Rebuilding the lifesaving huts scattered throughout Australia's high country (Supplied: D. Johnson, Tom's Outdoors)
11 high country huts were damaged or destroyed during the Black Summer bushfires. Five years later, they've all been rebuilt. Supplied: NSW Parks and Wildlife Service / D. Johnson, Tom's Outdoors
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The Australian
an hour ago
- The Australian
New treatment allows cancer patients to avoid going under the knife
You can now listen to The Australian's articles. Give us your feedback. You can now listen to The Australian's articles. Australian hospitals have adopted a new combination chemotherapy for bladder cancer that has brought remission rates to 60 per cent, taking patients out from under the knife. A blend of the drugs Gemcitabine and Docetaxel has seen patients sidestep side effects while cutting rates of surgical bladder removal since being trialled at Monash Health in 2023, with the treatment now available to hospitals. Hailed as a means to 'change the whole protocol for the treatment of bladder cancer', the combination takes medications already made affordable by the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme to an eligible population of thousands of patients. The drugs are referred to collectively as Gem-Doce. It represents the first non-surgical alternative in bladder cancer treatment since the decades-old introduction of tuberculosis drug Bacillus Calmette-Guerin, for which supply is volatile. Retired teacher Alan Feher, 72, was a successful recipient of the combination therapy after he was diagnosed with aggressive bladder cancer. He had been late to catch his cancer, given he is colour blind and missed the most obvious symptom of blood in his urine. He was also misdiagnosed with an enlarged prostate in 2018 before landing on the true cause of his symptoms. 'It's quite by accident that the process started because I was mainly concerned about prostate cancer, and didn't have much idea about bladder cancer,' he said. 'The biopsy showed two things: that it was a non-invasive bladder cancer, and it was also high grade. 'The urologist said it was normal to remove the bladder and the prostate … that's looking at quite radical surgery, which would have meant having some kind of a bag hanging off of my body, where the kidneys redirected outside of my body … I nearly fainted when I heard that.' Facing the prospect of surgery, his entrance into the 2023 drug trial led him into remission. Urological Society of Australia and New Zealand president Damien Bolton welcomed the successful combination therapy, pointing to rising death rates from bladder cancer as an indication of how necessary new treatments were. Its lethality has risen in line with Australia's ageing population. Weranja Ranasinghe. Picture: Monash Health Urological Society of Australia and New Zealand president Damien Bolton. 'One way we can hold back and hopefully cure bladder cancer is not by having a big operation to remove your bladder and give you a stoma, or by having chemotherapy and radiation which have serious toxicities, but by putting different anti-cancer agents into the bladder, and this combination … Gem-Doce, is a huge step forward for that,' he said. 'Since the time of Covid, there's been a shortage worldwide of BCG … in Australia, like many countries around the world, we've had to ration our use. 'Now with Gem-Doce, you've got the ability to reserve BCG for when it's most needed, and you've got another viable alternative.' Professor Bolton said he hoped, pending the therapy's success, it would be adopted into recommended treatment guidelines. Annually, more than 3000 Australians are diagnosed with bladder cancer, most aged over 50. An aggressive cancer, it disproportionately affects men. In isolation, Gemcitabine and Docetaxel are poor treatments for bladder cancer; when administered together, 60-69 per cent of patients respond positively. A simultaneous European study has reported a 79 per cent high-grade disease-free survival rate and 73 per cent overall disease-free survival rate. Monash Health study lead Weranja Ranasinghe said the therapy would take patients out of palliative care. 'This new treatment provides an excellent alternative for these patients with good tolerance and durability. The other advantage is that these agents are widely available and affordable,' Associate Professor Ranasinghe said. 'The new treatment, Gem-Doce, is (using) established chemotherapy medicines and administering them sequentially into the bladder is shown to be effective in about 60 to 69 per cent of patients who don't respond to BCG treatment or who want to preserve their bladder.' Read related topics: HealthVaccinations
ABC News
3 hours ago
- ABC News
Telstra fined for disruption to emergency call service used by people with hearing, speech impairments
Telstra has again fallen short of regulator standards and community expectations in providing access to emergency services. The telco giant has paid a penalty and agreed to launch an independent review after it mistakenly disabled its connection to an emergency call relay service, which is used by people with hearing or speech impairments. In a life- or property-threatening time-critical emergency situation, Australians should contact triple-0 (000) — or, if they are using a type and listen or teletypewriter (TTY) device, they can dial 106 to be connected to police, fire or ambulance services. An Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) investigation found the 106 emergency call service number was inadvertently made unavailable for 12 hours and 46 minutes between July 5 and 6 2024, following a server migration process. TTY is a text-based communication method for individuals who are deaf, hard of hearing or have speech impairments, allowing them to communicate via typed text over a phone line. A relay officer reads out the text a person types into their TTY device to an emergency operator. ACMA says it takes any disruption to an emergency call service very seriously, given there could be devastating consequences for members of the public. "This mistake could have contributed to very serious harm if someone who relies on this service had needed emergency assistance but was unable to get through," ACMA member and consumer lead Samantha Yorke said. "Fortunately, the records show no one attempted to use the 106 service for an emergency during the time the service was disabled." Under emergency call service rules, carriers must maintain the proper and effective functioning of their networks and facilities that are used to carry emergency calls. An analyst has raised concerns about the repeated failure of Australia's largest telecommunications providers to meet basic consumer needs. In December 2024, the ACMA imposed a $3 million penalty on Telstra after an investigation found 473 breaches of emergency call rules when Telstra's triple-0 call centre experienced a disruption for 90 minutes. "We've now had two major emergency service failures from Telstra in under a year," telecommunications consultant Paul Budde said, describing the incidents as "warning signs that core infrastructure is being compromised". Telstra has given the ACMA a court-enforceable undertaking to improve its relevant change management processes. It has also engaged an independent reviewer to look at the range of operational arrangements that support reliable delivery of the 106 emergency call service. "For years, Telstra has tried to position itself as a high-value tech company rather than a reliable utility," Mr Budde said. "But you can't build a shiny digital future on crumbling foundations. Telstra has also paid a penalty of $18,780, the maximum the ACMA could impose under the circumstances. Mr Budde said it was "pocket change" for the telco. "We need penalties that actually hurt — or better yet, incentives that reward doing the right thing." Optus was penalised a record $12 million by ACMA in late 2024 for a November 2023 network outage that caused considerable disruption to emergency call services. Telstra has committed to an independent review of its systems and says it will implement any reasonable recommendations of the review, develop and provide staff training and report regularly to ACMA on its progress implementing these undertakings. In a written statement, a Telstra spokesperson told the ABC that while no emergency calls failed during the disruption on July 6, 2024, the Telco understands the "critical importance of maintaining reliable emergency call services and the potential consequences of any disruption." 'We fully accept the findings of the ACMA and have committed to an independent review of our change management processes and operational arrangements to ensure such a mistake doesn't happen again,' the spokesperson said.
News.com.au
4 hours ago
- News.com.au
GPS artist's epic large-scale sketch of Lionel Messi ends in disaster after king tide swallows his car
A fitness enthusiast who creates large scale digital sketches using GPS and a run tracking app copped a messy surprise after completing his latest creation. Peter Mitchell spent most of Friday running and jogging to a specific set of coordinates along a stretch of remote sand dunes near Sandy Point, about three hours from Melbourne. After five hours and some 15 kilometres of distance covered, his epic drawing of football legend Lionel Messi was complete. The feeling of satisfaction was short-lived, after he returned to his red Toyota Yaris parked on the sand and found an unusually high king tide had swallowed it. 'I came around the corner and saw it, and I thought: 'Oh no, how am I going to get out of here? How am I going to get home?' Mr Mitchell told 'It's quite remote out there and there's not a lot around.' Dusk was rapidly approaching, the mercury had dropped significantly, and the 50-year-old was drenched from wading through the water. The nearest town was about a 30-minute drive away and Mr Mitchell faced the prospect of having to walk there. He grabbed a few essentials from his submerged car, including his diabetes medication, and ventured to the road. 'My hands were going blue because I'd been standing around in the water for so long. I thought maybe I'd be best to go for a bit of a jog to get down to the town. And then I saw this lady and asked for her help.' Ironically, the woman had come down to the beach to check out the king tide, which she'd heard was a sight to see that day. She drove Mr Mitchell to the town of Forster, which is a thriving hub in warmer months but slows right down over winter. 'I had a few wee dramas there because I was soaked right through. I had to get food into me because I hadn't had lunch – it was in the car and all wet. I went down to the pub, but I'm like, I can't go in bare feet, but my shoes and socks were absolutely soaking. 'I used a few tea towels, wrapped them around my feet as socks to absorb some of the water, and rocked into the pub and had a meal.' Warm and with a full belly, Mr Mitchell turned his mind to how he was going to salvage his beloved little car – and get home to the Mornington Peninsula. 'I spoke to a mechanic, who put me onto a few other people, they'd give me numbers, and it went around in circles. Finally, I got a hold of a guy with a tractor and he said he'd pull it out for $500.' A few friends from Melbourne were prepared to hire a trailer, drive to Sandy Point, and take Mr Mitchell and the Yaris home. 'I thought, OK, I'll go down to the beach as early as I can to check out the situation and see how bad it looks before I ring this guy with the tractor. But there's no taxis. I rang the one place, and it went to their answer machine, because it's the off-season. 'I'm just about to try hitchhiking when the taxi lady rang me back. So, she drove me there. We had an interesting conversation on the way.' In the bright light of day, and with the tide out, his car 'didn't look too bad' and Mr Mitchell had expected it to sink into the wet sand overnight. He sat inside it to survey the damage. It was full of water. But out of interest, he tried to turn it over – and it started. 'I thought, there's no way in hell. I literally closed my eyes and prayed. It started. Then I thought, this thing isn't going to move, but it did, and I drove straight off the beach. 'I couldn't believe it. I didn't want to turn it off again, but I phoned a mate who knows a bit about cars and asked what I should do. He said I should have a go driving it home. At least if it died, I'd be on the side of a road and could get help.' Miraculously, Mr Mitchell made it all the way to his house – about 155 kilometres away. 'Every time I stopped or went around a corner, all the water inside the car would slosh around. It was splishing and splashing all over the place.' The entire ordeal stretched for more than 24 hours and he described it as 'a rollercoaster' of emotions. 'It went from doing a really good Strava and feeling good about that to seeing the car and worrying, then being stranded and wondering if I was going to get hypothermia, to the car starting and actually working, then next thing I'm home. 'It was a relief. My car is pretty old anyway, it's got 240,000 kilometres on it, so I'm pretty amazed. But it was a long day. I'm still kind of unpacking it.' Mr Mitchell shared a video clip of the saga to his social media channels, where he has built a loyal global following over the past several months. To mark his 50th birthday last year, he created a large-scale map of the world by doing 170 kilometres of running through inner-city Melbourne and shared it on Strava, the run tracking app, and it went viral. After that, he started posting his creations to Instagram and later TikTok, receiving millions of views and occasionally generating international media buzz. For example, his sketch of LA Lakers star Kobe Bryant saw him interviewed on ESPN and CBS News in the United States. 'I've been working more on the high precision stuff at parks or the beach with smaller detailed elements. Using street routing, you can't get that same level of detail and there are lots of constraints. 'But if you're doing it in a big open area, you can do almost anything. It's amazing. I enjoy everything about it.' What started out as a bit of fun and a way of adding an additional challenge to his regular running regimen has taken Mr Mitchell somewhere he never imagined. 'I'm new to social media. I hadn't really used it before this. It's incredible to see how people respond to them. It's just nuts.' He has partnered with Strava and Telstra on a few projects and has a few more lined up with Foot Looker and the Melbourne Marathon. 'I would never have believed any of this happening in my wildest dreams.' While it's far from big bucks, it's a sign that Mr Mitchell has found a strong niche and could turn his burgeoning brand into something special. Until then, he's now wondering how he will go about replacing his Yaris. While it got him home, it's almost certainly a write-off. A friend from his running club started a Go Fund Me appeal on his behalf, calling for fans and supporters to chip in a few bucks to help ease the financial burden. 'I told them, there are a million good causes out there and people have got better things to spend their money on, but they insisted and set it up. It's nice, but I was reluctant. I'm just rolling with it.' When he has enough to buy himself a new car, there's no doubt what brand he'll consider. 'A second-hand Toyota, I think,' he laughed. 'I mean, it's proven to be pretty reliable and resilient.'
