning that there will be “no God” and “no country” without him as president. Though the attack only lasted a few hours, the consequences will linger for years.

As Joe Biden prepares to become the 46th president of the United States, managing the fallout from it will be one of his gravest challenges.

Read more: As US election day nears, the outcome won’t be simply a matter of political will

The long-standing threat of right-wing extremists

This threat appears to have been taken seriously by long-standing national security experts and scholars. But action against it was hindered under the Trump administration.

Starting in 2017, federal funding for tackling white nationalist and other far right extremist activity was cut, including university research and non-profit deradicalisation organisations such asLife After Hate

Last year, a whistleblower report from the Department of Homeland Security alleged senior intelligence officials were instructed to modify intelligence assessments to match Trump’s rhetoric and modify the section on White Supremacy in a manner that made the threat appear less severe.

During 2020, diverse groups stormed state legislative buildings to evade COVID-19 mitigation efforts and intimidate lawmakers at the behest of Trump.

Despite these public signs of growing extremist violence, even some lawmakers appeared to be caught unaware by the Capitol insurrection. In an opinion piece just after the event, Republican Senator Susan Collins wrote she first assumed the attack was coming from Iran.

Trump has demonstrated that conspiracy theories can drive electoral and fundraising success. Having started his political campaign with the “birther” conspiracy theory, challenging the citizenship and eligibility of American-born Barack Obama, Trump also cast shadows over his Republican rivals, including Ted Cruz, by accusing Cruz’s father of being linked to the man who killed JFK.

Similarly, Trump will end his administration on a conspiracy theory, one that has already cost five lives. Despite recent backlash from business leaders in America, Trump fundraised more than $200 million after election night on the basis of his refusal to concede defeat.

Recent Congressional races have further demonstrated the success of Trump’s template. Holocaust-deniers in three states ran for office in 2018 (all as Republicans). Two of the newest members of Congress are members of QAnon, the inheritor of the “pizzagate” conspiracy theory, in which all who oppose Trump are deep state members of a international child sex trafficking cabal.

Read more: Why the alt-right believes another American Revolution is coming

The challenge ahead for Biden

Where then, does this leave policy-making on national and global issues that require sober reflection and good judgement?

Alternative facts have no place in good governance. Their purpose is only to destroy and divide. This is why disinformation has been pursued so aggressively by hostile foreign actors against the US, with Russian active measures detailed extensively by the Republican chaired Senate Intelligence Committee reports.

Voter fraud, one of the key narratives of Russian efforts in election interference in 2016, has now become mainstreamed in the Republican base, with nearly half of respondents expressing doubt about Biden’s win. Public assurances by Republican secretaries of state have had limited impact, culminating in Trump’s taped conversation in which he asks the Georgia Secretary of state to “find” 11,000 votes for him (to win).

Joe Biden should focus on repairing Americans’ frayed trust in institutions and rehabilitate America’s battered reputation. At the same time, he should lead with science and fact, most immediately in tackling the nation’s COVID crisis.

Where conspiracy theories go hand in hand with corruption (such as Trump soliciting an election official to tamper with results), state authorities should pursue charges. Where disinformation has proven lucrative, tools should be explored to remove financial rewards. For instance, non-profit organisations that participated in or fundraised what the Joint Chiefs of Staff declared as “sedition and insurrection” could be stripped of protective tax status.

Some of these remedies lie firmly with Congress. Impeachment proceedings are already underway which could remove Trump’s ability to run in 2024. The 14th Amendment could be applied to expel or bar current office holders who participated in the insurrection from running for election again.

Read more: Trump is impeached again in historic vote. Now Republicans must decide the future of their party

Trump has recently condemned the violence done in his name. But he has not disavowed the rationale for it. His supporters within the Republican base, media and elected ranks continue to repeat his conspiracy theories on Fox “entertainment” shows, on AM radio, and now the halls of Congress. More than 100 US Representatives voted against certifying the ballots on which they themselves were elected.

The next few years will see investigations, commissions and reports detailing the failures that led up to the Capitol attacks. Any delay in accountability could see even more lives lost to conspiracy theories and those who profit from them.

– ref. As Joe Biden prepares to become president, the US still reels from the deadly consequences of ‘alternative facts’ – https://theconversation.com/as-joe-biden-prepares-to-become-president-the-us-still-reels-from-the-deadly-consequences-of-alternative-facts-153449

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Collins, Laureate Professor in Nutrition and Dietetics, University of Newcastle

In Australia and around the world, research is showing changes in body weight, cooking, eating and drinking patterns associated with COVID lockdowns.

Some changes have been positive, such as people cooking at home more, and eating more vegetables.

But many people have also reported snacking more, and eating and drinking in response to stress.

As the new year starts, you may be planning to tackle COVID-related weight gain. Before you do, consider that it may be better to focus on your eating patterns, rather than looking to the latest fad diet.

Emotional eating and weight gain

A survey of 13,829 Australian adults found one in five reported drinking more alcohol during COVID. In a survey of over 22,000 drinkers in the United Kingdom, one-quarter reported drinking more than usual over the previous week.

In Italy, of 602 people surveyed about changes in their eating habits during isolation, almost half said they sought “comfort foods” and ate more to feel better.

Eating and drinking alcohol boosts the release of “feel good” chemicals in your brain, making you feel better in the short term.

During times of stress, anxiety and boredom, like during lockdown, food and alcohol can seem like a quick fix. But overindulging isn’t going to help you in the long term.

According to a global WebMD poll on self-reported weight gain during the pandemic, about one-quarter of people in Hong Kong and Germany reported gaining weight, roughly 45% in Australia, Canada and the UK, and over 60% in Brazil and Italy.

United States respondents who reported putting on weight were asked to estimate how much weight they thought they had gained. Some 49% said less than 3 kilograms, 26% said 3-4kg, and 25% reported more than 4.5kg.

Participants believed a lack of exercise, stress eating and drinking more alcohol were contributing factors.

Read more: Health Check: what’s the best diet for weight loss?

It’s not just about weight

While weight gain can increase your risk of health problems, recent research suggests having healthy eating patterns is more important than weight.

A US study of 210,000 adults followed for up to 32 years found that irrespective of body weight, having a high diet quality was associated with lower risk of heart disease and stroke compared to having low diet quality.

A “high-quality” diet includes lots of variety within the basic food groups of vegetables, fruit and wholegrains, and includes limited junk food. A “low-quality diet” is the opposite.

Similarly, a Swedish study followed 79,000 adults over 21 years and found that among people with a higher body weight, also having a high-quality diet was protective against dying from any cause. But having a body weight in the healthy range was not protective among those who had a low-quality diet.

While higher diet quality is associated with better overall health, increasing your diet quality can also help reduce weight.

Read more: Health Check: six tips for losing weight without fad diets

4 tips to improve your diet and beat COVID kilos

Home cooking and eating together

If you spent more time cooking and eating meals at home during the pandemic, keep doing it. As well as being better for you than eating take-away foods and ready-made meals, it promotes well-being.

A study of 160 adults found people who ate healthy foods cooked at home experienced more intense positive emotions and worried less, compared to people who ate away from home.

For adolescents, a review found frequent family meals were associated higher self-esteem and other indicators of better mental health.

Eat more vegetables and fruit

A US study of 133,468 adults found those who increased their vegetable and fruit intakes lost weight. Every extra daily serve of fruit was associated with a weight loss of 250 grams over a four-year period, and every extra daily serve of vegetables with a loss of 110 grams. People who ate more berries, apples, pears, cauliflower, green leafy vegetables and carrots experienced greater weight loss.

This has well-being benefits too. For example, an Australian study which followed 12,385 adults from 2007 to 2013 and found greater life satisfaction, happiness and well-being among those who increased their intake of vegetables and fruit.

Try buying bigger quantities and a greater variety of vegetables and fruit when you do your grocery shopping.

Keep a food diary

Recording what you eat and drink and then checking the kilojoule and nutrient content helps boost your knowledge of what’s in various foods and drinks. It also increases awareness of your eating habits, especially snacking. You can use an app or pen and paper.

Once you’ve recorded your food and drink intake for a few days, you will notice areas to target for improvement.

You might also consider keeping a mood diary. This can help you identify other ways to improve your diet quality. The mood you’re in affects your food choices and your food choices affect your mood. Keeping track of both food and mood helps to identify triggers for eating.

Plan meals and snacks ahead

Check what ingredients you already have and plan meals and snacks to use these up. Next write a grocery list, just for what you need. Even if you’re staying home, prepare your lunch and snacks for the day in advance. This saves you time, money, limits food waste and reduces the number of times you have to think about food.

Read more: How we cook changed during lockdown – and we can learn from this for life after the pandemic

Visit the No Money No Time website to check your diet quality score using our free healthy eating quiz and find simple, inexpensive and healthy recipes.

If you’d like to learn more about food, nutrition and weight management, enrol in our free online course, The Science of Weight Loss – Dispelling Diet Myths, which starts on January 27.

– ref. Not feeling motivated to tackle those sneaky COVID kilos? Try these 4 healthy eating tips instead – https://theconversation.com/not-feeling-motivated-to-tackle-those-sneaky-covid-kilos-try-these-4-healthy-eating-tips-instead-152316

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Hao Tan, Associate professor, University of Newcastle

Australian coal exports to China plummeted last year. While this is due in part to recent trade tensions between Australia and China, our research suggests coal plant closures are a bigger threat to Australia’s export coal in the long term.

China unofficially banned Australian coal in mid-2020. Some 70 ships carrying Australian coal have reportedly been unable to unload in China since October.

This is obviously bad news for Australia’s coal exporters. But even if the ban is lifted, there’s no guarantee China will start buying Australian coal again – at least not in huge volumes.

China is changing. It’s announced a firm date to reach net-zero emissions, and governments in eastern provinces don’t want polluting coal plants taking up prime real estate. It’s time Australia faced reality, and reconsidered its coal export future.

First, the coal ban

In May last year, China’s government effectively banned the import of Australian coal, by applying stringent import quotas. As of last month coal exports to China from Newcastle, Australia’s busiest coal exporting port, had ceased.

In 2019, Australia exported A$13.7 billion worth of coal to China. This comprised A$9.7 billion in metallurgical coal for steel making and A$4 billion in thermal coal for electricity generation.

The latest official Australian data shows these export levels fell dramatically between November 2019 and November 2020. Comparing the two months, metallurgical and thermal coal exports to China were down 85% and 83% respectively.

Read more: China just stunned the world with its step-up on climate action – and the implications for Australia may be huge

Several Chinese provinces experienced power blackouts in late 2020. China’s state-backed media said the shortages were unrelated to the ban on Australian coal. Instead, they blamed cold weather and the recovery in industrial activity after the pandemic.

We dispute this claim. While Australian coal accounts for only about 2% of coal consumption in China, it helps maintain reliable supply for many power stations in China’s southeast coastal provinces.

Coal mining in China mostly occurs in the western provinces. Southeast coastal provinces are largely economically advanced and no longer produce coal. Instead, power stations in those provinces import coal from overseas.

This coal is cheaper than domestic coal, and often easier to access; transport bottlenecks in China often hinder the movement of domestic coal.

Beyond the trade tensions

Experience suggests trade tensions between Australia and China will eventually ease. But in the long run, there is a more fundamental threat to Australian coal exports to China.

Data from monitoring group Global Coal Tracker shows between 2015 and 2019, China closed 291 coal-fired power generation units in power plants of 30 megawatts (MW) or larger, totalling 37 gigawatts (GW) of capacity. For context, Australia decommissioned 5.5 GW of coal-fired power generation units between 2010 and 2017, and currently has 21 GW of coal-fired power stations.

The closures were driven by factors such as climate change and air pollution concern, excess coal power capacity, and China’s move away from some energy-intensive industries.

Our recently published paper revealed other distinctive features of the coal power station closures.

Read more: The Paris Agreement 5 years on: big coal exporters like Australia face a reckoning

First, China’s regions are reducing coal power capacity at different rates and scales. In the nation’s eastern provinces, the closures are substantial. But elsewhere, and particularly in the western provinces, new coal plants are being built.

In fact, China’s coal power capacity increased by about 18% between 2015 and 2019. It currently has more than 1,000 GW of coal generation capacity – the largest in the world.

Second, we found retired coal power stations in China had much shorter lives than the international average. Guangdong, an economically developed region of comparable economic size to Canada, illustrates the point. According to our calculation, the stations in that region had a median age of 15 years at closure. In contrast, coal plants that closed in Australia between 2010 and 2017 had a median age of 43 years.

This suggests coal power stations in China are usually retired not because they’ve reached the end of their productive lives, but rather to achieve a particular purpose.

Third, our study showed decisions to decommission coal power stations in China were largely driven by government, especially local governments. This is in contrast to Australia, where the decision to close a plant is usually made by the company that owns it. And this decomissioning in China is usually driven by a development logic.

Coal plant closures there have been faster and bigger than elsewhere in the country, as governments replace energy- and pollution-intensive industries with advanced manufacturing and services.

And as these regions become richer, the value of land occupied by coal power plants and transmission facilities grows. This gives governments a strong incentive to close the plants and redevelop the sites.

In coming years, southeast China will increasingly shift to renewable-based electricity and electric power transmitted from western provinces.

Securing our energy future

Coal power stations in China’s eastern coastal regions will continue to close in coming years, and power generation capacity will be redistributed to western provinces. For reasons outlined above, that means power generation in China will increasingly rely on domestic coal rather than that from Australia.

China’s coal exit is in part due to its strategy to peak its carbon emissions before 2030 and achieve net-zero by 2060. Australia must realistically appraise its coal export prospects in light of the long-term threat posed by shifts in China and other East Asian nations.

The Morrison government, and industry, should re-double efforts to rapidly expand renewable energy in Australia. Then we can leave coal behind, and emerge as a renewable energy superpower.

Read more: Want an economic tonic, Mr Morrison? Use that stimulus money to turbocharge renewables

– ref. Forget about the trade spat – coal is passé in much of China, and that’s a bigger problem for Australia – https://theconversation.com/forget-about-the-trade-spat-coal-is-passe-in-much-of-china-and-thats-a-bigger-problem-for-australia-153300

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Asha Bowen, Head, Skin Health, Telethon Kids Institute

A year ago, in late January 2020, Australia reported its first cases of COVID-19. Since then, we have seen almost 29,000 confirmed cases and 909 deaths.

As cases climbed in Australian cities in 2020, many students did their schoolwork from home. Australia, including Victoria, came out of lockdowns at the end of last year. But due to outbreaks in New South Wales and Queensland over Christmas and New Year, that impacted on Victoria, restrictions remain in some places.

So what now, for the new school year? Is it safe for students to go back to school?

What we learnt in 2020

Australian health officials, paediatricians, and federal and state education departments worked together to understand how SARS-CoV-2 — the virus that causes COVID-19 — is transmitted in Australian schools.

They also kept updating, as more information came to light, what schools can do to provide a safe learning environment for children and staff.

Up to the end of term 3 in New South Wales, 49 student- and 24 staff- cases were linked to schools and early learning centres. Each of these cases, and their contacts, were followed since the pandemic began. Schools had low rates of transmission — with 51 transmission events (38 students, 13 staff) out of 5,793 contacts traced (<1%) — in terms 1, 2, and 3 when COVID-19 safe measures were in place.

Key measures were:

• limiting adults in the school and early learning centre grounds

• staying home when unwell with cold-like symptoms

• getting tested early.

Most schools and early learning centres in NSW reopened after only a few days.

In Victoria, up until the end of August 2020, 1,635 cases were associated with early learning centres and schools. These consisted of 254 staff, 599 students and 753 household members, out of a total of 19,109 cases in Victoria during their second wave.

Two-thirds of infections in early learning centres and schools did not progress to outbreaks (two or more cases) and more than 90% were small outbreaks (fewer than ten cases).

Read more: Behind Victoria’s decision to open primary schools to all students: report shows COVID transmission is rare

While transmission has been connected with a Victorian school in the media, transmission events often have a more complex basis than just occurring in the classroom. Schools are often located in a multi-generational community and cases in this large school cluster were linked to high community transmission rates rather than infection in the school.

These studies confirm that when SARS-CoV-2 is detected in a student or staff member, it is very unlikely for other students or staff to be infected at school with the processes put in place in 2020 to provide a safe learning environment.

In Western Australia, almost 14,000 asymptomatic staff and students were swabbed at the school in terms 2 and 3. No cases of SARS-CoV-2 were detected, consistent with the absence of community transmission in that state.

But why are other countries closing schools?

Overseas, studies have shown schools can implement health strategies to safely keep schools open and minimise SARS-CoV-2 transmission risks.

In the US, the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention noted that: “trends among children and adolescents aged 0–17 years paralleled those among adults”. However, the organisation also reported:

as of the week beginning December 6, aggregate COVID-19 incidence among the general population in counties where K–12 schools offer in-person education (401.2 per 100,000) was similar to that in counties offering only virtual/online education (418.2 per 100,000).

In Norway, where testing is strong, schools were open with mitigation measures in place. There was minimal child-to-child (0.9%, 2 out of 234) and child-to-adult (1.7%, 1 out of 58) transmission.

Other countries have chosen to close schools as a last resort in national lockdowns in the face of extremely high rates of community transmission and daily case numbers, which meant only widespread reductions in population movements could be effective. This is not the case in Australia at the start of term 1, 2021.

Read more: Children may transmit coronavirus at the same rate as adults: what we now know about schools and COVID-19

It is common for viruses to evolve and there have now been several new variants of concern such as those identified in the UK, South Africa and Brazil which are more transmissible. The potential of such variants entering Australia is uncertain, and so is the risk of transmission in schools.

Reassuringly, if community transmission of such a variant occurs in Australia, we have established experience to monitor, and hopefully halt, its spread.

So, what should Australia do?

Remote learning provides considerable challenges to keep students engaged, reduces the close supervision and support in the classroom, and provides an added disadvantage for children with mental-health conditions, disabilities or special needs.

For parents, it is difficult to work effectively, provide for the family and maintain their well-being when their child is learning from home.

Read more: ‘The workload was intense’: what parents told us about remote learning

Based on the above evidence, schools are safe to open. But states should adopt mitigation measures — including when to add masks, reduce attendance or close schools — according to a traffic light system from green (standard measures) to red (close schools) based on the degree of community transmission. The Murdoch Children’s Research Institute has recommended this approach for Victoria. Education departments around Australia can consider a similar approach.

This is consistent with the recommendations of Australia’s National Cabinet and international advice.

It is important schools and early learning centres continue to adhere to their local COVID advice. Parents and guardians should check their contact details are up to date so they can be contacted easily, regularly check what restrictions are in place and, when unwell, get their child tested and stay at home.

In 2020, students and staff rapidly learned to regularly wash their hands, adapt to cleaners in the school throughout the day, socially distance and wear masks when required. These public health interventions, vaccination, and testing and tracing will remain the mainstay for the year ahead in Australia.

Monitoring well-being and building resilience will also be core educational activities in the months ahead.

– ref. Coronavirus: is it safe for kids to go back to school? And what about the new mutant strain? – https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-is-it-safe-for-kids-to-go-back-to-school-and-what-about-the-new-mutant-strain-152979

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kevin Davis, Emeritus Professor of Finance, University of Melbourne

Political pressure forced the federal government in 2017 – when Scott Morrison was treasurer – to call the royal commission into misconduct in the banking, superannuation and financial services sector.

Commissioner Kenneth Hayne delivered 76 recommendations to reform the industry in February 2019. Almost two years on, the government has yet to implement 44 of those and turned its back on five key reforms – including curbing irresponsible lending practices.

The COVID crisis can explain some part of its tardiness. It cannot explain the decision to weaken protections for the financial health and welfare of Australian consumers.

The axing of responsible lending obligations (RLOs) under the National Consumer Credit Protection Act 2009 is particularly egregious. The government has also rejected Hayne’s recommendations on commission payments for mortgage brokers.

Instead, it appears to be banking on market forces and voluntary codes of conduct to protect financially unsophisticated borrowers. This is the triumph of ideology and vested interests over logic and evidence.

Read more: Vital signs. It’s one thing to back down on Hayne’s recommendation about mortgage brokers, it’s another to offer nothing in its place

Plenty of credit

The case for removing responsible lending obligations rests on a number of unsupported assertions.

First, Treasurer Josh Frydenberg has argued lending needs be made easier to “kickstart” economic growth in these troubled times. The responsible lending obligations, he has said, increase the cost and time involved in making lending decisions.

But it is difficult to discern evidence in public statistics that responsible lending obligations have adversely affected loan growth or the cost of household-sector borrowing.

It is true lending for investment properties has plummeted, but that reflects changes in banks’ risk assessment and pricing of such loans. Owner-occupied lending has remained relatively strong and appears poised for further growth, likely raising existing house prices as much as stimulating new construction.

Personal lending has been declining for some years. But alternative ways to access personal credit, such as mortgage offset and redraw accounts, have grown.

New forms of “personal credit” such as Buy Now Pay Later and payday lending also appear to be growing strongly. These have generally skirted responsible lending requirements and arguably call for strengthening, not winding back, consumer protection laws.

Confusing regulatory roles

The second invalid assertion is that oversight of bank lending by the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority can substitute for explicit responsible lending laws enforced by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission.

This misconstrues APRA’s mandate and expertise, which is focused on institutional safety, not on consumer protection. APRA should be interested in the specifics of a very large loan that may affect the lender’s financial strength. It cannot be expected to examine thousands of smaller loans.

Fears no longer relevant

The third assertion is that responsible lending regulations have made lenders “increasingly risk averse and overly conservative”, out of fear of incurring onerous penalties.

That might have had some relevance in the past. But not so much since ASIC’s failed “Wagyu and Shiraz” case against Westpac in the Federal Court in 2020. The regulator accused the bank of breaching its responsible lending obligations by approving home loans using an automated estimate of applicants’ annual living expenses (known as the Household Expenditure Measure) rather than examining actual expenditure.

The Federal Court rejected ASIC’s argument – with the case acquiring its name due to the colourful analogy Justice Nye Perram used in his judgement:

I may eat Wagyu beef everyday washed down with the finest Shiraz but, if I really want my new home, I can make do on much more modest fare.

ASIC issued revised lending regulations in December 2019. It would have been more seemly for the government to have allowed more time to see how these changed regulations were working before abolishing them.

Loan processing costs should be falling

A fourth assertion is the excessive cost of gathering and processing borrower information. But the development of “open banking” is enabling fintechs to harvest data of consenting borrowers and provide information at lower cost than ever before.

Relying on codes of conduct is an act of faith

Finally, it is claimed that reforming industry codes of conduct, incorporating responsible lending objectives and making them legally enforceable, removes the need for separate lending laws.

But past experience with “self-regulation” does not promote confidence this approach will work.

Read more: Lunch with bankers. Even they’re unimpressed with their new Banking Code of Conduct

Review preferable to removal

A case might be made that the consumer protection regulatory regime has become unduly complex over time and warrants a full-scale review with simplification an objective.

But simplification is not the same as abandonment. There was a reason the government found itself under so much pressure to call the royal commission; and a reason Commissioner Hayne made those 76 recommendations.

This is a bad look for the federal government. It has the hallmarks of political opportunism, using the COVID crisis to be a friend of business at the expense of consumers.

– ref. Ideology triumphs over evidence: Morrison government drops the ball on banking reform – https://theconversation.com/ideology-triumphs-over-evidence-morrison-government-drops-the-ball-on-banking-reform-153529

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Justin Ellis, Lecturer in Criminology at the University of Newcastle, University of Newcastle

The Rise and Fall of Saint George is a story about place, belonging and community that taps into universal tensions of identity and faith in multicultural societies.

Playing for one night only at the Sydney Festival, the breezy and open space of the Headland at Barangaroo Reserve with Sydney Harbour as backdrop provided an additional dose of catharsis to this haunting and humorous tribute to freedom exemplifying the transformative power of music.

Electronica composer and musician Paul Mac and playwright Lachlan Philpott collaborated to create a personal and poignant reflection on the divisive national same-sex marriage debate in Australia and one of its local consequences: the destruction of a giant mural of George Michael in Newtown by several young men in separate incidences, one of whom claimed it violated his Christian faith.

Reflection and healing

Scott Marsh’s mural was commissioned by Mac and Johnny Seymour for the side of their home in Newtown following the death of George Michael in 2016. The singer is depicted as a saint in priestly robes with a cross dangling from one ear, his head surrounded by a rainbow-coloured halo and smoking marijuana.

For 11 months, the mural was a site of commemoration, celebration, pilgrimage and reassurance for the residents of Newtown — and further afield, given the made-for-Instagram quality of Marsh’s work.

The mural’s life was cut short by vandals and has become a site of contest over freedom of expression and faith. But this one-hour performance directed by Kate Champion with a huge choir, excellent music and a great lineup of singers is a celebration of life, love and resilience in unpredictable times.

The battle for George’s visibility played out in the performance is both reflection and healing, and a reminder freedoms cannot be taken for granted.

The mood during the marriage equality debate was intense given the divisiveness of the campaign. The result of the postal survey was a resounding yes, but roughly one-in-four of the votes were for no. This is still a lot of people.

Read more: Same-sex marriage survey by the stats: a resounding ‘yes’ but western Sydney leads ‘no’ vote

News audio broadcast from the same-sex marriage debate takes you back to the heightened emotion of that time. Video of Newtown streetscapes evoke the neighbourhood’s narrow and close knit rows of houses, and the lyrics reflect the importance of tolerance and acceptance: “with open minds there’s room for you here”, the choir sings.

Juxtaposed with audio from Penny Wong and Tony Abbott are cheeky and ribald lyrics balancing the gravity of the destruction of the mural with a humour that might ameliorate those violent acts: “Now we have a plebiscite that’s more dinky di than vegemite!”

Listening without prejudice

Rather than drawing on George Michael’s music, the show perpetuates his legacy as a freedom fighter for not only gay rights, but the right to be who you are and live your own truth without judgement.

In this, it embodies his call to listen without prejudice.

Mac speaks candidly about his personal experience of prejudice with the defacement of the mural; the fear the waves of vandalism to the mural caused him, his partner and the local community, and the vigils held to protect the mural.

Threats they received during this time were a reminder of the suspicion and fear divisiveness can generate.

Incidents of defacement were followed by the chalking up of affirmative messages by the local community. The final act of vandalism hid George with black paint reflecting that the ownership of sites of commemoration can be unpredictable.

But out of acts of violence — and resistance to violence — is born a transformative musical experience of community courage and determination.

Both George Michael’s “sainthood” and the push for LGBTQ rights will go on, and will take unpredictable twists and turns that emphasise the need to remain vigilant.

And as the lyrics noted, despite black paint hiding George Michael in the mural, “his soul is aflame”. He remains a beacon for freedom across the globe.

As we stood to leave Barangaroo, and the bright lights of Luna Park twinkled across the harbour, I felt a sense of gratitude. I was thankful to the community who conceived and brought this show to life: a performance that gave us space to reflect and celebrate, that moved the debate on the mural forward, and offered engagement as a solution to prejudice.

The Rise and Fall of Saint George was at Sydney Festival, January 15.

– ref. Sydney Festival review: The Rise and Fall of Saint George shows the transformative power of music – https://theconversation.com/sydney-festival-review-the-rise-and-fall-of-saint-george-shows-the-transformative-power-of-music-153100

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonatan A Lassa, Senior Lecturer, Humanitarian Emergency and Disaster Management, College of Indigenous Futures, Arts and Society, Charles Darwin University

News of storms battering parts of Queensland and the threat posed by Cyclone Kimi reminded me of a recent experience I’d had.

A few months after Cyclone Marcus unleashed havoc on Darwin in 2018, uprooting trees and causing million of dollars worth of damage, I had reason to visit a local caravan park.

I was there to pick up an item I’d bought on Facebook Marketplace from an older long term resident of the park, Anne*, and we got talking about the cyclone.

She described how tents were blown away, property lost and that “none of us were insured, really. So we have to be on our own”. Other Darwin caravan park residents had had their caravans crushed by falling trees, and were similarly uninsured.

These stories are anecdotal, but illustrate a broader problem. Communities living at the margins are often more vulnerable to disaster risk, a problem likely to be exacerbated by climate change.

Read more: A crisis of underinsurance threatens to scar rural Australia permanently

Heat stress, floods, cyclones

People with long-term tenure at caravan parks likely experience higher levels of disadvantage than the population as a whole; many are unemployed or in lower paying jobs, and contending with serious health issues.

As one report published by the St Vincent de Paul Society NSW put it:

Caravan park residents often experience high levels of violence and abusive behaviour, substance abuse and addiction, problem gambling, mental illness and poor physical health in an unsupported environment. A common factor among many residents is a desperate feeling of loneliness.

Many also often live with the threat of heat stress, floods, storms and cyclones. Many are underinsured. Some residents have reported trouble trying to get insured.

Research has identified an urgent need to maximise safety and minimise property exposure at Australian caravan parks. An article published in the Australian Journal of Emergency Management noted:

Not all people will have the capacity to insure against flooding and often the very poorest of people will seek accommodation in caravan parks because of the low rents. However, the caravans, in which they live and contain their valuables, are structures that are more likely to be severely damaged as against the more permanent structures of contemporary houses.

Some of this increased risk is due to the location of caravan parks. As a state engineering consultant put it in one study,

things like caravan parks or holiday parks are often proposed to be located in areas that wouldn’t normally be considered for normal residential development […] There is often a push to have that sort of development in these low-lying, vulnerable areas.

One study on caravan parks in coastal NSW found many were highly exposed to flooding and that:

many parks are ill-equipped to deal with flooding: a high turnover of park managers means that most have no direct experience of floods; attitudes of denial prevail; most parks have no means of raising community flood awareness; and the process of flood response planning is patchy and of poor quality.

Change is possible — and necessary

One study called for more regulation of parks and for park managers to be better equipped with the skills to manage disaster risk.

Urban planners in cyclone-prone areas could look to research on which tree species are most “wind-firm” and least likely to be uprooted in a cyclone — and use this information to inform urban planting strategies. Simply advising caravan-dwellers not to park under trees won’t work, as trees provide much-needed shade to offset heat.

Finding better ways to reduce risk of heat stress to long term caravan residents will grow only more important as the climate changes.

Too often, management of private caravan parks is seen as a problem for private property owners.

But as some researchers have pointed out, caravan parks sometimes operate as a form of social housing, and often house vulnerable populations.

Increasingly, local and state governments may need to play a larger role in ensuring the rights of long term caravan park residents to safe housing are protected, as climate change related disaster risk grows.

Name changed to protect identity. This story is part of a series The Conversation is running on the nexus between disaster, disadvantage and resilience. You can read the rest of the stories here.

– ref. Caravan communities: older, underinsured and overexposed to cyclones, storms and disasters – https://theconversation.com/caravan-communities-older-underinsured-and-overexposed-to-cyclones-storms-and-disasters-151840

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Crawford, Associate Professor in Construction and Environmental Assessment, University of Melbourne

Over the past few years, Australians have embraced online food delivery services such as UberEats, Deliveroo and Menulog. But home-delivered food comes with a climate cost, and single-use packaging is one of the biggest contributors.

Our research found Australians placed 27 million online food orders in 2018. By 2024, this number is projected to increase to 65 million.

The increasing use of take-away food packaging associated with online meal deliveries is making the food sector’s already massive carbon footprint even larger. Of the five cuisines we examined, packaging from burger meals was responsible for the most emissions, followed by Thai meals.

Last year, lockdowns related to COVID-19 led to a 20% increase in household solid wastes due in part to increased food deliveries. The climate crisis and problems facing Australia’s waste management sector mean we must urgently reduce waste from meals ordered online.

A growing problem

Technology, income and lifestyle changes mean fewer people are cooking at home or dining in restaurants, and more are having food delivered to their door. Some 9.4 million Australians are now registered users of online food delivery services, according to business data platform Statista.

In most cases, online food deliveries require single-use packaging. Producing, transporting and disposing of this packaging requires large quantities of energy and raw materials. Those materials release emissions as they break down in landfill or the environment, or are burned.

Read more: Using lots of plastic packaging during the coronavirus crisis? You’re not alone

Our research found in 2018, the disposal of single use packaging from online food orders in Australia led to 5,600 tonnes of carbon dioxide-equivalent (CO₂-e) emissions. The sector is growing by more than 15% each year, which means the packaging emissions will reach 13,200 tonnes of CO₂-e in 2024.

Emissions by cuisine

Our study quantified how much greenhouse gas is emitted over the life of food packaging used in online food delivery. Specifically, we examined five popular cuisine types: pizzas, burgers, Indian, Thai and Chinese.

The results, from lowest to highest, are presented below, in terms of carbon dioxide equivalent (CO₂-e):

• Chinese: 0.16kg CO₂-e for a plastic container and plastic bag

• Indian: 0.18 kg CO₂-e for a plastic container, paper bag and cling film

• Pizza: 0.20g CO₂-e for a cardboard box

• Thai: 0.23 kg CO₂-e for a plastic container and paper bag

• Burger meal: 0.29 kg CO₂-e for a paper bag, paper boxes, plastic straw, liquid paperboard cup with plastic lid and cardboard cup holder.

The typical meal from each restaurant was determined, and the packaging assessed. Obviously, the exact packaging used varies according to the specific order, restaurant and customer preferences, and individual meals may have a carbon footprint higher or lower than average for that cuisine.

We also found a brown paper delivery bag produces far more emissions than a plastic bag, due to the carbon released when it breaks down. However plastic bags generally create more litter and are more toxic to the environment than paper bags.

Worst packaging culprits

Our study found the production of the raw materials used in packaging – that is, fuels for plastic and wood pulp for paper and cardboard – contributes more than 50% of the total packaging emissions. Converting the raw materials into packaging products is the next highest contributor, at between 32% and 48%.

Replacing virgin raw materials with recycled content can reduce production emissions, but only by about 10%, due to the energy required in the recycling process. So reducing packaging use is more important than increasing the recycled content of materials.

Read more: Australia’s waste export ban becomes law, but the crisis is far from over

We also found the packaging disposal method can dramatically influence emissions. We assumed typical recycling rates of between 18% and 77%. However, if all packaging is sent to landfill, disposal-related emissions may increase by up to 15 times compared to the typical disposal scenario.

Paper-based packaging had the greatest disposal emissions due to its high carbon content. If all packaging materials are incinerated, then disposal emissions can be up to 49 times higher than the typical disposal scenario.

Plastics produce least emissions when disposed in landfill as opposed to recycling or incineration. And organic material such as paper and paperboard produce more emissions when disposed to landfill than if recycled or incinerated. So a material-specific approach to waste disposal and processing is important.

The way forward

The task of reducing single-use packaging has been made more urgent by new federal laws banning the export of unprocessed waste from Australia.

Increasing and improving waste recovery and processing infrastructure will help divert waste from landfill. However, packaging production – with both virgin and recycled raw materials – is very emissions-intensive. So producing less packaging in the first place is key to significant emissions reduction.

Online food delivery service providers should make it easier for customers to opt out of certain packaging products, such as bags and utensils. Investment in more environmentally friendly packaging options is also crucial.

Customers have a role to play, and consumer awareness and education campaigns will be important here. Refusing packaging where possible or choosing more eco-friendly options will also help to reduce single-use packaging emissions.

This article draws on research by former University of Melbourne Masters student Indumathi Arunan.

Read more: Recycling is not enough. Zero-packaging stores show we can kick our plastic addiction

– ref. Home-delivered food has a huge climate cost. So which cuisine is the worst culprit? – https://theconversation.com/home-delivered-food-has-a-huge-climate-cost-so-which-cuisine-is-the-worst-culprit-151564