Authorities ‘strongly discourage’ travel to and from six council areas that are home to most of the country’s new coronavirus cases. Follow live
Victoria has officially announced its new ministry.
Queensland has reported zero coronavirus cases overnight.
Queensland declares southern state a ‘hotspot’ while South Australia reconsiders decision to reopen its border
The Victorian government has announced it will extend its state of emergency for at least four more weeks and ramp up its police enforcement of lockdown rules after a spike in Covid-19 cases.
The surge has also prompted neighbouring South Australia to reconsider its decision to reopen its border, while Queensland has declared all of greater Melbourne a Covid-19 hotspot.
Continue reading...Campaigners want affordable kits for all but health experts doubt efficacy of a mass exercise
A new divide is opening up between the “haves” and the “have nots” – this time over Covid-19 testing. While private schools and big businesses have introduced testing for their pupils and employees, allowing them to return to school and work, state schools and small businesses will be left to rely on the state. Campaigners warn that “testing inequality” could fuel greater financial inequality.
Financial giants, such as Credit Suisse, have introduced antibody testing for their employees, while the Premier League restarted its season last week, thanks to rapid antigen testing of players and backroom staff. Ocado bought 100,000 testing kits for its staff when lockdown began and some private schools intend to use testing as part of their plan to get all children back into classrooms at the start of the next academic year.
Continue reading...Official toll passed a thousand on 22 consecutive days – far more than daily briefings said
Ministers have been accused of playing down the gravity of the coronavirus pandemic after it emerged that more than 1,000 people died every day in the UK for 22 consecutive days – in stark contrast with daily tolls announced by the government.
According to an analysis of official figures, the darkest day came on 8 April as the country prepared for Easter under lockdown, when a record 1,445 people died from Covid-19 in 24 hours.
Continue reading...A sophisticated state-based actor is targeting all levels of government and companies in a range of sectors, PM reveals. Follow live
Also, the Five Eyes finance ministers met. Given what their operatives do, a meeting seems superfluous, but ok.
Today Australia hosted a call with the Finance Ministers of the “Five Eyes” nations – Australia, Canada, New Zealand, United Kingdom and the United States.
It was the first of what will be regular calls among the countries to discuss the economic issues associated with COVID-19.
I guess when you don’t have the Global Times, you have to be a little more overt in your silent diplomacy.
Use of invasive digital and physical tracking measures soars as the pandemic spreads
Extensive surveillance measures introduced around the world during the coronavirus outbreak have widened and become entrenched, digital rights experts have said, three months after the World Health Organization declared a pandemic.
The measures have often been billed as temporary necessities rushed into place to help track infections, but governments have been accused of denting civil rights with the widespread use of techniques such as phone monitoring, contact tracing apps, and physical surveillance such as CCTV with facial recognition.
Continue reading...Experts call for legislation and trade deals worldwide to encourage green recovery
Pandemics such as coronavirus are the result of humanity’s destruction of nature, according to leaders at the UN, WHO and WWF International, and the world has been ignoring this stark reality for decades.
The illegal and unsustainable wildlife trade as well as the devastation of forests and other wild places were still the driving forces behind the increasing number of diseases leaping from wildlife to humans, the leaders told the Guardian.
Continue reading...Foreign affairs minister Marise Payne says Australian authorities visited the detention centre where the 53-year-old is being held. Follow live
Julian Hill is looking at the government’s spend on consultants (an evergreen sentence, no matter what political party is in government)
New analysis by the Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) has found that the big four consultancy firms – Deloitte, Ernest&Young, KPMG and PwC – now collectively reap $800m a year in government contracts.
But only 20% of that figure is spent on actual consultancy contracts, meaning the Morrison government is paying top dollar to large consultancy firms to work as contractors doing the day-to-day work of public servants.
The Australia Institute has begun a new campaign to have truth in advertising part of Australia’s political advertising.
An open letter coordinated by the Australia Institute and signed by 29 prominent Australians calls for parliament to pass truth-in-political advertising laws that are nationally consistent, constitutional and uphold freedom of speech.
Signatories to the open letter include former political party leaders and politicians, Dr John Hewson, Cheryl Kernot and Michael Beahan; former supreme court judges, the Hon Anthony Whealy QC, the Hon Paul Stein AM QC and the Hon David Harper AM QC, as well as barristers, community leaders, business people and other prominent Australians.
Continue reading...As lockdowns linger and economies falter, girls who are out of school are at increased risk of being cut
Covid-19 has exposed just how much work remains to be done to wipe out female genital mutilation (FGM) around the world. Two million girls who would otherwise be safe from the practice are believed to be at risk over the next decade as a direct result of the virus.
As lockdowns linger and economies tumble, many families have been spurred into action over the fate of their daughters, using school closures to cut them and marry them off, campaigners say.
Continue reading...Heat now causes more deaths than hurricanes, tornadoes or floods in most years, creating a new public health threat. An investigation reveals why the CDC’s prevention efforts have faltered
This story is co-published with Columbia Journalism Investigations, the Center for Public Integrity and Covering Climate Now. Read the full investigation here.
Charlie Rhodes lived alone on a tree-sparse street with sunburned lawns just outside Phoenix, Arizona. At 61, the army veteran’s main connection to the world was Facebook; often, he posted several times a day. But as a heatwave blanketed the region in June 2016 – leading to temperatures among the highest ever recorded – his posts stopped. Three weeks later, a pile of unopened mail outside his door prompted a call to police.
Continue reading...Food and Drug Administration says drug is unlikely to work against coronavirus and notes heart risks
US regulators revoked the emergency authorization for malaria drugs championed by Donald Trump for treating Covid-19, amid growing evidence they don’t work and could cause serious side effects.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said on Monday the drugs hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine were unlikely to be effective in treating the coronavirus. Citing reports of heart complications, the agency said the drugs’ unproven benefits “do not outweigh the known and potential risks”.
Continue reading...Organs of some who die after over a month in hospital sustain ‘complete disruption’, peers told
Covid-19 can leave the lungs of people who died from the disease completely unrecognisable, a professor of cardiovascular science has told parliament.
It created such massive damage in those who spent more than a month in hospital that it resulted in “complete disruption of the lung architecture”, said Prof Mauro Giacca of King’s College London.
Continue reading...Exclusive: senior official says contact tracing should be more effective before measures eased
England’s coronavirus lockdown should not be further lifted until the government’s contact-tracing system has proven to be “robust and effective”, the World Health Organization has said after widespread criticism of the first results of the new tracking operation.
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Mistakes mean findings should not be used as evidence for relaxing rule, say professors
Senior scientists have reported flaws in an influential World Health Organization-commissioned study into the risks of coronavirus infection and say it should not be used as evidence for relaxing the UK’s 2-metre physical distancing rule.
Critics of the distancing advice, which states that people should keep at least 2 metres apart, believe it is too cautious. They seized on the research commissioned by the WHO, which suggested a reduction from 2 metres to 1 would raise infection risk only marginally, from 1.3% to 2.6%.
Continue reading...Richard Horton does not hold back in his criticism of the UK’s response to the pandemic and the medical establishment’s part in backing fatal government decisions
There is a school of thought that says now is not the time to criticise the government and its scientific advisers about the way they have handled the Covid-19 pandemic. Wait until all the facts are known and the crisis has subsided, goes this thinking, and then we can analyse the performance of those involved. It’s safe to say that Richard Horton, the editor of the influential medical journal the Lancet, is not part of this school.
An outspoken critic of what he sees as the medical science establishment’s acquiescence to government, he has written a book that he calls a “reckoning” for the “missed opportunities and appalling misjudgments” here and abroad that have led to “the avoidable deaths of tens of thousands of citizens”.
Continue reading...Patients forced to buy pills online or go overseas for terminations
Women seeking abortions in Northern Ireland are still struggling to access services. Although abortion was legalised more than two months ago, claims persist that healthcare professionals are refusing to treat patients.
A leading reproductive rights group and a doctors’ organisation say that GPs are refusing to refer pregnant women to hospital services so they can access the tablets needed to undergo a medical abortion. They are also aware of midwives and nurses refusing to care for patients before and after the procedure.
Continue reading...Airlines seeking urgent judicial review of policy that they say could cost thousands of jobs
Britain’s three biggest airlines have filed papers in the high court to seek an urgent judicial review of the government’s quarantine laws, which they say are having a devastating effect on tourism and the wider economy.
British Airways, easyJet and Ryanair say the rules, which came into effect on Monday and require passengers arriving from abroad to self-isolate at a single address for 14 days, are flawed and will cost thousands of jobs.
Continue reading...Qld deputy premier and health minister says situation will be reviewed at the end of June ‘as we’ve said consistently’. Follow live
Speaking of awkward, Angus Taylor just took a dixer.
So that is a bit awkward, then.
Bristol man sees official record of his age as five years older than he says as theft of his identity
A young man who was given permission to stay in the UK after fleeing Gaza has been on hunger strike for more than 90 days in protest at what he sees as the “theft” of his true identity on his official records.
The man, who has learning disabilities and post-traumatic stress disorder, says he was wrongly assessed as being five years older than he is when he arrived in the UK. He regards his date of birth as a crucial part of his identity and a vital link to his late parents.
Continue reading...Australia’s GDP could fall by 6.3% this year if hit by a second wave of infections, the OECD says in a new report. Follow live updates
Scott Morrison is now calling on all the closed states to nominate the date they will re-open in July.
Because he is getting “frustrated” at the interstate border closures.
“People who rallied this [past] weekend, showed great disrespect for their neighbours,” Scott Morrison says.
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