The US has had a dramatic drop in covid infections and deaths, coinciding with with the mass rollout of vaccinations.
So a reasonable question is: how is the pandemic going for those yet to be vaccinated?
WashingtonPost has taken a look at that question, and the tl;dr is that for the unvaccinated, the pandemic is carrying on just as it was before the decline. The explanation may be the way vaccination and behaviours to limit disease transmission has become such a polarised issue. Those inclined to be vaccinated or not have separated into distinct social groupings, and the antis are still having their superspreader events while completely unprotected.
The evidence is clear, folks. Get your vaccination when it's offered to you. It really works. Herd immunity in the rest of society won't protect you if you're unvaccinated if your social circle includes a lot of other unvaccinated people.
""Vaccinated employees get a vaccination logo just like the Nazi's forced Jewish people to wear a gold star," Greene tweeted on Tuesday. Greene has also compared face masks to the gold stars. Nazis forced Jews to wear the stars to stigmatize, humiliate, isolate and control them."
oh well…rumor has it, some of them are fuckwits. Also it was not a gold star (that one goes to families in the US that have lost people in their war adventures elsewhere). The jewish citizenry of Europe, Russia, and other places occupied by the German were forced to wear a yellow star. Seriously, US Americans are dumb, mean, petty and dumb.
Don't they know that stuff is poisonous? There's a sign at the community gardens where there's been some at times considerable pilfering (I lost all my kumara one year), that gives a warning that the vegetables in the plot had been sprayed with di-hydrogen monoxide and should not be eaten until the withholding period had been safely observed!
oh well…rumor has it, some of them are fuckwits. Also it was not a gold star (that one goes to families in the US that have lost people in their war adventures elsewhere). The jewish citizenry of Europe, Russia, and other places occupied by the German were forced to wear a yellow star. Seriously, US Americans are dumb, mean, petty and dumb.
The Nazis required Jews to wear the yellow Star View This Term in the Glossary of David View This Term in the Glossary not only in the camps but throughout most of occupied Europe.
Yellow badges (or yellow patches), also referred to as Jewish badges (German: Judenstern, lit. 'Jew's star'), are badges that Jews were ordered to wear at various times during the Middle Ages by some caliphates, at various times during the Medieval and early modern period by some European powers, and from 1939–1945 by the Axis powers. The badges served to mark the wearer as a religious or ethnic outsider, and often served as a badge of shame.[1]
with all due respect…. yeah, nah nah. But thank you much for explaining my countries history to me, what would i do with out you telling me?
And yes, i am quick to judge, as Maya Angelou once said: "When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time." And it has served me well ever since.
Not only quick to judge but also resistant to challenge and correction with belligerent passive-aggressive behaviour to avoid having to change their minds let alone their behaviour; virtually incapable of admitting being wrong let alone apologising.
if you were to have looked at the links listed you would know that the white armband with blue david star is listed as one of the variants used in Poland and pretty much every where else they wore the yellow star.
Good grief, Incognito i have no idea what upset you today, but it was not me, nor anything i said. Please find someone else to discuss the marking of the jewish citizenry by the generation of my grandfather.
[Content deleted because it contained too many links that triggered Auto-Moderation]
But then you are not here calling me out on my perceived incomprehension of your attitude towards me, you are just here trying to goat someone into a cake fight, and as always, i don't have enough cake to waste.
Not admiration, but in absolute awe how someone can judge the IQ and undertake a character assassination of one nation in one fell swoop based on the colour of a badges worn in Europe over 75 years ago. That ain’t a mean feat, even by Trumpian standards.
Hopefully the awe you feel will grow an aspiration to explore the differences between persecution and claimed victimhood by choice. Every journey begins with a single step.
My journey is taking me in a different direction; my metaphorical shoes are well worn and not just by walking. I’m afraid I won’t live up to your aspirations.
“Several months ago, our studies showed that natural infection induced a strong response, and this study now shows that the responses last,” Weiskopf says. “We are hopeful that a similar pattern of responses lasting over time will also emerge for the vaccine-induced responses.”
I guess at the end of the day it comes down to choice. The vaccinated have nothing to fear. Those who have not had any of the vaccines are not a risk to the vaccinated.
From what I've read, the vaccines are safe for everyone….old, young. babies, pregnant women, immunocompromised…there's a vaccine to suit.
And all the vaccines are of course 100% safe and at least 90% effective and each new outbreak inspires a greater demand for the jab. There will be very few left unvaccinated, and these these folk pose no threat to those who are.
Antisocial arseholes who don't get vaccinated when given the opportunity, then get diseased, are still a risk to those for whom the vaccine is ineffective.
That's largely the immunocompromised. Often due to needing medication for other conditions.
Then if someone with a weak immune system is unfortunate enough to get exposed to one of those diseased antisocial arseholes and gets the disease, they are at risk of a prolonged illness, which vastly increases the likelihood of them becoming the source of new mutations.
There is nonetheless a point to be made that a person has a right (!) to decide whether they want to be vaccinated. It seems to me that this pandemic has not just wracked havoc with the health and economies but also with the understanding that people are free to decide. Emphasis on FREE. Unless we are now in a dictatorship by stealth?
I personally will get vaccinated once its offered. But only because I want to see my family again. Otherwise I wouldn't as I feel that the speed in which the vaccine was introduced leaves my sense of proper process very much at unease. And I am not the only one.
the speed in which the vaccine was introduced leaves my sense of proper process very much at unease.
Any rational person with even a minimum of understanding how these products are developed will have cause for concern.
The latest drive to use these experimental mRNA vaccines on children (using the 'you don't want to kill grandma') inducement is, in my opinion, criminal.
I can find no study which proves children are at risk from Covid 19 or are a risk to others.
I can find no study which proves children are at risk from Covid 19 or are a risk to others.
That’s unsurprising, but dead children are all the proof I need.
In Kids, The Risk Of COVID-19 And The Flu Are Similar — But The Risk Perception Isn't Even a vaccinated parent can occasionally get infected with the coronavirus. There's also a small risk that the virus can pass to an unvaccinated child, and that child has an extremely small risk of getting seriously ill. To date, out of more than 74 million children in the United States, there have been about 300 COVID deaths and a few thousand serious illnesses.
Everycell on the planet is either chocka-block with mRNA, or dead.
mRNA-based vaccines have been delivered to hundreds of millions of people since their initial approvals in December 2020.
Full length mRNA molecules have been proposed as therapeutics since the beginning of the biotech era. The field became active in 2012 when Moderna Therapeutics raised almost a billion dollars in venture funding in its first three years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messenger_RNA#Applications
The dawn of mRNA vaccines: The COVID-19 case [JCR, May 2021] In less than one year since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, two mRNA-based vaccines, BNT162b2 and mRNA-1273, were granted the first historic authorization for emergency use, while another mRNA vaccine, CVnCoV, progressed to phase 3 clinical testing. The COVID-19 mRNA vaccines represent a new class of vaccine products, which consist of synthetic mRNA strands encoding the SARS-CoV-2 Spike glycoprotein, packaged in lipid nanoparticles to deliver mRNA to cells. This review digs deeper into the scientific breakthroughs of the last decades that laid the foundations for the rapid rise of mRNA vaccines during the COVID-19 pandemic. As well as providing momentum for mRNA vaccines, SARS-CoV-2 represents an ideal case study allowing to compare design-activity differences between the different mRNA vaccine candidates. Therefore, a detailed overview of the composition and (pre)clinical performance of the three most advanced mRNA vaccines is provided and the influence of choices in their structural design on to their immunogenicity and reactogenicity profile is discussed in depth. In addition to the new fundamental insights in the mRNA vaccines' mode of action highlighted here, we also point out which unknowns remain that require further investigation and possibly, optimization in future mRNA vaccine development.
It's important to understand how the speed of development and approval was achieved. There weren't safety corners cut, that it happened a lot quicker than normal is more a reflection of how much drawn-out dawdling there is in the normal process, together with how tragically prevalent the disease become during the trials.
This meant the necessary data came in very quickly. Most new vaccines are for very rare diseases, so it normally takes a long long time for enough trial participants to actually be exposed to the disease to gather meaningful data.
The apparently compressed timeframe was achieved by companies taking financial risks by gearing up for the next stage while trials were still underway, rather than the usual process of waiting for results to come in before even thinking about the next stage. Regulatory and approval bodies also sped things up by immediately acting as soon as data was available, rather than their usual process of maybe considering things at their convenience months or even years after data becomes available.
This piece discusses the timeframe issue in more detail:
It's important to understand that there are absolutely no long term studies on these vaccines and there is absolutely no data to support a declaration that there will be no long term adverse effects from these vaccines.
So why, pray tell Andre, are they pushing these experimental vaccines on to children who are not at risk from Covid and pose minimal risk to others?
Children should get vaccinated because there are people at risk from infected children. It's only in your fantasies that children do not pose a risk to vulnerable individuals, and that children are not at personal risk.
The personal risk to children is lower, but the risk of death and long covid appears to be high enough that just the risk to children alone would justify a robust response to this emergent disease.
A SERIOUS picture is emerging about the long-term health effects of covid-19 in some children, with UK politicians calling the lack of acknowledgment of the problem a “national scandal”.
Children seem to be fairly well-protected from the most severe symptoms of covid-19. According to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, the majority of children don't develop symptoms when infected with the coronavirus, or their symptoms are very mild.
But Andre. Those people who are, according to you, at risk from being infected with Covid 19 by a child will be a non-child. An adult. Who may or may not have chosen to be vaccinated. Who will either not be at risk at all, or have chosen to live with the risk. Such risk that exists'
The good news is that evidence suggests children don't easily pass covid-19 to each other in the classroom. In one study, a 9-year-old in France with flu and covid-19 was found to have exposed more than 80 other children at three different schools. However, no one became infected with covid-19 as a result, despite numerous flu infections within the schools, suggesting that although the environment was conducive to transmitting respiratory viruses, covid-19 wasn't passed on as easily.
More recently, a study of children between 5 months and 4 years old in nurseries in France has shown low levels of infection and transmission of covid-19. The study also shows that staff weren't at greater risk of infection than a control group of adults. The results suggest that children are more likely to get covid-19 from family members than from their peers or teachers at nursery, although more evidence is needed, say the study's authors, because the study happened when strict measures were in place to control the virus, and before fast-spreading variants appeared.
That quote is from the study you cited, that also shows that children suffering from 'long Covid' are very much in the minority.
If I have the time later I will try and find a study that proves that the risks to children from Covid outweighs the long term risks from an experimental vaccine.
There are no studies of the long term health effects of covid vaccines because such studies will take a long time.
There are also no studies of the long term health effects of chilhood covid infection because such studies will take a long time.
It seems to me that some countries are vaccinating children because they will otherwise not reach covid herd immunity due to too many adults refusing the vaccine.
Well, we do know there are lots of people still suffering significant disability from covid fourteen months or more after they first got infected. My nephew is one of them.
The flip side to rights and freedoms include responsibilities and accountabilities.
So while I agree that anyone should be free to not get vaccinated, there should be a corresponding responsibility to minimise the risk of infecting others. So not having unvaccinated people in public facing jobs or other jobs where there is increased risk an infected individual may cause to others seems a reasonable precaution.
It seems to me that a reasonable accountability for those that refuse vaccination (without good medical reason) is they should be fully responsible for their own medical costs of treating that vaccine-preventable disease, should they get it, as well as the treatment costs and other losses suffered by anyone they pass it on to.
Rights also do not exist in isolation – they are balanced against others. Freedom from avoidable infection or death seems like a pretty significant one.
Maybe we could re-open some quarantine islands for those who believe their freedom to refuse is more important. They can imperil one another as much as they like.
People with HIV infection or other immunocompromising conditions or people who take immunosuppressive medications or therapies might be at increased risk for severe COVID-19. No data are available to establish COVID-19 vaccine safety and efficacy in these groups. However, the currently FDA-authorized COVID-19 vaccines are not live vaccines and therefore can be safely administered to immunocompromised people. People with stable HIV infection were included in the COVID-19 vaccine clinical trials, though data remain limited.
Immunocompromised people can receive COVID-19 vaccination.
So at the end of the day it is going to come down to availability and choice.
The happily vaccinated are not at risk from the unvaccinated.
Immunocompromised people can safely get the vaccine. It's just of low likelihood of doing them any good. Because they are immunocompromised – ie their immune systems are weak to non-functional, so they don’t have an effective immune system that can be trained to identify and neutralise the invading virus.
So they are still at risk from diseased antisocial arseholes.
Another interesting topic for discussion might be how it has come to be that it is acceptable to level hate speech at those exercising their right to bodily autonomy and medical choice?
In the absence of any real risk to those making a different choice.
On the topic of hate speech, you're the one here advocating for something that is likely to lead to identifiable specific harm to identifiable specific vulnerable individuals, while expecting to be free from accountability or consequences.
Where have I advocated for something that is likely to lead to identifiable specific harm to identifiable specific vulnerable individuals, while expecting to be free from accountability or consequences.
We are having a discussion. Debating the pros and cons of the necessity of vaccinating children with an experimental vaccine that has not been proven to have no long term adverse effects.
When the risk to and from those children from Covid 19 is extremely minimal.
Discussing a thing, and presenting evidence, does not constitute "advocating".
Of course, if you say so. Vaccines offer full protection to all known and future variants, don’t they, so there’s nothing to worry about? Some of these variants might arise in immunocompromised patients, as Andre has already pointed out. Some variants might arise as we speak in other countries.
It is the the FDA, the CDC and various researchers and health professionals making these claims.
And you make a good point about the variants, but I don't understand how immunocompromised people (if they choose to be vaccinated) are at any greater risk from variants than any other vaccinated person, providing of course the vaccine is effective for that variant. If the vaccine is effective for those variants then fully vaccinated people have nothing to fear from unvaccinated persons. If the vaccines are not effective against a variant then a person's vaccination status is not a risk factor for those vulnerable persons.
As has been said…this is a 'tricky' virus… and it's apparent ability to rapidly form viable mutations means that vaccines are not going to be the magic bullet some are understandably desperate for.
All the more reason to put greater effort into learning about the origins of this best. Know your enemy and all that.
I understood that the Covid vaccines on offer reduce the chance of death or serious injury, but they do not prevent a person becoming very sick. Some of us are better placed to tolerate that risk than others.
Well done on not rising to the manky bait bobbing around in the thread, My reckons have the animosity towards those that are wary is going to start ramping up.
If you read the first link in my comment, you’ll know that immune-compromised people generate a weaker or even no response at all to Covid vaccination. You’d also know that a third dose is being studied and under review, so no ‘expert’ worth their salt can make any claims yet.
Immuno-compromised people are always more vulnerable to infections.
Immuno-compromised with long (chronic) infections could be a source of new variants, as has been suggested previously.
It has been suggested that the variant may have originated in a chronically infected immunocompromised person, giving the virus a long time to replicate and evolve.[20][2][21][22]
…
The HV 69–70 deletion has, however, been discovered “in viruses that eluded the immune response in some immunocompromised patients”,[60] …
If this is correct, then even vaccinated immuno-efficient people may be at risk if the vaccine is less or not active at all against any new variant that may evolve in time in immuno-compromised patients.
It will be very interesting to find out about Ground or Patient Zero but it has little bearing on national and global vaccination and elimination strategies.
Be interested to hear what you think are the natural immunity for humans that currently exist. I assume that you refer to those who have previously had the virus and have recovered. Even so persons who have recovered can still be reinfected and transmit the virus.
As for natural treatments, do you have any studies supporting their efficaciousness?
.
Wouldn't it have been nice if those at greatest risk of serious illness / dying from any Covid outbreak (aged 80+ with comorbidities) had all been vaccinated by now (as opposed to just a relatively small minority). Maybe, just maybe the high-risk elderly should've been in Group 2 (as in other Anglosphere Countries) rather than back in 3 ?
There are lots of things the would have been nice to have been different.
One of the things that actually is nice about New Zealand's response to covid is that we now don't have community transmission, unlike just about everywhere else in the world.
So in New Zealand, those at highest risk of serious disease/dying (aged 80+ with cormorbidities) would be at the end of a chain of transmission starting at one of our various borders (air, sea, freight etc).
So I'm quite happy that the strategy is to try to break the potential chain of transmission at the earliest possible links, so those at highest risk didn't get exposed. After all, the elderly with comorbidities are also likely to have less robust immune responses, so the better protection for them is to not be exposed. Put another way, I'm quite happy my 80+ parents with comorbidities got their vax (first one 8 days ago) well after their port-working neighbour in his forties and their late 30s granddaughter that is a doctor at the local hospital.
IIRC, there were three published strategies for different levels of community transmission for the vaccine rollout – we're in the awesome position of using the one with no community transmission. The other two scenarios, limited community transmission and widespread community transmission, would both have put 80+ with comorbidities into a higher priority slot.
You're sounding very complacent given the recent emergence of dangerous new variants & the associated surge in Asia-Pacific Countries previously praised for their apparently successful elimination strategies …
… great to hear your 80+ parents have had their first jab … but most in that age group haven't … my 90 year old parents (one with high-risk health conditions) for instance continue to wait patiently with no sign on the horizon.
The Ministry of Health abandoned an effort to secure all district health board computer systems citing budget constraints.
The Government also has not followed through on its Cyber Security Strategy 2019 which promised annual reports around cybersecurity breaches.
He notes “enterprise security protection software”, of the type being talked about are in place at a number of different health organisations, but the ministry does not publicly disclose security tools and technologies.
Hunter allegedly pledged to the health IT industry that the ministry would put money into a sector-wide system for cybersecurity during a presentation he made to a Health Informatics NZ conference in Hamilton in 2019.
Meanwhile, key parts of the Government’s cybersecurity strategy have barely been implemented even though it was published two years ago. Promised actions included an action plan and an annual report.
The minister responsible for the cybersecurity strategy, Kris Faafoi, left the role in November last year.
His successor, David Clark, admits no annual cybersecurity report from the 2019 strategy document was ever produced. However, he promises a report will be produced for the 2022 financial year.
Well i guess the guys who get their medical help from the Waikato DHB are shit outta luck, prevention of these hacks are hard work, even harder when no one who is tasked and paid to do something is actually doing something. But i rest peacefull in the knowledge that should either Kris Faafoi or David Clark need any medical help they will get it asap, thus all is good.
The former Minister of Health who is on record knowingly lying about this very same DHB, who hid under his bed in Dunedin (when he wasn't out breaching lockdown rules) during the worst of the pandemic, who… too many screw ups to record.
He possibly could manage the parliamentary broom cupboard, but thats about his limit. Unbelievable.
Was Clark was Minister of Health until July last year? Over the period all of the approaches to the handling of Covid were formulated, established and got under way?
Our handling of covid was a massive screw up I suppose. Is that what history says? Oh well, put it down to Clark 'hiding under his bed' in Dunedin.
It came very very close to being a massive screwup. Geography, small and largerly well dispersed population, luck and yes, Arderns firm decision to lockdown are the reason we missed a bullet.
Do you really think Clark showed a sliver of leadership, hiding under his bed in Dunedin and repeatedly breaking lockdown? Do you not think his place, and his job, required him to be in Wellington? Do you think the repeated lies he told about the Waikato DHB were a good thing?
The policies and processes you point to were in no shape or form down to Clark. These were developed and refined and gamed over time by professionals. Clarks role was that of a manager and leader. He has failed continually as both.
@ Peter ChCh. What a ridiculous statement to make, Clark never hid under his bed. All ministers, including Clark, were told to work from home, which they all did, he was part of NZ's successful Covid19 strategy and I would describe his resignation as Minister of Health as a circuit breaker.
Dr Bloomfield would disagree with your belittling assessment that it was all down to luck, geography and small population, because it wasn't.
I seriously doubt your claim that the Waikato DHB board were sacked due to "repeated lies" from the minister, after all, it had been warned previously over its poor governance and finances.
Why is anyone surprised? There are no photo-ops when you do useful things like putting in decent cyber-security systems. It isn't nearly as useful as blowing $50+ million on horse and pony shows like the fiasco that was the Pike River Recovery project. That was the one where the PM, back before the 2017 election promised that the boys would be recovered and that money was no object?
I am not surprised, but still pissed of at the nonchalance with which these guys admit that in fact they had done nothing, and will do nothing until at least 2022 – well hire some to 'start the report' or such – after all some monies will be spend on IT this year as per Minister of health Andrew Little.
The only ones paying for the inaction of government are those needing the services of that DHB, the staff working there cause they don't et paid – that darn IT system – and never mind the covid vaccination roll out for the area as that too is supposedly done by he DHBs.
That was the one where the PM, back before the 2017 election promised that the boys would be recovered and that money was no object?
I think you’re misrepresenting things; there was never a promise of an unlimited budget (AKA blank cheque) and nobody would have expected that. IIRC, the total budget was $51 million, once Labour got into Government with NZF.
As you know, the Pike River Recovery Agency was set up by the new Government within MBIE, not MOH, as you seem to erroneously insinuate in your comment. You know how Government Budgets work, so please lift your game and stop making misleading comments here, thanks.
I gave you a link for my statement. Did you see in the bit that says.
""Returning your men and your boys is as much about a personal perspective as it is about anything else."
No projections for a monetary cost have yet been created and it was yet to be decided which budget the agency would come from.
Ms Ardern said that "money shouldn't be an issue".
"There's no reason why the work can't start immediately," she said."
That sounds pretty unlimited to me. And no, I don't accept that I have in any way implied that it was to be run by the Health Department. It was of course going to be part of Government expenditure and it is money the Government chose to spend in exactly the way the Government chose not to spend it on cyber-security.
So, you’re pretending that you’re naive and ignorant about Government budget allocations and Budgets? How cute, but I don’t believe you; no budget ever is unlimited or open-ended and you know this – you have previously claimed knowing “a great deal better” than the PM and the Minister of Finance (here it is: https://thestandard.org.nz/bluffgeld/#comment-1774689), which sounded like a load of pretentious hot air but you can’t have it both ways.
Anyway, money to start is not money to complete.
And no, I don't accept that I have in any way implied that it was to be run by the Health Department.
Well, in that case, your comment about the Pike River Recovery project was utterly irrelevant to the topic of the thread and a diversion. But then again, you were in good company with other divisive and divertive commenters here 🙁
Firstly. The Government did decide to finance the Pike River Recovery Project.
Secondly. They chose not to finance cyber-security for the DHBs.
One can only conclude that they wanted the first project more than they wanted the second. The budget allocation pot for each of them is quite irrelevant. The ranking of things they wanted to do stands and that confirms my conclusion.
If you want to argue that the various budget allocations for Departments were set and couldn't be altered in 2019 you will still have to explain why the project couldn't have been done in 2020.
You will also have to explain why, if additional money cannot be put into the budget for a Department at a time after the Budget cycle they managed to find a huge sum for the Covid 19 activities in early 2020 when the money had not been foreshadowed in the previous Budget round.
Sorry but they clearly chose one thing and did not choose another. The only thing I will agree that I am the one bringing it up without proof, in the form of a statement from one of the Politicians involved, that one had photo-op possibilities and the other didn't. It remains my opinion of course but I'll admit I don't have a smoking gun.
Indeed, Government set its Budget based on priorities. Whether they under-funded or not funded at all the centralising of cyber security is a moot point, as it is still up to each DHB to ensure its system is safe and fit for purpose. If it had gone ahead, not all DHBs may have taken it up, anyway. That’s your first red herring.
Your second red herring is to suggest that there is a direct connection between funding the Pike River Recovery Agency and not funding or underfunding centralised cyber security in the public health sector. There is no such link; they are funded from completely different pots of money (AKA Ministerial down to Departmental budgets, etc.). You just picked one of your favourite pet projects to take a swipe at your favourite targets, as usual.
Your third red herring is suggesting that Government found “a huge sum for the Covid 19 activities in early 2020 when the money had not been foreshadowed in the previous Budget round”. They did not “find” it anywhere, as you know. As if they were meant to also miraculously ‘find’ some money for cyber security!? Yeah, right. You know that Government does not run its books like that, so stop spreading disinformation.
You still have to explain why you are trolling here, particularly why you should get away with it.
Alwyn given Nationals history on underfunding health and IT stuff ups INCIS healthcare IT failures makes Labour look good.National kept funding for health at the 2008 levels over 9 years funding for 4.5 million NZers while the population increased by 500,000.The cash sums were made to look good but the percentages never increased.National gave the savings in tax cuts to buy votes just before elections.
Rubbish. Why don't you tell us what the health budget as in 2009 and then each year after that. Your claim that it never increased is a risible comment.
What Andrew says and reality seldom have much in common. I haven't looked at this study but I did look at one by, I think, the CTU Economist a few years ago. What they did, and what I think this study did, was to very carefully pick the starting year. You will note that National was in office for 9 years but this study purports to compare the numbers with 7 years ago. It doesn't look at the numbers from the end of the Clark Labour Government and compare them with the ones at the end of the National Government. That would be fair.
When they talk about 7 years they are taking as their base year the first year attributable to National. That was the 2009-2010 year. The 2008-2009 year was the last year of a Labour Budget.
Now what actually happened in 2009-2010 was a massive, far above inflation, one off, injection into the Health system. Then they didn't have further one offs, but basically kept up with inflation. This study is cheating by their choice of there starting year. Try doing it again by looking at end of Labour and end of National and you get a quite different result.
I'm not going to try and track down this study. It will have ended up in the rubbish bin by now I would think. At the time of the CTU equivalent I commented in some detail about the fiddle. It was on this site I believe. It was a fraud but not that many people bother to check out the claims made. The simply take the view, as you seem to have done, that Andrew Little says it so it must be true.
So Alwyn, basically that's just your opinion and you cant actually back yourself up.
$2.3 billion shortfall in health
"The funding needed for health to be restored to the level it was seven years ago to keep pace with cost pressures has widened to a massive $2.3 billion"
“The updated study by economic consultants Infometrics… used Treasury’s own modelling for calculating real health costs for core crown health expenditure"
Frustration, disappointment over health funding in Budget 2017
Patients and healthcare workers say they have been left frustrated and disappointed by “inadequate” funding for health in the 2017 Budget.
They said the Government’s announcements on Thursday would not go nearly far enough in addressing concerns about overworked staff, access to new medicines, and access to mental health treatment.
The Government said total health spending would be a record $16.77 billion in 2017/18 – an increase of $879 million, with an overall increase of $3.9b over the next four years.
However, the record claim does not take inflation into account, and sidesteps the fact that almost half the spending will go toward mandated wage increases as part of the pay equity settlement. …"
Why don't you take a look at how Infometrics calculate the result. Then you should ask yourself the simple question. What are they comparing their calculation to? The only rational answer is compared to what Labour might have done. Since Labour weren't the Government you will have to try and decide how an estimate for that can be determined. A possible answer is to take the last year of the Labour Government and increase it each year in the way they historically did. Or by the factor they did use in the paper, which is a possible interpretation of that.
You have to start however by what Labour actually were doing, not by what National was already doing during their term.
I wrote quite a lot about this in this blog. After you have read the Infometrics stuff, assuming that you can find it, and have understood their methodology try working out a proxy for what Labour might have done, and compare it with what National actually did do during their entire term. Their entire term.
You'll find that the total National did spend was greater than what Labour might have spent using their preferred inflation factor for Health expenditure.
I am really not going to waste my time repeating the facts about a subject over and over again to people who haven't bothered to read the comments the first time around.
It is like the rubbish people post that the banks can simply help themselves to the money in your account if they make bad deals and that you, the customer, lose your money while the shareholders in the bank lose nothing at all. I explained the fallacy in their statements on a number of occasions on this blog. I then decided that I had wasted enough time on fools.
That is what you are. You are a fool who believes a fallacious claim that one of your heroes chooses to blather on about. I have told people in the past what was wrong with the story. I really don't see why I should waste my time explaining it again to someone who is too lazy to read the first explanation.
What the facts prove is that you are a lazy idiot.
Last week, weka published a post on the Longwood Loop and our efforts to raise funds to buy an electric van that will travel the circuit from small town to little village in Southland, moving locally-produced fruit, vegetables, cheese, honey and whatever else locals produce, to other locals, waiting expectantly at the various "trading posts' along the loop.
We're thinking of, and pitching this as "a pilot for social and economic rejuvination and reslience in rural NZ", which is exactly what it is. With $47,400 raised already we are close to our target of $51 000 – we need just $3 600 more and have 36 hours left in our PledgeMe campaign to reach that target.
Could you, would you (I won't say, "you should 🙂 please give a little and share this message ( there are some great rewards: Wild South honey, Southern NZ scenic calendar, produce hamper, forest-garden tours (these are very ably narrated 🙂 meals and accomodation and more.
Vietnam has discovered a new coronavirus variant that's a hybrid of strains first found in India and the U.K., the Vietnamese health minister said Saturday (US time).
Nguyen Thanh Long said scientists examined the genetic makeup of the virus that had infected some recent patients, and found the new version of the virus. He said lab tests suggested it might spread more easily than other versions of the virus.
Vietnam was initially a standout success in battling the virus — in early May, it had recorded just over 3,100 confirmed cases and 35 deaths since the start of the pandemic.
But in the last few weeks, Vietnam has confirmed more than 3,500 new cases and 12 deaths, increasing the country's total death toll to 47.
My first question on this news was how is vaccination going in Vietnam? The short answer is it's barely even started – ourworldindata has them at just 1% of the population having received at least one dose.
Hopefully we'll make through to most of our population getting vaccinated before the next significant border breach.
As per the article is 1 million with astra zeneca, and still waiting on more doses to be delivered by the third/fourth quater?
Yes, that is what i hope, that we get enough of at least the compromised groups vaccinated and those that work the border and plague hotels.
Vietnam has since ordered a nationwide ban on all religious events. In major cities, authorities have banned large gatherings, closed public parks and non-essential business including in-person restaurants, bars, clubs and spas.
Vietnam so far has vaccinated 1 million people with AstraZeneca shots. Last week, it sealed a deal with Pfizer for 30 million doses, which are scheduled to be delivered in the third and fourth quarters of this year. It is also in talks with Moderna that would give it enough shots to fully vaccine 80% of its 96 million people
A frequent concern about the new mRNA vaccines is about their long-term safety – obviously a completely new technology does not and cannot have a long-term record so how can anyone know?
My own biochemistry expertise is negligible, but I have several family members and friends that are academics that need a deep understanding of cell biochemistry for their jobs.
Their opinions are unanimous: there is zero reason to believe the mRNA vaccines might have long-term effects beyond training the immune system to recognise the pathogen and deal to it. The mRNA simply causes a cell to make copies of the spike protein and show it to the immune system, then the mRNA breaks down and is dealt with by normal cell biochemistry processes just like all the myriad other RNA mediated processes going on all the time in cells. The immune system does its garbage cleanup on the cells exhibiting the spike protein just like it does the myriad other garbage cleanup operations going on all the time. For anything long term to come out of these completely routine processes (besides immunity) would go against well established understanding of how biochemistry works.
Then there's the fact that the first trials with mRNA vaccines started roughly a decade ago, and the first covid vaccine trials started roughly a year ago, and widespread administrations started roughly six months ago. In the context of vaccine side effects, that's starting to be "long-term". Even with the very intense monitoring happening, there is no signal of any kind of side-effects beyond the usual few weeks or at worst months timeframe that vaccine side effects almost always appear in.
mRNA is created during the process of transcription, where an enzyme (RNA polymerase) converts the gene into primary transcript mRNA (also known as pre-mRNA). This pre-mRNA usually still contains introns, regions that will not go on to code for the final amino acid sequence. These are removed in the process of RNA splicing, leaving only exons, regions that will encode the protein. This exon sequence constitutes mature mRNA. Mature mRNA is then read by the ribosome, and, utilising amino acids carried by transfer RNA, the ribosome creates the protein. This process is known as translation. All of these processes form part of the central dogma of molecular biology, which describes the flow of genetic information in a biological system.
Hey, howboutdat? Ctrl Shift V actually works. Next all I need is a browser where I can just hit that ‘clipboard with a T’ button.
Sure, what else can it be except an overly long piece of text with way too many links? It has already been explained to you today @ 2:40 pm and @ 3:50 pm, but here’s the reason why it triggers Auto-Moderation: https://thestandard.org.nz/faq/comment-formatting/#linking.
Your comment triggered Auto-Moderation because it contained too many links; it is pending. This has been around here on TS for as long as I can remember. This is entirely independent from Moderator action. In fact, a Moderator has to deal with it, review it, and release it as is or with edits, or Trash it. This takes time and depends on Moderator availability – Moderators are not at the beck and call of belligerent commenters who cannot or don’t want to follow the rules here.
Your comment is therefore utterly misguided, but this is not unexpected from you. In fact, your comment sounded like an accusation to me and I hope this was not your intention; you may want to be clearer to avoid such interpretation.
Bennett to announce forming 'change' government today
Yamina leader Naftali Bennett informed Lapid of his decision on Friday * They agreed that Bennett would serve first as prime minister until September 2023………………
MKs and other candidates in Yamina who oppose building a coalition that would replace Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will be asked to resign by Monday in order to be replaced by a candidate who would vote in favor of the government, because the support of at least six of the seven MKs in Yamina is necessary for a majority.
Sources in Yamina accused Netanyahu of lying about an agreement with Likud on a minority government being reached. They said the only agreements reached with Likud were about running together if there would be a fifth election.
"More than half of global GDP relies on high-functioning biodiversity but about a fifth of countries are at risk of their ecosystems collapsing due to the destruction of the natural world, according to an analysis by the insurance firm Swiss Re last year. Australia, Israel and South Africa were among the most threatened."
Panel of Mike Smith of the Iwi Chairs Forum, Climate Change Commission Rod Carr, Dairy NZ's Tim Mackle and Wellington Councillor Tamatha Paul talked emissions during a Q+A special this morning.
Tim Mackies made a stout defense of the dairying position but undermined his arguments by making some silly statements, eg
First thing is, it's not all about dairying although greenpeace like to use this highly emotive 'industrial'
There's nothing industrial about the sector, this is a bunch of families across the country pretty much…
Here is how leveraged house prices are unreasonably affecting Council rental prices. Whatever directive from government there has been, it is poor public housing that forces government public housing, central of local, to calculate rents based on market rents, or a proportion of them, rather than on historic book value, plus costs incurred. That way they would be paying their own way, not some inflated figure driven by stupid government policies based vaguely on business methods.
But a report to council last month indicated that, to keep up with market rate, senior housing rents in Marlborough needed to go up by 35 percent. This was $66 a week more for a one-bed unit, and $78 a week more for a two-bed unit.
The council has a self-imposed rule that the rent it charged for senior housing needed to be within 80 percent of the "market rate".
Pensioners said a 35 percent increase would be "impossible" to pay.
TL;DR: Here’s the top six news items of note in climate news for Aotearoa-NZ this week, and a discussion above that was recorded yesterday afternoon above between and The Kākā’s climate correspondent : An independent review panel into the emergency response to Cyclone Gabrielle in Hawkes Bayconcluded “that ...
There are now only a few days left to give feedback on the Draft Government Policy Statement (GPS) on Land Transport 2024-34 (see our earlier post this week on GPS submission guides). As we’ve reported, the GPS is a disaster for Local Government, so we were particularly interested to hear ...
Willis has pledged to go ahead with the debt-funded tax cuts, despite growing opposition from her own supporters worried about appearing fiscally irresponsible. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for ...
Open access notables A survey of interventions to actively conserve the frozen North, van Wijngaarden et al., Climatic Change:The frozen elements of the high North are thawing as the region warms much faster than the global mean. The dangers of sea level rise due to melting glacier ice, increased ...
Bryce Edwards writes – New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure. The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On ...
In 2015, then-Prime Minister John Key announced plans for a huge ocean sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands, banning fishing and mining from 15% of Aotearoa's EEZ. It was bold, it was ambitious, and it suggested that National might actually care about the environment. Except they fucked it up: Key failed ...
1. Who has just been given the accolade New Zealander of the Year?a. The Kokakob. The Cook Strait Ferryc. Fair God. Dr Jim Salinger 2. Which of these is an affront to decent society?a. Dame Edna Everageb. Mrs Doubtfire c. Dr. Frank-N-Furterd. Brian 3. Who is Penny Simmonds?a. The aspiring actress in Big ...
New Zealand’s biggest-ever political donations scandal is finally at an end. But what is the conclusion? No one can really be sure.The Court of Appeal released its judgement on Tuesday about the Serious Fraud Office case against the NZ First Foundation. On the face of it, the court found ...
Buzz from the Beehive Waves of rain are set to lash much of the North Island during Easter Weekend as a low-pressure system forms east of New Zealand, according to a weather forecast published in the past day or so. Niwa was warning of a “moisture-laden” long weekend, with rain expected ...
Look around us…Nicola Willis’ promises of balancing the books, of cutting spending without reducing services, and of delivering game changing tax cuts are disappearing before her eyes.Everyday we see stories of violent crime ending in horrific injuries, or worse. The cost of living worsens, whereas the PM claimed renters would ...
TL;DR: My top six news of note on the morning of Thursday, March 28 include:The Government will have to borrow between $10 billion to $15 billion more than previously expected in order to make up for a slowing economy and to pay for $14.9 billion of tax cuts, according to ...
This story by Naveena Sadasivam and Kate Yoder was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. The long-awaited jobs board for the American Climate Corps, promised early in the Biden administration, will open next month, according to details shared exclusively ...
Should landlords be able to deduct the interest on the loans they take out to bankroll their property speculation? The US Senate Budget Committee and Bloomberg News don’t think this is a good idea, for reasons set out below. Regardless, our coalition government has been burning through a ton of ...
Treasury’s first report on the economy since the change of government presents a damning indictment of Labour’s economic management. The problem for National is that it is so damning that logically, coupled with a rapidly slowing economy, Finance Minister Nicola Willis should respond to it by postponing or even cancelling ...
Budget tensions are becoming evident within the Coalition Government. Winston Peters made numerous political points in his speech to the NZF annual conference. But the attack on his own government’s fiscal policies raised issues of substance. ‘Today in the Sunday Star Times, journalist and former advisor to the Labour ...
Buzz from the Beehive The media – sure enough – have been binging on Finance Minister Nicola Willis’ release of the Budget Policy Statement and a statement headed Government announces Budget priorities This assures us – or rather, this parrots the Luxon team mantra – that the Budget “will deliver ...
The Ides of March brought me COVID followed by a bereavement. No wonder they tell you to be careful of them.I’m home now and have resumed the interrupted recuperation. Very much looking forward to getting back to regular things. Meanwhile, some thoughts…OneThis new Prime Minister guy just keeps getting more dire. ...
News that the Chinese ATP 40 cyber-hacking unit penetrated parliamentary internet networks in 2021 has renewed concerns about the PRC’s malign intentions in Aotearoa. But is the hack that significant given the length of time that has passed since its … Continue reading → ...
When Parliament passed the Intelligence and security Act in 2017, they assured us all that it was full of safeguards. Any intrusive surveillance of New Zealanders would be subject to a "triple lock", requiring the approval of the Minister and (supposedly independent) Commissioner of Intelligence Warrants, as well as post-facto ...
Eric Crampton writes – Richard Harman’s Politik newsletter provides a bit of the context that ought to have been showing up in other media reports on potential reductions in public service staffing. Media has been reporting on staffing cuts on the order of about 7%. Is that ...
Mike Grimshaw writes – It’s becoming increasingly apparent that many perceive free speech to have become the preserve of the politically right wing, the religiously conservative, the libertarian fringe, the anti-trans, the anti-Māori and…. well, just fill in with whatever groups or individuals you don’t like and don’t ...
Don Brash writes – As everybody who is not blind and deaf is aware, there is a huge political preoccupation with climate change at the moment, a widespread (though by no means unanimous) belief that global temperatures are rising mainly as a result of the greenhouse gases created ...
TL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy on Wednesday, March 27 include:Chris Bishop laid out his vision for filling Aotearoa-NZ’s $100 billion infrastructure deficit in a speech yesterday, emphasising user pays and private funding, but failed to say how to achieve bipartisanship on population, public borrowing and ...
Bryce Edwards writes – Former Finance Minister Grant Robertson and former Prime Minister Chris Hipkins have been conveying how unhappy they are with the tax system. Last week in his valedictory speech, Robertson called for the introduction of a wealth or capital gains tax. And this week Hipkins ...
On February 14, 2023 we announced our Rebuttal Update Project. This included an ask for feedback about the added "At a glance" section in the updated basic rebuttal versions. This weekly blog post series highlights this new section of one of the updated basic rebuttal versions and serves as a ...
Buzz from the Beehive China has loomed large in Beehive considerations over the past 24 hours, largely because of that country’s mischief-making in the cyber espionage department. Two media statements emerged on that subject hard on the heels of the PM baulking at questions put to him on RNZ’s Morning ...
Chris Trotter writes – WHY IS THE NATIONAL PARTY doing so much for landlords, property developers, trucking, and construction companies, and so little for everybody who isn’t already pretty well-off? It’s as if protecting landlords’ investments and building apartments and roads now constitute the whole of National’s ...
Bryce Edwards writes – When she was campaigning to be Minister of Finance last year, Nicola Willis pledged that she would resign from the job if she failed to deliver tax cuts in her first Budget. Now, it’s that pledge, along with Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s ...
Robert MacCulloch writes – The Reserve Bank has doubled staff numbers in five years to 510, with personnel costs rising to $80 million in 2023 from $32 million in 2018 – up by a whopping 150%. I guess when you print $50 billion and flood markets with liquidity, ...
The furore. In case you didn’t notice there was a controversy in the weekend involving dolphins in a little town off the South Island. Don’t panic, they haven’t declared independence and resumed whaling, this was simply a sailing event.The problem began when racing was cancelled on the opening day of ...
For 20 years or more, the case for a meaningful capital tax gains has been mulled over and analysed to death, including by the tax working group chaired by Sir Michael Cullen. More than once, the International Monetary Fund has said a CGT would be a good idea for New ...
TL;DR: My top 10 news and analysis links this morning include:Today’s must-read: The Public Health Communications Centre (PHCC) call for urgent preventive action and a risk assessment survey of long covid in this briefing noteLocal scoop: NZ road deaths surpass OECD rates, so why is the govt reversing safety plans? ...
This story was originally published by Grist and is part of Covering Climate Now, a global journalism collaboration strengthening coverage of the climate story. This story is part of a collaboration with Grist and WABE to demystify the Georgia Public Service Commission, the small but powerful state-elected board that makes critical decisions about everything from raising ...
This is a guest post from Robert McLachlan Global warming is accelerating; 2023 was off the charts. We need to stop burning fossil fuels. In New Zealand, transport accounts for half of all fossil fuels burnt. In the Emissions Reduction Plan, transport emissions fall 41% by 2035. As the ...
Labour productivity has been receding rapidly over the past two years, reversing a post-lockdown rise. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things to note in Aotearoa’s political economy as at 6:26am on Tuesday, March 26 include:Workers have been treading water in output per hour worked for 12 years, ...
TL;DR: The key events to watch in Aotearoa-NZ’s political economy in the week to April 2 include:Today, Parliament resumes sitting at 2pm for the second week of a two-week session. Officials for SIS and GCSB report their annual reviews in public to the Intelligence and Security Select Committee from 5.10pm.Tomorrow, ...
Faced with a barrage of criticism over the promised tax cuts from usually supportive commentators, Finance Minister Nicola Willis yesterday reaffirmed her intention to include them in this year’s Budget. The Government is up against it over the cuts just about every way it turns. Commentators like Fran O’Sullivan, Matthew ...
Here’s my pick of today’s substack posts as of 6:26pm on Monday, March 25: writes via his substack that Market-rate housing will make your city cheaper writes via his substack about the problems talking to double-cab ute (truck) drivers about their vehicles. today about moments of radicalisation in ...
Buzz from the Beehive Just before Christmas, Finance Minister Nicola Willis delivered something that was pitched as a mini-budget and brayed about the decisive action being taken to repair the Government books and support income tax relief in Budget 2024. In a statement headed Fiscal repair job underway. she introduced ...
My sister Belinda asked Dad yesterday what one word would describe Mum best. He said: vivacious.If you only knew her from the photos on the slideshow we've made for today,you might wonder about that, because the camera tended to lie with Mum.If ever she saw a camera pointed at her, she ...
There are two major public consultations closing in the next week, Auckland Council’s Long Term Plan (LTP), and the draft Government Policy Statement on Land Transport (GPS). Closing dates and times: LTP closes Thursday 28 February, at 11.59pm – a minute to midnight! GPS closes Tuesday 2 April, at 12pm noon – note that’s ...
From Kiwiblog’s David Farrar – Bryce Wilkinson writes: Senior Fellow Bryce Wilkinson’s analysis reveals that since March 2009, New Zealand has spent $158 billion more overseas than it has earned, but its NIIP has only fallen by $32 billion.Statistics New Zealand shows that receipts from overseas reinsurers have ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition? Brian Easton writes – The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could ...
Dear Nicola Willis,Right now you’ve probably got lots of competing demands coming at you. Ministers who’ve inherited quite a mess, or so you’ve told us, looking for money in the budget to improve things. I imagine that’s why they came to parliament - to make things better.You’ll have to make ...
The Local Government, Transport and Auckland Minister hasthreatened councils with intervention if they don’t merge water assets to take them off balance sheet, just as the now-repealed Three Waters plan directed. Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: My six things of note this morning for Monday, March 25 include:Simeon ...
A listing of 36 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, March 17, 2024 thru Sat, March 23, 2024. Story of the week Thanks to John Mason having the stamina to sit down to watch "Climate - the Movie" ...
This morning the Q&A programme had Simeon Brown on to talk about National’s replacement for Three Waters. In case anyone’s forgotten the three are - drinking water, waste water, and sewerage. It’s quite important not to get them mixed up. In much the same way that you wouldn’t want to ...
Today’s newsletter comes with a mini-podcast conversation between me and my buddy Liv Tennet, talking about her time as a child actor in Lord of the Rings. It’s a conversation with a lot of giggles as she talks about falling off a horse, and becoming a meme. Read ...
The Desmog Climate Disinformation Database documents, "individuals and organisations that have helped to delay and distract the public and our elected leaders from taking needed action to reduce greenhouse gas pollution and fight global warming." It's a who's who of the organised climate change denial movement, in other words. In ...
Bob Edlin writes – A High Court judge has decided miscreants who have mana – or who claim to have mana – should be treated differently from miscreants who have none. It’s a ruling that suggests indigenous law-breakers have a better chance of securing a discharge without conviction ...
Welcome to the first, and possibly last, edition of Brickbats, Bouquets and Bull’s Wool. In which I’ll take a look at the events of the last week or so, and rate them.In such ratings the numbers usually have more to do with the opinions of the reviewer, than the actual ...
Roger Partridge writes – My earlier column this month, New Zealand’s highest court could be facing a turning point, prompted a flood of feedback from business readers and lawyers alike. A common query was what Parliament can do to restrain an overreaching judiciary. This week I discuss two steps Parliament ...
TL;DR: In today’s ‘six-stack’ of substacks at 6.16pm on Friday, March 22: writes about New Zealand's Building Boom—And What the World Must Learn From It over at his substack. challenges the Auckland Council’s use of a 3.8 degrees of warming forecast to oppose a wave-park and data centre project ...
Is she hinting that the Coalition Government will have to back down on key promises it made in Opposition?The Minister of Finance, Nicola Willis, is telling an evolving story about her fiscal challenges. In Opposition she was confident that she could deliver her promised income tax cuts. Appointed minister, she ...
Buzz from the Beehive Ministers of the Crown have drawn attention to one sector of the science sector which is unlikely to be subjected to heavy spending cuts, a state-funded broadcaster which is doing nicely, thank you, and a sporting event that had $5.4 million from the public purse puffed ...
Abbott’s Freestyle Libre sensors allow continuous glucose monitoring (CGM). The sensor is applied to the back of the patient’s arm, with a thin filament under the skin measuring glucose levels constantly. But it costs around $100 per sensor and must be replaced once every 14 days. Photo by BSIP/Universal Images ...
The Inspector General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) recently released a report in which he exposes the existence of a foreign intelligence partner-controlled technological “capability” inside the headquarters of the GCSB, NZ’s 5 Eyes-affiliated signals intelligence collection and analysis agency. … Continue reading → ...
Peter Dunne writes – Nearly three decades after the introduction of MMP and multiparty governments there should be a greater level of understanding about their finer points than often appears to be the case. The reaction to the despicable outburst from the Deputy Prime Minister at the weekend highlights ...
The sweet kisses from fruit of summerHave slowly been turning dullerYou say, "those times"And "remember the daysWhen we went outside and there still was the shade?"Taking no reason into play…Autumn. Clear, blue days shortening to longer nights, growing colder. Aotearoa.That’s us. The temperature dropping, the looming car crash - so ...
Bryce Edwards writes – “It is often said that behind every great man is a great woman”. This is the pitch by the National Party Botany electorate branch to attend their “Ladies Afternoon Tea with Amanda Luxon”. For $110 including GST, you can turn up on Saturday 20 April ...
David Farrar writes – The Electoral Commission has published the expense returns for political parties for the 2023 election. I’ve put them in a table with how many votes a party got so we can see the spend per vote. National only spent $3.34 for every vote they got, almost ...
Winston Peters’ headline-making actions over the past week may have been a show of political power intended to strengthen his hand in Budget negotiations. It was no accident that his State of the Nation speech was as it was. He made it as New Zealand First Leader, not as Deputy ...
Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The five things that mattered in Aotearoa’s political economy that we wrote and spoke about via The Kākā and elsewhere for paying subscribers in the last week included:Former Labour Finance Minister Grant Robertson bowed out of politics this week, giving a series of exit ...
Graham Adams writes — If you love the law or sausages, as the saying goes, best not to look too closely at how they are made. And after watching the orgy of self-pity when Newshub’s closure was announced on February 28, television journalism should definitely be added to the list of those ...
Venerable New Zealand political commentator, Chris Trotter (https://bowalleyroad.blogspot.com/), is a sad creature these days. Once one of the most reliable Leftist writers out there – Economic Left at that – Trotter seems to have absorbed the worldview of Auckland culture-war obsessives. It is not for me to categorise what he ...
The cruelty of short-term memory loss is that each time you ask where she is, you get the fresh shock and grief of the news. That was Dad's day yesterday.Comfortingly, it seems to be less so today. Last night he looked crumpled, today he seems more settled. There's a card ...
Photo by Alvan Nee on UnsplashIt’s that new day of the week (Thursday rather than Friday) when and I co-host our ‘hoon’ webinar with paying subscribers to The Kākā for an hour at 5 pm. Jump on this link on YouTube Livestream for our chat about the week’s news ...
Buzz from the Beehive One minister is talking tough while a colleague – whose ministry had acted tough and drawn a barrage of flak – has shown an official softening. Some ministers are doing what Labour was good at, which is distributing public funds to causes regarded as worthy or ...
The Coalition Government’s plan to ‘get Auckland moving’ is a cuts cover-up that will ultimately cost Aucklanders more to move around the city, says Labour Auckland Issues spokesperson Shanan Halbert. ...
Slashing the Ministry of Pacific Peoples by 40% will have a devastating impact on pacific communities and further highlights how little this government cares about anything other than cutting taxes for the wealthiest few. ...
Labour has proposed an urgent inquiry to investigate the ever-increasing profits of supermarkets, aiming to lower costs for shoppers and food producers alike, says Labour Spokesperson for Commerce and Consumer Affairs Arena Williams and Primary Production Spokesperson Cushla Tangaere-Manuel. ...
With 14% of jobs on the line at the Ministry for Ethnic Communities, the responsible Minister Melissa Lee is failing to stand up for the very communities she’s meant to be representing. ...
COURT OF APPEAL: TRIFECTA OF VICTORY FOR NZ FIRST, TRIFECTA OF FAILURE FOR OPPONENTS For the third time since April 2020, New Zealand First has defeated the Serious Fraud Office and all those complicit in a malicious attack against a political party going about its lawful business in a lawful ...
The Green Party stands with people who live in public housing, people in dire housing need, experts and advocates in demanding better than the Government’s archaic approach to housing those who need our support the most. ...
New Zealand has recently lost the hosting rights of some major international sporting events including the America’s Cup, the Rugby Championship, Netball World Cup, and the Wellington Sevens. We are now at a huge risk of losing SailGP as well. And it won’t stop there. The recent issues with SailGP ...
A Member’s Bill drawn this week would modernise insurance law and make things fairer and more transparent for consumers, Christchurch Central MP Duncan Webb said. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues has confirmed she was aware of funding issues in mid-December and did nothing to stop it. On 14 March, she signed off on changes that were announced and implemented on 18 March without any consultation with disability communities. ...
Green Party MP Julie Anne Genter says her members' bill is an opportunity for the coalition government to plug the gap in electric vehicle incentives. ...
The National Government continues to talk about irresponsible tax cuts that will only drive up inflation, despite the country entering a technical recession. ...
The Minister for Disability Issues must act urgently to reinstate flexibility around the funding for disability support and apologise to disabled carers. ...
This story has been initiated by a leftie shill reporter who proactively sought to call a member of a former band, which disbanded twelve years ago, give their biased appraisal of what was said in my speech, and concocted a ham-fisted attempt at a story that does nothing but show ...
The Government has accepted Labour’s change to the Road User Charge (RUC) discount for hybrid vehicles, meaning there will still be some incentive for people to buy greener vehicles. ...
Many in the mainstream media have taken what was said in New Zealand First’s State of the Nation Speech in Palmerston North on Sunday and deliberately, deceitfully, and ignorantly misrepresented what I said and why I said it. The headlines and commentary on the news stated that I compared ‘co-governance ...
Kicking the most vulnerable people out of state housing and pushing them towards homelessness will result in a proliferation of poverty and trauma across our most vulnerable communities. ...
Te Pāti Māori co-leader and MP for Waiariki, Rawiri Waititi has penned a letter asking MPs to support his members bill to remove GST from all food. The bill is expected to go through its first reading in parliament this Wednesday. “I’m calling on all political parties to support my ...
Good afternoon. Thank you for, in your very busy lives, turning up to this meeting today. On October 14th last year New Zealanders overwhelmingly voted for change. That is exactly what this new government is bringing. New Zealand First campaigned to ‘take back our country’ and stop the disastrous economic ...
This year is about getting real with Kiwis and discussing the tough issues, as the National Government exacerbates inequality and divides New Zealand, Labour Leader Chris Hipkins said ...
The Government adding Significant Natural Areas (SNAs) to its already roaring environmental policy bonfire is an assault on the future of wildlife that makes Aotearoa unique. ...
After 12 years of fighting to protect our moana we are finding ourselves back at square one and back at court. Today, the Environmental Protection Agency is sitting in Hawera to reconsider an application from Trans-Tasman Resources to dig up 50 million tonnes of the seabed in South Taranaki. This ...
Minister Shane Jones’ decision to step away from a seabed mining project is evidence of the murky waters surrounding the Government’s fast-track legislation. ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The growth of Treaty of Waitangi clauses in legislation caused so much worry that a special oversight group was set up by the last government in a bid to get greater coherence in the publicservice on Treaty matters. When ministers first considered the need for tighter oversight in 2021, there ...
The Coalition Government’s miscalculation saga continues as it has forgotten an eyewatering $90 million gap in its interest deductibility cost figures, say Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds and Revenue Spokesperson Deborah Russell. ...
He Pou a Rangi Climate Change Commission has today released advice that says if the Government doesn’t act now New Zealand is at risk of not meeting its climate goals. ...
The Coalition Government has today confirmed it is abandoning first home buyers who are struggling to get ahead, says Labour Finance spokesperson Barbara Edmonds. ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has welcomed the passing of legislation to move light electric vehicles (EVs) and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) into the road user charges system from 1 April. “It was always intended that EVs and PHEVs would be exempt from road user charges until they reached two ...
New Zealand is strengthening its ability to combat illegal fishing outside its domestic waters and beef up regulation for its own commercial fishers in international waters through a Bill which had its first reading in Parliament today. The Fisheries (International Fishing and Other Matters) Amendment Bill 2023 sets out stronger ...
Economists Carl Hansen and Professor Prasanna Gai have been appointed to the Reserve Bank Monetary Policy Committee, Finance Minister Nicola Willis announced today. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) is the independent decision-making body that sets the Official Cash Rate which determines interest rates. Carl Hansen, the executive director of Capital ...
Apartment owners and buyers will soon have greater protections as further changes to the law on unit titles come into effect, Housing Minister Chris Bishop says. “The Unit Titles (Strengthening Body Corporate Governance and Other Matters) Amendment Act had already introduced some changes in December 2022 and May 2023, and ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters will travel to Egypt and Europe from this weekend. “This travel will focus on a range of New Zealand’s traditional diplomatic and security partnerships while enabling broad engagement on the urgent situation in Gaza,” Mr Peters says. Mr Peters will attend the NATO Foreign ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown is encouraging all road users to stay safe, plan their journeys ahead of time, and be patient with other drivers while travelling around this Easter long weekend. “Road safety is a responsibility we all share, and with increased traffic on our roads expected this Easter we ...
About 1.4 million New Zealanders will receive cost of living relief through increased government assistance from April 1 909,000 pensioners get a boost to Superannuation, including 5000 veterans 371,000 working-age beneficiaries will get higher payments 45,000 students will see an increase in their allowance Over a quarter of New Zealanders ...
Ensuring social housing is being provided to those with the greatest needs is front of mind as the Government restarts social housing tenancy reviews, Associate Housing Minister Tama Potaka says. “Our relentless focus on building a strong economy is to ensure we can deliver better public services such as social ...
The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary will not go ahead, with Cabinet deciding to stop work on the proposed reserve and remove the Bill that would have established it from Parliament’s order paper. “The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary Bill would have created a 620,000 sq km economic no-go zone,” Oceans and Fisheries Minister ...
Dam safety regulations are being amended so that smaller dams won’t be subject to excessive compliance costs, Minister for Building and Construction Chris Penk says. “The coalition Government is focused on reducing costs and removing unnecessary red tape so we can get the economy back on track. “Dam safety regulations ...
The coalition Government is expanding the medium-scale adverse event classification to parts of the North Island as dry weather conditions persist, Agriculture Minister Todd McClay announced today. “I have made the decision to expand the medium-scale adverse event classification already in place for parts of the South Island to also cover the ...
The passing of legislation giving effect to coalition Government tax commitments has been welcomed by Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “The Taxation (Annual Rates for 2023–24, Multinational Tax, and Remedial Matters) Bill will help place New Zealand on a more secure economic footing, improve outcomes for New Zealanders, and make our tax system ...
Science, Innovation and Technology Minister Judith Collins and Tertiary Education and Skills Minister Penny Simmonds today announced plans to transform our science and university sectors to boost the economy. Two advisory groups, chaired by Professor Sir Peter Gluckman, will advise the Government on how these sectors can play a greater ...
The Budget will deliver urgently-needed tax relief to hard-working New Zealanders while putting the government’s finances back on a sustainable track, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. The Finance Minister made the comments at the release of the Budget Policy Statement setting out the Government’s Budget objectives. “The coalition Government intends ...
The coalition Government will look at options to address a zoning issue that limits how much financial support Queenstown residents can get for accommodation. Cabinet has agreed on a response to the Petitions Committee, which had recommended the geographic information MSD uses to determine how much accommodation supplement can be ...
Cabinet has agreed to a short extension to the final reporting timeframe for the Royal Commission into Abuse in Care from 28 March 2024 to 26 June 2024, Internal Affairs Minister Brooke van Velden says. “The Royal Commission wrote to me on 16 February 2024, requesting that I consider an ...
The coalition Government is delivering an $18 million boost to New Zealanders needing to travel for specialist health treatment, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti says. “These changes are long overdue – the National Travel Assistance (NTA) scheme saw its last increase to mileage and accommodation rates way back in 2009. ...
The Government is recognising the innovative and rising talent in New Zealand’s growing space sector, with the Prime Minister and Space Minister Judith Collins announcing the new Prime Minister’s Prizes for Space today. “New Zealand has a growing reputation as a high-value partner for space missions and research. I am ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters has confirmed New Zealand’s concerns about cyber activity have been conveyed directly to the Chinese Government. “The Prime Minister and Minister Collins have expressed concerns today about malicious cyber activity, attributed to groups sponsored by the Chinese Government, targeting democratic institutions in both New ...
Independent Reviewers appointed for School Property Inquiry Education Minister Erica Stanford today announced the appointment of three independent reviewers to lead the Ministerial Inquiry into the Ministry of Education’s School Property Function. The Inquiry will be led by former Minister of Foreign Affairs Murray McCully. “There is a clear need ...
State Highway 1 across the Brynderwyns will be open for Easter weekend, with work currently underway to ensure the resilience of this critical route being paused for Easter Weekend to allow holiday makers to travel north, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Today I visited the Brynderwyn Hills construction site, where ...
Introduction Good morning to you all, and thanks for having me bright and early today. I am absolutely delighted to be the Minister for Infrastructure alongside the Minister of Housing and Resource Management Reform. I know the Prime Minister sees the three roles as closely connected and he wants me ...
New Zealand stands with the United Kingdom in its condemnation of People’s Republic of China (PRC) state-backed malicious cyber activity impacting its Electoral Commission and targeting Members of the UK Parliament. “The use of cyber-enabled espionage operations to interfere with democratic institutions and processes anywhere is unacceptable,” Minister Responsible for ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Defence Minister Judith Collins today announced New Zealand will provide logistics support for the upcoming Solomon Islands election. “We’re sending a team of New Zealand Defence Force personnel and two NH90 helicopters to provide logistics support for the election on 17 April, at the request ...
The European Union Free Trade Agreement Legislation Amendment Bill received Royal Assent today, completing the process for New Zealand’s ratification of its free trade agreement with the European Union. “I am pleased to announce that today, in a small ceremony at the Beehive, New Zealand notified the European Union ...
Public consultation on the terms of reference for the Royal Commission into COVID-19 Lessons has concluded, Internal Affairs Minister Hon Brooke van Velden says. “I have been advised that there were over 11,000 submissions made through the Royal Commission’s online consultation portal.” Expanding the scope of the Royal Commission of ...
Hardworking families are set to benefit from a new credit to help them meet their early childcare education (ECE) costs, Finance Minister Nicola Willis says. From 1 July, parents and caregivers of young children will be supported to manage the rising cost of living with a partial reimbursement of their ...
A specialised Independent Technical Advisory Group (ITAG) tasked with preparing and publishing independent non-binding advice on the design of a "green" (sustainable finance) taxonomy rulebook is being established, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts says. “Comprising experts and market participants, the ITAG's primary goal is to deliver comprehensive recommendations to the ...
Defence Minister Judith Collins has thanked the Chief of Army, Major General John Boswell, DSD, for his service as he leaves the Army after 40 years. “I would like to thank Major General Boswell for his contribution to the Army and the wider New Zealand Defence Force, undertaking many different ...
25 March 2024 Minister to meet Australian counterparts and Manufacturing Industry Leaders Small Business, Manufacturing, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly will travel to Australia for a series of bi-lateral meetings and manufacturing visits. During the visit, Minister Bayly will meet with his Australian counterparts, Senator Tim Ayres, Ed ...
Government commits almost $3 million for period products in schools The Coalition Government has committed $2.9 million to ensure intermediate and secondary schools continue providing period products to those who need them, Minister of Education Erica Stanford announced today. “This is an issue of dignity and ensuring young women don’t ...
Good morning, it’s great to be here. First, I would like to acknowledge the New Zealand Institute of Building Surveyors and thank you for the opportunity to be here this morning. I would like to use this opportunity to outline the Government’s ambitious plan and what we hope to ...
Minister for Pacific Peoples Dr Shane Reti has announced the Government’s commitment to the Auckland Secondary Schools Māori and Pacific Islands Cultural Festival, more commonly known as Polyfest. “The Ministry for Pacific Peoples is a longtime supporter of Polyfest and, as it celebrates 49 years in 2024, I’m proud to ...
Before moving onto the substance of today’s address, I want to recognise the very significant and ongoing contribution the Breast Cancer Foundation makes to support the lives of New Zealand women and their families living with breast cancer. I very much enjoy working with you. I also want to recognise ...
New Zealand has notched up a first with the launch of University of Canterbury research to the International Space Station, Science, Innovation and Technology and Space Minister Judith Collins says. The hardware, developed by Dr Sarah Kessans, is designed to operate autonomously in orbit, allowing scientists on Earth to study ...
Introduction Thank you for inviting me to speak with you today and I’m sorry I can’t be there in person. Yesterday I started in Wellington for Breakfast TV, spoke to a property conference in Auckland, and finished the day speaking to local government in Christchurch, so it would have been ...
The Coalition Government is contributing more than $1 million to support the establishment of an emergency multi-agency coordination centre in Northland. Emergency Management and Recovery Minister Mark Mitchell announced the contribution today during a visit of the Whangārei site where the facility will be constructed. “Northland has faced a number ...
New Zealanders have enjoyed a broader range of voices telling the story of Aotearoa thanks to the creation of Whakaata Māori 20 years ago, says Māori Development Minister Tama Potaka. The minister spoke at a celebration marking the national indigenous media organisation’s 20th anniversary at their studio in Auckland on ...
Commercial catch limits for some fisheries have been increased following a review showing stocks are healthy and abundant, Ocean and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones says. The changes, along with some other catch limit changes and management settings, begin coming into effect from 1 April 2024. "Regular biannual reviews of fish ...
Analysis by Keith Rankin. Keith Rankin, trained as an economic historian, is a retired lecturer in Economics and Statistics. He lives in Auckland, New Zealand. My earlier article – Can ‘Good’ be the Greater Evil? – looked at the issue of how wars should end, and how Good versus Evil ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 AMMA by Saraid de Silva (Moa Press, $38)A stunning debut novel reviewed by Brannavan ...
From Steve Martin to Ricky Stanicky, a pick’n’mix of things worth watching and listening to this long weekend. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. If you’re at a loss for something to occupy yourself with this Easter, don’t panic: The Spinoff’s got ...
Jesus had dinner with his 12 disciples right before he died. Noted historian Madeleine Chapman finds out who really deserved to be there.First published in 2018 but let’s be honest, the subject is timeless. As you sit on your couch this Easter Sunday, eating a chocolate egg you know ...
The newly-promoted Northern League club is on a mission to return to the National League for the first time in two decades. Plenty about domestic football in New Zealand has changed in that time – but the sense that this amateur competition is not an entirely level playing field remains. ...
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Auckland Council has put a deadline on new weather-impacted property owners applying for categorisation as government funding looks set to run out. Councillors have voted to support a deadline of September 30 for property owners who haven’t accessed support to come forward and engage with the council’s recovery office. It ...
NONFICTION 1 BBQ Economics by Liam Dann (Penguin Random House, $40) “It’s official,” wrote Dann nine days ago in the Herald, where he works as business editor at large, “we’re in recession.” Yeah, great. He delivered the bad stats: “GDP fell 0.1 percent in the December 2023 quarter, compared with ...
Comment: Every year on February 2, a dozen men in tuxedos and top hats approach the burrow of a groundhog in Gobbler’s Knob, Pennsylvania and entice the beaver-like rodent to emerge and predict the weather. If the groundhog, named Punxsutawney Phil, sees its own shadow when it is summoned, legend ...
By Anneke Smith, RNZ News political reporter A petition urging the New Zealand government to provide urgent humanitarian assistance to the Palestinian people has been tabled in the House. More than 200 people gathered on Parliament’s forecourt today and they were met by MPs from Labour, the Greens and Te ...
Pacific Media Watch The Paris-based global media freedom watchdog RSF (Reporters Without Borders) has appealed for information about the “disappearance” of Palestinian journalist Bayan Abusultan. She was reportedly last seen on March 19 among people “sequestered” in this week’s raid and siege of Al Shifa hospital by Israeli troops in ...
EDITORIAL:The Jakarta Post It happens again and again; indigenous Papuans fall victim to Indonesian soldiers. This time, we have photographic evidence for the brutality, with videos on social media showing a Papuan man being tortured by a group of plainclothes men alleged to be the Indonesian Military (TNI) members. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robyn J. Whitaker, Director of the Wesley Centre for Theology, Ethics, and Public Policy & Associate Professor, New Testament, Pilgrim Theological College, University of Divinity A strange and eclectic range of activities takes place across these few weeks of the year. Some ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Panizza Allmark, Professor Visual & Cultural Studies, Edith Cowan University It’s Easter weekend, which means many of us will be kicking back with the greatest hits on repeat. But whether you’re a boomer, or an ‘80s or ’90s kid, you might be ...
RNZ Pacific Fiji’s Acting Public Prosecutor has filed an appeal against the sentences of former prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama and suspended police chief Sitiveni Qiliho in their corruption case. Bainimarama was granted an absolute discharge for attempting to pervert the course of justice while Qiliho received a conditional discharge with ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Arosha Weerakoon, Senior Lecturer and General Dentist, School of Dentistry, The University of Queensland Casezy idea/Shutterstock How does toothpaste work? What did people use before toothpaste was invented? – Amelia, age 7, Meanjin (Brisbane) Thanks for your ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brett Hallam, Associate professor, UNSW Sydney IM Imagery/Shutterstock Solar SunShot is well named. The Australian government announced today it would plough A$1 billion into bringing back solar manufacturing to Australia, boosting energy security, swapping coal and gas jobs for those ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Dix, Research Fellow in Nutrition & Dietetics, The University of Queensland Easter is the time for chocolate. The shops are full of fantastically packaged and shiny chocolates in all shapes and sizes, making trips to the supermarket with children more challenging ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Emma Felton, Adjunct Senior Researcher, University of South Australia Even in a stubborn cost-of-living crisis, it seems there’s one luxury most Australians won’t sacrifice – their daily cup of coffee. Coffee sales have largely remained stable, even as financial pressures have ...
Mining company Trans-Tasman Resources has unexpectedly withdrawn its application for a consent to suck the valuable metals vanadium and titanium from the Taranaki seafloor, as it apparently wagers on the Government’s new fast-track process. It had spent two-and-a-half days putting its case to the Environmental Protection Agency’s decision-making committee, at ...
Contrary to the Associate Minister of Education’s claims, analysis of Healthy School Lunches Programme - Ka Ora, Ka Ako assessments has revealed it provides excellent value for the taxpayer dollar, as a groundswell of public opposition to Government ...
Greenpeace says wannabe Taranaki seabed miner Trans-Tasman Resources is likely banking on Christopher Luxon’s fast-track process to side-step proper scrutiny of its Taranaki seabed mining proposal by bailing out of the Environmental Protection Agency hearing ...
Kiwis Against Seabed mining today slammed Australian owned would-be seabed miner Trans Tasman Resources (TTR) for abandoning its application to the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) to mine the seabed of the South Taranaki Bight. The company ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katie Attwell, Associate Professor, School of Social Sciences, The University of Western Australia Ground Picture/Shutterstock Months after COVID vaccines were introduced in 2021, governments and private organisations mandated them for various groups. Health and aged care workers were among the ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Andrew Dzurak, Scientia Professor Andrew Dzurak, CEO and Founder of Diraq, UNSW Sydney Diraq For decades, the pursuit of quantum computing has struggled with the need for extremely low temperatures, mere fractions of a degree above absolute zero (0 Kelvin or ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Adrian Beaumont, Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne A national Essential poll, conducted March 20–24 from a sample of 1,150, gave the Coalition a 50–44 lead including undecided, a reversal ...
The Taxpayers’ Union has today made a formal request under the Regulations of the People’s Republic of China on Open Government Information () for information held about how New Zealand Members of Parliament are spending taxpayer ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Robert Nelson, Honorary Principal Fellow, The University of Melbourne A Byzantine depiction of the Eucharist in Saint Sophia Cathedral, Kyiv.Jacek555/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA A nasty quarrel arose in the 11th century over what kind of bread should be used in holy ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Patrick Hesp, Professor, Flinders University Patrick Hesp In some parts of Australia, coastal dunes are retreating from the ocean at an alarming rate, as waves carve up the beach and wind blows the sand inland. But coastal communities are largely ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Luke Heemsbergen, Senior Lecturer, Digital, Political, Media, Deakin University With an impressive 60% of the US smartphone market, Apple is undeniably big, but not a clear monopoly. Yet, years of innovation by Apple have effectively given the company its own exclusive ...
Whether you’re facing layoffs or are just an emotional junior staffer, it’s always a good idea to scout out a good crying place before you need it. It’s an incredibly hard time for Wellington. Across the city, thousands of public servants are hearing tough news about redundancies and layoffs. Government ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By James Miller-Jones, Professor, Curtin University Nuclear explosions on a neutron star feed its jets. Danielle Futselaar and Nathalie Degenaar, Anton Pannekoek Institute, University of Amsterdam, CC BY-SA How fast can a neutron star drive powerful jets into space? The answer, it ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Daryl Adair, Associate Professor of Sport Management, University of Technology Sydney Earlier this week, independent MP Andrew Wilkie accused the AFL of conducting “off the books” illicit drug testing to identify players using substances of abuse, then inappropriately withdrawing them from matches ...
The Government’s announcement that it will scrap plans for a vast marine sanctuary around the Kermadec Islands is ‘shameful’ and will make it impossible for Aotearoa New Zealand to meet its international commitments, says the World Wide Fund for Nature ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By John Quiggin, Professor, School of Economics, The University of Queensland Shutterstock The federal government has bowed to pressure from the car industry, announcing it will relax proposed emissions rules for utes and vans and delay enforcement of the new standards ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Suzanne Rutland, Professor Emerita, University of Sydney In his latest book, Jewish Life in Medieval Spain, Jonathan Ray focuses on the tumult of the 14th century in Spain – a time of the plague, civil strife and war between the two largest ...
While creating a slate of world-class shows, Whakaata Māori also developed a generation of world-class creatives. Television is an odd word. It mixes the Ancient Greek and Latin languages, and its most literal meaning is “far-off sight”. In the contemporary and living language of te reo Māori, “whakaata” as a ...
Yesterday the UN Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza. This significant step and the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza prompted an urgent debate in the New Zealand Parliament. Leader ...
The Government’s decision to reduce access to continuous glucose monitors (CGM) not only threatens the lives of children with type 1 diabetes and increases the potential for ‘Dead in Bed’ syndrome, but also threatens the health of their parents an ...
Apples are available year-round, but the wide variety on offer involves intensive scientific research – and large-scale commercialisation. What’s beautiful, red, sweet and crunchy? Tony Martin’s favourite kind of apple: Sassy. The CEO of apple and pear breeding organisation Prevar, Martin’s fondness for Sassy represents professional success as well as ...
Family violence specialist service Shine is calling on employers to stop asking for proof of domestic violence in order for employees to access domestic violence leave. The call comes five years after the introduction of the Domestic Violence ...
The Deputy Chairperson of the Finance and Expenditure Committee is calling for public submissions on the Budget Policy Statement 2024. The Budget Policy Statement 2024 (BPS) sets out the Government's priorities for the 2024 Budget. It explains the approach ...
Brutal government spending cuts that will see the size of the Ministry for Pacific Peoples slashed by 40% will hit Pasifika communities hard, the PSA says. The Ministry has told staff that it is seeking voluntary redundancies, and to redeploy and reassign ...
I live with five people I mostly love, but our different ideas about generosity are starting to really irk me.Want Hera’s help? Email your problem to helpme@thespinoff.co.nzDear Hera,This is a bit of a random one but here goes. I’m 22 and work an OK job (OK meaning I get paid ...
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While Nicola Willis wouldn’t give any details on its size, she said a package of tax cuts is definitely still coming in this year’s budget, writes Catherine McGregor in this excerpt from The Bulletin, The Spinoff’s morning news round-up. To receive The Bulletin in full each weekday, sign up here. ...
The Taxpayers’ Union is welcoming the investigation into the Department of Internal Affairs after it was revealed that the Department’s Chief Executive personally reached out to expedite a DJs passport application. Taxpayers’ Union Campaigns ...
Finance minister Nicola Willis delivers her first budget statement, and unwittingly helps Joel MacManus save his relationship. Nicola Willis strode into the Beehive Theatrette. Around me, on the green foldout seats, were the country’s top business and political journalists. They were all here to see her announce the Budget Policy ...
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The unidentified foreign intelligence operation discussed in a scathing report by New Zealand’s Inspector-General of Intelligence and Security (IGIS) last week appears to be a controversial United States intelligence system. The IGIS report said the Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) decision to host a foreign system from 2012-2020 was “improper” ...
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The US has had a dramatic drop in covid infections and deaths, coinciding with with the mass rollout of vaccinations.
So a reasonable question is: how is the pandemic going for those yet to be vaccinated?
WashingtonPost has taken a look at that question, and the tl;dr is that for the unvaccinated, the pandemic is carrying on just as it was before the decline. The explanation may be the way vaccination and behaviours to limit disease transmission has become such a polarised issue. Those inclined to be vaccinated or not have separated into distinct social groupings, and the antis are still having their superspreader events while completely unprotected.
The evidence is clear, folks. Get your vaccination when it's offered to you. It really works. Herd immunity in the rest of society won't protect you if you're unvaccinated if your social circle includes a lot of other unvaccinated people.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/interactive/2021/covid-rates-unvaccinated-people/?itid=hp_pandemic%20test
https://www.newsweek.com/tennessee-hat-shop-blasted-selling-nazi-style-jewish-stars-proclaiming-not-vaccinated-1596081
""Vaccinated employees get a vaccination logo just like the Nazi's forced Jewish people to wear a gold star," Greene tweeted on Tuesday. Greene has also compared face masks to the gold stars. Nazis forced Jews to wear the stars to stigmatize, humiliate, isolate and control them."
oh well…rumor has it, some of them are fuckwits. Also it was not a gold star (that one goes to families in the US that have lost people in their war adventures elsewhere). The jewish citizenry of Europe, Russia, and other places occupied by the German were forced to wear a yellow star. Seriously, US Americans are dumb, mean, petty and dumb.
James Shaw came up with an amusing anecdote on Q&A this morning:
A bottled water company in America (might be California) is producing GE free bottled water. Where else could that happen?
Don't they know that stuff is poisonous? There's a sign at the community gardens where there's been some at times considerable pilfering (I lost all my kumara one year), that gives a warning that the vegetables in the plot had been sprayed with di-hydrogen monoxide and should not be eaten until the withholding period had been safely observed!
That's funny, Mac1, 'cept, those who sole were unlikely to be deterred by the fear of sprays 🙂
Probably thought, all good, that's what we normally eat!
You’re so quick to judge.
https://www.holocaustcenter.org/visit/library-archive/holocaust-badges/
https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/classification-system-in-nazi-concentration-camps
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_badge
with all due respect…. yeah, nah nah. But thank you much for explaining my countries history to me, what would i do with out you telling me?
And yes, i am quick to judge, as Maya Angelou once said: "When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time." And it has served me well ever since.
Not only quick to judge but also resistant to challenge and correction with belligerent passive-aggressive behaviour to avoid having to change their minds let alone their behaviour; virtually incapable of admitting being wrong let alone apologising.
https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/artifact/white-armband-with-blue-star-of-david [same source as yours]
Nobody argued that it was about “[your] countries history”, which is another one of your many comprehension fails on display here on a regular basis.
Bye now – have a nice day.
if you were to have looked at the links listed you would know that the white armband with blue david star is listed as one of the variants used in Poland and pretty much every where else they wore the yellow star.
Good grief, Incognito i have no idea what upset you today, but it was not me, nor anything i said. Please find someone else to discuss the marking of the jewish citizenry by the generation of my grandfather.
[Content deleted because it contained too many links that triggered Auto-Moderation]
[link added: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_badge ]
But then you are not here calling me out on my perceived incomprehension of your attitude towards me, you are just here trying to goat someone into a cake fight, and as always, i don't have enough cake to waste.
I truly wish you a happy day.
Your other comment is held up in Spam. Cut and paste is too long, and too many links within the cut and paste.
It's impressive that someone can judge quickly and accurately while others dither, haver and nitpick, isn't it. You are right to express admiration.
Not admiration, but in absolute awe how someone can judge the IQ and undertake a character assassination of one nation in one fell swoop based on the colour of a badges worn in Europe over 75 years ago. That ain’t a mean feat, even by Trumpian standards.
Hopefully the awe you feel will grow an aspiration to explore the differences between persecution and claimed victimhood by choice. Every journey begins with a single step.
My journey is taking me in a different direction; my metaphorical shoes are well worn and not just by walking. I’m afraid I won’t live up to your aspirations.
"…and the antis are still having their superspreader events while completely unprotected."
It's almost like natural immunity and treatments don't exist in your world.
An oldie (in terms of this rapidly morphing field) but a goodie.
https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/lasting-immunity-found-after-recovery-covid-19
“Several months ago, our studies showed that natural infection induced a strong response, and this study now shows that the responses last,” Weiskopf says. “We are hopeful that a similar pattern of responses lasting over time will also emerge for the vaccine-induced responses.”
I guess at the end of the day it comes down to choice. The vaccinated have nothing to fear. Those who have not had any of the vaccines are not a risk to the vaccinated.
From what I've read, the vaccines are safe for everyone….old, young. babies, pregnant women, immunocompromised…there's a vaccine to suit.
And all the vaccines are of course 100% safe and at least 90% effective and each new outbreak inspires a greater demand for the jab. There will be very few left unvaccinated, and these these folk pose no threat to those who are.
I'm not seeing any problem here.
Antisocial arseholes who don't get vaccinated when given the opportunity, then get diseased, are still a risk to those for whom the vaccine is ineffective.
That's largely the immunocompromised. Often due to needing medication for other conditions.
https://www.advisory.com/en/daily-briefing/2021/04/20/immunocompromised
Then if someone with a weak immune system is unfortunate enough to get exposed to one of those diseased antisocial arseholes and gets the disease, they are at risk of a prolonged illness, which vastly increases the likelihood of them becoming the source of new mutations.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/covid-variants-may-arise-in-people-with-compromised-immune-systems/
There is nonetheless a point to be made that a person has a right (!) to decide whether they want to be vaccinated. It seems to me that this pandemic has not just wracked havoc with the health and economies but also with the understanding that people are free to decide. Emphasis on FREE. Unless we are now in a dictatorship by stealth?
I personally will get vaccinated once its offered. But only because I want to see my family again. Otherwise I wouldn't as I feel that the speed in which the vaccine was introduced leaves my sense of proper process very much at unease. And I am not the only one.
the speed in which the vaccine was introduced leaves my sense of proper process very much at unease.
Any rational person with even a minimum of understanding how these products are developed will have cause for concern.
The latest drive to use these experimental mRNA vaccines on children (using the 'you don't want to kill grandma') inducement is, in my opinion, criminal.
I can find no study which proves children are at risk from Covid 19 or are a risk to others.
That’s unsurprising, but dead children are all the proof I need.
Every cell on the planet is either chocka-block with mRNA, or dead.
The dawn of mRNA vaccines: The COVID-19 case [JCR, May 2021]
In less than one year since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, two mRNA-based vaccines, BNT162b2 and mRNA-1273, were granted the first historic authorization for emergency use, while another mRNA vaccine, CVnCoV, progressed to phase 3 clinical testing. The COVID-19 mRNA vaccines represent a new class of vaccine products, which consist of synthetic mRNA strands encoding the SARS-CoV-2 Spike glycoprotein, packaged in lipid nanoparticles to deliver mRNA to cells. This review digs deeper into the scientific breakthroughs of the last decades that laid the foundations for the rapid rise of mRNA vaccines during the COVID-19 pandemic. As well as providing momentum for mRNA vaccines, SARS-CoV-2 represents an ideal case study allowing to compare design-activity differences between the different mRNA vaccine candidates. Therefore, a detailed overview of the composition and (pre)clinical performance of the three most advanced mRNA vaccines is provided and the influence of choices in their structural design on to their immunogenicity and reactogenicity profile is discussed in depth. In addition to the new fundamental insights in the mRNA vaccines' mode of action highlighted here, we also point out which unknowns remain that require further investigation and possibly, optimization in future mRNA vaccine development.
It's important to understand how the speed of development and approval was achieved. There weren't safety corners cut, that it happened a lot quicker than normal is more a reflection of how much drawn-out dawdling there is in the normal process, together with how tragically prevalent the disease become during the trials.
This meant the necessary data came in very quickly. Most new vaccines are for very rare diseases, so it normally takes a long long time for enough trial participants to actually be exposed to the disease to gather meaningful data.
The apparently compressed timeframe was achieved by companies taking financial risks by gearing up for the next stage while trials were still underway, rather than the usual process of waiting for results to come in before even thinking about the next stage. Regulatory and approval bodies also sped things up by immediately acting as soon as data was available, rather than their usual process of maybe considering things at their convenience months or even years after data becomes available.
This piece discusses the timeframe issue in more detail:
https://theconversation.com/less-than-a-year-to-develop-a-covid-vaccine-heres-why-you-shouldnt-be-alarmed-150414
It's important to understand that there are absolutely no long term studies on these vaccines and there is absolutely no data to support a declaration that there will be no long term adverse effects from these vaccines.
So why, pray tell Andre, are they pushing these experimental vaccines on to children who are not at risk from Covid and pose minimal risk to others?
Children should get vaccinated because there are people at risk from infected children. It's only in your fantasies that children do not pose a risk to vulnerable individuals, and that children are not at personal risk.
The personal risk to children is lower, but the risk of death and long covid appears to be high enough that just the risk to children alone would justify a robust response to this emergent disease.
Just one of the many results from searching for long covid in children.
edit: and when it comes to general covid in children, there’s a plethora of articles like this:
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/in-depth/coronavirus-in-babies-and-children/art-20484405
But Andre. Those people who are, according to you, at risk from being infected with Covid 19 by a child will be a non-child. An adult. Who may or may not have chosen to be vaccinated. Who will either not be at risk at all, or have chosen to live with the risk. Such risk that exists'
The good news is that evidence suggests children don't easily pass covid-19 to each other in the classroom. In one study, a 9-year-old in France with flu and covid-19 was found to have exposed more than 80 other children at three different schools. However, no one became infected with covid-19 as a result, despite numerous flu infections within the schools, suggesting that although the environment was conducive to transmitting respiratory viruses, covid-19 wasn't passed on as easily.
More recently, a study of children between 5 months and 4 years old in nurseries in France has shown low levels of infection and transmission of covid-19. The study also shows that staff weren't at greater risk of infection than a control group of adults. The results suggest that children are more likely to get covid-19 from family members than from their peers or teachers at nursery, although more evidence is needed, say the study's authors, because the study happened when strict measures were in place to control the virus, and before fast-spreading variants appeared.
That quote is from the study you cited, that also shows that children suffering from 'long Covid' are very much in the minority.
If I have the time later I will try and find a study that proves that the risks to children from Covid outweighs the long term risks from an experimental vaccine.
There are no studies of the long term health effects of covid vaccines because such studies will take a long time.
There are also no studies of the long term health effects of chilhood covid infection because such studies will take a long time.
It seems to me that some countries are vaccinating children because they will otherwise not reach covid herd immunity due to too many adults refusing the vaccine.
That is exactly what the US is doing atm.
Also states are now rescinding mask mandates and are in the process of re-opening schools, no masks, no social distancing etc.
There are no long term studies of Covid either.
Well, we do know there are lots of people still suffering significant disability from covid fourteen months or more after they first got infected. My nephew is one of them.
Death is also fairly long term as an effect.
Quite, and I will rank those observable effects over unquantifiable future fears any day.
Here's an interesting read on those getting covid after vaccination, and giving the vaccine to those that have already had covid:
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/will-people-who-get-covid-post-vaccination-have-long-term-symptoms_l_60afda9be4b0ead279660672
However, we have about a year head start on our knowledge of covid compared with the new vaccines.
The flip side to rights and freedoms include responsibilities and accountabilities.
So while I agree that anyone should be free to not get vaccinated, there should be a corresponding responsibility to minimise the risk of infecting others. So not having unvaccinated people in public facing jobs or other jobs where there is increased risk an infected individual may cause to others seems a reasonable precaution.
It seems to me that a reasonable accountability for those that refuse vaccination (without good medical reason) is they should be fully responsible for their own medical costs of treating that vaccine-preventable disease, should they get it, as well as the treatment costs and other losses suffered by anyone they pass it on to.
Rights also do not exist in isolation – they are balanced against others. Freedom from avoidable infection or death seems like a pretty significant one.
Maybe we could re-open some quarantine islands for those who believe their freedom to refuse is more important. They can imperil one another as much as they like.
Heh – Waiheke comes to mind. They might be going to end up that way completely voluntarily.
I'd suggest Whakaari,/White Island.
Decent distance from the main land.
Nice and hot
Pretty damned sterile
No, no, Andre…it's all good to give the vaccine to immunocompromised people…
From the experts…
People with HIV infection or other immunocompromising conditions or people who take immunosuppressive medications or therapies might be at increased risk for severe COVID-19. No data are available to establish COVID-19 vaccine safety and efficacy in these groups. However, the currently FDA-authorized COVID-19 vaccines are not live vaccines and therefore can be safely administered to immunocompromised people. People with stable HIV infection were included in the COVID-19 vaccine clinical trials, though data remain limited.
Immunocompromised people can receive COVID-19 vaccination.
So at the end of the day it is going to come down to availability and choice.
The happily vaccinated are not at risk from the unvaccinated.
So what is your problem?
Immunocompromised people can safely get the vaccine. It's just of low likelihood of doing them any good. Because they are immunocompromised – ie their immune systems are weak to non-functional, so they don’t have an effective immune system that can be trained to identify and neutralise the invading virus.
So they are still at risk from diseased antisocial arseholes.
They seem to have that issue sorted…
https://www.cbsnews.com/video/coronavirus-vaccine-immunosuppressive-medications/#x
They are giving them an extra dose.
Again, it comes down to availability and choice.
The vaccinated are not at risk.
Another interesting topic for discussion might be how it has come to be that it is acceptable to level hate speech at those exercising their right to bodily autonomy and medical choice?
In the absence of any real risk to those making a different choice.
On the topic of hate speech, you're the one here advocating for something that is likely to lead to identifiable specific harm to identifiable specific vulnerable individuals, while expecting to be free from accountability or consequences.
Where have I advocated for something that is likely to lead to identifiable specific harm to identifiable specific vulnerable individuals, while expecting to be free from accountability or consequences.
We are having a discussion. Debating the pros and cons of the necessity of vaccinating children with an experimental vaccine that has not been proven to have no long term adverse effects.
When the risk to and from those children from Covid 19 is extremely minimal.
Discussing a thing, and presenting evidence, does not constitute "advocating".
Oh good, all sorted, nothing to worry about then, if you say so. Although people who actually know about this stuff might not quite see it this way, at least not yet: https://www.medpagetoday.com/infectiousdisease/covid19vaccine/92439
Of course, if you say so. Vaccines offer full protection to all known and future variants, don’t they, so there’s nothing to worry about? Some of these variants might arise in immunocompromised patients, as Andre has already pointed out. Some variants might arise as we speak in other countries.
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/world/2021/05/coronavirus-vietnam-detects-new-hybrid-of-indian-covid-19-variant-and-uk-mutation.html
If you say so.
Correction, Incognito.
It is not I making these claims.
It is the the FDA, the CDC and various researchers and health professionals making these claims.
And you make a good point about the variants, but I don't understand how immunocompromised people (if they choose to be vaccinated) are at any greater risk from variants than any other vaccinated person, providing of course the vaccine is effective for that variant. If the vaccine is effective for those variants then fully vaccinated people have nothing to fear from unvaccinated persons. If the vaccines are not effective against a variant then a person's vaccination status is not a risk factor for those vulnerable persons.
As has been said…this is a 'tricky' virus… and it's apparent ability to rapidly form viable mutations means that vaccines are not going to be the magic bullet some are understandably desperate for.
All the more reason to put greater effort into learning about the origins of this best. Know your enemy and all that.
I understood that the Covid vaccines on offer reduce the chance of death or serious injury, but they do not prevent a person becoming very sick. Some of us are better placed to tolerate that risk than others.
Immuno-compromised people are at a greater risk because they are immuno-compromised.
Thanks Rosemary for your mahi on this topic.
Well done on not rising to the manky bait bobbing around in the thread, My reckons have the animosity towards those that are wary is going to start ramping up.
If you read the first link in my comment, you’ll know that immune-compromised people generate a weaker or even no response at all to Covid vaccination. You’d also know that a third dose is being studied and under review, so no ‘expert’ worth their salt can make any claims yet.
Immuno-compromised people are always more vulnerable to infections.
Immuno-compromised with long (chronic) infections could be a source of new variants, as has been suggested previously.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lineage_B.1.1.7 [AKA UK variant]
If this is correct, then even vaccinated immuno-efficient people may be at risk if the vaccine is less or not active at all against any new variant that may evolve in time in immuno-compromised patients.
It will be very interesting to find out about Ground or Patient Zero but it has little bearing on national and global vaccination and elimination strategies.
HTH
Be interested to hear what you think are the natural immunity for humans that currently exist. I assume that you refer to those who have previously had the virus and have recovered. Even so persons who have recovered can still be reinfected and transmit the virus.
As for natural treatments, do you have any studies supporting their efficaciousness?
.
Wouldn't it have been nice if those at greatest risk of serious illness / dying from any Covid outbreak (aged 80+ with comorbidities) had all been vaccinated by now (as opposed to just a relatively small minority). Maybe, just maybe the high-risk elderly should've been in Group 2 (as in other Anglosphere Countries) rather than back in 3 ?
There are lots of things the would have been nice to have been different.
One of the things that actually is nice about New Zealand's response to covid is that we now don't have community transmission, unlike just about everywhere else in the world.
So in New Zealand, those at highest risk of serious disease/dying (aged 80+ with cormorbidities) would be at the end of a chain of transmission starting at one of our various borders (air, sea, freight etc).
So I'm quite happy that the strategy is to try to break the potential chain of transmission at the earliest possible links, so those at highest risk didn't get exposed. After all, the elderly with comorbidities are also likely to have less robust immune responses, so the better protection for them is to not be exposed. Put another way, I'm quite happy my 80+ parents with comorbidities got their vax (first one 8 days ago) well after their port-working neighbour in his forties and their late 30s granddaughter that is a doctor at the local hospital.
IIRC, there were three published strategies for different levels of community transmission for the vaccine rollout – we're in the awesome position of using the one with no community transmission. The other two scenarios, limited community transmission and widespread community transmission, would both have put 80+ with comorbidities into a higher priority slot.
.
You're sounding very complacent given the recent emergence of dangerous new variants & the associated surge in Asia-Pacific Countries previously praised for their apparently successful elimination strategies …
… great to hear your 80+ parents have had their first jab … but most in that age group haven't … my 90 year old parents (one with high-risk health conditions) for instance continue to wait patiently with no sign on the horizon.
Who would have thought? She'll be right?
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/125180968/ministry-of-health-abandoned-cybersecurity-system-for-waikato-and-other-dhbs-due-to-budget-issues
Well i guess the guys who get their medical help from the Waikato DHB are shit outta luck, prevention of these hacks are hard work, even harder when no one who is tasked and paid to do something is actually doing something. But i rest peacefull in the knowledge that should either Kris Faafoi or David Clark need any medical help they will get it asap, thus all is good.
David Clark is now in charge? Are you joking.
The former Minister of Health who is on record knowingly lying about this very same DHB, who hid under his bed in Dunedin (when he wasn't out breaching lockdown rules) during the worst of the pandemic, who… too many screw ups to record.
He possibly could manage the parliamentary broom cupboard, but thats about his limit. Unbelievable.
Wow so from Faafoi to Clark who's done nada. That's an arc of competence we can all take comfort in at least it wasn't Nash.
David Clark would be lucky to get a job in middle management in the real world. His CV does not make for good reading.
Was Clark was Minister of Health until July last year? Over the period all of the approaches to the handling of Covid were formulated, established and got under way?
Our handling of covid was a massive screw up I suppose. Is that what history says? Oh well, put it down to Clark 'hiding under his bed' in Dunedin.
It came very very close to being a massive screwup. Geography, small and largerly well dispersed population, luck and yes, Arderns firm decision to lockdown are the reason we missed a bullet.
Do you really think Clark showed a sliver of leadership, hiding under his bed in Dunedin and repeatedly breaking lockdown? Do you not think his place, and his job, required him to be in Wellington? Do you think the repeated lies he told about the Waikato DHB were a good thing?
The policies and processes you point to were in no shape or form down to Clark. These were developed and refined and gamed over time by professionals. Clarks role was that of a manager and leader. He has failed continually as both.
Why do you think Clark was dumped in July as MOH?
@ Peter ChCh. What a ridiculous statement to make, Clark never hid under his bed. All ministers, including Clark, were told to work from home, which they all did, he was part of NZ's successful Covid19 strategy and I would describe his resignation as Minister of Health as a circuit breaker.
Dr Bloomfield would disagree with your belittling assessment that it was all down to luck, geography and small population, because it wasn't.
I seriously doubt your claim that the Waikato DHB board were sacked due to "repeated lies" from the minister, after all, it had been warned previously over its poor governance and finances.
Louis. I never claimed thats why they were sacked. They were sacked because of incompetence, corruption and other performance based reasons.
I said Clark repeatedly lied to the media before finally coming clean and apologising for his lies. Please re read what I said.
@Peter ChCh I did read what you wrote.
Quote: "Do you think the repeated lies he told about the Waikato DHB were a good thing?"
You gave the perception that he lied in order to sack to DHB board, which is not true.
"Clark repeatedly lied to the media before finally coming clean and apologising for his lies"
Link?
Louis. Thats your perception, not what I wrote and certainty not my intent.
That's the problem with text communication, very easy for both sides to miscommunicate or misunderstand.
I am very well aware why that DHB was sacked, and for the reasons I stated. That was not Clarks doing.
You should still provide a link about all those lies by Clark to the media, thanks.
You were pretty clear Peter ChCh "Do you think the repeated lies he told about the Waikato DHB were a good thing"
Clark wouldn't lie…he is a religious minister/a man of God…a christian…
Phillip, that means he most probably cannot lie straight in bed!
But seriously, he comes across like a possum trapped in the headlights. Probably a decent guy, just out of his depth.
That's hypocritical of you Peter ChCh.
Well said Pete.
Why is anyone surprised? There are no photo-ops when you do useful things like putting in decent cyber-security systems. It isn't nearly as useful as blowing $50+ million on horse and pony shows like the fiasco that was the Pike River Recovery project. That was the one where the PM, back before the 2017 election promised that the boys would be recovered and that money was no object?
https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/new-zealand/we-have-obligation-families-new-cross-party-pike-river-mine-agency-would-bring-bodies-end-2018
Cyber security? Nah.
I am not surprised, but still pissed of at the nonchalance with which these guys admit that in fact they had done nothing, and will do nothing until at least 2022 – well hire some to 'start the report' or such – after all some monies will be spend on IT this year as per Minister of health Andrew Little.
The only ones paying for the inaction of government are those needing the services of that DHB, the staff working there cause they don't et paid – that darn IT system – and never mind the covid vaccination roll out for the area as that too is supposedly done by he DHBs.
It's either incompetence, lazyness, or malice.
I think you’re misrepresenting things; there was never a promise of an unlimited budget (AKA blank cheque) and nobody would have expected that. IIRC, the total budget was $51 million, once Labour got into Government with NZF.
As you know, the Pike River Recovery Agency was set up by the new Government within MBIE, not MOH, as you seem to erroneously insinuate in your comment. You know how Government Budgets work, so please lift your game and stop making misleading comments here, thanks.
I gave you a link for my statement. Did you see in the bit that says.
""Returning your men and your boys is as much about a personal perspective as it is about anything else."
No projections for a monetary cost have yet been created and it was yet to be decided which budget the agency would come from.
Ms Ardern said that "money shouldn't be an issue".
"There's no reason why the work can't start immediately," she said."
That sounds pretty unlimited to me. And no, I don't accept that I have in any way implied that it was to be run by the Health Department. It was of course going to be part of Government expenditure and it is money the Government chose to spend in exactly the way the Government chose not to spend it on cyber-security.
So, you’re pretending that you’re naive and ignorant about Government budget allocations and Budgets? How cute, but I don’t believe you; no budget ever is unlimited or open-ended and you know this – you have previously claimed knowing “a great deal better” than the PM and the Minister of Finance (here it is: https://thestandard.org.nz/bluffgeld/#comment-1774689), which sounded like a load of pretentious hot air but you can’t have it both ways.
Anyway, money to start is not money to complete.
Well, in that case, your comment about the Pike River Recovery project was utterly irrelevant to the topic of the thread and a diversion. But then again, you were in good company with other divisive and divertive commenters here 🙁
Firstly. The Government did decide to finance the Pike River Recovery Project.
Secondly. They chose not to finance cyber-security for the DHBs.
One can only conclude that they wanted the first project more than they wanted the second. The budget allocation pot for each of them is quite irrelevant. The ranking of things they wanted to do stands and that confirms my conclusion.
If you want to argue that the various budget allocations for Departments were set and couldn't be altered in 2019 you will still have to explain why the project couldn't have been done in 2020.
You will also have to explain why, if additional money cannot be put into the budget for a Department at a time after the Budget cycle they managed to find a huge sum for the Covid 19 activities in early 2020 when the money had not been foreshadowed in the previous Budget round.
Sorry but they clearly chose one thing and did not choose another. The only thing I will agree that I am the one bringing it up without proof, in the form of a statement from one of the Politicians involved, that one had photo-op possibilities and the other didn't. It remains my opinion of course but I'll admit I don't have a smoking gun.
Indeed, Government set its Budget based on priorities. Whether they under-funded or not funded at all the centralising of cyber security is a moot point, as it is still up to each DHB to ensure its system is safe and fit for purpose. If it had gone ahead, not all DHBs may have taken it up, anyway. That’s your first red herring.
Your second red herring is to suggest that there is a direct connection between funding the Pike River Recovery Agency and not funding or underfunding centralised cyber security in the public health sector. There is no such link; they are funded from completely different pots of money (AKA Ministerial down to Departmental budgets, etc.). You just picked one of your favourite pet projects to take a swipe at your favourite targets, as usual.
Your third red herring is suggesting that Government found “a huge sum for the Covid 19 activities in early 2020 when the money had not been foreshadowed in the previous Budget round”. They did not “find” it anywhere, as you know. As if they were meant to also miraculously ‘find’ some money for cyber security!? Yeah, right. You know that Government does not run its books like that, so stop spreading disinformation.
You still have to explain why you are trolling here, particularly why you should get away with it.
Alwyn given Nationals history on underfunding health and IT stuff ups INCIS healthcare IT failures makes Labour look good.National kept funding for health at the 2008 levels over 9 years funding for 4.5 million NZers while the population increased by 500,000.The cash sums were made to look good but the percentages never increased.National gave the savings in tax cuts to buy votes just before elections.
Rubbish. Why don't you tell us what the health budget as in 2009 and then each year after that. Your claim that it never increased is a risible comment.
Alwyn, the previous National government underfunded health by $2.3 billion dollars
“So that gives you an idea of how short it is and therefore why we are seeing patients put up in motel beds..”
https://www.tvnz.co.nz/one-news/new-zealand/system-so-overstretched-andrew-little-says-health-underfunded-2-3-billion
No. "Andrew Little says that National etc"
What Andrew says and reality seldom have much in common. I haven't looked at this study but I did look at one by, I think, the CTU Economist a few years ago. What they did, and what I think this study did, was to very carefully pick the starting year. You will note that National was in office for 9 years but this study purports to compare the numbers with 7 years ago. It doesn't look at the numbers from the end of the Clark Labour Government and compare them with the ones at the end of the National Government. That would be fair.
When they talk about 7 years they are taking as their base year the first year attributable to National. That was the 2009-2010 year. The 2008-2009 year was the last year of a Labour Budget.
Now what actually happened in 2009-2010 was a massive, far above inflation, one off, injection into the Health system. Then they didn't have further one offs, but basically kept up with inflation. This study is cheating by their choice of there starting year. Try doing it again by looking at end of Labour and end of National and you get a quite different result.
I'm not going to try and track down this study. It will have ended up in the rubbish bin by now I would think. At the time of the CTU equivalent I commented in some detail about the fiddle. It was on this site I believe. It was a fraud but not that many people bother to check out the claims made. The simply take the view, as you seem to have done, that Andrew Little says it so it must be true.
So Alwyn, basically that's just your opinion and you cant actually back yourself up.
$2.3 billion shortfall in health
"The funding needed for health to be restored to the level it was seven years ago to keep pace with cost pressures has widened to a massive $2.3 billion"
“The updated study by economic consultants Infometrics… used Treasury’s own modelling for calculating real health costs for core crown health expenditure"
"It’s not just Labour saying this:
Gosh, he's found a post on the Standard that repeats Little's waffle.
And adds David Clark and a number of Union Reps.
Are you surprised that The Standard didn't approve of the National Government? Doesn't mean they were right though.
You're in denial of the facts Alwyn, Infometrics used the government's own figures, which showed a $2.3 billion shortfall in health.
Why don't you take a look at how Infometrics calculate the result. Then you should ask yourself the simple question. What are they comparing their calculation to? The only rational answer is compared to what Labour might have done. Since Labour weren't the Government you will have to try and decide how an estimate for that can be determined. A possible answer is to take the last year of the Labour Government and increase it each year in the way they historically did. Or by the factor they did use in the paper, which is a possible interpretation of that.
You have to start however by what Labour actually were doing, not by what National was already doing during their term.
I wrote quite a lot about this in this blog. After you have read the Infometrics stuff, assuming that you can find it, and have understood their methodology try working out a proxy for what Labour might have done, and compare it with what National actually did do during their entire term. Their entire term.
You'll find that the total National did spend was greater than what Labour might have spent using their preferred inflation factor for Health expenditure.
That's a load of waffle and it's not my job to find your past comments on this website, that's your'e job.
Facts prove otherwise to your opinion, Alwyn.
I am really not going to waste my time repeating the facts about a subject over and over again to people who haven't bothered to read the comments the first time around.
It is like the rubbish people post that the banks can simply help themselves to the money in your account if they make bad deals and that you, the customer, lose your money while the shareholders in the bank lose nothing at all. I explained the fallacy in their statements on a number of occasions on this blog. I then decided that I had wasted enough time on fools.
That is what you are. You are a fool who believes a fallacious claim that one of your heroes chooses to blather on about. I have told people in the past what was wrong with the story. I really don't see why I should waste my time explaining it again to someone who is too lazy to read the first explanation.
What the facts prove is that you are a lazy idiot.
The facts prove you wrong alwyn, but there you go waffling again, with nothing to substantiate your opinion.
Well I think the drought may have ended
More bloody pluvial di-hydrogen monoxide. Dangerous stuff. Hope it's GE Free! See1.1.1 above.
However….
https://earthsky.org/earth/microplastic-rain-western-us/#:~:text=The%20discovery%20of%20the%20microplastics,fragments%20less%20than%205%20mm%20(.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhbjrPrBGe4
Joan Baez knew something. "And what have they done to the rain?" She sings later in the song, "Just a a little breeze, with some smoke in its eye".
The prophecy of song.
Last week, weka published a post on the Longwood Loop and our efforts to raise funds to buy an electric van that will travel the circuit from small town to little village in Southland, moving locally-produced fruit, vegetables, cheese, honey and whatever else locals produce, to other locals, waiting expectantly at the various "trading posts' along the loop.
We're thinking of, and pitching this as "a pilot for social and economic rejuvination and reslience in rural NZ", which is exactly what it is. With $47,400 raised already we are close to our target of $51 000 – we need just $3 600 more and have 36 hours left in our PledgeMe campaign to reach that target.
Could you, would you (I won't say, "you should 🙂 please give a little and share this message ( there are some great rewards: Wild South honey, Southern NZ scenic calendar, produce hamper, forest-garden tours (these are very ably narrated 🙂 meals and accomodation and more.
http://www.pledgeme.co.nz/projects/6879
Unbelievable lack of support from EECA there.
Happy to support the effort there.
Thanks, Ad!
I will repost tomorrow 👍
Lovely, thanks, weka!
All set to go. I used your comment above, hope that's ok.
Yes please!
But the kids will be okay..
https://twitter.com/chrischirp/status/1398757529430208522
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1398757529430208522.html
https://twitter.com/ProfColinDavis/status/1396783107676778498
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1396783107676778498.html
This interview* might interest those with a garden and a desire to interact with it more closely.
*advance warning – the interviewee is me 🙂
https://accessmedia.nz/ProgrammePage.aspx
https://accessmedia.nz/ProgrammePage.aspx?PID=61150e34-18c8-4a26-b53c-4b177e362b44
MP3
[direct link added]
Just a heads-up for you robert…
I understand a beard-intervention is being planned for you..
There are fears amongst your friends that you might completely disappear…behind that untrammelled growth…
Been practicing aikido for years in anticipation…
Heh..!
What is the interview title Robert?
The link gets me to the access media home page.
oh boy, the virus that just keeps on giving.
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/covid-19-coronavirus-vietnam-finds-new-variant-hybrid-of-india-uk-strains/CN5JRNYNIOITLZYNHK4TDYHZSQ/
My first question on this news was how is vaccination going in Vietnam? The short answer is it's barely even started – ourworldindata has them at just 1% of the population having received at least one dose.
Hopefully we'll make through to most of our population getting vaccinated before the next significant border breach.
As per the article is 1 million with astra zeneca, and still waiting on more doses to be delivered by the third/fourth quater?
Yes, that is what i hope, that we get enough of at least the compromised groups vaccinated and those that work the border and plague hotels.
A frequent concern about the new mRNA vaccines is about their long-term safety – obviously a completely new technology does not and cannot have a long-term record so how can anyone know?
My own biochemistry expertise is negligible, but I have several family members and friends that are academics that need a deep understanding of cell biochemistry for their jobs.
Their opinions are unanimous: there is zero reason to believe the mRNA vaccines might have long-term effects beyond training the immune system to recognise the pathogen and deal to it. The mRNA simply causes a cell to make copies of the spike protein and show it to the immune system, then the mRNA breaks down and is dealt with by normal cell biochemistry processes just like all the myriad other RNA mediated processes going on all the time in cells. The immune system does its garbage cleanup on the cells exhibiting the spike protein just like it does the myriad other garbage cleanup operations going on all the time. For anything long term to come out of these completely routine processes (besides immunity) would go against well established understanding of how biochemistry works.
Then there's the fact that the first trials with mRNA vaccines started roughly a decade ago, and the first covid vaccine trials started roughly a year ago, and widespread administrations started roughly six months ago. In the context of vaccine side effects, that's starting to be "long-term". Even with the very intense monitoring happening, there is no signal of any kind of side-effects beyond the usual few weeks or at worst months timeframe that vaccine side effects almost always appear in.
For more reading:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7956899/
https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/coronavirus/in-depth/coronavirus-vaccine/art-20484859
https://www.healthychildren.org/English/health-issues/conditions/COVID-19/Pages/The-Science-Behind-the-COVID-19-Vaccine-Parent-FAQs.aspx
ahh, when comments fall under pre – moderation. 🙂 It must be a rainy day sunday.
Or maybe lots of links?
i try to delink but sure that can be it.
Wikipedia quotes are especially bad. It can take ages to hunt down all the links in those and kill them.
Easily fixed: paste as Text Only
Hey, howboutdat? Ctrl Shift V actually works. Next all I need is a browser where I can just hit that ‘clipboard with a T’ button.
Why make life hard when it can be dead-easy with the lovely Text Editor provided at no charge by Lprent & Co 😉
The text editor actually told me "no". But was helpful enough to tell me to try the Ctrl Shift V.
I don’t actually use the front-end text editor but good to hear that it is working well.
Sure, what else can it be except an overly long piece of text with way too many links? It has already been explained to you today @ 2:40 pm and @ 3:50 pm, but here’s the reason why it triggers Auto-Moderation: https://thestandard.org.nz/faq/comment-formatting/#linking.
Dinner is smelling good!
Your comment triggered Auto-Moderation because it contained too many links; it is pending. This has been around here on TS for as long as I can remember. This is entirely independent from Moderator action. In fact, a Moderator has to deal with it, review it, and release it as is or with edits, or Trash it. This takes time and depends on Moderator availability – Moderators are not at the beck and call of belligerent commenters who cannot or don’t want to follow the rules here.
Your comment is therefore utterly misguided, but this is not unexpected from you. In fact, your comment sounded like an accusation to me and I hope this was not your intention; you may want to be clearer to avoid such interpretation.
This is going to be interesting, hopefully in a good way.
https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/politics-and-diplomacy/lapid-i-dont-know-if-well-form-a-government-or-not-before-mandate-expires-669478
I doubt there will be anything good to come from swapping one murderous right-winger for another.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/palestinians-rap-bennett-over-alleged-kill-arabs-remarks/
"More than half of global GDP relies on high-functioning biodiversity but about a fifth of countries are at risk of their ecosystems collapsing due to the destruction of the natural world, according to an analysis by the insurance firm Swiss Re last year. Australia, Israel and South Africa were among the most threatened."
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/may/27/nature-financial-value-investing-global-gdp-avoid-breakdown-ecosystems-un-report-aoe
If anyone knows about (financial) risk it's Swiss Re
https://twitter.com/nchefz/status/1398900901486735361
Panel of Mike Smith of the Iwi Chairs Forum, Climate Change Commission Rod Carr, Dairy NZ's Tim Mackle and Wellington Councillor Tamatha Paul talked emissions during a Q+A special this morning.
Tim Mackies made a stout defense of the dairying position but undermined his arguments by making some silly statements, eg
(sound of members of the panel scoffing)
https://www.tvnz.co.nz/shows/q-and-a/clips/we-can-have-our-cake-and-eat-it-dairynz-says-climate-change-solutions-can-be-found
(15min 20 secs into that clip)
Here is how leveraged house prices are unreasonably affecting Council rental prices. Whatever directive from government there has been, it is poor public housing that forces government public housing, central of local, to calculate rents based on market rents, or a proportion of them, rather than on historic book value, plus costs incurred. That way they would be paying their own way, not some inflated figure driven by stupid government policies based vaguely on business methods.
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/ldr/443677/elderly-council-tenants-hardships-laid-bare-at-meeting-to-discuss-rent-rises
But a report to council last month indicated that, to keep up with market rate, senior housing rents in Marlborough needed to go up by 35 percent. This was $66 a week more for a one-bed unit, and $78 a week more for a two-bed unit.
The council has a self-imposed rule that the rent it charged for senior housing needed to be within 80 percent of the "market rate".
Pensioners said a 35 percent increase would be "impossible" to pay.