Category: Universities

MIL-OSI Global: Canadians want politicians who reflect their views. Is that what they get?

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Jack Lucas, Professor of Political Science, University of Calgary

Right now, in provincial election campaigns across Canada, voters are trying to work out which political parties and local candidates might be their best representatives.

In British Columbia, the NDP and Conservative parties are running neck and neck ahead of this weekend’s election. In New Brunswick, the race between the Liberals and the Progressive Conservatives is equally tight. In Saskatchewan, Premier Scott Moe’s lead over the NDP appears to be more comfortable.

In each of these elections — and in the important municipal elections that are also happening across the country in weeks and months ahead — voters face the task of working out which candidate is best equipped to serve as their representative.

In the work that our politicians do on our behalf — their legislative votes, their policy advocacy, their casework, their community service — we want them to behave in ways that reflect our policy attitudes and priorities.

But do they?

Pathways to representation

In political science research, the relationship between politicians and citizens is typically thought to arise through one of two pathways.

In the first pathway, politicians represent their constituents’ preferences because they share those preferences — they agree with their constituents. We call this the “congruence” pathway.

In the second pathway, politicians represent their constituents’ preferences because they know those preferences and choose to represent them. This is the “knowledge” pathway.

Both pathways are thought to lead to the same destination: representation of constituents’ preferences by politicians.

But think for a moment about which pathway you would prefer for your representative to take: congruence or knowledge? Which option do you think provides the best representation for citizens?

We’ll tell you our own answers to these questions shortly. But first we need to understand just how different these pathways really are.

Measuring policy representation

In an upcoming article, our goal was to explore how well politicians perform on the congruence pathway and how many perform well on the knowledge pathway.

To answer these questions, we began with a very large survey of the Canadian public, asking more than 10,000 Canadians for their opinions on nine policy issues. These included gun control, immigration, trade with China, taxes, public transit investment and climate change — a wide variety of important policies.

We used this survey to make an estimate of the proportion of people who supported and opposed each policy statement across hundreds of municipalities.

Then, using the Canadian Municipal Barometer’s annual survey of municipal politicians, we asked politicians to guess the percentage of their constituents who support each policy statement. We also asked for each politician’s personal opinion on each statement.

These two surveys — one of the Canadian public, and the other of hundreds of Canadian municipal politicians — allowed us to measure and compare the two pathways.

Two pathways or one?

Let’s start with the good news: In general, politicians do a good job on both pathways. Across nine issues and hundreds of politicians, we found that nearly 60 per cent of politicians performed well on both pathways, and another 19 per cent performed well on at least one pathway.

The bad news is that politicians’ performance on both pathways is highly variable. On some policy issues, like gun control, nearly all politicians perform extremely well. On other issues, like immigration, politicians struggle.

But the most striking thing we discovered in our data was that the two pathways are closely related: Politicians who performed well on one pathway also tended to perform well on the other.

It turns out that these “pathways to representation” may not be very distinct after all.

Choosing your pathway

So, returning to our earlier question:

Which should you prefer? Should citizens choose politicians who represent their views through the congruence pathway or the knowledge pathway?

Our research suggests that most of the time, citizens don’t have to make the choice, because the two skills are so strongly connected. But suppose you did have to choose — what should you prioritize?

Personally, we’d choose congruence and would recommend focusing on finding a candidate who agrees with you on the things you care about, and support them.

Why prefer congruence? Because recent research shows that politicians struggle to think beyond their own beliefs when making guesses about their constituents’ attitudes. When politicians think about what their constituents want, they tend to assume that their constituents agree with them on various issues.

Our research has shown that they’re often right — congruence and knowledge are closely related. But this isn’t always the case, and politicians tend to think (much like the rest of us) that other people agree with them even when, sometimes, they don’t.

Read more:
Power to the people: How Canada can build a more connected and responsive Parliament

Ask policy questions

The good news is that politicians do tend to do reasonably well on both pathways, according our findings, so in real-world elections, you won’t typically be faced with this choice.

But when a political candidate comes to your door asking for your vote, here’s our advice: don’t quiz them about local public opinion, or ask them how often they’d conduct public opinion polls after they get elected.

Instead, ask them some questions about policy issues you care deeply about, and pick the candidate who shares your views.

You’ll be making your choices based on congruence — one of the two possible pathways to representation. But our research suggests that if your local representative aligns well with constituents, they’ll be a good performer on knowledge as well.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Canadians want politicians who reflect their views. Is that what they get? – https://theconversation.com/canadians-want-politicians-who-reflect-their-views-is-that-what-they-get-241331

MIL OSI – Global Reports –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI Global: Addressing online gender violence requires both culture and policy change

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Jaigris Hodson, Associate Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies, Royal Roads University

Many young women and girls report facing gender-based violence online. Appropriate responses need to be created within this dire landscape. (Shutterstock)

More and more of our lives are being spent on digital platforms. And, as we spend more time online, we are more vulnerable to a wide range of risks. This fact is particularly true for women and girls.

A 2024 global survey by Microsoft found that women are more likely than men to experience any type of risk online. And 25 per cent of teen girls reported experiencing sexual risks in their online lives, compared to 19 per cent of teen boys.

When online violence or abuse occurs to people because of their gender or gender presentation, it falls under the umbrella term gender-based online violence and abuse, also known as tech-facilitated gender-based violence. Unfortunately, incidents of this type of online violence seem to be increasing.

Appropriate responses need to be created within this dire landscape.

Some governments are creating policies to address gender-based online violence and abuse. For example, Australia has passed legislation mandating dating apps to update and enforce codes of conduct that address instances of sexual abuse.

The Canadian government tabled the Online Harms Act in February 2024, which, if passed, would introduce a regulatory framework that demands social media platforms moderate violent content. These legislative acts aim to hold digital platforms accountable for creating methods for reporting and deleting violent content by requiring them to assume full responsibility.

Governments must hold digital platforms accountable for the violence that happens on them, but are such approaches enough?

Our recent research suggests that some men might not even recognize if and how they are complicit in gender-based online violence. Cultural ideas, like rape myths, may influence their spheres of understanding. And, in these cases, they may not be compelled to follow a code of conduct set up by government or platform policy.

Governments must hold digital platforms accountable for the violence that happens on them, but it is also important to address prevalent narratives and myths about rape and sexual abuse.
(Shutterstock)

Rape myths

Rape myths are prejudicial and false beliefs that shape societal attitudes towards gendered violence. Examples of such myths are seen, for instance, when blame is put on the victim, the rapist is excused, and the rape is minimized and even sometimes justified.

In our study, we took a validated psychological scale for measuring the presence of rape myths and adapted it to understand how myths about gender-based online violence might influence behaviours that cause it, or at least prevent people from intervening.

The rape myths acceptance scale shows the degrees to which people accept certain myths that normalize sexual violence (such as, “she was asking for it” or “he didn’t mean to”). This scale is used to show how taken-for-granted assumptions contribute to cultures where victims of sexual violence are blamed or subject to disbelief when they come forward.

We adapted the rape myth acceptance scale because responses to it can reveal the cultural narratives that normalize many forms of gendered violence.

Indeed, research on rape myth acceptance points to the fact that we cannot fully address the acts of gender-based violence without first addressing these narratives. And gender-based online violence and abuse is not an exception.

What we found

Once we had adapted the rape myths acceptance scale to account for gender-based online violence and abuse, we used it in a survey of 1,297 Canadian men between 18 and 30 years old.

We used a likert scale to determine the degree to which young men agreed with statements like “claims of online gender-based violence are often weaponized against men” or “people who post about gender are sexuality are looking to start arguments.” We found that certain toxic myths and cultural narratives are prevalent among some respondents.

We found that certain rape myths were prevalent among some respondents.
(Shutterstock)

In particular, we found four myths that were more strongly endorsed: 1. It wasn’t really gender-based online abuse; 2. he didn’t mean to; 3. gender-based online abuse is a deviant event, and 4. she lied. These myths trivialize the impact of the violence, minimize the blame of those enacting the harm and discredit the voices of targets.

We noticed that as many as 30 per cent of our survey respondents agreed with many of these myths — a significant number of young Canadian men taking these regressive attitudes towards gender-based online violence.

As we looked to other research to explain the prevalence of these ideas, we also found that similar ideas are found in manosphere-related influencers — people like Andrew Tate, who are a growing source of hateful ideas about women and gender-nonconforming people.

Thinking ahead

We cannot address gender-based online violence and abuse by simply reporting and deleting offensive content. It also won’t stop by simply mandating that platforms have codes of conduct in place. In order to tackle the problem, we must addressing the cultural narratives that sustain it.

Everyone — from academics to policymakers to the public — needs to think about how we can address toxic beliefs to create long-lasting change and foster safer online communities. We can aim for such change in multiple ways.

We can create educational initiatives that promote inclusive and accessible narratives about the nature and importance of gendered violence. We can encourage citizens to engage in bystander intervention when they encounter these narratives. And finally, we need to understand why some young men take comfort in ideas that promote toxic expressions of masculinity.

Practitioners and researchers must keep exploring the nature and prevalence of myths surrounding gender-based online violence and abuse. We need to spend time with young men and ask them questions about what they think it is to be a man, and we need to provide positive examples of masculinity in order to make manosphere-style ideas less attractive.

Jaigris Hodson receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). She is a resident Fellow of the Cascade Institute, and a Research Advisor for the Clarity Foundation.

Esteban Morales receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC).

Kaitlynn Mendes receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), and the Canada Research Chairs Program.

Yimin Chen receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC).

– ref. Addressing online gender violence requires both culture and policy change – https://theconversation.com/addressing-online-gender-violence-requires-both-culture-and-policy-change-240636

MIL OSI – Global Reports –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI Global: B.C. election: Debate over the rights of gender-diverse youth continues as their school safety declines

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Elizabeth Saewyc, Director & Professor, School of Nursing & Executive Director, Stigma and Resilience Among Vulnerable Youth Centre, University of British Columbia

The treatment of gender-diverse youth in some Canadian schools has become a contentious issue. (Alex Van der Marel/Health and Well-being Report), CC BY-SA

The treatment of sexual minority and gender-diverse youth in Canadian schools continues to be a contentious issue among parents and political parties, particularly in provinces like Alberta and British Columbia.

In the run-up to the upcoming B.C. election, discussions around a sexual minority framework for schools and the SOGI 123 initiative are prominent.

What is SOGI 123?

Introduced into B.C.’s public schools in 2016, SOGI 123 aims to make schools safer and more inclusive for students of all gender identities and sexual orientations. The initiative provides resources to help educators combat and address discrimination and bullying, and foster supportive and inclusive environments for 2SLGBTQ+ students.

The push for SOGI 123 was informed by a 2014 study which included data from the McCreary Centre Society’s 2013 BC Adolescent Health Survey. That study showed that schools with an established Gay Straight Alliance or Gender Sexuality Alliance, along with anti-homophobic policies, lowered the odds of sexual minority students reporting discrimination, mental health issues and suicide attempts compared to students in schools without such initiatives. Notably, heterosexual students also benefited from these inclusive settings.

In 2018, a subsequent BC Adolescent Health Survey of more than 38,000 youth aged 12-19 — including almost 1,000 children who identified as gender diverse — revealed that gender-diverse youth, including those identifying as transgender or non-binary, faced high rates of bullying, both in-person and online. The findings highlighted the importance of strong school and family relationships, which were linked to better mental health and lower rates of substance use and suicidal thoughts.

Despite hopes that SOGI 123 would bridge the health and well-being disparity gap for gender-diverse and cisgender youth, recent events may be undermining those efforts. Over the past two years, there has been a notable rise in vocal opposition to the rights of trans and non-binary students across the country, with schools becoming a backdrop for protests and counter-protests.

In response to these challenges, researchers at the University of British Columbia teamed up again with McCreary Centre Society to analyze the BC Adolescent Health Survey data from 2023 to see what, if anything, has changed for trans, non-binary, and questioning young people in B.C. since 2018.

Key findings from the 2024 report

Improved family support: Some positive findings from the 2024 report include improved family support for gender-diverse youth with a noted reduction over time in these young people running away or getting kicked out of home.

Decreased feelings of safety: Results for students’ experiences at school were less positive, with decreases in feeling safe at school for both gender-diverse and cisgender youth. Gender-diverse young people were the least likely to report feeling safe in different parts of their school, and particularly in less supervised locations such as changing rooms and washrooms.

Increased reports of bullying: The majority of gender-diverse youth had experienced at least one type of in-person or online bullying in the past year, and rates of experiencing online bullying were at least twice those of cisgender boys.

Rising discrimination: Compared to five years earlier, there was an increase in gender-diverse youth reporting they had experienced discrimination, and the majority had experienced at least one form of discrimination in the past year. The most common location where discrimination occurred was at school: 32 per cent of trans girls and 57 per cent of trans boys reported they had experienced discrimination at school, compared to 29 per cent of cisgender girls and 20 per cent of cisgender boys.

School connectedness is crucial for mental well-being: Similar to past studies, strong school connections remained a strong protective factor for health and well-being, linked to reduced suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts. For example, trans boys with the highest school connectedness were 99 per cent less likely to report seriously considering suicide in the past year compared to those with lower school connections. Likewise, trans girls with strong connections were 8.7 times more likely to report good or excellent mental health compared to other trans girls with low school connections.

B.C. election issue

As the debate about SOGI 123 continues during this election cycle, the recent data from more than 76,000 Grade 7-12 students serves as a crucial and timely reminder.

It highlights the importance of considering the experiences and perspectives of B.C.’s youth in discussions about how to create safe and inclusive school environments for all.

Elizabeth Saewyc receives funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the Public Health Agency of Canada, and the US National Institutes of Health. She also provides consultation to the World Health Organization, UNICEF, and other UN Agencies on adolescent health indicators and health measures.

Annie Smith does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. B.C. election: Debate over the rights of gender-diverse youth continues as their school safety declines – https://theconversation.com/b-c-election-debate-over-the-rights-of-gender-diverse-youth-continues-as-their-school-safety-declines-239922

MIL OSI – Global Reports –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI New Zealand: University Research – Tongan-led solutions needed to overcome barriers to bowel cancer screening – Otago University

Source: University of Otago

The National Bowel Screening Programme is failing to deliver screening equitably to Pacific New Zealanders, but there are ways to improve it, research led by the University of Otago, Wellington has found.

The researchers held two talanoa focus groups in 2021, asking Tongan-born New Zealanders over 60 how the programme could be made more effective and equitable. They also talked to four Pacific experts working for the screening programme.

The researchers are some of the first to ask Tongan New Zealanders about their experiences with the bowel screening programme. The results of their study are published in the New Zealand Medical Journal.

Lead researcher Dr Viliami Puloka, from the University’s Department of Public Health, says the participants overwhelmingly supported a ‘by Tongan, for Tongan’ approach to screening.

“Many Tongans die unnecessarily from bowel cancer because the programme, while available, isn’t accessible to them. Taking a Tongan approach was recommended by all the participants and experts involved in the study.”

Dr Puloka says only 35 per cent of Tongan people are screened, compared with 58 per cent of New Zealanders overall. Pacific peoples are 60 per cent more likely to die from bowel cancer compared to New Zealanders of European heritage.

The study found Tongans were very motivated when it came to looking after their health, but that the programme was not meeting their needs, he says.

“It was important for us to understand what the road blocks are and how to empower people. Tongans stressed the collective nature of their society and the need to deliver the programme to the community, something that would only really be effective from a Tongan provider.

“The programme can be delivered equitably if there is the will to do so. What is required is courage and the political will to shift the power and resources necessary to ensure equitable outcomes.”

He says the recently announced lowering of the age at which bowel screening starts to 50-years-old for Pacific peoples is an essential step in increasing the accessibility of the programme.

But he says it does not take away the need to reimagine the programme from a Tongan and a Pacific perspective.

While the study focused on the Tongan community, Dr Puloka says the findings may also provide valuable insights into the needs of other Pacific peoples.

The research was independently funded by the Cancer Society of New Zealand.

Notes:

The research paper, ‘Polokalama Fekumi ki he Kanisā ‘o e Halanga-me’atokoní—Ko e vakai ‘a e Tongá: Tongan New Zealanders’ views on how to ensure the National Bowel Cancer Screening programme works well for the Tongan community’ is published in the New Zealand Medical Journal.

MIL OSI New Zealand News –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI Banking: Designing against the deaf tax: How we can flip the script on tokenism

Source: Microsoft

Headline: Designing against the deaf tax: How we can flip the script on tokenism

Inclusive Design – UX/UI

How we can flip the script on tokenism

By

Toby Fitch

Sep 24, 2024 – The estimated reading time is 11 min.

“Your baby has failed” isn’t a phrase any parent wants to hear. Yet for parents born with deaf children, babies are labeled failures before even leaving the hospital because they don’t pass mandated hearing tests. The weight and impact of that label is never felt by the hearing population because in an audio-dominant world, there’s no such thing as a mandatory sign language test. It’s no surprise, then, that systems fail to design for what dominant culture does not see or value: the creativity, brilliance, and depth of deaf culture.

When my parents found out I was deaf, my mother cried, worrying that I would have to navigate the challenges she and my father endured. Like me and my sister, both of my parents are deaf. As author Isabel Wilkerson describes in her book about race, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents, my parents experienced firsthand how our world is run by a caste system that is “about respect, authority and assumptions of competence — who is accorded these and who is not.”

American Sign Language for “born failures” is made up of three signs: ‘BORN, FAIL, FINISH’

From medicine to education, our systems are developed and implemented based on policies, attitudes, and institutional practices. It’s not biology that disables people in the Deaf or Disability community; it is the mismatches between our abilities and designed systems not designed for us. As disability rights activist Haben Girma put it, “They designed this environment for people who can see and hear. In this environment, I am disabled. They place the burden on me to step out of my world and reach into theirs.” Those mismatches place a disability tax on Deaf people at an early age. For example, fighting for accommodations like sign language interpreters for school, work, or receiving healthcare, or having the courage to speak up in the face of discrimination.

Despite the exclusion, ridicule, and language deprivation — my parents didn’t learn sign language until I entered elementary school because their [hearing] parents were told that they had to ‘talk’ (eg: speech) to succeed in life — they were never without hope. “Deaf people can do anything hearing people can, except hear,” said Dr. I. King Jordan, the first Deaf president of Gallaudet University. When a child endures language deprivation, they don’t get adequate exposure to other forms of effective communication, thus delaying their cognitive, social, and emotional development. Ultimately, having my sister and I would give new meaning to my parents’ personal histories and broaden their perspective in profound ways. As a born failure, I grew up in a world of mismatches, but as desktop computers became more readily available, those mismatches would lead me down a path of using my lived experience to break barriers in society, design and technology.

American sign language for “accessibility” shows a dominant hand moving under the non-dominant hand in a motion that implies the ability for anyone to go in and out of a space with ease.

Technology cracks the door open

Growing up, there weren’t really computers in classrooms and since most kids my age didn’t care for them, I was one of the first kids in my area to start using a computer. Since I had limited access to communicate with my classmates, computers helped me fill the time. My first computer was a PowerMac G3 Desktop, gifted by my cousin who ran his own design firm. I tinkered with different programs and video games like Backyard Baseball (1998) and the door to my future slowly opened.

I got my second computer in 7th grade because my parents were trying to be creative in how I would keep up in class with note taking. Pencil and paper weren’t working for me. My eyes were focused on my interpreter, the whiteboard, and just taking everything in. Couple that with the fact that teachers don’t stop speaking just because you’re looking down to write, and it’s not a surprise that I missed a lot of information. Typing notes was much faster than writing, so my school provided a PC and that widened the doorway to technology. It was a Dell Inspiron 8100 with Windows 2000 that was built like a tank, and it was really heavy! I sank a lot of time on that computer and surfed on the Internet quite often to learn just about anything. Ask Jeeves was my best friend, eventually replaced by MSN search and Google.

Access to information was my lifeline to learning about the world… and I did it through technology because I didn’t receive my information from conversations around the room. This wasn’t from lack of effort. I took over 15 years of speech training and learned to speak quite well to try and meet people halfway. The problem was, when they responded, I would only partially or pretend to understand, nodding my way through communication mismatches. This led to shallow interactions and pretending didn’t feel good because there was always something lacking — a missed opportunity for true human connection — when people were not willing to meet me halfway. These days, I rarely speak. Primarily using sign language gives me 100% access. I also use a notetaking app using speech-to text on my phone to interface with folks who don’t know sign language.

American Sign Language for “design” shows a dominant hand expressively drafting something in one swooping motion on the non-dominant hand with an open palm representing a canvas.

Using a Deaf lens at Microsoft

Designing at Microsoft, I often think about my lived experience and bringing empathy to the mismatches I face daily. I may be an avid user of technology, but there is plenty of room for technology to grow and fill accessibility gaps. I advocate for accessibility not because I want to, but because I have to. Design should be about how Deaf people experience the world, anticipating every need, and shifting left to prevent issues later in the product cycle. Differing lived experiences inform our unique perspectives, creating an exchange that can open opportunities. Overlooked problems get discovered and the approach to solving them become very mindful and effective.

As a profession, design has evolved tremendously in the past few years, moving from the aspirational towards the functional. UX mismatches in the systems we use still exist because, while they’re made based on a very wide set of users, they still lack all of the necessary elements for me to be accommodated. To solve these problems, we sometimes need to focus on “design for one and solve for many.” In other words, when we focus on designing for a single problem (or disability), it helps us to navigate the problem space writ large using empathy, our lived experiences, and leveraging co-design principles.

Part of what catalyzed many recent changes in design thinking was the 2020 Pandemic and rapid transition to remote work. For Deaf folks, we quickly found that video conferencing was the great equalizer because for once we were on equal footing with our peers. Meetings were more mindful and easier to track because people couldn’t talk over each other. This made work easier for Deaf people as others modified their behaviors to ensure clear audio or taking turns when speaking in meetings. Deaf people could also rely on captions to figure out who was speaking or catch the dropped information that interpreters may miss due to accents or things being lost in translation. For the first time, millions of people were experiencing Deaf gain. Communication and human connection through technology was improved by the Deaf community because anyone could use those features (including folks forced to mute their audio thanks to a screaming kid in the background!).

UX for Sign Language View in Teams. The D/HH experience in Microsoft Teams has driven the development of accessibility features like Sign Language View, designed specifically for those who rely on sign language for communication. Through a collaborative, co-design process with the D/HH community and sign language interpreters, we have developed features that ensure sign language users can perform at their best in any virtual collaboration setting. Key enhancements — such as the ability to manage and prioritize a list of signers, improved video quality for clearer sign language visibility, and simplified meeting controls — empowering D/HH users to engage quickly, fully and confidently.

The creation of Sign Language View in Teams

One shortfall of this new way of working, however, was the existing captioning solutions. It was painful for my Deaf peers and I to have to turn on captions with each call. Every time, you had to look for and prioritize the interpreters, open the chat window, and then finally be ready to participate in meetings. This design mismatch led to two Deaf employees (myself and a coworker) innovating an UX proposal for Microsoft Teams that would be more accommodating for Deaf users. Sign Language View was born out of a mismatch that we as employees faced daily, to the point that it was weighing on our disability tax. These days, I can now join meetings with less friction than I had before — but there are still more doors to open and work to do!

With AI, it’s truly an exciting time in tech and so much is yet to be determined. This makes it critical to enter the space with curiosity, humility, and nuance. People in the Deaf and Disabled community operate outside of societal norms, attuning us to gaps often missed by others. That creates a very sensitive, nuanced lens and curiosity is also often at play. When your ability to succeed is determined by how creatively you can hack a system that doesn’t work for you, it necessitates innovation. In totality, this gives us a lens to approach problems in ways that may be more holistic than traditional design best practices.

Co-design is great, but representation is an even better way to ensure people with lived experiences work directly to solve problems for their own communities. Ultimately, this leads to more equitable products for everyone and potentially more enjoyable ones, too. With sign language, for example, people often see it as a lesser form of communication but it’s highly expressive and an integral part of our cultural identity. People often want to travel to other countries to enrich their own lives by better understanding different ways of living. Living without sound is another way of experiencing life, and Deaf culture has its own social beliefs, behaviors, traditions, art, and values.

American Sign Language for “empathy” shows two people, one of which is the signer. With one hand close to the heart, both hands sign the word ‘UNDERSTAND,’ showing how sign language can expressively convey empathy for different viewpoints.

So, of the 90% of deaf children born to hearing parents, what if instead of being given the “bad news,” they were told they now had the chance to dive into a culture rich with language and expression? I think it could help erode the disability tax over time, leading to products and systems that are truly meant for all.

Header imagery by Karan Singh.

MIL OSI Global Banks –

January 24, 2025
MIL-Evening Report: Tech can help kids connect with nature and go outdoors – here are tips to make it work
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Kellie Vella, Postdoctoral researcher in Human-Computer Interaction, Queensland University of Technology

RasaBasa/Shutterstock

Young children’s lives are increasingly spent indoors. They have less access to green spaces, their parents are concerned about safety, and there’s also the draw of digital entertainment. This shift away from the natural world has been evocatively named “the extinction of experience”.

By being in green spaces, children benefit in many ways, including greater physical activity and improved concentration and self-control. The outdoors is also good for children’s learning. Benefits such as these have fuelled the rise of forest schools and the integration of nature play in early childhood education.

The things that play the biggest role in limiting children’s time in nature are urbanisation and parental attitudes. Despite this, digital devices are often blamed for keeping kids indoors.

Digital entertainment is widely perceived as addictive and detrimental. While the concept of screen time is contested, most Australian children are exceeding the current recommended guidelines.

Our research took a different approach, asking: could digital technologies be designed to foster nature connection? After looking at studies of digital technologies used by children aged eight years and under, we found a wide range of ways technology can help children find their way back into the great outdoors.

Being in nature

The ways children connect to nature go through several phases: “being in nature, being with nature, and being for nature”. Key experiences that boost this connection include free time in nature, seeing others like oneself in natural settings, recording nature experiences, and gaining confidence and a sense of agency outdoors.

We found technologies that help children to
- have social and playful experiences outdoors
- discover nature
- show their care for and learn about other species and the environment, and
- focus their creative and artistic abilities on the world around them.
The most commonly used technology were digital cameras in various forms: handheld, GoPros, or built into smartphones or prototype devices.

Case studies from all around the world show how digital imagery opens doors into the natural world. In São Paulo, Brazil, photography helped children notice urban nature they had overlooked. In the United States, it allowed them to collect images of species to learn about.

In Australia, children took photos in parks for creative manipulation later, while in Finland, an augmented reality “forest elf” encouraged imaginative nature exploration that children could photograph. In Italy, the ABBOT prototype used a screenless camera device linked to a tablet application, enabling nature exploration without the distraction of screens.

Julle, the augmented reality ‘forest elf’ used in the Finnish study.
Kumpulainen et al. (2020), CC BY

Young citizen scientists

Nature photography is also a gateway to citizen science. Apps like QuestaGame, though not a subject of our research, bridge the appeal of photography and the game design of Pokémon Go. The goal of the game is to collect images of species for science.

Our study found one citizen science project with seven- and eight-year-old children text logging seashore species they found. While the youngest children needed parental support to do this, they were reportedly the most enthusiastic.

Sound technologies can also help connect kids with nature. The Ambient Birdhouse plays nature videos in the home so that children are sensitised to bird sounds when outside. Another tool, the Eko nature sound collector, pairs with an app to let children manipulate sounds they’ve collected outdoors.

Like photography, sound technologies are an entry point to noticing the natural world. And children can use these even if they can’t yet read.

How can we use tech to connect children with nature?

There are many ways to appropriate existing technologies and make new ones to help children connect with nature. Parents and educators can use accessible technologies like cameras, and applications such as QuestaGame, including their schools-oriented challenge.

To add mystery and excitement by having to look at the images later – much like with film cameras – parents can cover up the screen of a smartphone or digital camera. (A few inches of painter’s masking tape can do the trick.)

Going out to check an automatic nature camera can also be exciting. It can even turn into a daily ritual. These cameras are available both commercially and DIY. To find the best places to put them, children can engage in backyard experimentation, adding another dimension to this activity.

To further encourage their children’s creative and scientific learning, parents can help children make digital stories out of nature photos, or learn about species together.

Finally, tech developers can use all this evidence to design dedicated tech tools for children to use in nature. These designs should be easy for young children to use, engage more senses than sight, and encourage outdoor play, wonder and care for nature.

If such technologies are designed in collaboration with children, families and educators, they have the chance to be widely embraced, both at home and in the classroom.

Our work shows there are ways to use technology to build kids’ interest in the outdoors. By listening to parents’ concerns about addiction to smart devices and children’s safety, we can ensure a world where children play outdoors freely, without veering towards surveillance.

Kellie Vella is a Research Fellow with the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child.

Madeleine Dobson is an Associate Investigator with the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child.

– ref. Tech can help kids connect with nature and go outdoors – here are tips to make it work – https://theconversation.com/tech-can-help-kids-connect-with-nature-and-go-outdoors-here-are-tips-to-make-it-work-240442
MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –
January 24, 2025
MIL-Evening Report: Preventing falls: Google Street View offers a quick way to assess risks for older New Zealanders

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Angela Curl, Senior lecturer, Department of Population Health, University of Otago

Google Street View has fast become a tool for people trying to get the feel for a community, look at real estate – and sometimes prank the tech giant when its mapping car drives by. But it also has the potential to help prevent falls and injuries in New Zealand’s urban environments.

Falls are a leading cause of injury and accidental death among older adults, but identifying the location of risks outside is labour and time intensive.

In our new research, we have created a tool using Google Street View to audit the places where people walk.

The goal of our new tool – Fall-SAFE – is to identify the risks in New Zealand’s built environments and create a database for local councils and community groups to understand where an older person might fall – and why.

A costly risk

Annually, one-in-three people over 65 are injured in a fall. This figure rises to one-in-two for people over 80.

In 2023 alone, ACC received 236,985 new claims for falls from people over the age of 60. Many of these falls resulted in serious injury, such as a hip fracture, hospitalisation or even death.

It’s not just older people who are at risk of falling – though they are, by far, the largest group. Last year, ACC paid out NZ$2.15 billion to cover claims for falls.

The flow-on effect from falls extends further than just medical recovery. Older people who have fallen outside, or who fear falling due to perceived risks, may be less willing to go for walks. They then miss out on the physical, mental and social benefits of this sort of activity.

Assessing the environment

Using data from ambulance service Hato Hone St John, we identified 2,117 falls between July 2016 and June 2018 in urban areas involving adults aged 65 and over. Wellington was excluded as the city uses a different ambulance service.

Auditors then used Google Street View to assess the locations of these falls and identify risks in the built environment that might have contributed. These risks included trip hazards, uneven foot paths, obstructions (such as overgrown bushes) and slopes.

Auditors used a “drop-and-spin” approach to their assessment, where they completed a 360° audit of the fall location. The Google Maps imagery was set to be as close to the date of the accident as possible.

Drop-and-spin virtual audits are quicker than physical audits, but similarly reliable. Furthermore, drop-and-spin virtual audits enable assessment over large geographic areas that would be difficult to examine in person.

Understanding New Zealand’s streets

After examining the different fall sites, we gained a better understanding of where falls happened and the hazards that could have contributed to the falls.

Half of all the falls had occurred in residential locations (49.1%) and one quarter occurred in commercial locations (22.4%). A further 16.2% of the falls had occurred in “other” locations (such as rural or industrial areas).

Over 60% of fall sites had at least one trip hazard due to poorly maintained footpaths. The most common obstructions were manholes, service covers or grates (71.5 %), poles (65.4%), utility boxes (46.6%) and overhanging vegetation (39.5%). Other obstructions such as bus shelters, chairs and tables, or drains were noted at 64.5% of the sites.

Three-quarters of the falls had occurred in locations that had a flat or gentle slope (76.3%). Only 15.5% of the falls had occurred on a moderate slope, while 8.2% had occurred on a steep slope.

Most (95.6%) of the fall locations had a normal kerb height (ten centimetres). Few locations had no kerbs (2.3%) or storm drains (2%). Streetlights were present in most fall locations, either on one side of the street (including partial or very sparse locations) (54%) or on both sides (44%). Streetlights were not visible in 0.9% of sites.

Of all the locations we assessed, just under 6% had no obvious risk whatsoever. This seems to indicate that external hazards were a contributing factor to the vast majority of falls – though without information from the person who fell, it is hard to know for sure.

A cheaper and faster option

The current approach to assessing the safety of urban environments – sending people out to physically look at a footpath to identify issues – can be time consuming and costly.

And the money to do the work is simply unavailable. Several councils, including Hamilton and Masterton, have announced significant cuts in funding from the New Zealand Transport Agency to maintain and repair footpaths and cycle lanes.

Another problem is that these assessors may not fully understand the experiences of older people in these locations. A hazard for someone aged 65+ may not seem like one for someone in their 30s or 40s.

Understanding the factors that contribute to a fall for older people – such as obstructions and trip hazards – allows city planners to address problems in the built environment.

Our free auditing tool provides a way for councils and advocacy groups to look at environments to understand the risks. Our research applied this to places where we know people had fallen, but the tool can be used to assess the risk of any environment.

Investing the time and effort now to address these fall risks early could save money – and lives – further down the track.

Angela Curl receives funding from Healthier Lives and Ageing Well National Science Challenges and Lotteries Health.

– ref. Preventing falls: Google Street View offers a quick way to assess risks for older New Zealanders – https://theconversation.com/preventing-falls-google-street-view-offers-a-quick-way-to-assess-risks-for-older-new-zealanders-241343

MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

January 24, 2025
MIL-Evening Report: Why are some Australian students having to pay to do PE at public schools?
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jessica Amy Sears, Lecturer, School of Education, Charles Sturt University

mattimix/Shutterstock

Health and physical education is one of the key subjects students learn at school. In Australia it is mandatory for students from the first year of school to Year 10.

It involves theory and practical components to help students manage their health and wellbeing. This includes healthy eating habits, sexual health, cyber safety and mental health. It also incorporates fundamental movement skills (such as throwing and catching), sports (such as swimming, gymnastics and football) and team-building.

Because it is a core, compulsory part of the curriculum it is supposed to be free for students at government schools. But our research shows some students are being asked to pay – and those who cannot are missing out.

Our research

In our recent study, we looked at the staffing and delivery of health and physical education in New South Wales government schools.

We surveyed 556 schools, which make up about 30% of public schools in the state. This included primary and high schools with a mix of locations and levels of advantage.

We used an online survey, which was completed by the teacher in charge of health and physical education.

Many schools are outsourcing lessons

We asked survey respondents who was teaching health and physical education to students at their schools. Some schools were using more than one option.
- For all schools: 67% were using external provider, 44.5% were using a specialist teacher and 55.4% were using another teacher.
- For primary schools: 78.4% were using an external provider, 17.9% were using a specialist teacher and 48% were using another teacher.
- For high schools: 44.8% were using an external provider, 95.9% were using a specialist teacher and 69.2% were using another teacher.
Previous research has shown how schools outsource to external providers to “fill the gap” of teachers lacking confidence and competence to provide quality health and physical education lessons.

This study did not measure how frequent outsourcing was, however, comments from respondents suggests it is regular. For example, one teacher said: “a typical [outsourced] class would have one lesson a week for a term”.

Another teacher similarly said

one 40 min[ute] lesson per week. Company comes in with equipment and young university students to run different activities. They also assess our students for us.

Another teacher told us:

We use [company name], they offer different sports/programs that run for one lesson a week per term.

Families are being asked to pay

Of the schools who were outsourcing lessons, 78% of the schools outsourcing lessons said they were asking parents to help pay for these lessons.

One respondent told us, the costs were “A$45 for one term, $80 for two”.

Of this group, 64% reported students who did not pay did other school work (either for health and physical education or another core subject). About one fifth of schools said students that don’t pay just had to “sit and watch”.

This suggests some students are missing out on basic learning opportunities at school for financial reasons. As one teacher told us:

the school uses some off-campus sporting/gaming facilities that students can choose to pay extra for instead of free on-campus teacher run [activities].

Some students are just made to ‘sit and watch’ if they can’t pay.
nannycz/Shutterstock

Why is this a problem?

The outsourcing of health and physical education lessons comes in the middle of an ongoing teacher shortage in Australia and around the world.

A 2024 UN report estimates a global shortage of more than 44 million teachers, with many teachers teaching outside of their areas of expertise.

Specific shortages of health and physical education teachers have been noted for more than a decade.

However, outsourcing lessons away from qualified teachers, is a significant concern. Little is known about the external providers’ qualifications or quality. Unlike teachers, they are not subject to registration requirements or professional standards.

Even more concerning is some students are missing out on lessons or some components of lessons because their families have not been able to pay.

This links to wider concerns about unequal access to sport in the school system. This includes some private schools with new Olympic pools and boat ramps when other public schools don’t have access to council playing fields.

More research is needed

Our study suggests more research is needed. We need further information on staffing, outsourcing and lesson delivery in other areas of the country and in other subjects.

We need to be sure all students are being taught the core curriculum, free of charge and by qualified teachers – ideally specialists.

Jessica Amy Sears is affiliated with ACHPER (Australian Council for Health, Physical Education and Recreation) NSW.

Rachel Wilson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Why are some Australian students having to pay to do PE at public schools? – https://theconversation.com/why-are-some-australian-students-having-to-pay-to-do-pe-at-public-schools-239489
MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –
January 24, 2025
MIL-Evening Report: A decade after the US version ended, Australia remakes The Office. It’s not new, but it’s funny

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Philippa Burne, Honorary Fellow (Screenwriting), Victorian College of the Arts, University of Melbourne/PhD Candidate, UniSA Creative, The University of Melbourne

Amazon/Bunya Entertainment

Firstly, let’s revisit the question: why are they remaking The Office?

Just over ten years after the United States version of the British series ended, Australia has decided to make its own version. It follows franchises in Canada, Greece, India, Sweden and Poland, to name a few.

But we all have offices to go to, we all have our particular office cultures, co-workers and complaints. Post-pandemic, office life is becoming routine again. The more things change, the less things change, and that could be the theme of The Office Australia.

In fact, this is probably the perfect timing for this remake: post work-from-home, when large corporations are demanding workers return (often unwillingly) to shared workplaces. That’s the premise of the pilot episode of The Office Australia – everyone stops working remotely and reunites at the office. It’s timely and a good way of updating the concept to make it relatable.

‘A riddle, swallowed by an idiot …’

Modern nods, same old business

A few more nods to contemporary office culture are included, such as Zoom meetings and standing desks. But apart from that, the Australian Office could be set anytime from the 1990s onwards in terms of the look, practices and low-fi tech of the office itself.

The remake mirrors closely the US version: a romance storyline, tensions between office and warehouse, an old-school boss who loves, craves and needs camaraderie, and a staff for whom work life comes second to what they’d rather be doing.

The original United Kingdom series of The Office, by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, only had 12 episodes, which is still surprising to realise given how much it defined television sitcom in the decades following. Parks and Recreation (2009–2015) owes a huge debt to The Office. Whether we would have had Utopia (2014–present) without it is debatable. The late, great John Clarke broke in Australia with The Games (1998–2000) and Australia has long done this sort of observational comedy very well.

Will Australia’s version capture local flavour? It does feature the Melbourne Cup.
Amazon

Despite a deep vein of experience and success to draw on, The Office Australia sticks closely to The Office format in terms of stories, characters, tone, look and laughs.

This might be because the show – made by Amazon and BBC Australia – is launching into around 240 countries and territories. It needs to find a line between being Australian and being international. That said, it has probably veered more into the international end of the scale, with enough Australiana (venomous snakes, barbecues) to ground it here, but still universal enough to be widely relatable and understandable.

The US version had 201 episodes, giving it scope to develop the characters and the storylines and make it a massively popular and frequently rewatched series. (There’s a follow up series in the works called The Paper.) So it’s no wonder writers Julie De Fina and Jackie van Beek looked to the this version for guidance for the Australian series. This is less an adaptation than a remake with a different accent.

Familiar and new faces

Hannah Howard (Felicity Ward) is the devoted office manager who loves her job too much and runs an under-performing, dysfunctional workplace of uninterested staff.

The show centres on her, with the familiar mockumentary style. Like David Brent and Michael Scott before her, Hannah Howard is optimistic, naive, relentless and terrible at staff management. She forces pyjama days and bus trips on her employees, who are clearly unwilling yet never actively rebel. There is plenty of comedy in the awkwardness and small moments.

Felicity Ward plays the boss (sort of) of this particular office.
Amazon

Her devoted assistant and receptionist Lizzie (Edith Poor), a former Scout, wears a grey suit and will pursue any idea no matter how ill-conceived or illegal to make Hannah’s plans come to fruition.

Long-suffering human resources manager Martin (Josh Thomson) tries to keep them from actually breaking laws, while Nick (Steen Raskopoulos) and Greta (Shari Sebbens) gaze awkwardly across their workstation divider at each other in a slow-burning love story. There are the usual office roles which offer story beats: accounting, IT, sales.

The first Australian season of The Office might not be anything new, but I kept watching. It felt safe, even comforting. Perhaps in a similar way going to someone else’s family for Christmas lunch can feel familiar: recognisable foods, decorations, known characters – but with the frisson that maybe something different will happen this time.

This remake knows what it is. It’s been made to satisfy an audience wanting to be in a world that reflects their own experiences, but takes it just that bit too far. It’s not setting out to break moulds, but to bring the mould up to date and give it an Australian voice for the world to hear.

The Office premieres on October 18 on Prime.

Philippa Burne does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. A decade after the US version ended, Australia remakes The Office. It’s not new, but it’s funny – https://theconversation.com/a-decade-after-the-us-version-ended-australia-remakes-the-office-its-not-new-but-its-funny-241356

MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI: b1BANK Promotes Jerry Vascocu to President

Source: GlobeNewswire (MIL-OSI)

BATON ROUGE, La., Oct. 17, 2024 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — b1BANK, the banking subsidiary of Business First Bancshares, Inc. (Nasdaq: BFST), announced today that N. Jerome “Jerry” Vascocu Jr. will be the bank’s new president, reporting to Jude Melville, who will retain the title of chairman and CEO.

Vascocu, who joined b1BANK in 2022 as chief administrative officer, oversees the coordination of banking, operations, risk and credit functions for the bank. He has also led several functions for the bank including correspondent banking, wealth management, human resources and marketing, where he recruited additional strong teammates, developed new products and introduced new technology.

“With an extensive and varied 30-year career, Jerry’s proven leadership and broad-based banking experience is especially relevant to the challenges and opportunities we anticipate facing as we continue to grow our impact on behalf of clients across the regions in which we operate,” said Jude Melville, chairman and CEO of b1BANK. “Most important, he’s a good person and I look forward to partnering with him in this new role.”

Before joining b1BANK and relocating to Baton Rouge, La., Vascocu led the development and implementation of client-focused strategies for commercial banking teams across the Southeast at First Horizon Bank. During his 17-year career at IBERIABANK and First Horizon, he also served as market president in multiple markets across Louisiana and Arkansas. Vascocu started his banking career immediately after earning his Bachelor of Arts in Economics from Vanderbilt University.

“b1BANK continues to build momentum in all our markets and across our various business units. This is a direct result of our teams’ dedication to our clients and to the communities we serve,” said Vascocu. “I am fortunate to be part of a great organization and thankful for the opportunity to serve in an expanded leadership role. I am excited about what is ahead for b1BANK.”

Vascocu remains focused on community development, economic development, education and healthcare, having served in board leadership roles across Louisiana most recently for One Acadiana, Ochsner Lafayette General Hospital and Foundation, University of Louisiana at Lafayette College of Business and Athletic Foundation.

About Business First Bancshares, Inc.

As of June 30, 2024, Business First Bancshares, Inc., (Nasdaq: BFST) through its banking subsidiary b1BANK, had approximately $6.7 billion in assets, $6.1 billion in assets under management through b1BANK’s affiliate Smith Shellnut Wilson, LLC (SSW) (excludes $0.9 billion of b1BANK assets managed by SSW) and operates Banking Centers and Loan Production Offices in markets across Louisiana and Texas, providing commercial and personal banking products and services. Commercial banking services include commercial loans and letters of credit, working capital lines and equipment financing, and treasury management services. b1BANK was awarded #1 Best-In-State Bank, Louisiana, by Forbes and Statista and is a multiyear winner of American Banker’s “Best Banks to Work For.” Visit b1BANK.com for more information.

Misty Albrecht
b1BANK
225.286.7879
Misty.Albrecht@b1BANK.com

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/6f3fe29c-03e2-468c-afd8-4ed162d7727e

The MIL Network –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI Global: The B.C. election could decide the future of the province’s species at risk laws

Source: The Conversation – Canada – By Courtney W. Mason, Professor and Canada Research Chair, Rural Livelihoods and Sustainable Communities, Thompson Rivers University

With British Columbians going to the polls this week, a whole host of key issues are on the agenda. Among these issues stands the future of species at risk legislation in B.C. — and perhaps with it Canada as a whole.

Canada, with its vast area, is home to 18 terrestrial and 13 aquatic ecozones and a staggering 140,000 plant and animal species. However, Canada’s abundant biodiversity is under threat from ongoing human-caused extinctions.

As polar regions warm at an accelerated rate, Canada’s species face increased peril.

Canada’s current laws aren’t doing enough to protect species at risk, and the time for action to make new laws or strengthen the existing ones is now.

Read more:
B.C. election: Party proposals on climate action point in opposite directions

Gaps in existing law

Now, you may be wondering, “doesn’t Canada already have species at risk laws?”

The federal government enacted the Species at Risk Act (SARA) in 2002, however, its impacts have been far from perfect.

A major issue with SARA is that it does not apply everywhere. Canada’s legal system divides power between federal and provincial governments. Wildlife, including species at risk, are mostly the provinces’ responsibility. SARA only applies to aquatic species, migratory birds and species on federal land (like national parks).

Unfortunately, most animals are not adept at reading maps, and a SARA-protected species can lose its protection simply by crossing a jurisdictional boundary. SARA does include exceptions where the federal government can intervene if a province is not doing enough to protect a particular species. But in practice the provinces have mostly been left to their own devices.

These jurisdictional dynamics, characteristic of Canadian federal politics, have created variations in species protection efforts across the country.

Of Canada’s nine common law provinces (excluding Québec and the territories), five have designated species at risk laws. The other four — British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Prince Edward Island — have only limited protections within other laws.

So, does it matter that only some provinces have species at risk legislation? To address this question, we compared the protections provisions of each province, and found that those with designated species at risk laws consistently provided much more robust protection frameworks than those that didn’t.

Read more:
B.C. election: Debate over the rights of gender-diverse youth continues as their school safety declines

‘Endangered’ does not mean protected

Species protection efforts are marked by numerous momentous decision-points. Perhaps the most significant decision of all is whether to list a species as at risk.

Most Canadian jurisdictions use committees of experts — including Indigenous knowledge holders and conservation scientists — to evaluate the risk to a species. In some provinces, like Nova Scotia, this becomes the official species at risk list.

In others, including federally, the committee decision is only a recommendation and the relevant minister has final discretion on listing. Ministerial discretion has led to certain types of species — particularly ones whose harvest or habitats are economically important — to repeatedly not be listed.

Discretion is not limited to listing decisions. In jurisdictions with species at risk laws, discretion allows governments to not enforce protections that interfere with other priorities. For example, a provincial government deeply invested in forestry could use ministerial discretion to de-emphasize protections for old growth forests, despite providing critical habitats for species at risk.

Where species at risk laws are insufficient, leaving room for discretion only weakens already limp protections. The only way to improve conditions for species at risk is to support governments that promise to prioritize the environment, and continually hold them to those promises.

Promises without progress

B.C. has over 2,000 plants, animals and habitats listed at risk. This is eight times more than Ontario, which has the second most listed species at risk with just over 250. Despite this, B.C. has some of the least complete legal protections, barely edging out Alberta to not come last in our scoring comparison. The province also has a history of promising species at risk law reform with no concrete action.

B.C. clearly illustrates how promises do not always lead to results.

In 2017, the B.C. NDP formed the province’s government under an agreement with the B.C. Green Party to prioritize environmental issues — including protecting species at risk. The 2017 mandate letter charged George Heyman, the Minister of Environment, to develop species at risk legislation.

After 2020’s mid-coronavirus snap election, the B.C. NDP gained a majority government without needing support from the B.C. Green Party. Consequently, 2020’s mandate letter showed weakening environmental priorities. The letter signalled a move away from species at risk legislation and instead directed the minister with “continuing to work with partners to protect species at risk”.

Perhaps realizing this language could not be further softened, new premier David Eby made no mention of species at risk or wildlife in the 2022 mandate letter.

Nonetheless, species at risk protections are back on the political agenda in the ongoing election, with both the B.C. NDP and B.C. Conservative parties promising “made-in-B.C.” and “science-based” biodiversity initiatives and species at risk legislation.

However, the result of the election will have a significant impact on the strength of any new laws, as the NDP’s platform focuses on overall biodiversity and increasing protection to critical habitats such as old-growth forests, while the Conservative’s seems mostly aimed at working with hunters to increase ungulate populations to allow larger hunting quotas.

Uncertain future

In recent legislative debates, B.C.’s ministers responsible for species at risk (and their habitats) have explained delays in making a species at risk law by increasingly emphasizing that they are taking the time to include Indigenous perspectives.

While it is positive that legislators are acknowledging the necessity of collaborating with Indigenous Nations on environmental laws, it is hard not to read repeated references to the length of consultation as deflecting responsibility for government inaction onto Indigenous communities.

Read more:
Swing state voters along the Great Lakes love cleaner water and beaches − and candidates from both parties have long fished for support there

Elections are impending across the country and environmental interests are back in the conversation. However, any progress could easily be lost if new governments are not committed to support environmental interests, both during and after the election cycle.

It is vital to support political parties with an environmental platform aimed at protecting biodiversity. Canada’s species at risk need voters to keep them in mind at the ballot boxes.

Courtney W. Mason receives funding from SSHRC; Canadian Mountain Network; BC Parks; Braiding Knowledge Canada.

Jordyn Maria Bogetti receives funding from SSHRC; Canadian Mountain Network.

– ref. The B.C. election could decide the future of the province’s species at risk laws – https://theconversation.com/the-b-c-election-could-decide-the-future-of-the-provinces-species-at-risk-laws-239550

MIL OSI – Global Reports –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI USA: Congressman Rogers Announces $10 Million Earmark to Expand Morehead State University’s Space Science Network

Source: United States House of Representatives – Representative Harold Hal Rogers (KY-05)

Recognizes U.S. Lunar Mission “Saviors” with Congressional Tribute

MOREHEAD, KY (Oct. 17, 2024) – U.S. Rep. Harold “Hal” Rogers (KY-05) visited Morehead State University’s Space Science Center on Thursday to announce a federal earmark totaling nearly $10 million in Community Project Funding to broaden the region’s highly competitive deep space network. The funding will be used to enhance the two space tracking stations on campus to support future government-funded and commercial space programs.

“The staff and students at Morehead State are now involved in some of the United States’ most innovative and historic space missions. This project will allow the space science center to support future NASA programs, including NASA’s Near Space Network, Artemis and the Moon to Mars Program,” said Congressman Rogers, chairman of the House appropriations subcommittee that funds science-related federal agencies. “This means that students here at MSU will have first-hand access to more lunar and deep space tracking services that they cannot get anywhere else in the country.”

“We are incredibly grateful for the support and leadership of Congressman Hal Rogers in securing this critical funding for Morehead State’s Space Science Program. His dedication to advancing science and technology in our region has been instrumental in positioning MSU as a leader in space research and exploration,” said Dr. Jay Morgan, President of Morehead State University. “This funding will allow us to expand our capabilities, provide our students with unmatched hands-on experiences, and contribute to the growing space economy in our region and in Kentucky. It’s an exciting time for Morehead State, and we thank Congressman Rogers for helping make this possible.”

Congressman Rogers also requested a $7.5 million Community Project Funding earmark for fiscal year 2025 MSU’s Space Science Center to provide payload operations for government and commercial space stations. The funding request was approved by the House Appropriations Committee and is pending on-going budget negotiations.

“This funding is a game-changer for Morehead State’s Space Science Program. It enables us to further enhance our research and technological capabilities, allowing our students and faculty to participate in groundbreaking projects that contribute directly to the future of space exploration,” said Dr. Ben Malphrus, Director of the MSU Space Science Center. “We’re deeply thankful to Congressman Hal Rogers for his vision and continued support, which is helping us shape the next generation of space scientists and engineers right here in Eastern Kentucky.”

To highlight the importance of investing in Morehead State’s work at the Space Science Center, Congressman Rogers recognized the staff and students who saved the United States’ latest mission to the moon after a troubled landing damaged the Odysseus Lander, “Odie,” cutting-off communications back to Earth.

“Morehead State was the only conduit between NASA and the private company that sent the lunar lander to the moon to conduct research. The multi-million-dollar mission was in jeopardy of failure, until the staff and students here in our Appalachian Mountains worked around the clock for 72 hours to save that historic mission,” said Congressman Rogers. “I submitted a tribute in the Congressional Record to commemorate the team that NASA Administrator Bill Nelson dubbed as the ‘saviors’ of the nation’s first lunar landing since the Apollo era.”

The Congressional Record is preserved in the Library of Congress, recognizing the work of MSU staff members, Dr. Malphrus, Chloe Hart from Ashland, Emily Walter from Pikeville, Nathan Fite, Christopher Smith and Seifala Moustaffa, as well as students Mila Shearer and Carrie Bruce.

For more information about Congressman Rogers work in Washington and at home in Kentucky, visit halrogers.house.gov and follow him on social media.

MIL OSI USA News –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI USA: Duckworth Visits Chicago State University to Discuss Efforts to Support Student Parents

US Senate News:

Source: United States Senator for Illinois Tammy Duckworth
October 17, 2024
[CHICAGO, IL] – U.S. Senator Tammy Duckworth (D-IL) today visited Chicago State University (CSU) to tour their campus child care center and meet with Chicago Alderwoman Michelle Harris, Illinois State Representative Marcus Evans Jr. (IL-HD-33), CSU leadership and parents. Last month, Duckworth reintroduced her Child Care Access Means Parents in Schools (CCAMPIS) Reauthorization Act, legislation which builds on her previous efforts to help increase access to on-campus child care for the more than 4 million parenting students currently enrolled in postsecondary education programs. Duckworth and University leadership also discussed funding for CSU, including $800,000 in Congressionally Directed Spending Duckworth secured for the University. Photos from today’s visit are available on the Senator’s website. “As college costs continue to skyrocket, we can’t simply stay on the sidelines as it gets even harder for parenting students to afford higher education,” said Duckworth. “The more than 4 million college students who are also raising children already have enough to worry about—child care should not be one of them. It was great to visit Chicago State today and see the University’s efforts to support its students to help them provide a better, stronger future for their families.” The CCAMPIS Reauthorization Act would help increase the rate of parenting students attending postsecondary education by reauthorizing and fully funding the only federal program that exclusively supports on-campus child care services and ensure the U.S. Department of Education is meeting the needs of parenting students. Duckworth originally introduced this legislation when she was in the U.S. House of Representatives. In Fiscal Year 2023, Duckworth secured $800,000 in federal funding through a Congressionally Directed Spending Request for Chicago State University. This federal investment supported redesigning the CSU curriculum and increasing access to the internet by improving and expanding computer facilities. In August, Duckworth and U.S. Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL) secured $22.7 million for the Strengthening Predominately Black Institutions (PBI) program as a part of their Illinois priorities for FY25 advancing through the Senate Appropriations Committee. This funding will support the Strengthening PBIs program by helping to expand their capacity to serve low- and middle-income students, especially Black students. Chicago State University is a PBI. Chicago State University is a predominantly black public university in Chicago. It includes an honors program for undergraduates, and offers bachelors and masters degrees in the arts and sciences. CSU was founded in 1867 as the Cook County Normal School, an innovative teachers college.

MIL OSI USA News –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI USA: October 17th, 2024 JEC Chairman Martin Heinrich Hosts “Pro-Worker, Pro-Business Opportunities” Roundtable

US Senate News:

Source: United States Senator for New Mexico Martin Heinrich
PHOTOS & VIDEO
Heinrich highlights how federal legislation is expanding pathways to in-demand jobs in New Mexico
ALBUQUERQUE — U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.), Chairman of the U.S. Joint Economic Committee (JEC), hosted a “Pro-Worker, Pro-Business Opportunities” roundtable to talk directly with New Mexicans about how federal legislation he helped pass into law is creating careers in high-demand sectors and strengthening New Mexico’s health care, skilled trades, early childhood education, and union workforce.

Heinrich Hosts “Pro-Worker, Pro-Business Opportunities” Roundtable on October 17, 2024.
“The manufacturing and clean energy renaissance driven by historic investments from the Infrastructure Law, the Inflation Reduction Act, and the CHIPS and Science Act is creating career opportunities across New Mexico. We need to build on this momentum by expanding access to apprenticeships, supporting new, high-quality jobs in the building and skilled trades, growing pathways to health care careers, and strengthening our early childhood education workforce. I will continue fighting to address workforce shortages, build the middle class, grow our economy, and provide more New Mexicans with the careers they can build their families around in their home communities,” said Heinrich.
Thanks to recently enacted legislation that Heinrich helped pass into law, like the Inflation Reduction Act and Infrastructure Law, New Mexico is now at the center of a clean energy “manufacturing renaissance,” which is creating hundreds of jobs in New Mexico that people can build their families around.
Heinrich discussed his work with community leaders to create more pathways to in-demand careers, including through jobs training and registered apprenticeship and pre-apprenticeship programs. He also highlighted the success of the domestic manufacturing tax credits in the Inflation Reduction Act and CHIPS and Science Act that have expanded clean energy and semiconductor manufacturing in New Mexico.
Through his role as Chairman of the U.S. Joint Economic Committee (JEC), Heinrich has held hearings on job training in the clean energy sector, the domestic boom in manufacturing, and investing in early childhood education. Heinrich has also released reports on growing registered apprenticeship programs, job training for the clean energy transition, the manufacturing renaissance, addressing rural health worker shortages, the economic benefits of early childhood education, employing women in the clean energy sector, and growing the labor force in New Mexico.
Heinrich has long been committed to creating new pathways to careers for New Mexicans in the communities where they grew up, while tackling shortages in in-demand sectors like health care and early childhood education.
Heinrich introduced the Apprenticeship Pathways Act, legislation to create pathways to careers for high school students by expanding access to apprenticeship programs for occupations with high need, including the building trades, healthcare, manufacturing, technology, telecommunications, and early childhood education.
Earlier this year, Heinrich introduced the Pre-Apprenticeships To Hardhats (PATH) Act, legislation to strengthen the pipeline for careers in New Mexico, address rising workforce shortages, and grow the state’s economy through quality pre-apprenticeship programs.
In March, Heinrich introduced the Providing Resources and Opportunities for Health Education and Learning (PRO-HEAL) Act, legislation that will tackle the health care provider shortage in New Mexico and nationwide by expanding pathways to high-quality, in-demand health care careers that medical professionals can access in their communities. Specifically, the PRO-HEAL Act addresses medical provider shortages by incentivizing states and institutions of higher education to expand or create health care provider pipeline programs, particularly in underserved and rural communities. The legislation is inspired by the success of the Combined BA/MD Degree Program at the University of New Mexico, where over 65% of students who have graduated from their program practice medicine in New Mexico.
Last year, Heinrich introduced the Pathways to Health Careers Act, legislation that reauthorizes and modernizes the Health Profession Opportunity Grant (HPOG) program to help address health care shortages in New Mexico and across the country and create pathways to high-quality, in-demand health care careers.
The HPOG program has a proven track record of successfully educating workers for jobs in the health care industry, while also providing career coaching, job placement, and a mix of other support services. The Pathways to Health Careers Act would restart and expand the HPOG Program, providing $425 million to make HPOG available nationwide from FY2024 through FY2028 and includes set asides for Tribes and U.S. Territories.
In 2021, Heinrich introduced the Championing Apprenticeships for New Careers and Employees in Technology (CHANCE in Tech) Act, legislation to create earlier pathways to high-paying careers in the information technology (IT) industry.
Investments in Clean Energy and Advanced Manufacturing:
Heinrich has been fighting hard to pass legislation and secure investments that are growing the state’s economy, building the middle class, and expanding high-quality jobs New Mexicans can build their families around.
In 2022, Heinrich helped author and pass into law the landmark Inflation Reduction Act,which has created a manufacturing renaissance in the state and established New Mexico at the center of the nation’s clean energy future. Heinrich marked the two-year anniversary of the legislation being signed into law in August, highlighting how its incentives have expanded and spurred a number of new clean energy projects across New Mexico.
Earlier this year, Heinrich highlighted $20 million from the Inflation Reduction Act for Pajarito Powder to scale production of components for electrolyzers and fuel cells. Heinrich invited the U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm to tour the facilities of Pajarito Powder in Albuquerque, N.M.
In June, the N.M. Delegation welcomed $23.9 million from the CHIPS and Science Act for SolAero, an Albuquerque, N.M.-based manufacturing company, to increase its production of compound semiconductors for spacecraft and satellites, as part of an expansion and modernization of their facility. Heinrich, Luján, and Stansbury, along with Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham and Albuquerque Mayor Tim Keller, welcomed U.S. Deputy Secretary of Commerce Don Graves and White House CHIPS Coordinator Ryan Harper to New Mexico to highlight this investment.
In April, Heinrich and Luján welcomed Energy Secretary Granholm to break ground on a new 216,000-square-foot Array Technologies manufacturing campus — a $50+ million investment located on Albuquerque’s Westside — which will employ over 300 additional New Mexicans to facilitate the production, assembly, design, engineering, and customer service of solar tracking technology.
That same day, Heinrich, Granholm, and Vasquez participated in a ribbon-cutting ceremony celebrating the production of the first wind towers coming off the Arcosa Wind Towers manufacturing line. The ribbon-cutting ceremony came nearly nine months after Heinrich welcomed President Biden to the Belén manufacturing facility — a $60 million investment that will have a $314 million economic impact and create 250 jobs in the region.

MIL OSI USA News –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI USA: Casey Announces More than $18.4 Million for Workforce Development, Community Revitalization in Pennsylvania Coal Communities

US Senate News:

Source: United States Senator for Pennsylvania Bob Casey

Recipient

Grant

Project

Bedford County Development Association

$498,840

Bedford County Business Park II -Site Preparation

Bedford County Technical Center

$50,000

Bedford County Technical Center: Expanding Opportunity in Coal Impacted Appalachia

Catalyst Connection

$2,000,000

Pennsylvania Career Pathways to Advanced Manufacturing: “Forging Your Future”

Center for Employment Opportunities

$50,000

Transitional Employment for Justice Impacted Pittsburgh Residents

Center for Population Health

$751,057

Growth of Community Health Workers inCambria/Somerset Counties, Pennsylvania

Corry Community Development Corporation D/B/A Impact Corry (nonprofit)

$887,000

Corry City Center Trail Link

Enterprise Development Center of Erie County, Inc.

$2,000,000

Ironworks Square: Smart Redevelopment in Coal Impacted Regions

Greene County Commissioners

$50,000

Greene County Barriers to Workforce Study

IUP Research Institute

$452,326

NWPAMade — Galvanizing and empowering the region’s creative economy

JARI Growth Fund, Inc.

$1,000,000

Startup Alleghenies Ecosystem Capital and Technical Assistance Expansion – Capital

JARI Growth Fund, Inc.

$879,253

Startup Alleghenies Ecosystem Capital and Technical Assistance Expansion- Technical Assistance

Jewish Healthcare Foundation

$1,990,867

Revitalizing Community Jobs—Building, Training and Supporting the Frontline Workforce for Nursing Homes in Pennsylvania

Lycoming County

$1,867,395

Susquehanna River Walk Extension Trail Construction Project

O.S. Johnson Technical Institute

$50,000

Planning for Vehicle Maintenance Technology Jobs of the Future

Office of Child Development, University of Pittsburgh

$49,751

Two-Generational Literacy to Strengthen the Workforce Pipeline

Pittsburgh Robotics Network (PRN)

$750,000

Maturing Appalachia’s Robotics Workforce

Saint Vincent College (SVC)

$662,672

Equipment and Technology for a Nursing Education and Lab Facility at Saint Vincent College

Screen Arts Institute

$400,000

The Broadcast Arts Initiative

The ClearWater Conservancy of Central Pennsylvania, Inc.

$2,000,000

ClearWater Community Conservation Center Ecotourism, Agritourism, and Agribusiness Hub

The University of Scranton

$1,321,980

The University of Scranton: Technology Driven Transformation in Workforce Development and Innovation

Westmoreland Hospital

$769,193

Building an Innovative Nursing Workforce Model: Bridging the Gap from Student to Expert

MIL OSI USA News –

January 24, 2025
MIL-Evening Report: A sister’s last hope to save her brother from addiction – David Vincent Smith’s He Ain’t Heavy is a triumphant debut

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Chris Thompson, Lecturer, Australian Catholic University

Bonsai Fims

So, on we go
His welfare is of my concern
No burden is he to bear
We’ll get there
For I know
He would not encumber me
He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother
– He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother by The Hollies

Writer–Director David Vincent Smith’s reference to The Hollies’ 1969 hit as the title for his new film is not without irony.

Max (Sam Corlett) – drug-dependent and out of control – is clearly a crushing weight on his sister Jade (Leila George) and mother Bev (Greta Scacchi).

The opening scene of this compelling new Australian production throws us right into the chaos he visits upon them. The desperate, violent, off-camera shouts of abuse from Max as his sister sneaks past concerned neighbours and into their mother’s house are obviously nothing new.

Bev, seated at the kitchen table, shows none of the anxiety we see in Jade. Perhaps she’s beyond reacting to Max’s outbursts. Perhaps she looks past the ugly side of her son through eyes that see only with a mother’s love.

Jade, however, is at the end of her tether. Everything she’s tried has failed. She’s left with just one last desperate measure.

This desperate measure didn’t come to David Vincent Smith as a narrative conceit. It was much closer to home.

One night, Smith got a call from his mother who told him his own drug-addicted brother was outside their home. As he explains in the film’s press kit:

I could hear smashing windows in the background as he tried to claw his way inside. I was done. There had been many years of violence, emergency rooms and mental trauma […] my own life was suffering as a result […] what could I do? I had an idea – I could kidnap him. Take him out to the desert, throw away the car keys and resolve this once and for all.

Smith didn’t pursue that extreme thought in real life. Instead, it found its way onto the screen, first as a short “proof of concept” film – I’m Not Hurting You, which played at the 2019 Sydney Film Festival – and then as He Ain’t Heavy, his first feature film.

The kidnapping and withdrawal

Jade does indeed kidnap her brother. She sedates him and brings him to their dead grandparents’ home in the country, which Jade and Bev have been packing up in preparation to for its sale.

Here, we see Jade’s methodical preparation of the room where she will incarcerate Max, the food she will feed him, the posters and pamphlets that inform her how to manage a drug addict’s withdrawal.

The film follows Jade (Leila George), who has spent much of her life trying to bring her brother Max out of his drug addiction.
Bonsai Fims

The choice of the grandparents’ home is significant for our understanding of this fractured family. Here we find evidence that things weren’t always like this.

We see old photo albums of happier times, toys and games that are now just reminders of fun family visits, a guitar that was once part of Max’s promising singing career, the nearby waterhole where lazy days were spent, and pencil marks on the door jamb recording the siblings’ growth.

Perhaps the resonance of their better days will be as powerful as the enforced withdrawal in bringing Max back. But, of course, Jade’s best-laid plans don’t go as she might have hoped.

Sam Corlett, who plays Max, also plays the role of Leif Eriksson in the popular Netflix series Vikings: Valhalla.
Bonsai Fims

In many ways, Max’s drug addiction is what Alfred Hitchcock would have called a McGuffin – the story element you think the film is about, when in fact the film is about something else entirely.

In this case, that something else is love: the love Jade feels for her brother that leads to this extreme action, the love Bev feels for her son that makes her vulnerable to his unpredictable and violent behaviour, and the absence of love Max feels for himself – a void that sucks him into a self-destructive spiral.

He Ain’t Heavy is essentially a three-handed chamber piece that delivers a triumvirate of distinctive, grounded and well-delineated performances, each one serving a sharply written screenplay imbued with an authenticity that reflects Smith’s lived experience.

Bev (Greta Scacchi) feels a lot of lover for her son, which makes her vulnerable to his unpredictable and violent behaviour.
Bonsai Fims

A powerful portrait of familial love

Without giving any spoilers, there are some narrative conveniences along the way that might detract from a lesser film. In this case, however, they are easy to forgive, in favour of the powerful viewing experience they help deliver.

If only for the curiosity factor, it’s worth noting Leila George is also Greta Scacchi’s real-life daughter (her father is Vincent D’Onofrio). This obviously doesn’t hurt when it comes to casting for family resemblance. But this tidbit of trivia is quickly forgotten in the moments of each of their finely crafted, absorbing performances.

In Smith’s earlier short film version, we see a plaque on the grandparents’ kitchen wall with the following aphorism:

RECIPE FOR LIFE – pinch of persistence, dash of kindness, spoonful of laughter, heap of love.

This is a story about a family that has exhausted its persistence, and for whom laughter is something of the past. But Jade’s extreme action is really an act of kindness. Both she and Bev, in their own ways, are driven by that heap of love.

He Ain’t Heavy is a film that deserves the same heap of love from its audience.

The film serves a sharply written screenplay imbued with authenticity.
Bonsai Fims

He Ain’t Heavy is in select cinemas from October 17.

Chris Thompson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. A sister’s last hope to save her brother from addiction – David Vincent Smith’s He Ain’t Heavy is a triumphant debut – https://theconversation.com/a-sisters-last-hope-to-save-her-brother-from-addiction-david-vincent-smiths-he-aint-heavy-is-a-triumphant-debut-237764

MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI United Kingdom: Virtual reality and wearable technology pilot to cut drug deaths
Source: United Kingdom – Executive Government & Departments

The government will fund research into wearable technology, virtual reality and artificial intelligence in a bid to support people with drug addictions.
Government funds research into wearable technology, virtual reality and artificial intelligence to support people with drug addictions and save lives

Projects include body-worn devices which alert emergency services if overdose is expected

11 projects across UK could be rolled out more widely if successful

Thousands of lives could be saved through the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and wearable technology designed to reduce drug deaths and improve outcomes.

The government has awarded £12 million to projects across the UK that are researching innovative technology to support people with addictions.

One of the chosen projects, called PneumoWave ALERT, pairs a chest-worn sensor that monitors breathing to a mobile device that sends out an immediate alert to nearby antidote carriers and emergency services if an overdose is detected, helping people get potentially life-saving treatment as soon as possible.

Another study will look at using virtual reality to help people overcome their triggers for cocaine addiction. People will be assessed using watch-like devices to determine which cues in their environment lead to a drug craving, by measuring physical changes to the body.

Virtual reality will then be used to create realistic situations to repeatedly expose people to triggers in a safe environment. Previous research shows cue exposure treatment (CET) can significantly reduce the level of craving and relapse among alcoholics, but it has not yet been fully explored for people experiencing a cocaine addiction until now.

Minister for Public Health and Prevention, Andrew Gwynne said:

Drug addiction devastates lives and rips apart families, and this government is committed to gripping this problem.

We’re determined to harness the full potential of cutting-edge technology to save thousands of lives across the country. I want the UK to lead the way in championing innovation to end the harmful effects of addiction.

The research is being funded through the Addiction Healthcare Goals programme, which is run by the Office for Life Sciences (OLS). Around £12 million has been awarded to 11 projects across eight organisations in the UK. The projects were selected as part of the Reducing Drug Deaths Challenge and the NIHR i4i Addiction: Innovation for Treatment and Recovery Awards, which are being run in partnership with the Scottish government and National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR).

The funding will also support research to improve the accessibility of the life-saving drug naloxone. Naloxone rapidly reverses heroin and opioid overdose but is typically available as an injection or nasal spray which have limitations and cannot always be used in time. Kings College London is looking into naloxone wafers which melt in the mouth and provide rapid access to this emergency medicine and can fit easily in a wallet or purse.

Several of the projects are based in Scotland which has the highest rate of drug deaths in Europe.

These include a wristband to monitor vital signs such as blood oxygen levels, heart rate and body temperature. If an overdose is suspected, the device, named “Saving Sam”, will send out an alert to a trusted contact. This research is being run by the University of Edinburgh and NHS Fife.

The technology being researched could be rolled out to more sites across the UK if successful. The projects support the government’s Health Mission – building an NHS fit for the future – by helping to embed a greater focus on prevention and supporting services.

It also helps establish the UK as a global leader for innovative treatments and technologies, supporting the UK’s Growth Mission – for sustained economic growth, good jobs and increased productivity across the country – by inspiring healthcare companies to invest in the UK, while supporting people back into stable work.

Science Minister Lord Vallance said:

The UK’s life sciences sector plays a critical role in finding new ways to tackle the biggest challenges facing healthcare, including the devastating impact of addiction. The Addiction Healthcare Goals Programme is testament to our commitment to bringing together researchers, clinicians, and innovators to create real change.

From wearable technology to AI-powered tools, these innovative projects highlight the power of collaboration in delivering life-saving treatments. By investing in these partnerships, we are tackling addiction head-on and ensuring that cutting-edge science reaches those who need it most, improving public health across the UK.

Professor Mike Lewis, NIHR’s Scientific Director for Innovation, said:

Innovation in managing addiction is needed to break the pattern of prison relapse and rebound and the wider impacts of addiction on society.

Through the NIHR i4i Addiction: Innovation for Treatment and Recovery Awards, successful projects have been awarded funding to develop approaches to improve treatment and recovery outcomes.

Interventions, including AI, that allow management in the community need this research to validate their potential so we can implement them at scale.

Professor Dame Anna Dominiczak, Chief Scientific Advisor for Health, Scottish Government, said:

Tackling drug-related deaths is a priority for the Scottish Government and NHS Scotland and we are committed to tackling these issues through targeted research, innovation and support.

As part of phase two of the Reducing Drug Deaths Innovation Competition, funding has been awarded to develop seven prototypes aimed at reducing drug deaths.

These innovative solutions include wearable sensors, digital monitoring and alert applications as well as novel antidote delivery systems.

By harnessing the expertise we have in Scotland and across the rest of the UK, we can continue to develop new technologies to drive prevention initiatives.

Professor Anne Lingford-Hughes, Chair of the Addiction Healthcare Goals, said:

New approaches to treat drug addiction and reduce drug related deaths, particularly from overdose, are urgently needed. The Addiction Healthcare Goals programme is pleased to fund promising innovations that have brought together partnerships between industry, academia and organisations involved in delivering treatment and care for those experiencing drug addictions.

Establishing such collaborations also enhances the UK’s research capacity and ability to deliver novel patient research. This lays firm foundations for the UK to accelerate the development and testing of effective innovations to use in routine care to save lives, reduce harms, and benefit society.

Notes to editors:

Further information on some of the projects is available below:

Reducing Drug Deaths Innovation Challenge

Pneumowave ALERT

PneumoWave ALERT is a remote monitoring platform designed to make opioid usage safer by detecting the onset of life-threatening respiratory problems caused by opioid-induced overdose. The platform consists of a discreet, chest-worn biosensor paired with a mobile device, which allows for the immediate alerting of nearby naloxone carriers and emergency medical services. The research involves conducting end-to-end monitoring, detection, and alerting in 200 high-risk patients residing in homeless accommodation, in collaboration with the University of Dundee, King’s College London, and Third Sector partners HumanKind, Thames Reach, and Hillcrest Futures.

NOMW Health

NOMW Health, in collaboration with Greater Glasgow and Clyde Innovation Hub and The University of Southampton, previously conducted a feasibility study on LifeSavr, an innovative wearable device aimed at addressing the opioid overdose crisis. The Scotland-based team is now advancing the development of LifeSavr to prepare it for consumer availability in the UK, Europe, and globally. LifeSavr features monitoring of oxygen saturation, heart rate, body movements and respiratory rate for accurate overdose detection. It is based on NASA research and uses a self-contained design that eliminates the need for a mobile phone. The device aims to reduce the burden on emergency services and long-term care.

Kings College London

Kings College London is developing rapid-dispersal naloxone wafers to improve the accessibility and portability of this life-saving emergency antidote medication. Naloxone rapidly reverses heroin/opioid overdose, but current forms (injection and nasal spray) have limitations, such as requiring healthy nasal passages and consistent carrying by users. The proposed naloxone wafers disintegrate within seconds and can easily fit into a wallet or purse, addressing the current low carriage rates which are around 15-20%.

EMoodie – Saving SAM System for Alert and Monitoring of Potential Overdoses

‘Saving SAM’ is an innovative, low-cost digital tool developed by eMoodie Limited to help prevent drug overdoses and save lives. The tool consists of a wristband that monitors vital signs such as blood oxygen levels, heart rate, body temperature, and movement patterns to detect potential overdose risks. If an overdose is suspected, the wristband sends an alert to the Saving SAM app on the user’s smartphone, alerting a trusted contact. The app also offers mental health support and well-being programs for people who use drugs. Co-created with people with lived experience, “Saving SAM” is an overdose detection tool that combines wearables, remote monitoring, artificial intelligence (AI), and a smartphone app with gamified digital therapeutics.

Mesox-Ltd

MESOX has developed a wearable patch of the antidotes Naloxone and Flumazenil for the rising number of drug deaths from mixed overdosing of opioids and benzodiazepines. The skin patch is designed for wide application by non-professionals in the community, avoiding the challenges of existing routes of administration and complexity of injectable antidotes. In the next phase of development on the programme, MESOX will work closely with NHS Fife and other sub-contractors to design acceptability studies with patients across all four UK nations.

Science & Engineering Applications Ltd (Scienap)

Scienap, in collaboration with ambulance services led by the Scottish Ambulance Service, has designed a low-cost alert and responder pathway to create effective responses to potentially fatal overdose events. The project includes a new Alert App for self-monitoring by drug users, automatically raising an alarm if they become unresponsive, and a Care & Respond App for trusted supporters to provide coordinated help, administer life-saving drugs, and be supported by emergency services when appropriate.

University of Glasgow

The University of Glasgow presents a significant advancement in wearable sensor technology for detecting and preventing overdoses. The soft sensor, designed for seamless body integration, provides real-time respiratory monitoring to identify early signs of overdose episodes. The team will test the usability and acceptability of the refined prototype with people with lived/living experience of substance use through an iterative co-design process supported by the West of Scotland NHS Innovation Hub.

NIHR i4i Addiction Innovation: Innovation for Treatment and Recovery Awards

Kings College London – is developing a Virtual Reality-enhanced cue exposure treatment integrated with a wearable device to address craving, prevent relapse and improve treatment outcomes of people with cocaine dependence.

A key challenge in helping people to recover for cocaine addiction (or dependence) is their craving for the drug that can be triggered by ‘cues’ in their environment, such as situations or objects, which remind them of the pleasurable effects of cocaine. This process is known as ‘classical conditioning’ and the aim of this study is to reduce the risk of relapse to cocaine through use of novel technologies to reduce craving. This research will test the ability of technology-enhanced CET to reduce craving and relapse to cocaine use, compared to people receiving usual care.

Another project led by Kings College London, The Prison Release Engagement Trial will refine and test an interactive smartphone app to improve Continuity of Care post-release for prisoners working to stay drug free.

For the full list of projects that have been successful in receiving funding across both competitions, please see the NIHR publications and the Scottish Government publications.

Further information

The Addiction Healthcare Goals is being delivered by the Office for Life Sciences (OLS) alongside the Dementia, Mental Health, Cancer and Obesity Healthcare Goals. The Addiction Healthcare Goals programme is working to make the UK a globally leading location for researchers and industry to develop, trial and deploy innovative treatments and technologies which will help people recover from drug and alcohol addictions, save lives, and benefit society.

Alongside funding innovative research, the Addiction Healthcare Goals programme is aiming to support the training of research leaders across the UK and is exploring ways to make better use of addiction healthcare data to enable researchers to develop better treatments. The programme has also been working with the James Lind Alliance to identify the key research priorities within the UK community and will be publishing this list in 2025 with the aim of influencing future research funding priorities.

The projects were selected as part of the Reducing Drug Deaths Challenge and the NIHR i4i Addiction: Innovation for Treatment and Recovery Awards, which were run in partnership with the Scottish government and National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR). The successful Reducing Drug Deaths projects builds on feasibility funding awarded through phase 1 of the Reducing Drugs Deaths Challenge last year.

The Addiction Healthcare Goals form a part of the Department of Health and Social Care’s ambition to deliver a world-class treatment and recovery system for people experiencing drug and alcohol addictions.

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Published 18 October 2024
MIL OSI United Kingdom –
January 24, 2025
MIL-Evening Report: How did public service leaders talk to staff about Robodebt? What they said – or didn’t – is revealing
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Daniel Casey, Lecturer, School of Politics and International Relations, Australian National University

In July 2023, after the release of the damning Robodebt Royal Commission report, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese declared:

it was wrong, it was illegal, it should never have happened and it should never happen again.

A major finding was some senior public servants were overly responsive to the wishes of ministers, to the detriment of the general public. The report describes an environment that was:

fraught […] characterised by a powerful drive for savings, strongly expressed ministerial policy positions […] and intense pressure experienced by public servants.

Investigating the scheme, which ran under the Morrison government, Commissioner Catherine Holmes was disturbed by “the lengths to which public servants were prepared to go to oblige ministers”, undermining the concept of impartiality and frank and fearless advice.

The release of Rick Morton’s new book Mean Streak brings a renewed focus on the lessons from Robodebt. To learn from such a serious crisis, organisations need to openly confront what happened, discuss and understand what the failure means. What were the systemic causes? What cultural failings did it expose? How can we ensure a similar disaster does not happen again?

Our research found little evidence these questions were being asked by many public service leaders immediately after the royal commission.

In the six months after the royal commission report’s release, almost half of the heads of Australian Public Service (APS) agencies apparently decided they didn’t need to communicate with their staff about Robodebt and explain what it meant for them.

What did department leaders do?

Learning from the failure of Robodebt will take time. In 2024, the public service is investigating and punishing some of those involved and implementing a new integrity plan.

Our research focuses on the six months after the release of the royal commission report: July to December 2023. Research shows the immediate post-crisis period is crucial to effective learning.

But before organisations can respond, they have to interpret and understand the meaning of the failure.

Just as the public turns to political leaders in a crisis, employees look to management. Leaders’ communication, whether by email, an all staff video, or a town hall meeting, is crucial.

These messages set the organisational narrative that explains what happened and why, what the repercussions are, how it can be resolved, and what lessons (if any) should be drawn from the crisis.

Three days after the royal commission report was released, the secretary of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, Glyn Davis, and Australian Public Service Commissioner Gordon de Brouwer, emailed all public service employees saying:

we are committed to working through the findings in an open and constructive way with you — the APS — and with the Australian public.

Our focus, however, is on how leaders of individual departments and agencies responded. Using Freedom of Information (FOI) requests, we asked how leaders communicated with staff in the crucial period straight after the commission reported.

Departments are where policy development occurs and they often work closely with ministers.

But only half of all public servants work for departments. The rest work across the 100 or so agencies.

While most department heads communicated with their staff about Robodebt, only 54% of agencies’ leaders did.

The 50 agencies that did not communicate with their staff about the meaning of Robodebt in the months following the report employ more than 45,000 people, more than 25% of the public service.

Not my problem mentality

Three large departments told us that “no documents were identified” or “the Department does not hold documents […] that meet the terms of the request”. This indicates they did not communicate with staff in the first six months after the Robodebt report was handed down. The departments were:
It is not clear why those secretaries decided not to write to their staff directly about Robodebt, but the absence of communication sends a message.

This was explicit in some responses. For example, in declining our request, we were told that the Independent Health and Aged Care Pricing Authority:

[…] is not an outwardly facing organisation and as such does not provide payments to individual recipients. Consequently, it is not required to respond to the Royal Commission and there are no documents that are relevant to your request.

Even when there was some communication, agencies were not necessarily addressing the cultural issues. For example, the Clean Energy Regulator was focused on public perception:

there is a heightened sense of scrutiny on regulators […] please be vigilant if you are approached by anybody working for a media outlet.

In such circumstances, it is unlikely cultural change will occur.

Some positive signs

On the positive side, there were examples of agencies that addressed the serious implications of Robodebt for their work, which is likely to improve their organisational culture.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) identified a number of recommendations “albeit directed at other agencies […] that ASIC should act on”. They noted that “given most of our people come from the private sector”, there was a need to improve training on “our obligations as public servants”.

Read more:
Two former federal departmental heads breached public service code 25 times in Robodebt scandal

Similarly, Australian statistician David Gruen emphasised creating a culture where “people feel supported if and when they seek to raise difficult issues with their colleagues or superiors”. Similar discussions were had at AUSTRAC.

Departments are closest to ministers, so we hoped their communications would address problems in the relationships between senior public servants and ministers, a key issue exposed in the Robodebt case.

Unfortunately, only four departments discussed over-responsiveness with their staff or in executive meetings, in the period studied.

The department of industry and science was the most comprehensive. Secretary Meghan Quinn wrote to staff several times, reflecting that the “findings go to the heart of leadership and culture and this should be our focus going forward”. The department’s integrity branch wrote to staff:

public servants [must] […] provide the government with advice that is frank and honest. If you ever feel pressured to do or sign something you are not comfortable with, it’s important you speak with your supervisors […] you have the Executive’s backing not to put your name to anything that is not true or not in the public interest.

However, this was one of the few departments where senior staff confronted these core issues directly in the early months after the royal commission reported. Most departments did not name or discuss the underlying cause of the failures: over-responsiveness to ministers at the expense of protecting the public.

While many of the errors of Robodebt can be solved through new procedures and rules, changing public service culture is a bigger learning project.

It requires a shift in norms and reweighting the competing duties of public servants. They must serve elected ministers, but equally, they must serve the public by ensuring probity, fairness and legality.

Robodebt illustrated the harm that occurs when the balance tips too far towards ministers and away from the public interest.

That this was rarely part of the communication from public service leaders to their staff in the immediate aftermath of the royal commission does not bode well for lessons being learnt from the crisis.

Daniel Casey worked in the Department of Social Services during the period of Robodebt, but did not work on the Robodebt program.

Maria Maley received funding from the Australian Research Council.

– ref. How did public service leaders talk to staff about Robodebt? What they said – or didn’t – is revealing – https://theconversation.com/how-did-public-service-leaders-talk-to-staff-about-robodebt-what-they-said-or-didnt-is-revealing-240015
MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –
January 24, 2025
MIL-Evening Report: Can NZ’s supply chain build enough resilience and sustainability to survive the next global crisis?

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Julia Fehrer, Associate Professor, Business School, University of Auckland, Waipapa Taumata Rau

New Zealand is highly reliant on trade – particularly on maritime routes, which are lifelines for exports and imports. Key sectors such as agriculture, construction, and wholesale and retail trade depend heavily on this global network.

External events can severely disrupt the flow of goods, delay deliveries or damage critical infrastructure.

But a crisis like the COVID pandemic can also disrupt business commitments to sustainability goals such as reducing carbon emissions, minimising waste and improving resource efficiency.

This is important, because several major New Zealand companies have introduced sustainability measures into their operations over the past decade.

Fonterra, for example, adopted low-carbon logistics and distribution practices. Zespri uses blockchain technology to improve the transparency of its sustainable practices and enhance tracking across its supply chain. Air New Zealand partners with local suppliers and adopts initiatives to lower its carbon emissions.

In our recent research, we reviewed 287 studies on supply chains. We identified key tensions between efficiency and sustainability, and how major disruptions to supply chains and operations can swing the balance between the two.

On one hand, businesses are pressured to maintain lean, cost-effective operations. On the other, there is a growing recognition of the need to build resilience and sustainability, particularly in the face of climate change.

Traditional strategies

New Zealand’s supply chains are susceptible to disruptions from natural disasters (such as earthquakes and floods), geopolitical tensions and global health crises.

Businesses have historically responded in a variety of ways: diversifying suppliers, increasing inventory buffers and securing alternative transport routes.

The use of technology, such as radio frequency identification, has played a crucial role in tracking goods across the supply chain. It provides real-time visibility and accurate inventory management.

Blockchain is becoming a key tool for making supply chains more sustainable. This technology uses a digital ledger to keep information safe and easy to trace.

But the ongoing technological innovation risks disadvantaging people and businesses with limited resources and capabilities along the supply chain.

Embracing a circular economy

During the pandemic, businesses experienced shortages of critical supplies, delays in shipments and fluctuating demand. This forced them to temporarily abandon long-term sustainability strategies in favour of short-term survival tactics.

This made sense from a business perspective. But to build more resilient and sustainable supply chains, businesses will need to move beyond traditional strategies.

Our research found integrating circular economy principles into supply chain management can help create a buffer for businesses.

The circular economy model focuses on minimising waste – keeping products and materials in use for as long as possible. There is also a focus on regenerating natural systems to foster economic, social and environmental resilience.

Companies can reduce their reliance on external supply chains by focusing on reusing materials, creating closed-loop systems with regional partners and by boosting the technologies already in place.

By fostering stronger links with local suppliers and focusing on regional sourcing, businesses can reduce their exposure to global risks. This will also help build more self-sufficient supply chain ecosystems.

Building sustainable supply chains requires investing in advanced technologies, such as blockchain and artificial intelligence. But implementing these technologies should be done carefully and in stages to minimise disruption. Going slowly can also allow for the inclusion of all supply chain partners in these technological transitions.

The way forward

New Zealand’s supply chain future hinges on greater collaboration between everyone involved, including businesses, policymakers and communities.

In practice, this means working together to build systems that are not only efficient and cost-effective but also resilient and sustainable.

Equally, resilient supply chains require regional manufacturing ecosystems. To mitigate the risks from global supply chain disruptions, it’s essential to support local manufacturing, even when offshore manufacturing costs are lower.

This will require government support and strategic investment in regional manufacturing innovation.

While New Zealand’s supply chains face significant challenges, there are great opportunities to reshape them for a more resilient and sustainable future.

By integrating circular economy principles, using advanced technologies and fostering regional collaboration, New Zealand can build supply chains that are prepared for future crises and which also contribute to the country’s sustainability goals.

Julia Fehrer receives funding from the New Zealand Ministry of Business, Innovation, and Employment.

Christina Stringer, Sunny Kareem, and Timofey Shalpegin do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Can NZ’s supply chain build enough resilience and sustainability to survive the next global crisis? – https://theconversation.com/can-nzs-supply-chain-build-enough-resilience-and-sustainability-to-survive-the-next-global-crisis-241348

MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI Australia: Australian Centre for Child Protection celebrates 20 years of improving the lives of vulnerable children

Source: University of South Australia

17 October 2024

Left to right: Professor Melissa O’Donnell, Deputy Director Research; Professor Leah Bromfield, Director and Chair of Child Protection; Amanda Paton, Deputy Director Practice; Lisa McDonald, Centre Manager

The Australian Centre for Child Protection (ACCP), founded in 2004 by the Australian Government and the University of South Australia, is celebrating its 20^th birthday and two decades of helping to prevent and respond to child abuse and neglect.

The ACCP’s public health approach to child protection saw it quickly gain influence across the sector early on, making major contributions to the first National Framework for Protecting Australia’s Children and the National Research Agenda for Protecting Children.

Today, the Centre continues to provide leadership and input to national strategies and action plans as well as supporting Commissions and Inquiries nationally.

Current areas of focus include families with multiple and complex needs, preventing infant removals, child sexual abuse, harmful sexual behaviours, out-of-home care and issues impacting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and families.

Deputy Vice Chancellor Research and Engagement at UniSA, Distinguished Professor Marnie Hughes-Warrington AO, says the ACCP has informed UniSA’s research, focusing on big issues, partnered approaches and developing new solutions that benefit society.

“The Centre’s focus on partnering with the sector to drive new approaches and outcomes in child protection continues to shape Australian policy and practice in this critical field,” she says.

Centre Director Professor Leah Bromfield says that the ACCP’s third decade marks a shift in focus to a transformation agenda.

“We know through our work across the past two decades that our child protection systems are not fit for purpose, and we must reimagine our approach to protecting children. ACCP is driving research and innovation to shape this transformation now and into the future,” she says.

“This new approach has the potential to be an example to the rest of the world.”

To celebrate its 20-year milestone and during Children’s Week, on Thursday 24 October the Australian Centre for Child Protection will present a free one-day virtual symposium, sharing the latest in ACCP’s research, solutions and insights, with more than 20 presentations from Centre staff, students, and partners across a range of priority themes.

Prof Bromfield says the symposium program has been designed to showcase the breadth of expertise and knowledge across the ACCP team.

“It’s our way of continuing to work hand in hand with the sector, driving new knowledge that can be applied, and supporting the sector and its workforce,” she says.

“This is how we can successfully continue to improve the lives of our most vulnerable children.”

Registrations and the full program for the symposium can be found on the ACCP website.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Contact for interview: Professor Leah Bromfield M: +61 401 635 310 E: Leah.Bromfield@unisa.edu.au

Media contact: Annabel Mansfield M: +61 479 182 489 E: Annabel.Mansfield@unisa.edu.au

Other articles you may be interested in

MIL OSI News –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI Australia: Research project to address cultural gap
Source: Government of Western Australia
Nearly $200,000 has been awarded to The University of Western Australia for a research project that will develop a tool to more effectively measure mental health and wellbeing in the Aboriginal community of Mullewa.

The research project called Tharlbarra Maga: Developing a Strong Head, Strong Mind Measure received funding from Healthway’s 2023 Targeted Research Round, which called for research projects that focused on new and innovative ways to measure health behaviours.

Chief Investigator Dr Charmaine Green from the Western Australian Centre for Rural Health (WACRH) at The University of Western Australia said the funding will support the considerable formative work that has already been undertaken in Mullewa.

“We currently don’t have culturally appropriate tools to be able to measure the impact we are making on the local Aboriginal community’s mental health, social and emotional wellbeing,” she said.

“This research project will provide an alternative to Western mental health tools and measures, which are often disliked and not appropriate for Aboriginal people as they do not reflect their cultural beliefs and understandings of wellbeing.

“This research project will take two years to complete, the tools that will be developed are likely to be interactive, story and picture based, using local idioms and local artists.”

Healthway CEO Colin Smith said Healthway looked forward to the outcomes of Dr Green’s work, as it will address a gap by providing culturally and locally relevant tools to measure mental health and wellbeing.

“This research project will involve extensive consultation with Aboriginal co-researchers and Mullewa community members to better understand the Mullewa mental health story.

“Once culturally appropriate tools are developed, they will be shared with the wider community to improve our understanding of community mental health in Mullewa and help shape the delivery of more effective health programs.

“The project can also provide a blue-print for other Aboriginal communities to develop similar, locally appropriate tools.”

Healthway’s 2023 Targeted Research Round has supported four research projects worth nearly $800,000 to address gaps in measuring health behaviours and inform future policy and process.

The successful recipients include:

Dr Charmaine Green, WACRH, The University of Western Australia – Tharlbarra Maga: Developing a Strong Head, Strong Mind Measure- $199, 640

Dr Emma Carlin, University of Western Australia – Measuring and supporting Aboriginal social and emotional wellbeing within primary healthcare – $199, 690

Associate Professor Michael Livingston, Curtin University – Measuring alcohol risk, information needs and pathways using an AI chatbot – $198,748

Professor Peter Gething, Curtin University – Smart Walking and Cycling: Active Travel to School Simulator – $197,876.
The post Research project to address cultural gap appeared first on Healthway.

MIL OSI News –
January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI New Zealand: Universities – Agritech invention wins $100k Challenge – UoA

Source: University of Auckland

This year, a cutting-edge agritech solution designed to benefit the health of cows took out first place in the Velocity $100k Challenge.

University of Auckland researcher Liz Cunningham, who has lost cows to mastitis, a costly disease that sees udder tissue become inflamed, often due to bacteria, won the University of Auckland Velocity $100k Challenge with her start-up – QuickMas.

The Liggins Institute research technician and her teammates, academic staff from the Auckland Bioengineering Institute, Faculty of Engineering and the Liggins Institute, say QuickMas is about helping in the fight against antibiotic resistance in dairy cattle.

Cunningham says QuickMas will show whether a cow has mastitis, help identify the pathogen causing it and determine whether the cow has responded to antibiotics.

“QuickMas will also be able to help farmers decide if their cow is safe to put back in the herd or if she may still be harbouring infectious bacteria.

“It will give dairy farmers answers about their cows’ mastitis in as little as 15 minutes and no more than an hour.”

The on-farm diagnostic tool, Cunningham says, is as simple as a Covid test, doesn’t require Wi-Fi, and farmers can self-interpret the results – no need to send them to a vet.

“It’s done using a milk sample, which is processed by our machine for five minutes before it’s added to our test cartridges. Farmers will then be able to identify the source of infection.

“The current testing method on the market sees farmers have to wait at least 24 hours for a result. It also requires Wi-Fi, which a lot of milking sheds don’t have.”

Cunningham and her team are currently testing QuickMas prototypes.

“We worked really hard to develop something quick, reliable and fit for farms. We want QuickMas to add value to farmers’ businesses here and all over the world.

“Winning the Velocity challenge is amazing, and we’re excited to use the support provided to get this to market as quickly as we can to help dairy farmers and their cows.”

Cunningham says the QuickMas team will explore potential partnerships and seek external investment over the next six months, with the plan to have the product on the market in 2025.

“Using QuickMas will help the dairy industry in its fight against antibiotic resistance. Helping farmers understand the correct pathogen will enable them to treat their cows more efficiently. It will also inform treatment duration.

“Farmers will have the information to give each cow individualised and responsive treatment – undertreating or overtreating with antibiotics will be a thing of the past.”

Read about the other Velocity winners here. http://www.auckland.ac.nz/en/news/2024/10/17/innovating-until-the-cows-come-home.html

MIL OSI New Zealand News –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI China: 8M in China’s big cities commute over 50 km daily: Report

Source: China State Council Information Office 2

Vehicles run on Jianguo Road during morning peak hours in Chaoyang District of Beijing, capital of China, Jan. 3, 2023. [Photo/Xinhua]
In China’s 22 most populous cities, long-distance commuters still face challenges, with more than 8 million people commuting over 50 km each day, according to a report released Thursday.
The finding comes from the commuting monitoring report of major cities in China, released by a research institute under the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, in collaboration with the China Academy of Urban Planning & Design.
Covering 45 major Chinese cities with rail transit, the report shows that among the 22 cities with a population exceeding 5 million, Beijing has the highest proportion of long-distance commuters, with 12 percent traveling over 50 kilometers, followed by Guangzhou at 10 percent.
In terms of one-way commuting time, 28 percent of commuters travel for over 60 minutes in the Chinese capital, while in Shanghai, Chongqing, Tianjin, Wuhan and Qingdao, more than 15 percent of commuters fall into this category.
One such commuter is a 46-year-old individual surnamed Sun. Every weekday, he leaves his home in Tianjin, a 13.6-million-people municipality neighboring Beijing, around 6 a.m., drives to a parking spot near Tianjin Railway Station, then switches to high-speed rail and subway to reach his workplace in Beijing — an almost two-hour, one-way commute that he has maintained for a decade.
“I spend about 12 hours outside each day, but there’s no other choice,” Sun said, adding that he commutes rather than renting an apartment in Beijing mainly because he wants to accompany his child who is attending a junior high school in Tianjin.
For many long-distance commuters like Sun in the megacities, rail transit services still need improvement.
Although the total area covered by operational rail transit in the 42 surveyed cities with subway services exceeds 10,000 kilometers, only one-fifth of commuters live and work within 800 meters of a station.
“Every 430,000 yuan (about $60,376) invested in rail transit construction results in just one additional person gaining access to the 800-meter range,” said Fu Lingfeng, an official of the China Academy of Urban Planning & Design.
Guo Jifu, director of the Beijing Transport Institute, explained that larger cities with a higher proportion of the tertiary industry find it increasingly challenging to balance job locations and housing.
“While planners envision an ideal scenario, the reality is that job-residence separation remains widespread in urban areas,” Guo said.
To improve commuting experiences, Guo proposed measures such as integrating rail transit with urban development, building efficient commuting systems, and encouraging employers to provide housing and adopt flexible work arrangements.
According to Yang Zeng, a professor at Shanghai University, the trend of living and working across cities in China is unique and differs from Western experiences and this phenomenon reflects long-term potential.
“Strategies like city cluster integration are improving transportation and providing young people with more flexibility, enabling them to work in different cities without having to live in the main city center,” Yang said.
For Sun, his hours-long commute is a mix of joy and fatigue. During the journey, he takes short naps, handles work on his phone and occasionally watches short videos. “I can deal with many issues while traveling. It’s a good way to use my time. I’ve gotten used to this lifestyle,” he said.

MIL OSI China News –

January 24, 2025
MIL-Evening Report: Do IUDs cause breast cancer? Here’s what the evidence says

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Brett Montgomery, Senior Lecturer in General Practice, The University of Western Australia

PeopleImages.com – Yuri A/Shutterstock

A new study has found a link between hormonal intrauterine devices (IUDs) and breast cancer.

The research is important, but media reports of a large increase in risk may be causing unnecessary worry.

Let’s put the findings in perspective for people who use IUDs.

What are IUDs?

IUDs are commonly used contraceptive devices. They sit inside the uterus (womb) to prevent pregnancy.

Older versions contain copper as their active ingredient. Newer “hormonal” IUDs slowly release a synthetic progesterone called levonorgestrel. This mimics the body’s natural progesterone hormone.

Both the copper and hormonal types of IUD are highly effective at preventing pregnancy over many years. Fertility is readily restored when they’re removed.

But the hormonal IUDs have the extra advantage of making periods lighter and less painful. Some people have one inserted for these reasons, even if they don’t need contraception.

Many women experience pain on insertion or spotting in the first few months of use. But compared to other contraceptives, women generally find IUDs very acceptable and continue to use them.

What did the new study find?

The new study, by researchers from Denmark, used data from national health registries to look for links between hormonal IUD use and breast cancer.

They tracked nearly 80,000 people who started hormonal IUDs across two decades. They compared these people to an equal number of people born at the same time who did not use hormonal IUDs.

On their raw numbers, you might think hormonal IUDs prevented breast cancer, because there were 720 cases of breast cancer in the hormonal IUD group, and nearly 900 in the other group. But that’s not the full story.

Ideally, when researchers study the effects of medicines, they do a “randomised controlled trial”, where researchers use chance to decide whether people get one treatment or another. This ensures the two groups are very similar apart from the treatment being studied. That’s not what happened here.

Read more:
Randomised control trials: what makes them the gold standard in medical research?

Instead, they simply studied people who had decided to have a hormonal IUD, and compared them to people who didn’t. This means the groups were different in many other ways.

So, the hormonal IUD group and the other group might appear to have a different risk of breast cancer – not because of the IUDs, but because of their other differences. For example, more highly educated women might be more likely to choose IUDs, and also more likely to attend breast cancer screening, where their breast cancer would be discovered.

The researchers “adjusted” their results to account for many differences between the two groups (including education, age, number of children, and some other medicines and medical conditions). After this “adjustment”, the numbers pointed in a different direction: towards a higher risk of breast cancer among people who used a hormonal IUD.

However, there are many other important risk factors for breast cancer the authors seem not to have adjusted for, such as body weight, alcohol use, smoking and physical activity. If there were differences between the two groups in these things, then the study’s results may still be biased. This makes me quite uncertain about the results.

Ultimately, we can’t say the IUDs caused the breast cancer – just that there’s an “association” or “link”.

Read more:
Clearing up confusion between correlation and causation

How big are the risks?

There are two different ways researchers express risk: “relative” and “absolute” risks. Here, the “relative” risk increase was about 30% for women using the IUDs for up to five years, 40% after 5–10 years, and 80% after 10–15 years of use.

These sound like massive risks. But though these statistics compare the risk of breast cancer in IUD users to the risk in non-users, they do not tell us the proportion of women who will get breast cancer. For that, we need to look at “absolute” risk increases.

These are much smaller. For every 10,000 women, this study suggests we might see an extra 14 cases of breast cancer after up to five years of use, 29 cases after 5–10 years use, and 71 cases after 10–15 years use. In “absolute” terms – as a proportion of all the IUD users – all of these risk increases are comfortably under 1%.

Absolute risk increases are much smaller.
Frame Stock Footage/Shtterstock

Reporting the dramatic relative risks, and not the much smaller absolute risks, is a common flaw in stories about health risk, and goes against science reporting recommendations.

What does other research say?

There are other studies on this topic, including a much larger recent study from Sweden based on data from more than half a million users of hormonal IUDs.

This suggested only a 13% relative risk increase in breast cancer – much smaller than the risk increases in the Danish study. This would mean an additional 1.46 cases of breast cancer for every 10,000 women per year.

This is in keeping with a recent large review of studies on this topic, which also found a much smaller risk than the new Danish paper.

The Swedish study also looked at other cancers. The results suggested a decreased risk of cancers of the cervix, ovaries and endometrium (womb lining). This mixed picture of some cancer risk and some cancer protection is also seen for traditional contraceptive pills.

And of course, all contraception protects women from the risks of pregnancy.

What does it mean for me?

The link between hormonal IUDs and breast cancer is probably very small, and might be a statistical illusion rather than a real thing.

Even if it’s a real risk, it may be offset by protection against other cancers.

And it may be dwarfed by other risks for breast cancer, such as high body weight, physical inactivity, alcohol use, and smoking. Online resources can help you visualise these risks.

Hormonal IUDs aren’t the right contraceptive choice for every woman. However, they deserve to stay high up on the menu of options.

Brett Montgomery is a GP who works academically and clinically. In his clinical work he sometimes discusses contraception with patients, including IUDs, but he does not insert IUDs himself. He has no commercial relationship with any IUD manufacturer.

– ref. Do IUDs cause breast cancer? Here’s what the evidence says – https://theconversation.com/do-iuds-cause-breast-cancer-heres-what-the-evidence-says-241663

MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI Banking: Lufthansa Group appoints Brendan Shashoua as Lufthansa Group’s Senior Director Sales – Southeast Asia and the Pacific

Source: Lufthansa Group

Brendan Shashoua has been appointed Lufthansa Group’s Senior Director Sales – Southeast Asia and the Pacific. Based in Singapore, he leads Lufthansa Group’s sales force across Southeast Asia and the Pacific region.

Born and raised in Switzerland, Brendan Shashoua began his Lufthansa Group career in revenue management at SWISS in 2011. After 2.5 years, he progressed into sales as a Global Key Account Manager with responsibilities for the management of some of Lufthansa Group’s largest corporate customers. In 2018, he began his first team lead position in Sales Services and Groups in Switzerland where he was responsible for development of the inaugural Lufthansa Group Global Sales Services Competence Center.

In July 2021, he assumed the role of Director of Regional Sales Canada with responsibility for the entire Canadian market, including Lufthansa Group’s successful Joint Venture with United Airlines and Air Canada. Brendan Shashoua is a dual citizen of both Switzerland and the United Kingdom and holds an Executive MBA from Zurich University. He is happily married with one son.

About Lufthansa Group

The Lufthansa Group is an aviation group with operations worldwide. With 100,000+ employees, Lufthansa Group generated revenue of €35.4bn in the financial year 2023. Our largest business segment is Passenger Airlines while other key business segments include Logistics and Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul (MRO). Other companies and Group functions such as IT companies and Lufthansa Aviation Training form complimentary components of the Group. All airlines and business segments play leading roles in their respective markets.

MIL OSI Global Banks –

January 24, 2025
MIL-Evening Report: A giant biotechnology company might be about to go bust. What will happen to the millions of people’s DNA it holds?

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Megan Prictor, Senior Lecturer in Law, The University of Melbourne

isak55/Shutterstock

Since it was founded nearly two decades ago, 23andMe has grown into one of the largest biotechnology companies in the world. Millions of people have used its simple genetic testing service, which involves ordering a saliva test, spitting into a tube, and sending it back to the company for a detailed DNA analysis.

But now the company is on the brink of bankruptcy. This has raised concerns about what will happen to the troves of genetic data it has in its possession.

The company’s chief executive, Anne Wojcicki, has said she is committed to customer privacy and will “maintain our current privacy policy”.

But what can customers of 23andMe themselves do to make sure their highly personal genetic data is protected? And should we be concerned about other companies that also collect our DNA?

What is 23andMe?

23andMe is one of the largest companies in the crowded marketplace for direct-to-consumer genetic testing. It was founded in 2006 in California, launching its spit test and Personal Genome Service the following year, at an initial cost of US$999. This test won Time magazine’s Invention of the Year in 2008.

Customers eagerly took up the opportunity to order a saliva collection kit online, spit in the tube and mail it back. In a few weeks when the results were ready they could find out about their health, ancestry, and other things like food preferences, fear of public speaking and cheek dimples.

The price of testing kits dropped rapidly (it’s now US$79). The company expanded globally and by 2015 had 1 million customers. The firm went public in 2021 and initially the stock price soared. As of 2024, the company claims 14 million people have taken a 23andMe DNA test.

23andMe is one of the world’s largest biotechnology companies.
T. Schneider/Shutterstock

23andMe rode the wave of popular excitement and investor interest in genetics. It wasn’t alone. By 2022 the direct-to-consumer genetic testing market was valued at US$3 billion. The three largest players – 23andMe, AncestryDNA and MyHeritage – together hold the genetic data of almost 50 million people globally.

There are dozens of smaller players too, with some focusing on emerging markets such as MapMyGenome in India and 23mofang and WeGene in China.

What happened to 23andMe?

23andMe has had a rapid downfall after the 2021 high of its public listing.

Its value has dropped more than 97%. In 2023 it suffered a major data breach affecting almost seven million users, and settled a class action lawsuit for US$30 million.

Last month its seven independent directors resigned amid news the original founder is planning to take the company private once more. The company has never made a profit and is reportedly on the verge of bankruptcy.

What this might mean for its vast stores of genetic data is unclear.

When people sign up for a 23andMe test the company assures them: “your privacy comes first”. It promises it will never share people’s DNA data with employers, insurance companies or public databases without consent. It puts choice in the hands of consumers about whether their spit sample is kept by the company, and whether their de-identified genetic and other data is used in research. Four in five people who bought a 23andMe test have agreed to their data being used in research.

However, if you dig a bit deeper, it’s clear that 23andMe uses people’s data in many different ways, such as sharing it with service providers. Perhaps most importantly, if the company goes bankrupt or is sold, people’s information might be “accessed, sold or transferred” as well.

In a statement to The Conversation, a 23andMe spokesperson said Wojcicki is “not open to considering third-party takeover proposals”, and that in the event of any future ownership change, the company’s existing data privacy agreements with customers “would remain in place unless and until customers are presented with, and agree to, new terms and statements – and only after receiving appropriate notice of any new terms, under applicable data protection laws”.

Tips for people to protect their genetic data

With 23andMe in the spotlight, people might want to take steps to protect their genetic data (although experts say there’s not really any more risk now than there has always been).

The simplest thing is to delete your account, which opts you out of any future research and discards your saliva sample. But if your data has already been de-identified and used in research, it can’t be retrieved. And even if you delete your account, 23andMe says it will keep hold of information including your genetic data, date of birth and sex, to comply with its own legal obligations.

Buying a DNA test online might feel fun and rewarding and it’s certainly been marketed that way. There are plenty of good news stories about how getting those test results has helped people to connect with lost family or understand more about their health risks. People just need to buy tests with their eyes open about what this might mean.

First, the results might not be all positive. Finding out about health risks without guidance from a health professional can be scary. Learning that the person you thought was your mum or dad actually isn’t, is an outcome for as many as 1 in 20 people who’ve bought a DNA test online.

Second, every company selling DNA tests does so with lots of legal conditions attached. People click through these without a second thought but researchers have shown it is worth taking a closer look. Consider what the company says about what it will do with your data and your sample, how long they will keep it, who else can access it, and how easy it will be to delete later.

There are guidelines from organisations like Australian Genomics that can help. And bear in mind that if a company holding your DNA profile is sold, it might be hard to make sure that data is protected.

So maybe reconsider giving a DNA test as a Christmas gift.

Megan Prictor is a member of the International Association of Privacy Professionals and the Australasian Association of Bioethics and Health Law.

– ref. A giant biotechnology company might be about to go bust. What will happen to the millions of people’s DNA it holds? – https://theconversation.com/a-giant-biotechnology-company-might-be-about-to-go-bust-what-will-happen-to-the-millions-of-peoples-dna-it-holds-241557

MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI Australia: Minister Shorten interview on 2ST Mornings with Graeme Day

Source: Ministers for Social Services

18 October 2024

Program:

2ST Mornings

Interviewer:

Graeme Day

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

SUBJECTS: Northcott Dapto Disability Hub; NDIS reform

GRAEME DAY, HOST: It’s coming up to a quarter to 10 and on the line is the Minister for the NDIS and Government Services. It’s a very good morning to Bill Shorten, hello.

BILL SHORTEN, MINISTER FOR THE NDIS AND GOVERNMENT SERVICES: G’day, Graham. How are you today?

DAY: Not too bad, not too bad. A busy day for you. You’re on the south coast?

SHORTEN: Yeah, it’s fantastic. I was invited to be the special guest at a really moving event last night in Wollongong. The CEO of Greenacres, which is a marvellous disability service, 71 years old. CEO Chris Christodoulou after the last 11 years is finishing up and he’s done a great job there, but it was really moving. A lot of the participants were there, their families, a lot of the good and the great of Wollongong, Ryan Park, Paul Scully, Alison Byrne and Stephen Jones. But most importantly, Chris and his family and the guy has made a difference. And today I’m going to the new Northcott Disability Hub in Dapto, which is going to be great for people with disability in the local region

DAY: It must be good to see government money going into these facilities and make it easier for people?

SHORTEN: Yeah, I’m a believer. I believe that one of the best things the Government can do with very important taxes people pay is make sure that people with profound and severe disability get a better chance. And, you know, really, I know Aussies don’t like paying tax, well most don’t, but when it comes to things like Medicare and making sure that the profoundly and severely impaired have a chance for a more fulfilling life, you know, I think that’s – it’s great. And so I’m very motivated to make sure that the money gets through to the people for whom the Scheme, the NDIS was designed.

DAY: Now, the NDIS, it certainly had its problems. When you took over as the Minister, did you realise the enormity of what had to be fixed? How far it was off the rails?

SHORTEN: I don’t – no, I mean, the short answer is no – I don’t know if you’ve ever ordered anything on eBay and the photos look good, but when you get it, you go, hmm, that’s not what I ordered? No, the truth is a bit better than that. The reality is the NDIS is helping hundreds of thousands of people. There’s now 660,000 people receiving personal budgets and support. There’s over 400,000 people work in the sector. When I sort of campaigned for the idea, like in 2008, 9, 10, if you’d said that we’d have a Scheme helping this many people, I’d have said, you know, what’s that line out of The Castle when they talk about the price of jousting sticks? I’d say tell them they’re dreaming. But the reality is it is doing good. When Labor lost in 2013, there were four trial sites. So, you know, credit to the Libs, they’ve got it up to scale, but their eye was not on the ball when it came to the back office functions, you know, the scrutiny of their payments, looking for quality. I mean, a lot of service providers do a great job, but there are some people who are attracted like flies to the barbecue, seeing government money just lining their own pockets. And I’ve been all about getting rid of the, you know, the snake oil salesmen and the crooks out of the Scheme.

DAY: And you’ve been fairly successful with that too, because when it first started, it seemed like there was an NDIS provider on every corner. But that has reduced somewhat because of the scrutiny that basically the Labor Government’s put on it.

SHORTEN: Yeah, listen, this is a growth industry. You know, I used to be a union rep with the AWU and look after the steel industry. Steel is a big industry in the Illawarra, Port Kembla. There’s about 20,000 people working still, but in the last 15 years, this NDIS sector has gone from none to – it’ll be half a million people working in the next few years, which is good. The need was always there. So, it’s a growth industry, but what we’ve got to do is make sure it’s growing along set lines, that it’s not the Wild West, that people are not selling snake oil and shonky therapies or just manipulating, treating participants and their carers and their families as human ATMs.

DAY: Can I ask you a question on behalf of the public? I think where the problem lies with the interaction of the public with government – people often say to me, with all the technology we have, for all the people that we have that are skilled, why is it with the NDIS, with Centrelink and what have you, why does it take so bloody long? It seems that there’s so much waiting time there with people that need help?

SHORTEN: I have an answer. The reality is that you can’t run human services without humans. And my predecessors had bought the digital revolution and they’re right, it’s much quicker to do things online. But not everyone wants to go online. We get 10 million people a year coming into Centrelink or Service Australia offices. The problem is the staff have been cut to the bone. Ten years ago there was about 37,000 people working. The deal was apparently that we buy all this fancy technology and we wouldn’t need people. What we got instead was Robodebt. What we’ve got – we got down to about 27,000 staff and that’s a disaster. So, now we’re up above 30,000. Call waiting times for both Medicare and social welfare payments have now fallen and in other words, it’s getting less time before you get answered. Would you believe I’ve just introduced a queuing system in Service Australia office where you ring ahead and you can make an appointment. I know that is not rocket science, but you know, this is a major development and with the NDIA, when people knew that we were reforming, we did get a sort of tsunami of extra claims in the last six months. People trying to proverbially, some people, getting in for last drinks before we turned the tap off of some of the scams. But that’s now coming back to more manageable level. I’m sorry people have had bad experiences waiting. I know it is happening, but all I can tell you is that the KPI or the sort of key performance indicator I asked from my senior public servants is tell me waiting times every week on the phone. I just want to know are we getting it done more quickly and are we processing payments more quickly? Now I know for someone who’s still waiting to get their old Age Pension sorted or their DSP, they might say, well, it doesn’t matter what Bill says, I’m still waiting. The fact is, on a lot of indicators, like it’s just evidence, so I’m confident to say it. We have – it is getting better, you know, the number of complaints that we get have been cut in half in terms of Centrelink. The other good thing is in the NDIS, the number of complaints we’re investigating nearly doubled because we’re putting more resources into investigating the rorts.

DAY: You certainly have done a great job. One thing just before you go, because I know you’ve got to go shortly, you’ve decided in the not too distant future to call it a day on your political career? You’ve certainly been high profile. You’ve seen the ups and you’ve seen the downs. When it comes to public life, what, what is the moment where you go, look, I’m going to step down and spend more time for me or my family because we often see it in public life and it comes out of the blue? Was it a long process of you thinking it through or was it just one day walking up the stairs going, you know what, I think I might like to do something else?

SHORTEN: Sort of a mix. I mean, first of all, I should say that for all the crap days – and sometimes you have them – I wouldn’t give up a single day in the last 17 years. Probably the only day I’d give up is the day my mum passed. And other than that, you know, I’m – what’s that Frank Sinatra line? Regrets, I’ve got a few, but then again, too few to mention. I – no one in my family’s ever been a politician, like my family – you know, my grandma was an air raid warden in Britain, and she lived in the northeast in public housing. My mum was the first in the family to ever go to university. No one – I pinch myself, it’s a privilege to serve. When I occasionally hear about pollies lining in their own pockets, it drives me nuts because that’s not what most of them do. I just think it’s a privilege to serve. The hard thing is, when do you call it quits? When do you say, I’ll do something else? Because I’m not retiring. I’m moving into another aspect of public life, helping adults, young people and adults do lifelong learning and universities, and how do we foster a spirit of critical thinking and enquiry in a generation? So, I’m going to a busy job, but it’ll be less partisan, which is fine. I’m happy not to have to trade sledges every day. I mean, at a certain point you get sick of playing in the cricket team of sledging, which is parliament. I’ve mixed feelings. I love my portfolio. Not everyone in my portfolios loves me, but I love them, well nearly everyone. I love my electorate. I live in the northwestern suburbs of Melbourne. I’ve lived there for 35 years, like, I love it. Do you leave when you’re going well, or do you leave when you’re carried out? I had a choice to be a lifer and there’s nothing wrong with that. I never wanted to be, with respect, a corporate door opener. That’s what some politicians do. There’s this myth that we all get pensions. We don’t. We’re very well remunerated, but I’ve always known the day after politics I’ll have to find a job. So, I applied for the this job to run the university under my own steam. It wasn’t a government appointment, so I’ve got mixed feelings. I love what I do and I’m really going to love helping the University of Canberra, but also higher education and TAFE. You know, I’m interested in – we can’t stop learning and I think Australia does best when we’re giving people the skills to equip – the future is changing so quickly. How do we help people? So, I’m going into a new facet of helping people, but I love what I do currently. I mean, when does a good athlete – not that I’m an athlete, but when does a good athlete stop playing footy? When does, you know, when do any of us, you know, you’re a good journalist, when do you decide you want to do something else? It’s not – I would give no advice to anyone else except always pick a job that you love doing.

DAY: Absolutely. Mate, thanks so much. Thanks for the job that you have done and say g’day to Stephen Jones for us as you do the opening today at Northcott.

SHORTEN: Sorry, mate, we broke up then.

DAY: I was just saying thanks for the job that you have done and say g’day to Steve Jones for us when you – both of you are there for the opening of Northcott at Dapto today.

SHORTEN: Yeah, well, that was – I’m going to look forward to Northcott today, but that was [inaudible]

DAY: Okay, mate. Okay, we’ll talk soon.

SHORTEN: All right, good on you. Thank you.

DAY: Okay, great to talk to you. Thanks so much. Bye.

SHORTEN: Bye.

MIL OSI News –

January 24, 2025
MIL-Evening Report: When does the love of the game outweigh the cost? ABC’s Plum brings rugby league’s concussion crisis to the fore

Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle O’Shea, Senior Lecturer, School of Business, Western Sydney University

ABC

Brendan Cowell’s 2021 novel Plum has expertly wed two seemingly unnatural partners: rugby league and poetry. Cowell’s story is both an ode of love to rugby league, and a powerful exploration of the catastrophic effects of sport-induced brain injury.

This story has now been brought to life in an ABC drama of the same name. It brilliantly reflects the experience of many players who are left to suffer – often in silence – with the long-term costs of the game.

A theatre of damage revealed

Our introduction to the main character, Peter “The Plum” Lum (played by Cowell), is jarring. Plum’s body lies motionless in a darkened changing room, enveloped by the distant sounds of a roaring stadium full of fans, a sharp referee’s whistle and the commentator’s pitched voice: “this poor bloke, he has had his head absolutely battered”.

We watch the doctor’s light worryingly cast to and fro across Plum’s dazed gaze, while his heavily pregnant wife’s concerned face looms large. Much larger, however, is the coach’s demand: “get the salts doc” – and his insistence that “the only way he (Plum) isn’t going back out there (on the field) is if he is fucking dead”.

And so the act proceeds, with Plum, like many athletes before and after him, returning heroically to the field. Though his team is victorious – another trophy retained – we’re forced to consider the unspoken costs of his love for the game.

These costs are amplified once the adoration from Plum’s fans and teammates, and his mantle as Cronulla’s king, are no more. We come to know a shell of a man who is desperate to deny, despite the advice of his doctor, the cognitive and other effects of the “little jolts” and “hard head knocks” experienced throughout his career.

The intensity with which Plum keeps his health condition a secret, and the ongoing abuse he levels on his body, provide a window into the lived experiences of many rugby league players. While this game gives, it also takes more than its fair share.

Asher Keddie stars as Plum’s former wife, Renee.
ABC

Masculinity and collision sports

The series highlights the emerging scientific link between collision sports such as rugby league and degenerative brain conditions including CTE-induced dementia – as well as attempts to discredit this science and silence the voices of athletes and families seeking redress from league administrators.

Contact and collision sports have often required athletes to sacrifice their brains and bodies in the pursuit of glory and success.

While a diagnosis of the degenerative brain disease Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) can only be made posthumously, Plum displays many of the hallmark symptoms: impaired judgement, impulse control issues, aggression, depression and anxiety.

Viewers are taken into the deep fog of this existence. As a 1990s playmaker, Plum had fame but not fortune. Nearing 50, working at an airport, we see a traumatic near-miss as he experiences an epileptic seizure.

His forgetfulness leaves him unable to remember his favourite player’s name at a Cronulla Sharks corporate event. He suffers confusion and anxiety. Aggressive acts, including punching holes in bedroom walls, become his daily pain and shame.

Plum’s absent father’s advice to “never take a backwards step” also echoes throughout the series, reflecting the deeply embedded view of rugby league as a hard sport played by equally hard men.

This hard man veneer is grounded in stoicism – and for Plum and his former teammates, in unhealthy addictions to gambling, drugs and grog. Plum repels his family and friends, making his world intentionally small for fear he might forget something or someone. The series brings to the fore the raw and visceral effects of hypermasculinity and not speaking out.

Cowell himself hails from the Sydney suburb of Cronulla, where the show is set.
ABC

Rugby league and poetry

The series also features poetry and the presence of past literary figures (conjured in Plum’s mind) such as Charles Bukowski and Sylvia Plath. As viewers, we see Plum’s internal dialogues with these apparitions, but his family and friends can’t.

Plum also joins a local poetry group, where his decaying brain finds purpose and connection. This unlikely outlet becomes his therapy. It comforts him and provides him a space to communicate his experiences with the outside world. Through his ode to rugby league, we witness him come closer to clarity.

Read more:
Why a portrait of a former NRL great could spark greater concussion awareness in Australia

All the while, Plum’s son is a talented player on the verge of a professional rugby league contract. And although Plum doesn’t regret a minute of his playing career, his prognosis leaves him urging his son away from the sport’s theatre of damage. This is a decision echoed by many parents in real life.

The future of collision sports

Reflecting on the potential impact of his book and the ABC series, Cowell imagines a space where the competitive commercial rivalries between football codes such as AFL, rugby union and soccer are suspended.

Instead of competing for a greater share of the market via trivial one-upmanship, sport leagues could pool their resources to invest in science that helps us understand and prevent sport-induced brain trauma.

Considering how many rugby players conceal and/or fail to report concussive episodes, we’ll need a major cultural shakeup at all levels of the game – because a love for the game should never come at the expense of oneself.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. When does the love of the game outweigh the cost? ABC’s Plum brings rugby league’s concussion crisis to the fore – https://theconversation.com/when-does-the-love-of-the-game-outweigh-the-cost-abcs-plum-brings-rugby-leagues-concussion-crisis-to-the-fore-240550

MIL OSI Analysis – EveningReport.nz –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI Security: Man Involved in Shooting During Tennessee State University Homecoming Charged with Federal Firearm Violation

Source: United States Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco Firearms and Explosives (ATF)

NASHVILLE – A criminal complaint obtained today charges Marquez Davis, 24 of Nashville, with being a previously convicted felon in possession of a firearm, announced Acting United States Attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee Thomas J. Jaworski.

According to the complaint, officers of the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department (“MNPD”) were searching for Davis on October 14, 2024, to arrest him on state charges related to the deadly shooting on Jefferson Street during Tennessee State University’s Homecoming celebration on October 12^th. MNPD officers located Davis in a house in North Nashville and prepared to arrest him on outstanding warrants. Footage from law enforcement’s aerial surveillance showed an individual, later identified as Davis, exit the residence’s rooftop, climb to an adjacent rooftop, and discard a firearm. Davis was then arrested by MNPD on criminal homicide charges related to the October 12^th shooting on Jefferson Street. Officers recovered a Franklin Armory Inc, Model FAI-15 caliber multi-pistol near where Davis discarded it from the rooftop. According to the criminal complaint, Davis has prior felony convictions for robbery, possession of a controlled substance for resale, and being a felon in possession of a handgun.

“Everyone in our community must be able to gather and celebrate together without fearing random gun violence,” said Acting United States Attorney Thomas J. Jaworski. “Our office will do whatever it takes to keep firearms out of the hands of felons who may use those firearms to inflict greater damage on our citizens.” Jaworski added: “Our firm commitment is in our continued partnership with Chief Drake and the MNPD to hold offenders accountable, reduce gun violence, and ensure safer communities for everyone.”

If convicted, the defendant faces up to 15 years in prison.

This case is being investigated by the MNPD and the ATF. Assistant U.S. Attorney Ahmed A. Safeeullah is prosecuting the case.

A federal complaint is merely an allegation. The defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

# # # # #

MIL Security OSI –

January 24, 2025
MIL-OSI Australia: UTAS Inveresk precinct complete with the opening of The Shed

Source: Australian Ministers for Education

The University of Tasmania (UTAS) today celebrated the opening of its latest facilities, penning a new chapter in the life of one of Australia’s oldest universities – supported by funding from all three levels of government.

The Shed, the last of three new buildings at UTAS’s redeveloped Inveresk campus at Launceston, is set to receive students from semester one next year.

Centrally located opposite City Park, The Shed is the largest of UTAS’s three new facilities, and includes a variety of specialised allied health clinics, science labs and nursing simulation facilities.

The facility will host community health education programs, professional development workshops, sports science testing and wellbeing initiatives, as well as a range of community activities and events.

The $97 million project was delivered as part of the $304 million relocation and redevelopment of UTAS’s main Launceston campus from Newnham to Inveresk – which is expected to increase student numbers to 10,000 by 2032.

This transformation was jointly funded, with $130 million from the Australian Government, $108.6 million from UTAS, $60 million from the Tasmanian Government and $5.4 million from the City of Launceston – as part of the $609.4 million Launceston City Deal.

Quotes attributable to Federal Minister for Education, Jason Clare MP:

“Congratulations to the Vice-Chancellor, staff and students on the opening of The Shed right here in the heart of Launceston.

“This new building will help train more nurses and health workers and support more people in Northern Tasmania to get a crack at going to uni.”

Quotes attributable to Federal Minister for Regional Development and Local Government, Kristy McBain MP:

“As someone that had to leave home to attend university, I know how important it is to have education opportunities locally, especially in our regions – because postcodes shouldn’t be a barrier for your future.

“Having toured this campus last year, I know its central location and high-quality facilities will boost attendance numbers – with 2,400 students already moving to the Inveresk precinct, and around 4,000 students expected from early next year.”

Quotes attributable to Tasmanian Minister for Education, Jo Palmer:

“The Shed is an important piece of infrastructure, but it’s what will occur within its walls and upon this new campus that is most important.

“This project provides exciting opportunities for our young people embarking on their journey of lifelong learning and also for the wider community.

“Being able to stay in Tasmania and study new courses such as speech pathology, physiotherapy and occupational therapy is so important for our young people.”

Quotes attributable to Tasmanian Minister for Business, Industry and Resources, Eric Abetz MP:

“The completion of The Shed is a significant milestone in the Northern Transformation Project. This state-of-the-art facility is a testament to what can be achieved when all levels of government, the University of Tasmania, and the local community work in unison for a common goal.

“This transformation project is not just about new buildings, it’s about creating an environment that fosters innovation, learning, and growth, with benefits extending well beyond the university’s walls and into the community.

“It is exciting to see the tangible outcomes of this investment driving significant economic activity across the region—creating jobs, supporting local industries, and delivering long-term benefits to the Tasmanian economy.”

Quotes attributable to Federal Labor Senator for Tasmania, Helen Polley:

“We continue to deliver the projects that people in Launceston and across Northern Tasmania deserve – with this transformative campus to ensure people can study in-demand qualifications at home.

“With the expected influx of new students into Launceston in the coming years, our investment in the University’s presence at Inveresk will support new jobs and stimulate our local economy long into the future.”

Quotes attributable to City of Launceston Mayor Matthew Garwood:

“The completion of UTAS’s campus is an amazing milestone for the city and region.

“Launceston’s CBD has been transformed by the relocation of UTAS’s campus to Inveresk into a vibrant and dynamic precinct.

“We have seen how the relocation has given confidence to nearby investments in the city, including our own redevelopment of the iconic Albert Hall.

“Inveresk has now become a really colourful and contemporary part of Launceston, with its links to QVMAG, UTAS Stadium and our CBD.”

MIL OSI News –

January 24, 2025