Babies aren’t born with enough vitamin K, which is essential to clot blood. This is why it’s recommended in Australia that all newborns receive a vitamin K injection at birth.

Without it, they’re at risk of vitamin K deficiency bleeding, a rare but life-threatening condition.

However, two large studies from the United States and Sweden have found a rising proportion of newborns with no record of receiving the shot. Neither study recorded why.

Australia has no comparable national data, and a surveillance project that monitored vitamin K deficiency bleeding in infants ended in 2017.

Two states do keep count, though, and both show a decline. Queensland Health figures obtained by the ABC show 98.3% of babies received vitamin K in 2016, falling to 95.5% by 2025 – meaning more than 2,500 babies went without last year alone.

Tasmania’s rate fell from 99% to 97% over the same period. No other state or territory publishes the figures.

What is the vitamin K injection?

First, it’s not a vaccine, it’s a vitamin preparation.

Newborns have low stores of vitamin K because very little crosses the placenta during pregnancy. In newborns, the gut bacteria that produce vitamin K are not yet well-established. Levels in human milk are also low.

For healthy newborns, Australia’s guidelines recommend a one milligram injection at birth – usually in the thigh muscle.

There is also an oral option. This has three 2mg doses: at birth, at 3–5 days, and in the fourth week after birth. The final dose is not required for babies who mainly drink formula, as it contains vitamin K.

However, the injection is the preferred option because it is more reliable and requires only one dose.

As with other injections, it can cause brief pain and occasionally some redness, swelling or bruising at the injection site. Serious reactions are very rare.

What can happen without it?

Babies can develop vitamin K deficiency bleeding in the first week of life, but the most dangerous form appears later, from eight days to six months old, typically at 1–3 months.

This condition is rare. Across 25 years of Australian surveillance, there were 0.84 reported new cases for every 100,000 live births, roughly two or three reported cases a year. However, this number could be higher, as the data relies on voluntary reporting.

In 30–50% of cases that develop after the first week, the bleeding is inside the skull, which can be life-threatening.

Underlying liver disease, which can impair babies’ absorption of vitamin K, was confirmed in 43% of the late Australian cases.

What we know about past cases

A 2019 surveillance study looked at how many vitamin K deficiency bleeding cases Australian paediatricians reported between 1993 and 2017.

During this period, there were 58 cases. Among these, 33 babies had received no vitamin K at birth – in 28 cases because their parents had declined it. In the other five cases the reason wasn’t recorded or there was no clinician present.

Of the 58 babies, six died, all from bleeding inside the skull. Three of those deaths followed a home birth where vitamin K had been refused.

Parents declined at 11 of the 13 home births in the study, and 11 of the 28 refusals were in northern New South Wales and Southeast Queensland.

It’s important to note this study counted only reported cases of vitamin K deficiency bleeding, not vitamin K injections and refusals across all births.

But among affected babies, there was a clear increase in parental refusal. In 1993–2005, 32% of cases involved parents refusing the injection. In 2006–17, the proportion rose to 63%.

Injection rates are falling overseas

A 2025 US study looked at the electronic health records of more than 5 million newborns across 403 hospitals. It found the proportion with no record of a vitamin K injection rose from 2.92% in 2017 to 5.18% in 2024.

The study measured cases where the newborn did not receive the injection, not confirmed refusal: parents’ or clinicians’ reasons were not recorded. But unlike Australia, there is no approved oral vitamin K for newborns in the US, so babies without a recorded injection were unlikely to have had drops instead.

In Sweden, a recent study looked at more than 2 million newborns between 2003 and 2021. The proportion of cases where the newborn didn’t receive a vitamin K injection actually fell between 2003 (1.32%) and 2006 (0.66%), but then more than doubled to 1.5% in 2021.

Why do some parents decline it?

There is no published Australian research on why parents decline.

International evidence suggests there’s no single reason. US research has identified concerns about perceived injection risks, ingredients, dose and side effects; a preference for a more “natural” approach; mistrust of medical or pharmaceutical advice; and information encountered online or through social networks.

In 2015, a New Zealand study found parents who declined newborn vitamin K were more likely to decline later childhood immunisation.

One enduring concern followed a 1992 study reporting a link between the then-used formulation and childhood cancer. Better-quality studies did not confirm the finding. This older formulation is no longer used in Australia.

If you’re expecting a baby

Giving birth can be a difficult time to weigh up new medical information. So it’s a good idea to think about the vitamin K injection ahead of time.

Ask your midwife, doctor or obstetrician for more information during pregnancy about what the injection involves, and make the decision before the birth.

If you choose the oral version, remember it’s three doses, not one. It’s that final dose that protects against the late bleeding that can cause brain haemorrhage.

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

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/11/vitamin-k-shots-stop-internal-bleeding-in-newborns-so-why-are-some-parents-refusing-them/

Keith Rankin, 10 July 2026 – National currently has 43 electorates seats, which represents 36% of all seats in a 120-seat Parliament. If National was to get 30% of the party vote and to retain all its electorates, it would be entitled to 36 seats in total (37 seats in practice, given some ‘wasted’ votes); although if Opportunity were to just miss out, that number would probably rise to 39 seats.

With 37 entitled seats, and all electorates retained, there would be a National overhang of six seats. Such an overhang could help the National-led coalition to retain power; albeit without Nicola Willis and Paul Goldsmith.

(In 1993, National got 35% of the vote, entitling it to 35 seats in a 99-seat Parliament. It won 50 seats, meaning that if that election was held under MMP, National would have had a substantial overhang. But it still would have lost that election, because there would have been fewer bigger electorates; only FPP – First Past the Post – saved National’s bacon in 1993.)

Labour presently has 17 electorate seats. Other parties have 11. The distribution of electorate seats may well not change very much in 2026.

The Arithmetic

Total seats are determined by party vote percentages. But electorate seats are determined, in New Zealand’s experience, mainly by the two-party National-Labour swing. (New Zealand voters are generally encouraged to consider the MMP electorate vote as a party vote, even though technically it’s a personal vote. Journalists tend to say things like ‘voting for National in the Tukituki candidate vote’, rather than ‘voting for Wedd in the Tukituki candidate vote’.)

What is new this time is that the two-party National-Labour swing is looking more muted than usual when one of those is struggling. Both parties’ polled percentages are in the doldrums. This means that, while National may lose a small number of electorates, it probably won’t lose many.

So, if National gets 30% of the vote, it may well be the least unpopular party in the new Parliament. But it will need to lose seven electorate seats in order to get Willis back into parliament; and eight to save Goldsmith.

Given that National will almost certainly lose some of its electorates – including my own of Waitakere (formerly New Lynn) – National will be unwise to pursue an overhang strategy. National may lose six electorates, just enough to lose its overhang but not enough to gain any list MPs.

Clearly National’s best strategy is to try to get its party vote up to 36%, which should gain National two list MPs. But 36% seems like a tall order. National only got 38% in 2023, when it easily outpolled the next largest party.

(And what if National’s Melissa Lee wins Mt Albert from Labour? The winner in Mt Albert – a four-cornered contest this year – may only need to get 30% of the electorate vote. Lee got 33.5% in 2023, and nearly won.)

Another trick might be, in electorates where current MPs have retired, for the new candidate to ‘have a cup of tea’ with the Labour candidate Gary Payinda, and campaign for the party vote only. For example, Lloyd Budd in Whangarei; though such a budding politician would probably be reluctant. Further, there are only four electorates in this situation.

(Though if Christopher Luxon is pushed, I suspect that he would be a late withdrawal as a candidate; National could then choose to not contest Botany. Then Melissa Lee could ‘fall on her sword’, and endorse Labour’s Helen White to win Mt Albert. Maybe not. Another issue; I see that Labour are running medical doctors in at least two electorates, Whangarei and Napier. These men, I presume, are desperately needed in their communities as doctors.)

A further trick might be to put pressure on an electorate MP to resign soon after the election – maybe Penny Simmonds who is now a superannuitant – so that Nicola Willis could take her place. While the by-election strategy worked for Andy Burnham in the United Kingdom, I can think of only one similar case in New Zealand; Robert Stout.

(Sir Joseph Ward – Prime Minister 1906-1912 and MP for Awarua, south of Invercargill, from 1887 to 1919 – did try to win the Tauranga seat in a 1923 by-election, but failed; and his Party was then in Opposition. But Robert Stout – another former Prime Minister [NZ’s youngest before Jacinda Ardern] – did shift from Dunedin to Inangahua to win the 1893 by-election; but he was too late to push Richard Seddon out of the Premier’s job. Having challenged Seddon, he was not invited into Seddon’s Cabinet. Inangahua was not to the urbane Stout’s liking; he became MP for City of Wellington in the 1893 general election.)

My guess is that, if National does get to form a government (after the 2026 election) despite having no list MPs, then David Seymour will be insisting on becoming Minister of Finance. Or Shane Jones? New Zealand First might have more leverage than Act. Jones would at least move the government away from stultifying neoliberalism, much as Bill Birch eased the pain in 1994.

Re Nicola Willis, it is interesting that the electorate of Wellington North looks like being a three-cornered contest. Jonathan Pitts might just win for National. He could then be asked to stand-down in favour of Nicola Willis; for him, that would be the pits, and Willis might not win the subsequent by-election. Should she fail to get back into Parliament, Nicola Willis could succeed Ruth Richardson at the New Zealand Taxpayers Union; as soon as Ms Richardson retires, that is. In that role, Willis might have more influence and less responsibility than she has at present.

About the writer:

Keith Rankin (keith at rankin dot nz), trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand.

Keith Rankin, 10 July 2026 – I note that the New Zealand ambulance service (Hato Hone St John), has experienced four days this last week of all-time record callouts. The reason is a mix of increasing numbers of middle-aged and older people, spikes in certain winter illnesses, and a possible increased incidence of chronic illnesses. (See One call every 20 seconds: Current demand for ambulances ‘unsustainable’ – St John, RNZ 10 August 2026.)

These ambulance callout data will be strongly correlated to mortality data.

I have produced these charts of the New Zealand population organised by generation (aka birth cohort). I have labelled these generations B (boomer, born around 1950), J (Jones, born around 1960), X (born around 1970), Y (born around 1980), M (millennial, born around 1990), Z (born around 2000), and Α (alpha, born around 2010).

In a ‘global North’ country with minimal international migration, the population of a generation remains essentially the same until people are in their forties, and then we see a contraction – a ‘die off’ – as mortality makes discernible inroads into that population. Where international migration is significant, it is populations aged between 20 and 45 whose cohorts are expanding.

Chart 1 looks at older generations, from B to M; Chart 2 looks at younger generations from X to Α.

Chart 1

The first thing to note in Chart 1 is the ‘baseline’ of people aged 35-to-39. This is in solid blue, and reflects substantial amounts of immigration and emigration of people aged under 35. Nevertheless, the outlines of birth numbers are clear. New Zealand’s birth peaks were in the early 1960s (late Gen J) and early 1970s (late Gen X). Then there was a substantial ‘baby bust’ (Gen Y) followed by a ‘baby blip’ (Gen M). We note that the principal reason for the excess numbers of Gen M people aged 35-to-39 is immigration, not a domestic baby boom; and it may well be that many of these people do not have ‘permanent residence’ status, so may be subject to forced emigration in the next five years.

We also note that current (ie June 2026) populations for each age group and birth-cohort (from Gen J) are marked by a big orange dot. These dots tell us that the numbers of younger Gen Js, Gen Xs and Gen Ys are fairly similar to each other, thanks to some evening out resulting from net immigration. But their numbers are much higher than the numbers of ‘boomers’ (Gen B).

The next thing to note is that, for the most part, generations reach their maximum size when aged 45-to-49. Net immigration to New Zealand increases these cohorts when they are younger adults; then generational die-off becomes the principal demographic dynamic after age 50. In the case of Gen X, the immigration effect predominated until ages 50-to-54. And then we see what looks like a discernible Gen X die-off from age 50-54 to age 55-59.

The working-age die-off of Gen-B is quite small, from about 245,000 people at age 45-49 to about 230,000 people at age 65-69 (a die-off of 15,000). The comparable die-off for Gen J looks to be somewhat greater: 25,000 (from 305,000 to 280,000). We also note that, for the span of Gen X, there is a worrying level of mortality as they reach their late fifties and early sixties.

It would appear that we may attribute to Gen J and Gen X – rather than Gen B – much of the present increase of chronic illness noted by Hato Hone.

Chart 2

This chart looks at younger generations. The ‘baseline’ given here – in solid red this time – reflects mostly births, though many of the births for Gen Α in particular will be births to parents born outside of New Zealand. Immigrants generally have relatively high birth rates.

Looking at that baseline, of greatest significance is a dramatically higher number of teenagers in the mid-2020s compared to what we were used to over the previous two decades. This looming labour supply bulge will compound the labour market difficulties currently being faced by 20-to-24 year-olds.

Next we look at the big orange dots, and note that there is a huge present population bulge for Gen M; the ‘baby blip’ generation has been substantially augmented by immigration. Given the state of the New Zealand economy, it’s unlikely that Gen Z will see a boost of immigrants aged 30-to-40, which is what Gen M experienced. Indeed, Gen Z may well shrink in New Zealand over the next five years; net emigration. So the Gen M bulge will remain.

New Zealand had 300,000 Gen M people born around 1990 when they were aged 20-to-24, and now has 410,000 people born around 1990. Given that we know a lot of millennials have emigrated, it would seem that as many as 40% or 45% of this birth cohort in New Zealand were born overseas. Is New Zealand the country in the world with the greatest churn of peak-working-age population, with more immigrants coming as many emigrants go?

Conclusion

New Zealand’s working-age population is in flux. Good for the international airlines which fly to Aotearoa, but potentially very difficult for the making of social policy. Mind you, if the policymakers don’t really know about these dramatically fluctuating demographics, then they will be blissfully unaware of the difficulties which they face.

About the writer:

Keith Rankin (keith at rankin dot nz), trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand.

Locals and officials in Colombia have begun a massive search and rescue effort to find survivors of a powerful earthquake that struck near San José del Palmar in Chocó, with major damage observed in the cities of Cali, Manizales and Pereira.

At least 132 people have already been confirmed dead, with that number expected to rise significantly in the coming hours and days. Thousands of homes have also reportedly collapsed or been damaged.

The United States Geological Survey said the magnitude 7.4 earthquake occurred primarily due to strike-slip faulting at a depth of approximately 110 kilometres. In simple terms, a strike-slip earthquake occurs when two blocks of Earth’s crust slide horizontally past one another, rather than moving up or down.

This comes just a month or so after earthquakes in Venezuela, which may have destroyed or damaged more than 58,000 buildings and took the lives of thousands.

It’s far too early to tell whether the earthquake in Colombia is connected to the one in Venezuela. But there’s some evidence from Australia that nearby earthquake faults can “communicate” with one another. A seismic slip on one fault can effectively transfer stress to another nearby fault, causing an earthquake.

I’ve spent years experimentally testing reinforced concrete structures, some specifically designed to Colombian construction practices. My research suggests we shouldn’t be surprised so many buildings collapsed in this disaster – and also that we should be concerned about the many other regions around the world with similar practices.

Building practices in Colombia

In buildings, slabs, beams and columns provide resistance to gravity loads. But reinforced concrete walls are needed to resist lateral loads from wind and, in rare but extreme cases, earthquakes.

But in Colombia many buildings have thin concrete walls, typically 7 to 10 centimetres thick. They only have a single layer of steel reinforcement – commonly electrowelded wire mesh, which is very brittle and ruptures quickly.

The thinness of the walls also means that “confinement”, where hooped steel is placed at the edges of a wall to help prevent concrete crushing, is near impossible to place during construction. Nor is it required in building standards.

Testing Colombian buildings

Along with colleagues from three Colombian universities, I ran full-scale tests at the Earthquake Engineering and Structural Dynamics Laboratory at the Federal School of Technology in Lausanne, Switzerland, on concrete walls built to match common Colombian construction practice. We wanted to find out how these walls perform when shaken the way an earthquake shakes a building.

The results were concerning even before Monday’s earthquake.

When an earthquake shakes a building, the ideal situation is for many small cracks to form at the base of a steel-reinforced wall. This distributes the stress.

If a single, large crack forms because of the low amount of steel, the stress is concentrated. This causes the reinforcing bars to rupture and the wall to fail.

But the walls on these buildings are so thin, even if there was enough steel reinforcement, they’re still liable to fail during an earthquake. Our experimental tests showed there’s just not enough strength for these walls to survive significant ground shaking.

This unfortunately doesn’t appear to be a rare or isolate design choice – it’s standard practice across the Latin American region.

A 2018 survey of nine buildings in Cali, one of the cities hit by Monday’s earthquake, found that 90% had walls with a single layer of reinforcement, and 30% had walls 100mm thick or thinner.

Not isolated to South America

In 2011, a magnitude 6.3 earthquake caused widespread damage to the city of Christchurch, taking the lives of 185 people.

Most reinforced concrete buildings designed post-1980s performed well. This was owing to the design principles introduced at the time, which required engineers to carefully think about the placement of steel to allow the structures, including the walls, to deform and resist the earthquake actions.

However, some of the collapses observed were in buildings designed before these principles were introduced. One such example is the Pyne Gould building. Its collapse was likely the result of a low amount of steel used in the thin concrete core walls, where a single crack is thought to have formed, concentrating stress.

Until recently, this type of design practice – thin walls with typically a light amount of reinforcing steel – was also allowed under the Australian Standards for Concrete Structures.

After the Christchurch earthquake, this design practice became a concern for the structural and earthquake engineering community, and the Australian standards were revised in 2018 to help prevent this type of structural failure in future designs.

However, a proliferation of lightly reinforced, thin concrete walls likely exists in the building stock of Australian cities built before this revision. Testing on walls built to this same practice, including some conducted here in Australia, has shown they perform just as poorly as their Colombian counterparts under earthquake loading.

This is concerning, as Australia is not immune to strong earthquakes.

Ryan Hoult has received funding from the Swiss Government Excellence Postdoctoral Scholarship. His experimental research was also conducted as part of a project funded through the Swiss Bilateral Research Programs for Latin America. He is Vice President of the Australian Earthquake Engineering Society, a professional body for earthquake engineering research and practice in Australia.

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/11/colombia-earthquake-has-killed-at-least-132-my-research-helps-explain-why-it-was-so-destructive/

Whatever happens at tomorrow morning’s urgent caucus meeting to address speculation about his leadership, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has had a very bad few days already.

It began with the National Party leader apologising for chastising a business gathering about dependency on government. He then took his caucus colleagues by surprise with an impromptu “promise” to hold a referendum on the electoral system.

His mishaps have earned comparisons with the fictional David Brent of The Office, and media speculation about a leadership spill ramped up yet again.

Luxon had already put his own leadership to a caucus vote in April. The problem – then and now – is that the party has no stellar alternative leader waiting in the wings, unlike Labour in 2017 when it elevated deputy Jacinda Ardern to the top spot within seven weeks of polling day.

Strategically, it can make more sense for an up-and-coming politician to let their leader take the fall at an election, then make their move to become party leader. That way they get to enjoy a spell in opposition to consolidate and differentiate themselves from an incumbent prime minister.

Ardern’s rise in 2017 was a stunning last-minute gamble that paid off. But haste didn’t serve her career well in the long run. Ideally, contenders within the National caucus such as Chris Bishop and Erica Stanford would be timing a run more carefully, given the Ardern example.

A change of leader at this late stage is a desperate measure – and the consequences hard to predict. What worked for Labour in 2017 may not work again for either major party.

Culture war casualties

Labour should be benefiting from National’s blunders, but is not faring much better. Leader Chris Hipkins is doing about as poorly as Luxon in preferred-prime-minister polls.

Worst of all for Labour, two recent polls have placed the party below 28% of the party vote, lagging behind National.

When National went below 30%, Luxon’s leadership was on the line. Hipkins has deflected criticism, speaking of a “rogue poll” produced by a “right-wing lobby group”.

The problem is, Hipkins has not “built new stocks of leadership capital” since my previous assessment of the two leaders in March 2025. Moreover, there’s an underlying controversy that may sink Hipkins’ bid to return as prime minister.

In other countries, the big issue eroding support for traditional centre-left (and centre-right) parties is immigration. That’s becoming a bigger concern in New Zealand too, fuelled mainly by the NZ First party. But New Zealand is better able to control immigration because of its geographic isolation.

The really divisive culture war issue in domestic politics is Indigenous rights, Māori sovereignty and te Tiriti of Waitangi. On this, Hipkins and Luxon are both nervous.

Coalition vulnerabilities

In the United Kingdom, one of the main reasons given by those defecting from Labour to the right has been “immigration”. In New Zealand, one has to look at “Treaty-based co-governance” as a reason for Labour to lose supporters.

Hipkins knows this and was silent on the issue during his recent speech to the Labour Party faithful.

He can’t risk angering his pro-Treaty base by walking back from policies of the former Labour majority government. And he can’t risk alienating potential Labour voters who support Treaty settlements but aren’t comfortable with wider co-governance policies.

There is nowhere to hide, however, as these matters are bound to come up in election debates. And both leaders are vulnerable because of their likely coalition partners.

Luxon’s leadership was compromised, for example, by the ACT Party insisting on introducing a socially divisive (and ultimately doomed) Treaty Principles Bill in 2024. More recently, he was sideswiped by NZ First leader Winston Peters telling a Chinese-born Green MP to “go back to your own country”.

For his part, Hipkins will face pressure from the Greens and Te Pati Māori – if they form a coalition government – to reintroduce a co-governance agenda or push even further towards tino rangatiratanga (self-determination) without first building majority public support.

Febrile speculation

Neither Luxon nor Hipkins has been highly popular as a leader of their country. In both cases, it looks like their leadership capital peaked too early.

For Luxon, that came while still in opposition in early 2022, after he’d been elected to lead his caucus in late 2021. For Hipkins, it was after he took over from Ardern as prime minister in January 2023, and then responded to a major weather disaster.

Voters know both leaders well enough now. They saw them compete once before in head-to-head debates before the 2023 election, and they’ve had plenty of time to “price in” their unimpressive leadership skills.

A change of leader in either of the major parties is unlikely to pull a rabbit out of the hat at this late stage. Neither has an obvious alternative contender for prime minister.

Still, the political media (and plenty of citizens) enjoy a bit of febrile speculation. Backbench MPs whose careers are at stake if their party polls badly will be inclined to grumble. Journalists will listen. But voters needn’t (and probably won’t) be moved by it.

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

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/11/luxons-leadership-on-the-line-again-neither-national-nor-labour-stand-to-benefit/

What causes a dog to slink away from a cranky person, when they will quietly approach and lean against someone who is weeping? We’ve all seen it – they can respond to our feelings. And science agrees dogs have emotions too.

These social skills could underpin dogs’ success in living with us. But do you think your dog could tell an angry person’s face from a sad or fearful one?

New research published in the journal iScience explored that question, and revealed interesting findings from magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans of dogs’ brains.

Scanning dogs’ brains

Dogs are sensitive to human faces. They look longer in response to our emotional expressions and sounds compared with neutral ones.

Scientists weren’t sure whether dogs were just differentiating “good mood” (happy) from “bad mood” (angry, fearful or sad), or treating these expressions as genuine indicators of different emotions.

The new study, by Raúl Hernández-Pérez, a neuroscientist at the University of Vienna, and colleagues, explored this gap using MRI to scan pet dogs’ brains while they were viewing photos of human faces.

Building on their earlier work, the researchers found evidence that dogs do process images of our distinct emotional expressions differently.

The researchers used machine learning and showed that when looking at a dog’s whole brain, a different brain region was activated to distinguish between fear and sadness (the right rostral suprasylvian gyrus, to be precise), than between fear and anger (this was in the right mid ectosylvian gyrus and left splenial gyrus).

The analysis didn’t detect a difference in the brain areas activated when dogs were shown images of human anger and sadness. Fear stood out from the other negative emotions.

This raises the question: why?

It might be that fear and anger are simply more attention-grabbing than sadness.

Other research has found dogs react to fear and anger faster, and with a bigger physical response, such as a raised heart rate. This is likely because they’re the expressions most likely to call for a quick response from dogs to stay safe.

Sadness is less likely to pose a direct threat to dogs living with people, so they experience less urgency to respond to it. We know some dogs don’t respond with the heroic Lassie behaviour we might like when we are in distress.

Although the numbers in this new research were small (eight and twelve dogs across the two parts of the study), this is the first MRI-based proof-of-concept evidence that dog brains can distinguish between two human facial expressions of distinct negative emotions. It indicates dogs’ neural representation of our emotion goes beyond a simple valence (good/bad) split.

This shows us that perceiving emotion in others (even across species) isn’t handled by one single “emotion centre” in the brain – in dogs, in humans, or in other animal species. It’s spread across a network of regions working together as part of living socially.

A sense-ational result

The authors of this study point out that using still images of humans is a very people-centred way to explore how dogs interpret our emotional states.

We know dogs live in rich sensory worlds where the scent and sound of our speech also convey emotions, shaping how dogs respond to us.

Read more:
Dogs see their world through smell – and scientists are starting to translate it like never before

In fact, even wolves who have grown up around people show the same kind of response to the odour of human fear as dogs. This highlights the important role of learning, as distinct from evolutionary differences in canid bodies or how they respond to people. Dogs (and wolves) are learning about us in every interaction we have with them.

Dogs are adept at watching, smelling, and listening to our emotions, learning how these signals predict our behaviours toward them, and using this information to live with people harmoniously.

Returning the favour, learning more about how dogs express their emotions seems like the least we can do.

Mia Cobb receives funding from The Chaser Initiative and the University of Melbourne.

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/11/brain-scans-provide-world-first-evidence-dogs-can-distinguish-between-human-fear-and-sadness/

The Roman emperor Julian (332–363 CE) called bread the food that “among us is thought to be the most nourishing”.

Bread and other cereal-based foods were indeed central to ancient Mediterranean diets. This was supplemented by pulses, oil, wine and whatever seasonal produce people could obtain.

This is not quite the “Mediterranean diet” we think of today, with its vegetables, olive oil and grilled fish.

Although bread was fundamental to Julian’s Roman world, it wasn’t universally appealing. The Ethiopians, who lived on meat and milk, thought bread was terrible food that lacked nourishment.

They wondered how the Mediterraneans could live on this “diet of dung”.

Galen’s overview

The physician Galen (129–216 CE), provides our fullest account of the ancient Mediterranean diet.

In his book On the Properties of Foodstuffs, he first discusses cereals and pulses, then plants, and finally animal foods and fish. Wheat was, he says, the most widely used and “valuable” food.

Bread was not merely an accompaniment. For many people it supplied the bulk of a meal. Galen distinguishes between different types of bread. The finest white bread was “the most nourishing”. Bran bread ranked lowest, though Galen suggested it emptied the bowels more effectively.

Preparation mattered too. The best bread was “most leavened and very well kneaded” and baked “with moderate heat”.

An excessively hot oven produced a crust that was “dry and like pottery” while leaving the centre raw. Completely unleavened bread, Galen thought, suited almost nobody.

Galen learned the importance of processing wheat through an unpleasant personal experience. During a country journey with some of his friends, a poor peasant woman served them boiled whole grains because her household had run out of bread:

Throughout the next day we had no appetite because of indigestion, so that we could eat nothing, were full of wind and suffered from headaches and blurred vision. For there was not even any bowel action, which is the only remedy for indigestion.

The same grain became nourishing only after milling, sieving, kneading, fermenting and baking.

What else was on the menu?

Ancient people certainly ate fruit and vegetables. Galen discusses lettuce, cabbage, onions, gourds, figs, grapes, apples, pears and pomegranates. But he did not automatically regard them as the basis of a healthy meal.

Many plants were valued chiefly for medicinal effects: they might loosen the bowels, thin bodily fluids or stimulate urine, while supplying little nourishment.

The plant-rich diet could also reflect poverty rather than a healthy choice. Galen calls oats “food for draught animals, not for men”, except when “the extreme of hunger” forced people to make bread from them.

Pulses were more important than modern images of Mediterranean cuisine suggest. Lentils, chickpeas, lupins and various flowering legume plants supplied substantial nourishment.

Galen describes an Alexandrian physician who lived for four years largely on pulses. His diet sounds strikingly modern – until Galen reveals the physician seasoned them with fish sauce.

Fresh fish, meanwhile, was not necessarily an everyday staple. Access depended on location and wealth, as fish could be expensive.

Fish caught near Rome could also be contaminated by waste flowing into the river Tiber from “latrines, bathhouses or kitchens”.

Is there a single ‘Mediterranean diet’?

The Greek writer Athenaeus shows why we should be careful when speaking about “the” Mediterranean diet.

Athenaeus wrote around 200 CE and imagined a long dinner party at which the guests discussed food, wine and dining customs. His examples reveal that what people ate depended heavily on where they lived and how much money they had.

He begins one book with an account of Lusitania, in modern Spain. Seafood there, he says, “in point of abundance, excellence, and beauty, far exceeds that found in our sea”.

Wheat, barley, wine, figs and meat were remarkably cheap. Wild game was worth so little that sellers sometimes gave it away “as a bonus for goodwill”.

In other places, fish was expensive. Athenaeus quotes a diner complaining:

I don’t think I’ve ever seen fish more expensive. Poseidon, if you got 10% of what’s spent on them every day, you’d be far away the richest god there is!

Nor was fish always served simply. Athenaeus preserves a recipe by the 5th-century BCE Sicilian cook Mithaecus:

Clean the insides of a ribbon-fish after cutting off the head, wash and cut into slices, and pour cheese and oil over them.

The fish and olive oil sound familiar. The thick covering of cheese and oil clashes with today’s image of healthy, lightly grilled seafood.

Read more:
Take fish, salt in vats, leave in sun for months: why ancient Romans loved fermented fish sauces like garum

The Mediterranean diet vs ‘the Mediterranean diet’

Most ancient Mediterraneans could hardly live without bread. Cereals supplied the bulk of their calories; pulses, oil, vegetables, fruit and fish varied according to region, season and wealth.

The ancient evidence leaves us with no single ancient Mediterranean diet. There were many: one for regions where food was plentiful, another for poor people just trying to survive, and another for wealthy diners able to pay extraordinary prices for expensive delicacies.

The modern Mediterranean diet is, therefore, not an ancient menu preserved unchanged. It is a selective reconstruction, highlighting olive oil, vegetables and seafood while quietly removing the mountains of bread and cheese.

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

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/11/todays-mediterranean-diet-leans-on-olive-oil-vegies-and-fish-but-the-ancients-mainly-ate-bread/

By Kaya Selby of RNZ Pacific

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/11/papua-new-guinea-seeks-dialogue-over-new-hefty-20000-us-visa-bond/

A growing body of research suggests listening to music has a positive impact on our health and wellbeing. We use music in at least seven different ways to regulate our emotions, including for entertainment, comfort or reflection. And it’s not just feelgood tracks; we also turn to music to sit with feelings of grief, sadness or frustration.

One of the more powerful ways we connect with music is through song lyrics. Sometimes, the lyrics of a song can feel like they’re reaching into the very depths of our soul. They can help us feel seen or inspired, or pick us up when we’re feeling down.

How lyrics facilitate emotion regulation was the question at the heart of our recent research, published in Psychology of Music. Even a casual listener of pop can tell you songs of love and loss frequently top the charts (à la Taylor Swift). But not every song is about a love story or a breakup.

We wanted to understand what it is within popular songs that so many of us are connecting with.

Basic psychological needs

Richard Ryan, one of the most cited living psychologists, and his colleague the late Edward Deci, assert that humans have three basic psychological needs: autonomy, competence and relatedness. To put it simply, we want to feel in control of our choices, confident in our abilities, and connected to others.

We are typically motivated to engage with things that support these needs, which in turn has a positive impact on our mental health and wellbeing.

We set out to examine whether themes of autonomy, competence and relatedness might be present in popular song lyrics.

To do this, we analysed the top ten songs from the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) charts over a 35-year period from 1988 to 2023 (360 unique songs in total).

Combining theory-driven content analysis with a custom-built AI tool called MuseAI, we found themes of human connection (relatedness) were the most frequent to appear in the song lyrics.

In fact, 73% of the chart-topping songs contained this theme, including Dua Lipa’s Levitating (“I got you, moonlight, you’re my starlight”) and John Legend’s All of Me (“Cause all of me loves all of you”).

Furthermore, lyrics about the satisfaction of these needs (47%) – such as getting together with a love interest – were more common than lyrics about having those needs frustrated (25%) — such as sitting in the heartbreak of love lost.

We also found many songs with themes of autonomy (15.6%) – think Miley Cyrus’ Flowers (“I can take myself dancing and I can hold on my own hand”) – and competence (11.4%), such as Lizzo’s About Damn Time (“I’m not the girl I was or used to be, b*#ch, I might be better”).

Early findings from our follow-up research suggest the frequency of themes and valence likely vary by genre. For example, our preliminary findings suggest hip-hop lyrics include more frequent themes of competence satisfaction, such as in Chris Brown’s Look At Me Now.

Interestingly, Australia’s Triple J Hottest 100 demonstrates a strong lean towards themes of relatedness frustration. It’s possible this reflects young people’s use of music as a way to navigate experiences such as heartbreak or betrayal (think Olivia Rodrigo’s Driver’s License).

Music for mental health

Our ongoing research is focused on teasing apart precisely how our connection to certain themes in song lyrics can impact our mental health. We’re particularly interested in understanding why some listening sessions help us process emotions and work through difficult feelings, while others leave us ruminating on our frustrations.

People intuitively turn to music in times of need. As we deepen our understanding of how this process works, music listening could function as an accessible and low-cost tool to support mental health.

The development of smartphone apps such as MoodyTunes – which aims to support wellbeing in young people through music – offer exciting opportunities to harness music as a therapeutic resource.

In the words of US singer Dobie Gray, “give me the beat boys and free my soul, I want to get lost in your rock and roll”.

Nicholas Matherne receives funding through an Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship.

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

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/11/why-do-certain-lyrics-touch-us-so-deeply-we-studied-35-years-of-hits-to-find-out/

Ted Lasso is back: the hugely successful Apple TV series has returned for a fourth season.

The sports comedy-drama – which follows an American football coach with zero soccer experience who is hired to run a struggling English Premier League team – has become a cultural phenomenon. It has won 13 Emmy Awards and was the most-watched original streaming show in the United States in 2023.

In Season 4, Ted faces a new challenge: coaching a second-division women’s soccer team.

The show’s popularity raises an interesting question for anyone involved in sport: would Ted Lasso actually be a good coach in real life?

Goodbye, old school

Outwardly, Ted hardly fits the traditional image of a hard-nosed elite sports coach. He is relentlessly optimistic, talks about feelings and seems more interested in people than tactics.

For decades, successful coaching was often associated with authority, toughness and control.

But successful modern coaches such as Steve Kerr in the US National Basketball Association (NBA) and Chris Fagan in the Australian Football League (AFL) have challenged this model, speaking openly about vulnerability, empathy and genuine relationships with their players.

Their success suggests showing humanity is not a weakness in high-performance coaching.

What is Ted’s coaching style?

Ted’s approach resembles what researchers call “autonomy-supportive” coaching.

Despite the academic-sounding name, the idea is simple: rather than controlling every decision, coaches give athletes some ownership, listen to their views, explain why they are being asked to do something, and help them feel capable of doing it.

A meta-analysis of 131 studies involving almost 39,000 participants found autonomy-supportive coaching was associated with stronger motivation and wellbeing.

But does it improve performance?

One field experiment with 33 coaches and 64 athletes preparing for the 2012 Paralympic Games found autonomy-supportive coaching helped these athletes win more medals.

Research suggests the relationship between coach and athlete is crucial in elite sport.

Ted’s relationship with talented but tempestuous striker Jamie Tartt is a good example of this.

They begin with little trust or mutual understanding. Yet Ted continues to invest in him when things become difficult.

Gradually, Jamie begins to trust Ted, accept his coaching and put the needs of his teammates ahead of himself. Their relationship develops through trust, respect, cooperation and mutual understanding.

This reflects something Ted tells journalist Trent Crimm early in the series. For him, coaching is not ultimately about wins and losses – success is about helping his players become the best versions of themselves.

But Ted ends up influencing more than his players’ motivation and relationships. He also helps shape what they believe.

It’s not all warm and fuzzy

Coaches constantly communicate expectations through what they say and how they behave.

Over time, these messages can shape what athletes believe about themselves, their training and what they can achieve. A scoping review my colleagues and I recently published found that beliefs can be shaped not only by an intervention, but also by who delivers it and the relationship they have with the recipient.

Communication, confidence, empathy, enthusiasm and optimism can all play a role.

None of this means great coaching is simply about being nice. Athletes still need honest feedback, clear expectations and accountability.

Supporting autonomy does not mean allowing athletes to do whatever they want. Creating an environment where athletes can speak openly and make mistakes does not mean lowering standards.

Ted demonstrates the distinction when he confronts Jamie over his attitude to training.

Caring about an athlete and challenging them are not mutually exclusive. The best modern coaches combine high support with high expectations. They need technical and tactical expertise but they also need the ability to build relationships, communicate belief, listen and adapt.

The ‘Lasso Way’ works

Overall, modern coaches create environments in which athletes want to improve.

One exchange between Ted and Trent in Season 3 encapsulates this, when the journalist suddenly realises Ted’s coaching has transformed the squad from a bunch of individuals into a team capable of “total football”:

Trent: It’s going to work!

Ted: Great! What is?

Trent: Total football!

Ted: Ok…?

Trent: And I’ll tell you why.

Ted: Why?

Trent: The Lasso Way! You haven’t switched tactics in a week.

Ted: I haven’t?

Trent: No! You’ve done this over three seasons!

Ted: I have?

Trent: Yes! By slowly but surely building a club-wide culture of trust and support through thousands of imperceptible moments, all leading to their inevitable conclusion: total football.

Ted: Well, how about that!

Perhaps Trent was right: the “Lasso Way” was built through thousands of seemingly insignificant moments.

Modern coaching research suggests those moments may not be so insignificant after all.

Vincent Kelly is an elected director of Exercise & Sport Science Australia.

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/11/would-ted-lasso-be-a-good-sports-coach-in-real-life/

Since the Bondi Beach terror attack last December, there has been heightened attention on antisemitism in Australia, as evidenced by the ongoing Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion.

As with any form of prejudice, combating antisemitism requires understanding how it operates, why it persists over time and across populations, and how it can be addressed effectively. And as with all forms of prejudice, these questions cannot be answered without high-quality research.

Yet, research on antisemitism faces a double bind, which is preventing progress.

On one hand, there is too little of it in Australia. The size of the Jewish population and the assumption that general research on prejudice can sufficiently address antisemitism limit its funding appeal.

On the other hand, the research that does exist can be subjected to intense contestation, especially when findings do not align with commonly held viewpoints.

A review I conducted of journal articles published by Australia-affiliated academics between 1990 and 2025 demonstrates this effect. I identified only 173 articles on antisemitism, compared with 3,640 on racism.

More significantly, most articles were on historical forms of antisemitism, with only 26 presenting new empirical research. By contrast, 13 articles presented no new data. Instead, they disputed the presence of antisemitism or argued that claims of antisemitism were being weaponised for political purposes.

Australia is not alone. In 2024, a US research team published one of the first quantitative studies of antisemitism in the US healthcare sector. It was soon criticised in an editorial in another journal for its methods and analysis. The authors responded by pointing out their methods were on par with research on other forms of prejudice.

This creates a vicious cycle. A limited evidence base is used as a reason to question how widespread or serious the problem is. Efforts to strengthen that evidence base are then challenged over their definitions, samples, methods or alleged political motives.

What we learn when we study antisemitism

The recent special issue of the journal American Psychologist on antisemitism and psychology provides a useful illustration of what’s possible when experts focus on how antisemitism operates in practice.

Some articles tackled prior assumptions about antisemitism. My article with Wen Shan of the Singapore University of Social Sciences tackled the assumption that perceived Jewish success drives prejudice against Jews. We found that people in China admire Jewish success and try to emulate it, both materially and morally, suggesting envy is not necessarily a driver of antisemitism.

Similarly, Maria Babińska of Université Libre de Bruxelles and her colleagues found that in Poland and Germany, antisemitism was a predictor of Holocaust distortions, while Holocaust distortions were not a predictor of antisemitism. This suggests collective guilt over the Holocaust is not a driver of antisemitism.

Other articles examined the role of ideology. Britt Hadar of Reichman University in Israel found a key driver of anti-Jewish prejudice is the stereotyping of Jews as powerful. However, the rationale for this differs, depending on political ideology. Those on the right perceive Jews as threatening to the dominance of their own group, while those on the left perceive Jews as obstructing equality between people.

Jordan Moon of the University of Southampton and his colleagues examined how ideology impacts people’s responses to prejudice against Jews. They found progressives reacted more negatively than conservatives to someone expressing anti-Jewish prejudice without justification. However, this changed when prejudice was justified by opposition to Israel’s treatment of Palestinians.

And several studies addressed the complex relationship between antisemitism and perceptions of Israel. Johannes Due Enstad of the Norwegian Institute for Social Research found those who believe Israel’s treatment of Palestinians is equivalent to Nazi Germany’s treatment of Jews are more willing to justify harassment or violence against Jews.

Rutgers University psychologist Kent Harber and his colleagues found negative attitudes toward Israel were partly driven by stereotypes that Jews are dishonest, care only about their own group, consider themselves superior and expect special treatment.

These attitudes were also shaped by conspiracy beliefs portraying Israel as secretly engineering or exploiting conflict to advance its interests, and portraying Jewish organisations as using money, pressure and allegations of antisemitism to build support for Israel and suppress criticism.

Finally, Gal Gutman of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and Michael Gilead found negative Jewish stereotypes commonly found in the West also exist in large language models. This suggests artificial intelligence may reproduce and amplify anti-Jewish stereotypes.

What we need next

The key takeaway from these studies: antisemitism has distinctive features that cannot be assumed to operate in the same way as other forms of prejudice. This is why it warrants dedicated attention.

So let’s debate theories, challenge measures, improve samples and test competing explanations. But let’s not delegitimise research simply because we dislike the findings.

And to further advance our understanding of antisemitism, we need more research, involving larger studies. This will help us identify effective ways of reducing it.

Josh Keller is a member of the Australian Academic Alliance Against Antisemitism (5A).

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/11/lets-stop-arguing-about-antisemitism-and-focus-on-researching-it/

It has a dull title – the Crimes Amendment Act 2026 – but one aspect of its provisions has had plenty of publicity: the expanded right to make “citizen’s arrests”.

Aimed primarily at giving retail staff greater powers to combat petty crime, and security guards more power to hold people, the amendments raise an important question: what are the risks if people misunderstand or misuse these new powers?

In fact, “citizens” do not really have powers of arrest – unless they are asked by a police officer to help arrest someone committing (or suspected of having committed) an imprisonable offence or disturbing the peace.

This is covered under section 315 of the Crimes Act 1961. What has changed is the defence available to someone detaining or using force against someone else, which might otherwise be a criminal offence in its own right.

The main change is to section 35 of the Crimes Act. Previously, it provided a defence in limited circumstances: at night (defined as between 9pm and 6am) if someone was committing an offence against the Crimes Act; and during the day only if the offence carried three years’ imprisonment or more.

In reality, most people don’t know which offences committed during the day would qualify – and offences such as low-value theft and common assault would not.

Complicating factors

The new wording provides a defence whatever the time of day and whatever the maximum sentence for the offence. But three complexities remain:

• it only applies if the person is “found committing” an offence – a past offence will not do

• it only applies to offences under the Crimes Act – driving offences, drugs offences or offences against multiple other laws require you to know if they have their own separate defences

• and “reasonable suspicion” is not enough – if no offence is being committed, there is no defence.

There are other potential complications. For example, what if the alleged offender is very young? If they’re under ten, the law says they cannot commit an offence; under 14, they cannot commit an offence if they don’t know their action is wrong or against the law.

What if they are mentally impaired to the extent they cannot stand trial and be convicted? All these factors could lead to court cases to determine the correct interpretation.

The Crimes Amendment Act 2026 also adds an obligation to section 35 and various other limited defences in the Crimes Act, requiring the arresting person to contact the police “as soon as practicable” and to follow their directions. If not, the protection of the defence is lost.

What about using force?

The use of force is regulated separately by section 39 of the Crimes Act. It allows “such force as may be necessary to overcome any” resistance.

That means unnecessary force is illegal. Importantly, this is not what the person using the force thinks is necessary – it means what is objectively necessary.

The law prevents this defence if “reasonable means in a less violent manner” could be used. And it forbids force intended or likely to cause death or serious bodily harm, unless the police call on you to assist.

This has been changed to specify that the force used can include “physical or mechanical restraints”. But the limitation of force being necessary remains.

Of course, something necessary in the heat of the moment may become unnecessary once people are calm. We can expect to see future legal cases about whether a continued use of restraint was necessary.

There has also been a change to defences relating to property, such as in a shoplifting situation.

Section 52 of the Crimes Act allows “reasonable force” to be used to stop the theft or recover the property. Previously, it expressly prevented striking or causing bodily harm. A grapple was fine, but not a punch.

It has been amended to remove the prohibition on striking or doing bodily harm – but it still has to be reasonable force. So a punch (or more) will still be unlawful if not found reasonable.

A legal can of worms

What if the person detaining or using force against someone steps outside the limits of these defences?

Detaining someone unlawfully and without consent, intending to confine them, is kidnapping. That carries up to 14 years’ imprisonment.

Unlawful use of force starts as common assault, which under the Crimes Act carries a one-year sentence. There are more serious offences if the force causes an injury or serious harm.

Finally, we need to remember these amendments cut both ways: a person who is wrongly detained or has improper force used against them can also rely on the expanded provisions to try to arrest the person who has challenged them.

They may also try to claim self-defence, which allows reasonable force against a perceived assault. If everyone believes the law is on their side, the result could be escalating consequences.

There is a more fundamental problem here. Police officers have training in methods of restraint, partly because some actions can be very dangerous. For example, positional asphyxia can kill people who cannot breathe properly, and some people are more susceptible to it.

Situations that warrant a citizen’s arrest or the use of force will generally be stressful enough. It’s debatable whether a potential legal can of worms improves matters.

Kris Gledhill is a member of the Executive Committee of the Criminal Bar Association, and is working on a criminal justice project funded by the Borrin Foundation. The views express here are his own..

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/11/expanded-citizens-arrest-powers-could-open-a-legal-can-of-worms-heres-what-to-know/

By Rashneel Kumar, editor of the Cook Islands News

An exclusive poll reveals a tight election with no clear winner, as the surging Cook Islands United Party (CIUP) challenges the governing Cook Islands Party (CIP) while cost-of-living concerns dominate voter focus.

With just two days to go before the country heads to the elections on Wednesday (Thursday NZ time), a Cook Islands News election poll shows no clear winner, indicating a coalition will be required to form the next government.

None of the political parties contesting the election achieved a majority in a sample of voters — representing just over one percent of those registered to vote — polled across the country.

• READ MORE: Other Cook Islands elections reports

The governing CIP, which is seeking a fifth consecutive term, holds a narrow baseline lead with 30.5 percent popular support but faces a fierce challenge from the surging CIUP at 26.7 percent.

The Democratic Party, which lost ground in the 2022 general election, has slumped further in the polls to 8.6 percent — tying with the Independents.

With more than a quarter of the electorate (25.7 percent) still undecided and Independents capturing over 20 percent of votes in the Pa Enua (outer islands), no single party currently possesses a clear, unassisted path to a 13-seat parliamentary majority.

CIP leader and caretaker Prime Minister Mark Brown said they were grateful to be in front, which matched what their candidates were hearing at the doors — “a lot of quiet support for a team that has delivered”.

Taking ‘nothing for granted’
“But a lead is not a result, and we take nothing for granted,” Brown told Cook Islands News. “With a field this wide, every vote has to be earned, and we intend to keep earning them right up to election day.

“The only poll that counts is the one on August 12, and that one belongs entirely to our people.”

Compared to previous electoral baseline, Teariki Heather-led Cook Islands United Party has experienced a major surge and has effectively displaced the Democratic Party as the primary challenger to the incumbent CIP.

Heather welcomed the poll, saying they were “grateful” for the surge in support and adding, “we [moved] at least from a minority party to a major party now”.

He said he expected this level of support and foresaw becoming a major challenger to the governing CIP.

Democratic Party leader Tina Pupuke-Browne said they took the poll result “seriously”.

“Of course I would like to see the Democrats polling higher, but I am not going to dismiss a poll simply because one part of it is uncomfortable,” Pupuke-Browne said.

25.7 percent undecided
She noted that 25.7 percent of those polled remain undecided.

“That tells me many people are still weighing up their choices and looking closely at what each party and candidate is offering,” Pupuke-Browne said.

“I do not believe any political party is entitled to anyone’s vote, including people who want a change of government. We have to earn their support.”

She said the Democrats would continue to do that by talking about the issues people raise with them every day, “the cost of living, support for families and pensioners, opportunities for our young people, the Pa Enua, better public services, and accountable government”.

“We are putting forward a serious alternative. Ultimately, it is for the voters, not politicians, to decide who they trust to form the next government.”

Brown said he respected undecided voters.

“In a serious election, weighing it up carefully is exactly what a thoughtful voter should do, and I would never take their vote for granted,” he said.

‘Look at the record’
“My message to them is simple: look at the record, and look at the plan. Over 10 years we rebuilt the economy after covid, halved the government’s debt, lifted pensions, the Child Benefit and the minimum wage, and kept the buses free.

“Our manifesto carries that forward with five clear promises.

“For us it’s important that we keep working to prove to those undecided voters that we are the government of choice.”

United Party’s Heather asked the undecided voters to “reconsider and work with the United Party, because definitely we need change”.

“Obviously, there is quite a number of those who are not sure who they would decide — that’s what the poll says, but honestly, I believe, the people will vote on the 12th for United Party … the people just sitting on the fence and not coming out loud, but on the 12th, they will come out loud and you will have the absolute figures then.”

Incumbent Mark Brown is the preferred prime minister at 35.2 percent followed by Heather at 19 percent and Pupuke-Browne trails at 5.7 percent.

A majority — 50.5 percent — of respondents across the Pa Enua and Rarotonga identified the cost of living and inflation — including fuel prices, water and power bills, housing, transportation and consumer goods — as their primary concern.

Republished from the Cook islands News with permission.

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/10/two-way-battle-no-clear-majority-as-cook-islands-prepares-for-polls/

When I sit down to fill in my first Australian Census in 2026, one question I will be watching closely is a familiar one. Back home in India, “What is your religion?” was never really a question – although it is asked in the census.

But religion looks different in Australia. The first option for religious affiliation on the census is “no religion”, before Catholic, Anglican, Islam, Hinduism, other options, and a free-text field.

It is a small design choice with a surprisingly long and, at times, politically loaded history.

The slow start – and a rapid shift

Australia has asked about religion in every census since 1911.

In that first census there was no “no religion” box at all. If you did not have a religion, you had to write it in yourself, in the margin.

Only about 0.4% of Australians, roughly 10,000 people in a young, overwhelmingly Christian society, recorded “no religion”, alongside another 14,000 who were recorded as “indefinite” — including agnostics and freethinkers – and 86,000 who refused to answer the question.

We do not know a great deal about who those 10,000 people were, apart from the fact they dared to write outside the lines on a government form.

They were likely members of Australia’s secular organisations, like the Sunday Free Discussion Society or the Victorian Association of Progressive Spiritualists, both established in Melbourne in the 1870s, and reflected across the country. Or maybe they identified as “rationalists” who argued against religion and for science.

By the 1960s, Europeans and North Americans were seeing unexpected changes in religious identity, Australia was not far behind. Australians became more diverse in their theology, and their ways of worshipping and the social norms that were associated with religiosity also shifted.

But people still said they were religious. For decades the number of people recording “no religion” on the census barely moved – it was still under 1% by the mid-1960s.

This changed in 1971, when the Australian Bureau of Statistics added a simple instruction to the form: if you had no religion, write “none”. This gave people explicit permission to say what was already true for many.

The effect was immediate. “No religion” jumped from under 1% to 6.7% of the population in a single census.

The White Australia Policy had been abolished, increasing the diversity of migrants – and with it, the diversity of religions. At the same time, the social and class status linked to Christianity in Australia was becoming less prevalent, and more Australians started to disassociate themselves away from the religion they had been raised in.

Losing our religion

From there, the number climbed steadily. More people migrated to Australia, more Australians turned away from the religions they were raised in, and more Australians were comfortable with saying they didn’t consider themselves religious.

In 1991, “no religion” was introduced as one of the checkbox options. It sat at the bottom of the list, and 12.9% of Australians selected it that year. The number of Australians describing themselves as having no religion was 16.6% by 1996, around 18.7% by 2006 and 22.3% by 2011.

By then, it was the second-largest individual category in the country, behind only Catholicism.

In 2016, “no religion” became the first option on the list, and it became the largest single category, representing just under 30% of the country.

By 2021 it climbed to 38.9% – overtaking every individual Christian domination, but lower than Christianity’s 43.9% overall. It was the first census where less than half of Australians described themselves as Christian.

It is easy to think of immigration as simply adding religious diversity to Australia. But the true picture is more nuanced.

Around one-quarter of people selecting “no religion” in 2021 were born overseas.

Australia’s growing secular population is not simply the result of Australian-born people moving away from religion. It is also because some immigrants arrive already identifying with no religion, and feel more comfortable expressing that identity after settling in Australia.

But some might feel fearful about recording their religion in the face of Islamophobia, Antisemitism or other forms of religious discrimination. Religious groups have been campaigning for their members to record their faith honestly – even if some people might otherwise not be tempted to. Of course, non-religious groups have been campaigning, too.

I had half-joking conversation with immigrant friends and peers: suggesting that ticking “no religion” might be the quieter option, to not draw any more attention to an already-scrutinised identity.

Nobody can measure such an instinct showing up in the data; the ABS cannot see motive, and Australia’s census privacy protections are strict. Even if it happens only to a small extent, it would mean something different: not people feeling free to say they have no religion, but some choosing it to avoid being noticed.

That is the story I will be thinking about when I finally tick my own box.

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

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/10/australians-have-said-they-have-no-religion-on-every-census-weve-had-and-it-is-growing-every-year/

You know the feeling. Your account is suspended, your refund request is refused, or you’re still being charged for a cancelled subscription.

So you go to the company’s website for help and you find a chatbot. It offers a menu that doesn’t include your situation. There is no option to speak to a person. Eventually you give up.

Since the start of 2023, Australians have made 1,780 complaints about online retailers, marketplaces, search engines and social media platforms to the telecommunications industry ombudsman. In 2025, complaints were up 20% on the year before.

Account access problems were the most common problem, followed by disputes over charges and fees. More than seven in ten involved just five companies: Meta, Google, Microsoft, Apple and Hubbl.

Unfortunately, all those complaints about online services made to the telecoms industry ombudsman fall outside its jurisdiction. No existing ombuds scheme can make a binding decision about them.

We need a dispute resolution system that can deal with these complaints, and there are precedents for this.

Digital problems cost the economy

The Consumer Policy Research Centre found four in five Australians had a problem with a digital service in the past year, and that unresolved problems cost an estimated $497 million annually. Two in three who complained were left dissatisfied.

Dissatisfaction was highest over refunds people believed they were entitled to (84%), followed by having no way to contact someone who could help (83%).

The centre says when people complained to online businesses and platforms, many had to deal with virtual customer service portals and AI chatbots that are unhelpful, give no explanation or offer inaccurate advice.

Who can deal with these complaints?

The government’s scams prevention framework offers a model. It requires banks, telcos and global digital platforms to join an external
dispute resolution scheme run by the Australian Financial Complaints Authority by September 1.

However, this scheme is limited to scams and won’t cover the sort of account or platform issues outlined above.

Under Europe’s Digital Services Act, platforms must have a proper complaints process, and decisions cannot be made by machines alone. Qualified staff must supervise them. If the platform still gets it wrong, users can take the dispute to an independent body certified by the government, which must decide within 90 days.

For example, one dispute settlement body, Appeals Centre Europe, has ruled on 1,500 disputes and overturned more than three quarters of the platforms’ original decisions.

Maybe AI could be part of the solution

Any dispute resolution scheme covering online platforms would face huge numbers of cases with similar problems. This is where chatbots and AI could actually become part of the solution.

British Columbia’s Civil Resolution Tribunal guides people through an interactive Solution Explorer, a rules-based chatbot that asks set questions and returns tailored information based on set rules, before any human decision-maker gets involved.

In research my colleagues and I published in the UNSW Law Journal, we compared rules-based chatbots with generative AI chatbots to see how they can help people with small-value claims.

Generative AI’s ability to provide personalised and targeted responses is genuinely attractive.

But generative AI also hallucinates, confidently inventing legal rules and cases that don’t exist. Even when it isn’t fabricating a source, it can
produce highly convincing advice that is simply wrong.

That risk falls hardest on the people these systems are meant to help. A consumer who can’t afford a lawyer is also the person least equipped to notice when an AI has made up the law. And the error is invisible: told wrongly that you have no claim, you simply walk away, and nobody ever finds out. No feedback reaches the system that produced the error.

Getting the design right

The Victorian Law Reform Commission sets out sensible principles in its report on AI in Victoria’s courts, including one clear recommendation that AI must not make the final decision. A person must decide the outcome.

Before any new resolution scheme integrates AI tools, it must decide which tools will be used, for what functions, and what safeguards will reduce potential risks.

The chatbots people are stuck in today aren’t broken. They are working exactly as designed – for the online companies that built them.

Australia rarely gets to design a dispute resolution scheme from scratch, and it is building one now as part of its scams prevention framework.

Whether technology ends up serving consumers or stonewalling them is not a question about AI. It’s a question about who the system is designed for, and whether there is always, at the end of it, someone to turn to.

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

Original source: https://analysis1.mil-osi.com/2026/08/10/complaints-about-online-platforms-often-go-nowhere-ai-could-actually-be-part-of-the-solution/