Darwin, Palmerston and Katherine in Northern Territory enter lockdown on midday Monday until midday Thursday after a new case of Covid-19 was recorded overnight. ACT extends Covid-19 lockdown to 2 September as cases and exposure sites continue to grow
► Subscribe to Guardian Australia on YouTube
Japan is reportedly set to extend it state of emergency in Tokyo and other regions while Sydney has reported seven deaths over the past 24 hours, its deadliest day of the pandemic so far
It’s Robyn Vinter here in the UK, taking over from Helen.
If you’re in lockdown and finding yourself increasingly grumpy and/or sluggish, Guardian Australia’s Alyx Gorman has investigated how you can best avoid “lockdown brain”:
That’s it from me, Helen Livingstone, I’m handing over to my UK colleague Robyn Vinter.
Here’s a brief rundown of what’s been happening so far:
Continue reading...Leaders from the US, UK, Australia, New Zealand and Canada have reacted to the news that the Taliban has begun taking control of Kabul after a 20-year mission to Afghanistan led by western countries. UK prime minister Boris Johnsons said, ‘we don't want anybody bilaterally recognising the Taliban’, while New Zealand’s prime minister Jacinda Ardern said conversations over how the new regime is treated will be for some time in the future. US secretary of state Antony Blinken blamed ‘the inability of Afghan security forces to defend their country’ for the quick takeover while Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau said he was ‘heartbroken’ at the news. Australian prime minister Scott Morrison said that fighting for freedom is ‘always worth it whatever the outcome.’
530,000 of the new doses to go to 20-to-39-year-olds living in the 12 hotspot LGAs as NSW struggles to contain outbreak
One million additional doses of the Pfizer vaccine are on the way to Australia, after the Polish government answered the Morrison government’s international pleas for help and as New South Wales authorities struggle to contain the state’s Covid outbreak.
A total of 530,000 of the new doses, due to arrive in Australia late on Sunday, have been quarantined for use in NSW for 20-to-39-year-olds living in the 12 hotspot Sydney local government areas.
Continue reading...12 Sydney LGAs to get half of the one million extra Pfizer doses secured from Poland; rapid antigen testing to be trialled in some Sydney aged care homes. This blog is now closed
We’ll leave it there for now. Here are today’s main developments:
Police are cracking down on large gatherings in breach of Victoria’s lockdown restrictions, reports AAP.
In the inner city, dozens congregated for a takeaway drink pub crawl event on the streets of Richmond on Saturday, while in Northcote about 200 people gathered for a street party.
Continue reading...Both nature and nurture contribute to incredible recall skills and for those who have them there are benefits and drawbacks
“17 April 2001?” I ask Krystyna Glowacki, 24, over Zoom.
“That was a Tuesday,” she shoots back after less than half a beat. It was.
Continue reading...Until relatively recently, lethal infectious diseases stalked the lives of Australian children – including my father, Tom Keneally. Vaccines have saved millions
It’s 1940, and a five-year-old boy lies in an oxygen tent. He struggles for breath and hallucinates that his leaden toy soldiers are alive and marching around the room, monstering him with their bayonets.
He has diphtheria, a disease also known as The Strangling Angel. There is a vaccine, but not every child has been inoculated. The bacterial infection creates a membrane across the back of the throat, cutting off air supply.
Continue reading...NSW premier Gladys Berejiklian announces 466 cases, four deaths and 5km limit for greater Sydney
That’s where I’ll leave you for tonight. It’s been a big day. Let’s recap what we learned.
No public holidays for Parkes...
While the new PHO isn’t available, interesting to note that the Govt took no time at all to cancel the public holidays impacted by the lockdown… ♂️ pic.twitter.com/5uEtFIpKiE
Continue reading...Australian Medical Association says NSW health system ‘can no longer manage’ after record Delta case numbers
New South Wales has been forced into a snap statewide lockdown after enduring its worst day of the Covid-19 pandemic so far, with 466 new cases and four deaths.
Australia’s most populous state has tightened restrictions and imposed new $5,000 fines for lockdown breaches, ahead of an expected worsening of numbers in coming days.
Continue reading...A noisy minority in NSW’s northern rivers are pushing back against Covid-19 restrictions
Benny Zable has lived in Nimbin on and off since 1973, when he arrived in town for the Aquarius festival – the event that seeded counterculture and escapist lifestyles into the northern rivers of New South Wales.
The 75-year-old artist and activist is a storied figure in this part of Australia, now a heartland for alternative health and wellness advocates, and notorious for low immunisation rates. He was also the first person from Nimbin to show up for a Covid-19 vaccine.
Continue reading...A Northern Territory supreme court ruling will allow Zachary Rolfe to argue he is immune from criminal liability under a clause in NT law
A jury could potentially find that a Northern Territory police officer accused of murdering a young Indigenous man during an outback arrest is immune from criminal liability, judges have ruled.
Constable Zachary Rolfe, 29, shot Kumanjayi Walker, 19, in the remote community of Yuendumu in November 2019, according to assumed facts released by the NT supreme court.
Continue reading...Two new Covid cases in ACT; NSW records 390 cases, two deaths; Queensland records seven cases, Victoria records 15 new cases; son of Sydney man who travelled to Byron Bay also charged. Follow all the day’s news
Barr has acknowledged the long waiting times at testing sites throughout the state, and has asked people who have been contacted by ACT Health as close or casual contacts to come forward as priority for testing:
We will be expanding testing capacity, hours of operations and the number of people at each existing testing centre can manage in a day but yesterday was our all-time record number of tests. We expect today will be even busier and we have stood additional testing capacity.
So please, if you do not have symptoms and you are not an identified close contact, you do not need to be tested today. Please, stay-at-home. There will be an opportunity to be tested in the days ahead but the priority right now is to test those people who ACT health have contacted.
The ACT has recorded two new Covid-19 cases, bringing the total to six. It has identified 1,862 close contacts and that number will grow.
There are more casual contacts. There were more than 2,000 tests yesterday and results have been received on about 1,330 of them.
Continue reading...Friends rally support from Canberra to Washington to ask Chinese government to show compassion to Lei who is separated from her children
Two months before she was detained by Chinese authorities on opaque national security grounds, the Australian journalist Cheng Lei was catching up with her colleagues from the state-owned China Global Television Network (CGTN) for dinner.
Gathering at a Japanese restaurant in Beijing, the group enjoyed multiple courses and a few drinks, while sharing banter about work.
Continue reading...ACT begins seven-day lockdown; more restrictions for NSW as state confirms 345 new local cases and two deaths; high court declines to hear Murugappan family case; Queensland reports 10 new cases; Victoria records 21 new cases. Follow all the day’s news
Chief Executive of Western NSW Local Health District, Scott McLachlan, tells @PatsKarvelas that the majority of COVID cases in regional NSW outbreaks at the moment - including Dubbo and Walgett - are Aboriginal people.
Staying with the Walgett outbreak, my colleague Nino Bucci has been digging into this story.
Related: NSW inmate released on bail before prison received positive Covid test result
Continue reading...Health authorities yet to identify the source of the new case, who spent several days in the community while infectious
The Australian Capital Territory will go into lockdown after recording a locally acquired Covid-19 case for the first time in more than a year.
The chief minister, Andrew Barr, announced a seven-day lockdown from 5pm Thursday after a man in his 20s tested positive for Covid-19 on Thursday morning.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Spoof software likely to cause difficulties for contact tracers in the event of outbreaks
A fake check-in app is being used by Covid-19 conspiracy theorists and anti-lockdown groups to dupe business owners and keep location data out of the hands of contact tracers in at least three states.
Guardian Australia can reveal that conspiratorial websites and Telegram groups with at least 15,000 followers are sharing links that allow users to generate fake check-in confirmations on their phones.
Continue reading...After 20 years on the ground, Australian and allied forces have rapidly exited Afghanistan – ending Australia’s longest war. The Taliban has launched a nationwide offensive and violently acquired territory from the Afghan government, leaving local workers who once assisted the Australian defence force fearing for their lives. In this extract from Guardian Australia's Full Story podcast, Laura Murphy-Oates speaks to Afghan interpreter Naser Ahmadi about how aiding Australian forces put him and his family in danger, and reporter Ben Doherty explores the situation in Afghanistan and why some Afghan workers have been left behind
Continue reading...Melbourne faces the possibility of a lockdown extension as shopping centre workers ordered into quarantine; new cases emerge across regional NSW. Follow all the day’s news
Queensland LNP MP George Christensen has spoken to Sydney radio 2GB about being censured through a parliamentary motion yesterday.
The whole House, including the government, voted to support Labor’s motion disassociating the parliament with Christensen’s anti-lockdown and anti-public health measure comments yesterday (although Scott Morrison couldn’t bring himself to name or reference Christensen in his speech and just a hour or so later, cabinet minister Paul Fletcher declined five times on national TV to say he disagreed with Christensen’s views)
Happy Wednesday!
It’s not just hump day; we’re also halfway through the parliamentary sitting. At this stage, there’s a week break and then it’s back into it, but you have to wonder whether any of the east coast MPs will risk going home, given how quickly Covid is changing the landscape. Although, it doesn’t seem like anyone is missing the deputy prime minister, who has been in lockdown in Armidale, and apparently, unable to zoom in for the sitting (he has answered no questions in QT and offered no contributions to debate).
Continue reading...NSW records 356 new Covid cases as virus spreads across the state; Queensland records three new cases; Victoria records 20 new cases. This blog is now closed
That’s where we will leave the live blog for Tuesday.
If you haven’t been one of the millions to fill out your census already, tonight is the night.
The former prime ministers Malcom Turnbull and Kevin Rudd are addressing a La Trobe Asia webinar focused on Australia’s relationship with China.
The discussion has turned to climate action, a day after the IPCC report on the threat the climate emergency poses.
The proposition that we should all down tools until China does more is very naive.
We’re not. So that’s a huge, huge problem.
Continue reading...Five-month-old Mia suffered critical injuries after her mother fell while trying to avoid the bird
The devastated aunts of a baby who died after her mother tried to protect her from a swooping magpie have described the feelings of torture the parents have been left with.
Mia was in her mother’s arms when a magpie swooped at them at a Brisbane park on Sunday.
Continue reading...