Former lobbyist and Labour insider reinvented himself as a therapist after twice withdrawing from politics
By his own admission Derek Draper could be a “cocky know-it-all”. His self-confidence was, on occasions, his undoing.
Yet even those who had some reason to be embarrassed by his behaviour recognised he had a rare ebullience. Two former prime ministers led the political tributes, with Tony Blair saying Draper was “someone you always wanted on your side”.
Continue reading...Review calls for ADF to develop ability to precisely strike targets at longer range and to develop stronger network. Follow the day’s news live
Plibersek v Joyce on Newspoll
In their regular spot on Sunrise, environment minister Tanya Plibersek and Coalition frontbencher Barnaby Joyce weighed in on those Newspoll results.
They’re very strong support numbers, and I tell you the reason is not based on polling but what people tell me when I’m out around the country.
People tell me that they’re pleased to see a government that is just getting on with the job, doing what we promised and they’re impressed that the prime minister is just sticking with what he said he’d do.
We don’t have an election tomorrow and that’s a good thing.
A lot of people are starting to focus now on issues such as the voice and saying, “I don’t feel comfortable with this.”
Continue reading...Exclusive: Dr Michelle Ananda-Rajah says strategy is letting Australians down but medical groups back regulatory approach
A Labor MP and doctor says the nation’s strategy on responding to Covid infections is “letting Australians down” and is calling for an overhaul oof eligibility for powerful anti-viral drugs to allow far greater access for more people.
Dr Michelle Ananda-Rajah said she had paid more than $1,100 from her own pocket this week on a private script for Covid anti-virals for a sick family member who was not eligible for subsidised access to the drugs. She called on her government to open the treatments to all people aged over 12, labelling the rules “daft”.
Continue reading...Chief medical officer Paul Kelly says a long Covid strategy is ‘well under way’ but will not be finalised until advice is received from the inquiry
The federal government is developing a national long Covid strategy, with a parliamentary inquiry hearing the condition has resulted in job losses and homelessness among some sufferers.
The chief medical officer, Professor Paul Kelly, said the federal health department had been tasked with developing a national long Covid strategy that would cover prevention, immunisation, treatment and research into the condition.
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Continue reading...Kyle & Jackie O Show radio host reveals on air she is ‘struggling with this fatigue’ and has received medical advice to stop working
Radio host Jackie O is stepping away from her long-running breakfast show with co-host Kyle Sandilands in order to recover from health issues months after contracting Covid-19.
While presenting the Kyle & Jackie O Show on KIIS FM on Monday, Jackie O, real name Jackie Henderson, said she had been struggling to recover after she contracted Covid-19 earlier this year, and that she had received medical advice to stop working in order to address an enduring cough and fatigue.
Continue reading...Top disease expert warns against prematurely declaring victory over pandemic in interview with the Guardian
Dr Anthony Fauci, America’s top infectious disease expert, has warned against prematurely declaring victory over the pandemic, not only due to short-term needs but because long Covid represents an “insidious” public health emergency for millions of people.
In an interview with the Guardian, Fauci urged the US Congress not to be complacent and to resume funding efforts to combat the virus, including the scourge of long Covid, which remains scientifically elusive but understood to hit women and people of colour especially hard.
Continue reading...State school pupils twice as likely to feel they have fallen behind than peers in private schools, landmark study finds
Four out of five teenagers say their academic progress has suffered as a result of the pandemic, with state school pupils twice as likely to feel they have fallen behind than their peers in private schools, according to initial findings from a landmark study.
Half of the 16- and 17-year-olds questioned said the Covid disruption had left them less motivated to study, while 45% felt they have not been able to catch up with lost learning.
There was a lot of chaos in my life at the time and then we went into lockdown quite unprepared. There was a lot of confusion about schooling. I didn’t really have access to technology. I didn’t have online lessons, things like that. There was work that went on every week, but I couldn’t access it because I didn’t have the internet. I remember talking to one of my friends and they were like, ‘Oh have you seen the work that’s been put for English’, and I was like, ‘We have work?’
It was only in the September when we came back I finally got more support. I got a laptop and I got better access. A lot of people in my school had issues like me. A lot of people didn’t have technology or they didn’t have structured lessons, so we’ve had a lot to try to catch up on. A lot of the lessons have been quite content-heavy because it felt like we were trying to do two years in one, so that was quite stressful. And I felt like I had to work harder to do my GCSEs. I felt I had to do more to recover to my peers’ level.
Continue reading...The latest variants are masters at evading immunity – meaning previous infection and vaccines are unlikely to provide much protection against catching it
Australia is heading for its third Omicron wave in the coming weeks, as BA.4 and BA.5 become the dominant Covid strains.
BA.4 and BA.5 are more infectious than previous Covid variants and subvariants, and are better able to evade immunity from vaccines and previous infections. So we’re likely to see a rise in case numbers.
Continue reading...Of the 750,000 hospitalised, many still report fatigue, muscle pain, insomnia and breathlessness, with women worst affected
Fewer than one in three people who have been hospitalised with Covid-19 have fully recovered a year after they succumbed to infection.
That is the shock finding of a survey into the impact of long Covid in the UK. The team of scientists and doctors at Leicester University also found that women had poorer recovery rates than men after hospitalisation, while obesity was also likely to hinder a person’s prospects of health improvements.
Continue reading...Dr Nathalie MacDermott says condition has substantial impact on people’s ability to work and costs to government and business
The UK will pay an economic price for failing to consider long Covid when lifting restrictions and recommending vaccinations for children, a doctor has warned.
The decision to drop all Covid rules in England was largely based on whether the NHS could handle the number of sick patients, but far more people are expected to develop long-term medical problems after fighting off the virus.
Continue reading...Steve Bladon led his Lincolnshire school tirelessly through the pandemic and thought the worst was over – then fatigue set in
Last month, Steve Bladon, a father of four, watched with some unease as the prime minister announced the lifting of all Covid restrictions in England. After two years of the pandemic – the lockdowns, the legal requirements to self-isolate, the social distancing and mandatory masks – the message from government was that it may not be over, but it’s time to learn to live with Covid.
As the headteacher of a primary school in a small town in Lincolnshire, Bladon, 46, knows as much as anyone about living with the virus. He has led his team and school community tirelessly through the pandemic, delivering remote education and food parcels, reassuring anxious parents and keeping colleagues calm.
Continue reading...Extreme fatigue, brain fog, sleep disturbances, chest pain and skin rashes. These are just a few of the on-going symptoms of long Covid, a disorder that can persist for many months after an initial Covid infection. With such a vast range of symptoms, and health organisations stretched to capacity by the acute stage of the disease, long Covid has continued to remain something of a mystery.
But with numerous studies trying to understand what exactly people are suffering from, progress is being made. Ian Sample speaks to Prof Akiko Iwasaki about what we do and don’t know about long Covid, and how the vaccine could reveal clues about what’s behind the disorder
Archive: Channel 4 News, Sky News
Continue reading...Though still rare, the numbers of kids across the US reporting symptoms long after infection are increasing, doctors say
Javanese Hailey found her daughter hunched over in pain inside their home in Manassas, Virginia, about 32 miles south-west of Washington DC.
The nine-year-old could barely walk because her stomach hurt so much, Hailey said, recalling that Sunday evening in October.
Continue reading...Many sufferers have been left unable to eat due to long-term distortions to their senses
Four months after getting sick with Covid, Anne-Héloise Dautel couldn’t eat anything at all. “I just wanted to vomit, I was gagging at everything around me,” she said. “I couldn’t even stand my own smell. I was showering five times a day.” Coffee, toothpaste, shampoo and roast meat were the worst. By the time she went to hospital, she weighed just 46kg.
Severe weight loss and kidney failure are some of the impacts of smell and taste distortions which leave people unable to eat or drink things they loved, like coffee or bacon, because they smell like rotting flesh or sewage.
Continue reading...Findings raise possibility Covid may cause microscopic damage not detected by normal tests
Abnormalities have been identified in the lungs of long Covid patients that could offer a potential explanation for why some people experience breathlessness long after their initial infection.
The findings, from a pilot study involving 36 patients, raise the possibility that Covid may cause microscopic damage to the lungs that is not detected using routine tests.
Continue reading...Observational study finds double-jabbed people 41% less likely to report Covid symptoms 12 weeks after a positive test
Vaccination could reduce the risk of long Covid, research by the Office for National Statistics suggests.
The study, of more than 6,000 adults, found those who were double-vaccinated had a 41% lower likelihood of self-reporting Covid symptoms 12 weeks after first testing positive.
Continue reading...Low levels of certain antibodies found to be more common in those who go on to develop long Covid
Doctors have discovered an “antibody signature” that can help identify patients most at risk of developing long Covid, a condition where debilitating symptoms of the disease can persist for many months.
Researchers at University hospital Zurich analysed blood from Covid patients and found that low levels of certain antibodies were more common in those who developed long Covid than in patients who swiftly recovered.
Continue reading...MPs urge support for workers after data shows extent of ongoing illness in first 18 months of pandemic
NHS trusts in England lost nearly 2m days in staff absences due to long Covid in the first 18 months of the pandemic, according to figures that reveal the hidden burden of ongoing illness in the health service.
MPs on the all-party parliamentary group (APPG) on coronavirus estimate that more than 1.82m days were lost to healthcare workers with long Covid from March 2020 to September 2021 across England’s 219 NHS trusts.
Continue reading...My lab has found significant microclot formation in long Covid patients. Unfortunately, these are missed in routine blood tests
One of the biggest failures during the Covid-19 pandemic is our slow response in diagnosing and treating long Covid. As many as 100 million people worldwide already suffer from long Covid. That staggering number will eventually be much higher, if we take into account that diagnoses are still inadequate, and that we still do not know what the impact of Omicron and future variants will be.
Patients with long Covid complain of numerous symptoms, the main ones being recurring fatigue and brain fog, muscle weakness, being out of breath and having low oxygen levels, sleep difficulties and anxiety or depression. Some patients are so sick that they cannot work or even walk a few steps. There is possibly also an elevated risk of stroke and heart attacks. One of the biggest sources of concern is that even mild and sometimes asymptomatic initial Covid-19 infection may lead to debilitating, long-term disability.
Continue reading...Underneath the shadow of the snow-topped Austrian Alps, in front of a forest of thick green trees and behind a pure azure lake, sits a sprawling chalet that has seen everyone from Kate Moss to Michael Gove pass through its wide glass doors. The VivaMayr health resort in Altaussee, Austria, has long been the picturesque home of celebrity detoxes – strict bans on caffeine and alcohol, combined with stricter rules about the number of times you need to chew your food (40, naturally) have helped numerous celebrity clientele lose weight. The detoxing might sound harsh, but tranquillity oozes through the resort’s Instagram page, where enchanting mists tickle thick evergreen trees and women pose with mugs in sleek, pine interiors. It’s not the image that comes to mind when you think “long-Covid clinic”, but it is one. For £2,700 a week (excluding accommodation), sufferers can attend VivaMayr’s post-Covid medical programme, which promises a “better quality of life”.
There is currently no cure for long Covid – the condition in which individuals continue to suffer Covid-19 symptoms for months after first being infected – but there are plenty of treatments. There is an entire network of specialist NHS long-Covid clinics across the United Kingdom – here, patients can undergo rehabilitative programmes to help them improve their stamina, breathing and cognitive functions (for many, long Covid is characterised by fatigue, breathlessness, and concentration problems). Yet in September, the Office for National Statistics estimated that 1.1 million people in the UK currently suffer with long Covid, while between July and August, only 5,737 people were referred to specialist NHS clinics. With the Omicron variant threatening more lives, there’s a gap in the market for long-Covid care, and plenty of private practitioners are happy to fill it – for a price.
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