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RTH10260
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Parents refuse use of vaccinated blood in life-saving surgery on baby
New Zealand’s health services go to court over guardianship of four-month-old boy whose parents have not let heart operation go ahead

Eva Corlett in Wellington
Wed 30 Nov 2022 05.38 GMT

New Zealand’s health service has made a court application over the guardianship of a four-month-old baby whose parents are refusing to allow his life-saving heart surgery to go ahead unless non-vaccinated blood is used.

The parents of the baby discussed their son’s health situation and their medical preferences in an interview with an anti-vaccination campaigner.

In the interview the parents say their baby has severe pulmonary valve stenosis, and that he needs surgery “almost immediately”, but that they are “extremely concerned with the blood [the doctors] are going to use”.

“We don’t want blood that is tainted by vaccination,” the father said. “That’s the end of the deal – we are fine with anything else these doctors want to do.”

The vaccines to prevent severe disease and death from Covid-19 have been found to be extremely safe and effective, with millions of people around the world vaccinated.

According to the blood service, NZ Blood, any Covid-19 vaccine in the blood is broken down soon after the injection.



https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/ ... ry-on-baby
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#2

Post by bill_g »

[suziesunshine] The good news from this story is it demonstrates Tha Stoopid is not limited to USians. [/suziesunshine]
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#3

Post by AndyinPA »

Maybe parents who are anti-vaxxers should be taken to old cemeteries, where there are so many young children buried. :mad:
"Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is to be controlled by all that the coward fears… To be led by a liar is to ask to be told lies." -Octavia E. Butler
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#4

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The nanny state
New Zealand passes world-first tobacco law to ban smoking for next generation
The country is believed to be the first to implement an annually rising legal smoking age

Tess McClure in Auckland
Tue 13 Dec 2022 05.16 GMT

New Zealand has introduced a steadily rising smoking age to stop those aged 14 and under from ever being able to legally buy cigarettes in world-first legislation to outlaw smoking for the next generation.

Associate health minister Ayesha Verrall said at the law’s passing on Tuesday: “Thousands of people will live longer, healthier lives and the health system will be $5bn better off from not needing to treat the illnesses caused by smoking, such as numerous types of cancer, heart attacks, strokes, amputations.”

New Zealand is believed to be the first country in the world to implement the annually rising smoking age, ensuring tobacco cannot be sold to anyone born on or after 1 January 2009.

It will be accompanied by a slew of other measures to make smoking less affordable and accessible, including dramatically reducing the legal amount of nicotine in tobacco products and forcing them to be sold only through specialty tobacco stores, rather than corner stores and supermarkets.

The country has also increased funding for health services and campaigns, and rolled out quitting services specifically for Māori and Pacific communities.

The number of stores legally allowed to sell cigarettes will be reduced to a tenth of their existing levels – from 6,000 to just 600 nationwide. The laws passed their final reading on Tuesday evening, and will come into force in 2023, as New Zealand attempts to reach its goal of making the country “smoke-free” by 2025.



https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/ ... ng-by-2025
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Jacinda Ardern’s ‘arrogant prick’ comment nets more than $100,000 at charity auction
A signed copy of the official parliamentary record was sold to raise money for a prostate cancer charity

Tess McClure in Auckland
Thu 22 Dec 2022 01.39 GMT

A signed copy of the transcript of the New Zealand prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, calling a minor opposition party leader an “arrogant prick” has been sold for more than $100,000 at an auction to raise money for prostate cancer.

The prime minister’s muttered jibe was caught on a hot mic during parliamentary debate last week, after a series of questions from David Seymour, leader of New Zealand’s libertarian right Act party.

“He’s such an arrogant prick,” the prime minister said as she returned to her seat next to deputy prime minister and close political ally Grant Robertson. The remark was picked up by her microphone and preserved in the official parliamentary record, Hansard, after Seymour demanded an apology.

After the acrimonious exchange went viral, the pair – normally at odds politically – joined forces in a show of Christmas goodwill to sign and auction off a copy of the parliamentary record for charity. All funds would go to prostate cancer research “for pricks everywhere”, the auction said.




https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/ ... at-auction
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Post by Tiredretiredlawyer »

What a fabulous idea! :clap:
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/20 ... w-zealand/
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, who won global praise for her leadership style during the coronavirus pandemic, announced her resignation Thursday ahead of national elections later this year.

“I have given my absolute all to being Prime Minister but it has also taken a lot out of me,” Ardern, 42, said in a statement. “You cannot and should not do the job unless you have a full tank, plus a bit in reserve for those unplanned and unexpected challenges that inevitably come along.”

Lawmakers representing her ruling center-left Labour Party will vote Sunday on a new leader, who will lead the party to a national election Oct. 14.

The news came as such a surprise that Ardern had to dismiss suggestions she was trying to get ahead of a scandal by resigning, or was stepping down because her party has been trailing the main conservative opposition in recent voter polls.

“I’m not leaving because I believe we can’t win the election, but because I believe Labour can and will win it. We need a fresh set of shoulders for the challenges of both this year and the next three,” she said.

Ardern told reporters that she had discussed the decision with only a few people, and hadn’t even told her four-year-old daughter ahead of time.
"Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is to be controlled by all that the coward fears… To be led by a liar is to ask to be told lies." -Octavia E. Butler
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Major flooding swamps New Zealand after summer's worth of rain falls in 15 hours

Published January 27, 2023 10:33am EST

Rainfall amounts ranged from 1 to 2 inches per hour for three to four hours, and parts of the city ended up with more than 10 inches in less than a day. Auckland International Airport set a daily, monthly and all-time 24-hour rainfall record, accumulating 9.80 inches of rain Friday.


AUCKLAND, New Zealand – A state of emergency was declared after heavy rain led to widespread flooding in Auckland, New Zealand, on Friday. Floodwaters forced roads to be closed as people became trapped in their vehicles during the evening commute.

Rainfall amounts ranged from 1 to 2 inches per hour for three to four hours, and parts of the city ended up with more than 10 inches in less than a day

.Auckland International Airport set a daily, monthly and all-time 24-hour rainfall record, accumulating 9.80 inches of rain Friday. The previous 24-hour record was only 6.37 inches, set on Feb. 16, 1985.

"10 inches is about what Auckland typically gets over an entire summer, but it happened in a 15-hour period," said Ben Noll, a meteorologist at the National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research (NIWA) in Auckland.





https://www.foxweather.com/extreme-weat ... rain-flood
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Auckland flooding: death toll rises as New Zealand hit with more heavy rain and landslides
Four people have been killed as authorities warn severe weather conditions will continue in New Zealand’s north island

Reuters
Sun 29 Jan 2023 04.47 GMT

Heavy rainfall continued to batter New Zealand’s north island, causing landslides, flash floods and knocking out roads, with the death toll rising to four after a person who had been missing was confirmed dead.

Battered by rain since Friday, Auckland, New Zealand’s largest city of 1.6 million people, remained under a state of emergency on Sunday. The nation’s weather forecaster, MetService, warned of more severe weather on Sunday and Monday for the north island. Intense rainfall could also cause surface and flash flooding, it said.

The focus of the emergency has since moved south, with Waitomo District – located about 220 kms (137 miles) from Auckland – declaring a state of emergency late on Saturday.

Vehicles partially submerged in flood waters in Auckland, New Zealand, which left two people dead
New Zealand flooding: three dead and one missing as Auckland hit by record rainfall
Read more
Police confirmed that a man missing after being swept away on Friday in Onewhero, a rural village about 70 kms (43 miles) south of Auckland, had died.

“The most horrific part of it is that we’ve lost lives,” deputy prime minister Carmel Sepuloni told reporters in Auckland.

Climate change is causing episodes of heavy rainfall to become more common and more intense in New Zealand, though the impact varies by region. Climate change minister James Shaw noted the link to climate change on Saturday when he tweeted his support for those affected by flooding.




https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... landslides
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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... ific-ocean
New Zealand intercepts 3.2 tonnes of cocaine worth $500m floating in Pacific Ocean

New Zealand authorities have found a record-breaking amount of cocaine floating in international waters, which they say was bound for Australia and would have been enough to supply the country for a year.

The 3.2-tonne haul was valued at NZ$500m (US$315m, AU$456m). It was the largest seizure of illicit drugs made by New Zealand law enforcement “by quite some margin”, the police commissioner, Andrew Coster, said at a news conference in Wellington on Wednesday.

A joint operation between New Zealand police, defence and customs agents led to the cocaine’s discovery in the Pacific Ocean, where 81 bales of the drug were floating in nets in international waters six days’ sailing north-east of New Zealand, the director of the police’s national organised crime group, Greg Williams, said.

The quantity of the drug was enough to supply New Zealand for 30 years, which made it clear there was “no way” it was destined for that country, Williams said.
"Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is to be controlled by all that the coward fears… To be led by a liar is to ask to be told lies." -Octavia E. Butler
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Post by Phoenix520 »

Say, did I hear that Jr was headed to Australia for a little kangaroo hunting?
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Jacinda Ardern takes up leadership and online extremism roles at Harvard
Former prime minister will likely be overseas during the period of New Zealand’s election in October

Tess McClure in Auckland
Tue 25 Apr 2023 22.58 BST

Former New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern has taken up three new roles at Harvard University, where she will study and speak on leadership, governance and online extremism.

Ardern announced in an Instagram post on Wednesday morning that she was “incredibly humbled” to be joining the university on joint fellowships at the Kennedy School’s Center for Public Leadership and the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society, based at Harvard Law School. She will focus on the study of online extremism at the law school, and on building leadership and governance skills at the Kennedy School.

The fellowships will begin in the autumn, and will take Ardern overseas for the period of the New Zealand election in October. Ardern said that “While I’ll be gone for a semester (helpfully the one that falls during the NZ general election!) I’ll be coming back at the end of the fellowships. After all, New Zealand is home!”

Ardern has visited Harvard before: last year, she given an honorary doctorate of law and earned a standing ovation when speaking at Harvard’s commencement on gun control and democracy.

The former prime minister will continue her work on the Christchurch Call – an inter-governmental and tech company pledge she developed after the Christchurch terror attacks to prevent extremist and terrorist content being spread online.

Her time at Harvard will include “time spent studying ways to improve content standards and platform accountability for extremist content online, and examine artificial intelligence governance and algorithmic harms,” the University said in a statement. She will also continue her work on the board of Prince William’s Earthshot Prize, which awards five £1m prizes each year for work providing solutions to major environmental problems.




https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... at-harvard
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#13

Post by Dave from down under »

Phoenix520 wrote: Wed Feb 08, 2023 10:49 pm Say, did I hear that Jr was headed to Australia for a little kangaroo hunting?
I heard that he was going fishing...

(cf his favourite catch that was found floating off NZ)
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#14

Post by Dave from down under »

Jacinda Ardern rocks! :thumbsup:
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#15

Post by Lani »

Dave from down under wrote: Wed Apr 26, 2023 2:37 am Jacinda Ardern rocks! :thumbsup:
Yes, she does! I follow her - she's wonderful.
Image You can't wait until life isn't hard anymore before you decide to be happy.
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‘We have offended a nation’: Miami zoo’s treatment of kiwi bird enrages New Zealand
Zoo apologises after videos of a bird being handled and petted by guests under bright lights prompted uproar in New Zealand

Tess McClure in Auckland
Wed 24 May 2023 00.56 BST

The treatment of a kiwi at a Miami zoo has enraged thousands of New Zealanders, who launched a furious campaign to bring their national bird home and prompted the zoo to apologise.

Videos of Pāora – a kiwi bird housed by Zoo Miami – being handled and petted by guests under bright lights emerged on Tuesday, to almost immediate uproar in New Zealand.

Reclusive and nocturnal, kiwis are beloved in New Zealand to the point that the flightless, rotund, nocturnal ground-dweller has become the country’s national icon.

The footage went viral within hours – sparking a 9,000-person petition, a flood of complaints to the zoo, a government intervention from the Department of Conservation and comments from the prime minister.

On Wednesday, zoo spokesperson Ron Magill said the zoo had “made a huge mistake here”. After receiving a flood of complaints, “I immediately went to the zoo director, and I said, we have offended a nation,” he said in an interview on national radio.

Later that day, prime minister Chris Hipkins weighed in on the incident, saying it “shows a lot of Kiwis take pride in our national bird when they’re overseas”.

“The New Zealanders who witnessed what was happening there caught it pretty quickly,” he said. The prime minister added that the zoo had “made public statements of regret on what’s happened, and I acknowledge that and thank them for taking it seriously”.

Americans may have been surprised by the immediacy and volume of the fury on behalf of the kiwi – but New Zealand is unusually dedicated to the welfare of its endemic birds.

The country’s early breakaway from other land masses means that it has no native land mammals, and is instead populated instead by a vast array of birds. Many are now endangered, and there are ongoing national campaigns to wipe out predators and save them. The kiwi holds a special place in the hearts of New Zealanders. It is considered a taonga (cultural treasure) by Māori.

Pāora, the Miami bird, was hatched in the US as part of a breeding program.




https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... ew-zealand
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Supermarket AI meal planner app suggests recipe that would create chlorine gas
Pak ‘n’ Save’s Savey Meal-bot cheerfully created unappealing recipes when customers experimented with non-grocery household items

Tess McClure in Auckland
Thu 10 Aug 2023 05.19 BST

A New Zealand supermarket experimenting with using AI to generate meal plans has seen its app produce some unusual dishes – recommending customers recipes for deadly chlorine gas, “poison bread sandwiches” and mosquito-repellent roast potatoes.

The app, created by supermarket chain Pak ‘n’ Save, was advertised as a way for customers to creatively use up leftovers during the cost of living crisis. It asks users to enter in various ingredients in their homes, and auto-generates a meal plan or recipe, along with cheery commentary. It initially drew attention on social media for some unappealing recipes, including an “oreo vegetable stir-fry”.

When customers began experimenting with entering a wider range of household shopping list items into the app, however, it began to make even less appealing recommendations. One recipe it dubbed “aromatic water mix” would create chlorine gas. The bot recommends the recipe as “the perfect nonalcoholic beverage to quench your thirst and refresh your senses”.

“Serve chilled and enjoy the refreshing fragrance,” it says, but does not note that inhaling chlorine gas can cause lung damage or death.

New Zealand political commentator Liam Hehir posted the “recipe” to Twitter, prompting other New Zealanders to experiment and share their results to social media. Recommendations included a bleach “fresh breath” mocktail, ant-poison and glue sandwiches, “bleach-infused rice surprise” and “methanol bliss” – a kind of turpentine-flavoured french toast.

A spokesperson for the supermarket said they were disappointed to see “a small minority have tried to use the tool inappropriately and not for its intended purpose”. In a statement, they said that the supermarket would “keep fine tuning our controls” of the bot to ensure it was safe and useful, and noted that the bot has terms and conditions stating that users should be over 18.

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Prehistoric bird once thought extinct returns to New Zealand wild
Return of takahē – large, flightless bird – to alpine slopes of the South Island marks a conservation victory in New Zealand

Tess McClure in Auckland
Tue 29 Aug 2023 00.05 BST

Tā Tipene O’Regan, 87 years old, leaned into his carved walking stick and reached down to a large wooden box. He paused a second, then slowly lifted the lid. Out shot the hefty body of a bright turquoise bird, legs windmilling, launching from its cage like a football from a slingshot.

“I am now largely blind, but I still saw them,” O’Regan says: a flash of blue feathers and bright red legs racing for the tussocks.

That streak of colour was the takahē: a large, flightless bird, that was believed for decades to be extinct. Eighteen of the birds were released in the Lake Whakatipu Waimāori valley, an alpine area of New Zealand’s South Island last week, on to slopes they had not been seen roaming for about 100 years. For Ngāi Tahu, the tribe to whom the lands belong, and who faced a long legal battle for their return, it is particularly significant, marking the return to the wild of the birds that their ancestors lived alongside, in lands that they had fought to regain.

Takahē are unusual creatures. Like a number of New Zealand birds, they evolved without native land mammals surrounding them, and adapted to fill the ecosystem niches that mammals would occupy. They are flightless, stand at around 50cm tall, and live in the mountains. Their presence in Aotearoa dates back to at least the prehistoric Pleistocene era, according to fossil remains.

“They’re almost prehistoric looking,” says Tūmai Cassidy, of Ngāi Tahu. “Very broad and bold.” Front-on, their bodies can appear almost perfectly spherical – coupled with the blue-green plumage, they look like a model planet Earth perched atop two long, bright red legs.

“Someone once called us, the land of the birds that walk,” says O’Regan, a Ngāi Tahu rangatira (elder). “There are few things more beautiful than to watch these large birds galloping back into tussock lands where they haven’t walked for over a century.”



https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... aland-wild
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#19

Post by AndyinPA »

They do look a bit prehistoric!
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‘Dinner plate sized’ device found inside woman’s abdomen 18 months after cesarean birth

Kathleen Magramo, CNN
Tue, September 5, 2023 at 12:26 PM GMT+2·3 min read

A surgical tool the size of a dinner plate was found inside a woman’s abdomen 18 months after her baby was delivered by cesarean section, according to a report by New Zealand’s Health and Disability Commissioner.

An Alexis retractor, or AWR, which can measure 17 centimeters (6 inches) in diameter, was left inside the mother’s body following the birth of her baby at Auckland City Hospital in 2020.

The AWR is a retractable cylindrical device with a translucent film used to draw back the edges of a wound during surgery.

The woman suffered months of chronic pain and went for several checkups to find out what was wrong, including X-rays that showed no sign of the device. The pain got so severe that she visited the hospital’s emergency department and the device was discovered on an abdominal CT scan and removed immediately in 2021.

New Zealand’s Health and Disability Commissioner, Morag McDowell, found Te Whatu Ora Auckland – the Auckland District Health Board – in breach of the code of patient rights, in a report released on Monday.




https://www.yahoo.com/news/dinner-plate ... 35514.html
(original: CNN)
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#21

Post by Tiredretiredlawyer »

:shock:
"Mickey Mouse and I grew up together." - Ruthie Tompson, Disney animation checker and scene planner and one of the first women to become a member of the International Photographers Union in 1952.
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