Tag: SB001

Many non-communicable diseases, such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease and certain cancers can be can be prevented by modifying behaviour such as tobacco use, dietary habits and physical activity. But the rise of such diseases shows current methods of health communication are inadequate.

The Hayne royal commission into misconduct in the banking, superannuation and financial services industry found Australia’s responsible lending requirements were correctly calibrated.

The COVID epidemic in Papua New Guinea has significantly accelerated, judging by the available reports of case numbers.

Testing for coronavirus is increasingly recognised as essential for getting life back to normal. Free rapid testing is now being offered to the families of all pupils in England under the government’s plan to reopen schools. Similarly, every person in Germany will soon be entitled to a weekly test.

Australia’s interests will be well served by a greater capability in pharmaceutical and medical manufacturing. I was interested to hear the insights from two significant companies in this sphere, ResMed and CSL.

On March 2, 2021, Microsoft published information about four critical vulnerabilities in its widely used Exchange email server software that are being actively exploited. It also released security updates for all versions of Exchange back to 2010.

New research published this week in the British Medical Journal found the coronavirus variant originating in the United Kingdom, called B.1.1.7, is substantially more deadly than the original strain of SARS-CoV-2.

With 43% of enrolled voters counted in yesterday’s Western Australian election, the ABC was calling Labor wins in 49 of the 59 lower house seats, to just two for the Liberals and three for the Nationals. Five seats remained in doubt.

In the autumn of 2020, I was contacted by the field archaeology unit of the Swedish National Historical Museums, who are also known as the Archaeologists. They were excavating at a Viking-age settlement at Viggbyholm just north of Stockholm. During routine metal detecting of the site, they had located a ...

Japan is currently restricted by its anti-militarist constitution, which prohibits the use of armed forces to resolve international conflict. Many of those relatively receptive to Trump’s demands are also in favour of revising the constitution to remove these constraints, not to mention being firmly in favour of his hard line ...

When clinical studies emerged showing that people who test positive for SARS-CoV-2 shed the virus in their stool, the sewer seemed like an obvious place to look for it. Wastewater surveillance can be used at the community level to see potential outbreak clusters before clinical diagnosis, especially in areas where ...

March 26 marks 50 years since the start of Bangladesh’s liberation war, a bloody nine-month campaign that culminated in the nation’s independence on Dec. 16, 1971.

Policy is the set of principles and goals that guide governmental decision-making. Congress may have the sole power to write new laws, but it does not have a monopoly on making policy.

Best to avoid the media just now if you’re squeamish about seeing needles. Politicians and other notables are rushing to bare arms for the jab, encouraging confidence in the COVID vaccines.

Though we might not think of the spine as readily as we do heart disease or other conditions as reasons for illness, it represents a considerable burden of disease for the Australian health system.

The Morrison government’s plan to halve the cost of up to 800,000 air tickets for interstate travellers is a rescue package of sorts for Australia’s tourism industry.

Reynolds made the remark to her staff on February 15. It referred not to Higgins’ allegation of rape but to her claim she was not adequately supported afterwards.

If Apple and other tech companies have their way, it will only become harder to have our phones and other devices repaired by third-party businesses.

Among the many explanations put forward for soaring home prices, one we hear repeatedly is zoning — the regulations that govern the purposes for which land can be used, including how densely people can be housed in different locations.

Keir Starmer’s honeymoon period as leader of the Labour Party appears to be over. He had a robust start when he took over in April 2020, winning over large swaths of party members and outperforming Boris Johnson in polls on “most trusted” and as “preferred choice for prime minister”.

On March 11 2020, the World Health Organization declared that the COVID-19 public health emergency had become a pandemic: 114 countries were affected, there were 121,500 confirmed cases and more than 4,000 people had succumbed to the virus.

The vast arsenal of fiscal, monetary and legal measures used by Australian governments to offset the COVID-induced economic crisis have worked well. They did not prevent a recession (popularly defined as two quarters of negative GDP growth) but things could have been much worse.

Nearly 800,000 half-price air tickets for travel to and from holiday areas will be provided under a $1.2 billion program to support aviation and tourism, to be announced by the Morrison government on Thursday.

The business conditions unit said it could run a survey of 1,200 businesses, but that it would cost money — $20,000. Gruen told them to spend it. The survey began on March 16, ran for three days and was published on March 26, a record-quick ten days after the first ...

Chronic pain affects about 3.4 million Australians. Internationally, almost one-third of people with chronic non-cancer pain take opioids to manage their condition.

Scientists have long known that certain ingredients are needed to support life, especially water and key organic chemicals like carbon. In recent years, both ingredients have been found on giant asteroids and other celestial bodies.

This pollen exposure isn’t just a problem for people with hay fever. It’s a reaction to pollen in general. Even types of pollen that typically don’t cause allergic reactions were correlated with an increase in COVID-19 infections.

This is more than enough coronavirus vaccines for the entire population — and then some. But with vaccine hesitancy on the rise in Australia, questions remain over what methods the government will use to persuade enough people to get the jab.

Pope Francis’s historic trip to Iraq, including visits to the war-torn north, has been deeply significant. It is one that needs to be seen in the context of peace rather than politics.

Rather than tracking and targeting you on an individual basis, Google’s alternative groups you instead into a crowd of people with similar generalised interests. Google argues this grants users more privacy. This sits oddly with the reassurance to advertisers that the new technique is at least 95% as effective as ...

The 2011 disaster delivered a devastating one-two punch to the Fukushima plant. First, the magnitude 9.0 earthquake knocked out off-site electric power. Next, the tsunami breached the plant’s protective sea wall and swamped portions of the site.

The US$1,400 direct checks to people are the most expensive and perhaps most popular part of the $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package racing its way through Congress right now.

Brisbane is in pole position to win the rights to stage the Olympic and Paralympic Games in 2032, after being named as the preferred candidate city last month. The excitement is building, but the hard economic realities of staging a mega-event can’t be ignored.

As Aotearoa New Zealand begins the third week of COVID-19 vaccinations, the focus turns from the 12,000-strong border workforce to their families and household contacts.

Despite living in dynamic environments and facing an uncertain future due to climate change, New Zealanders generally expect their land and property rights will endure indefinitely.

The governors of Texas and Mississippi announced that they were rescinding their statewide mask mandates and allowing restaurants and other businesses to return to 100% capacity in early March. The moves come while new infection numbers in the U.S. are still higher than they were in September and just ahead ...

In recent Australian electoral history, Labor was crushed at the March 2011 NSW election, and at the March 2012 Queensland election. In NSW 2011, the Coalition under Barry O'Farrell won the two party vote by 64.2-35.8, and Labor won just 20 of the 93 lower house seats.

Defence Minister Linda Reynolds will miss a week of the Senate and a week of Senate estimates, after getting a medical certificate to extend her leave until April 2.

The wealthiest 1% controlled 39% of all wealth in 2016, up from less than 30% in 1989. At the same time, the bottom 90% held less than a quarter of America’s wealth, compared with more than a third in 1989.

Weather patterns across the U.S. have felt like a roller coaster ride for the past several months. December and January were significantly warmer than average in many locations, followed by February’s intense cold wave and a dramatic warmup.

The Johnson & Johnson vaccine has been hailed as a game changer. It requires only a single dose rather than two doses spaced weeks apart, and it does not need freezer storage, making it a natural fit for hard-to-reach rural areas and underserved communities with limited access to health care ...

The oil industry’s lobbying arm, the American Petroleum Institute, suggested in a new draft statement that it might support Congress putting a price on carbon emissions to combat climate change, even though oil and gas are major sources of those greenhouse gas emissions.

The federal government routinely spends amounts in the millions, billions and, more recently, trillions, yet these numbers are far beyond what individuals encounter on a daily basis, making it hard for most people – and probably lawmakers – to wrap their heads around them.

The most important feature of blockchain for art is that blockchains are impossible to change. An artist can provide a proof authenticating an artwork which can never be altered. This proof can then be sold at auction passing it from artist to collector, making blockchain art highly liquid.

Regulations brought in following the UK’s departure from the EU have delayed the export of live shellfish to Europe, causing entire lorry loads of lobsters and langoustines to expire in Scotland’s ports.

Human civilisation is on a collision course with the laws of ecology. Experts have long warned of zoonotic diseases jumping the species barrier as a result of growing human encroachment on nature.

The idea of relocating Whitehall departments to the regions has a long but rather mundane history in the UK. Already, more than 80% of civil servants are based outside London – probably higher than most of us assume, given Britain’s highly centralised political system.

There’s a global shortage in semiconductors, and it’s becoming increasingly serious. The US is currently reviewing of its supply of the technology, following a landmark executive order from President Joe Biden.

More than 17,000 earthquakes have been recorded in the south-west of Iceland, in the Reykjanes Peninsula, during the past week. People living in the area have been advised to be extra careful due to dangers of landslides and rockfall. Many of the larger earthquakes have even been felt in Iceland’s ...

Italy has blocked the shipment of AstraZeneca vaccines based on export authorisation rules introduced by the European Union in January. These rules require vaccine manufacturers in the EU to seek authorisation to export vaccines to some countries outside the bloc.