Health News at Your Fingertips

NSW parliament will likely not sit in August due to Sydney’s lockdown and the potential of regional MPs seeding coronavirus in their communities, AAP reports.

The Speaker of the lower house, Jonathan O’Dea, on Tuesday agreed to postpone August sitting dates after a request from Gladys Berejiklian.

That request followed chief health officer Dr Kerry Chant’s advice that both houses be deferred until at least September.

“In addition to the heightened risk of Covid-19 transmission in parliament itself, there is a risk of seeding Covid-19 to regional communities when MPs and staff return home,” Dr Chant said in a letter to health minister Brad Hazzard.

Mining giant Rio Tinto will return $US9.1 billion in dividends after recording its most profitable six months on the back of surging iron ore prices, AAP reports.

The world’s largest iron ore miner reported underlying earnings of $US12.2 billion ($A16.55 billion) for the six months ended 30 June, more than double from $US4.75 billion a year earlier.

The result was slightly ahead of analysts expectations for a $US12 billion profit.

And here’s the video of Scott Morrison comparing the vaccine take-up to a gold medal run at the Olympics earlier today:

Reviews of rapid Covid-19 tests in Australia have found markedly different results in their effectiveness, but experts say the New South Wales government’s decision to employ them in schools and essential workplaces will help to control the virus.

Michael McGowan has this story after NSW announced that rapid tests would be used during Sydney’s continuing lockdown.

Australia’s sharemarket has fallen from record highs yesterday, as a coronavirus lockdown extension for NSW dimmed the mood of investors, AAP reports.

The ASX200 on Wednesday had its biggest loss in more than a week and all share categories bar property were lower. Information technology shares fell most, by 2.13%, following losses on Wall Street.

A four-week extension for the lockdown in Sydney and surrounds will hamper plenty of businesses in the short term.

The benchmark S&P/ASX200 index closed lower by 52.1 points, or 0.7 %, to 7379.3.

Researchers at the Peter Doherty Institute have been awarded a prize for their work in sequencing the full Sars‐CoV‐2 virus last year, and then sharing it with the world within 24 hours.

The researchers isolated the virus from the first patient diagnosed with Covid-19 in Australia, and swiftly shared it with the world.

They have now been awarded with the Medical Journal of Australia’s national prize for excellence in medical research.

Their winning study is online and free to access.

The Peter Doherty Institute is a joint venture between the University of Melbourne and the Royal Melbourne Hospital.

The NT government has to pay out a $35m class action settlement to young people mistreated while in youth detention.

The amount of the historic settlement can be revealed today after the government this week failed in its federal court bid to suppress the figure.

Two applicants, Aaron Hyde and Dylan Jenkings, launched a class action in 2016, claiming they were assaulted, abused and falsely imprisoned while in youth detention facilities in Darwin and Alice Springs, and covers anyone who was mistreated while in an NT youth detention centre between August 2006 and November 2017.

“Only the people who have walked in my shoes know what we’ve been through,” Hyde said. “I hope this settlement leads to change to create a better system for the younger mob.”

It’s estimated about 1,200 young people could be eligible for a share of the compensation.

“No amount of money will undo the ongoing harm caused by these abuses, but it is an important acknowledgement of the pain caused to hundreds of young people,” Maurice Blackburn principal lawyer Ben Slade said.

“While in detention, these young people were subjected to appalling treatment that included excessive force, handcuffing, strip searching and isolation in cells.

“These young people may have broken the law, but they did not deserve to be broken by the law.”

The NT government does not admit that officers acted illegally, but it has previously apologised for the way young people were treated in youth detention. A federal court hearing to approve the final settlement is scheduled for 8 November in Darwin.

Josh Frydenberg has declined to describe the vaccination rollout as “a race”, but said “we’ve got to do it as quickly as possible”.

He is asked by the ABC’s Patricia Karvelas about the prime minister’s earlier comments today, where he likened the vaccination take-up to “a gold medal run” at the Olympics. Morrison of course previously said the vaccination rollout was “not a race”.

Karvelas: “So let’s settle this – is it a race?”

Frydenberg: “Well, I firmly believe the quicker we get people vaccinated the faster we get out of this crisis.”

Karvelas: “So it is a race?”

Frydenberg: “From here on, we’ve got to do it as quickly as possible.”

He adds that Australia had weathered the pandemic well compared with other countries.

“We’ve done well to avoid the fate of other nations in terms of loss of life … Other countries have done it [vaccinations] faster than us but their circumstances have also been different.”

Frydenberg is asked: “The economy is forecast to contract in the September quarter … should we be prepared for a recession?”

He says:

Seeing our two biggest states in lockdown over the quarter is going to have a significant economic impact. So I won’t be surprised if the September quarter comes in negative.

A definition of recession is when you have two consecutive quarters of negative growth.

That is something we will obviously do our best to avoid and the quickest way to avoid that … is to see New South Wales get on top of this outbreak and to come out of lockdown.