Living next to an active volcano
Photo:
Brad Scott - GNS Science
Graham Leonard
Photo:
Jeff McEwan, Capture Studios
Taranaki Mounga is one of New Zealand's about a dozen active volcanos - but what does that actually mean for locals?
Volcanologist and GNS principal scientist Graham Leonard shares the latest research and preparedness advice.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
RNZ News
2 hours ago
- RNZ News
Former Lake Alice nurse charged over ill-treatment of children dies aged 93
Dempsey Cockran in court in 2021. Photo: RNZ / Nate McKinnon The only staff member at the notorious Lake Alice child and adolescent unit to face prosecution over the horrors at the Rangitīkei institution in the 1970s has died. Dempsey Corkran, 93, died on Saturday 14 June, according to death notices that appeared in weekend newspapers. The notices said the Marton man "died at home surrounded by his family", and his family thanked Marton district nurses and the Arohanui Hospice in Palmerston North. A private service has been held. "His presence, guidance and wit will be missed by us all," the notices said. Appearing in court under his full names, John Richard James Corkran, the former unit charge nurse faced eight charges of ill-treating children by injecting them with the paralysing drug paraldehyde. He was due to face trial in Wellington in 2023, but in June that year the High Court granted a permanent stay due to his failing health . Corkran first appeared in court in late 2021, then aged 89, at the conclusion of a third police investigation into the Lake Alice unit. That investigation found there was also enough evidence to charge the unit's lead psychiatrist Dr Selwyn Leeks and one other staff member, but they were unfit for trial. Leeks died in early 2022 in Australia, aged 92. Previous police investigations in the 1970s and 2000s did not result in charges. Corkran faced - and pleaded not guilty to - eight charges of ill-treating children between 1974 and 1977, carrying maximum penalties of 10 years' jail. Court documents said Corkran injected the boys with drugs for reasons including them running away; calling him a bastard; "being smart"; and because a boy was "enjoying himself too much, laughing and having jokes with friends". When the prosecution was halted, survivors of the Lake Alice unit spoke about their disappointment that no one would ever face justice for what happened there - horrors the government now acknowledged amounted to torture. Corkran did not appear at his later court hearings, but was at his initial call in the Whanganui District Court. Outside he declined to comment to reporters, and his family grew angry as television cameras followed him along the street. Corkran worked at Lake Alice from 1960 as a psychiatric nurse, becoming a charge nurse in 1968 and then in the child and adolescent unit, which opened in 1972, from 1974. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
21 hours ago
- RNZ News
Genetic marker found for rare children's brain disease
A New Zealand-led research team has found new information about the cause of microcephaly, a disease that affects brain growth and function in children. Photo: Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay An Otago-led team has uncovered a genetic cause for a rare children's brain disorder. University of Otago associate professor Louise Bicknell, co-author of the study, said the international research team were investigating microcephaly, a developmental disorder where children's brains fail to grow. Dr Louise Bicknell says new research has helped pinpoint a genetic cause of the devastating children's brain disease microcephaly. Photo: Supplied/ University of Otago - Sharron Bennett They pinpointed specific changes in a gene called CRNKL1, and their findings were recently published in the prestigious American Journal of Human Genetics. It was the culmination of a seven-year study of a New Zealand family, Bicknell said. "Their wee girl had really severe microcephaly. Her brain was much smaller than we'd hoped for, and there were quite a few structural things that were abnormal about her brain, so quite unusual." Researchers compared her brain structure with that of nine children overseas who also had the condition. "It was only then that, we realised they all had similar features, of a really small brain, as well as these structural [aspects] of other parts of the brain not being so usual." In a striking discovery, nine of the families also showed genetic changes in the exact same spot in the CRNKL1 gene. It proved there was a strong link between these specific genetic changes and the disorder, and it was an exciting breakthrough, she said. "That's when the heart starts racing and you know you are onto something. Your gut instinct kicks in and says, this can't be a coincidence, this must be something." Lead author Dr Sankalita Ray Das, a postdoctoral fellow at Otago's Rare Disorder Genetics Laboratory, said the research findings clearly showed that CRNKL1 was "crucial" for healthy brain development. "Importantly, this knowledge has provided understanding for families affected by these severe conditions and lays the foundation for further research into why just the brain is affected by these genetic changes." The researchers received funding from the Neurological Foundation of New Zealand, Cure Kids and the University of Otago, Bicknell said. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
a day ago
- RNZ News
Media in the middle of political skirmishes over sickness and health
Last weekend's Sunday Star Times digs into the political battleground of healthcare. Photo: Sunday Star Times Mediawatch : This week the latest Ipsos Issues Monitor survey showed 'inflation/cost of living' was - again - the top concern of Kiwis. No surprise there - or that 'healthcare/hospitals' was in second place. "It continues on its upward trend, reaching its highest level of concern (43 percent) since tracking began," Ipsos said. That - and the fact that more of those surveyed chose Labour as the party most capable of managing health - would have stood out for the government. The same is true of how the issue plays out in the media. Under the headline The political problem of health Health Minister Simeon Brown told the Sunday Star-Times last weekend the job "matters to every New Zealander from the moment they're born to the moment they die. It's a huge responsibility, but there's also significant opportunity." He'd just announced an opportunity for private hospitals - instructing Health NZ to make long-term deals with them for elective surgeries. "We haven't been ideological about it, we've been focusing on pragmatic solutions to ... maximise what's delivered both in the public and private system," Brown told Newstalk ZB the same day. The next day, New Zealand Herald political editor Thomas Coughlan reported official papers showed Treasury reckoned further cuts to health would be needed to meet the demands of the government's health delivery plan. But that didn't come up when the prime minister appeared that day on Newstalk ZB for his regular Monday morning chat. The host Mike Hosking said he couldn't agree more when the PM said people don't care who's doing their long awaited op when they are staring at the hospital ceiling. But then Hosking told the prime minister about an interview last week with a Christchurch surgeon who works in both the public and the private systems. "We need to be more flexible in public (hospitals). They even come round at one o'clock and say it looks like you'll finish after 4 or 4.30, so we won't let you do your second case," Chris Wakeman told Hosking last week. "You wouldn't close your factory at 4 o'clock if you still had work to do," he added. Later, Mike Hosking read out a text from an unnamed listener who claimed nurses and anaesthetic technicians insist operating stops early if it looks like it's going to go past 4pm. The following day Mike Hosking asked Brown if surgeries that might overrun 4pm were routinely postponed. "Look, there are heavily unionised contractual arrangements in the public system and so you do end up with inefficiencies throughout the system. Those issues need to be dealt with by Health New Zealand to make sure that it is more efficient," Brown replied. "These union agreements ... drive inefficiency and a lack of productivity. These are issues that do need to be resolved as part of (Health New Zealand) negotiations with the unions." Health Minister Simeon Brown Photo: RNZ / REECE BAKER "Absolutely not. The limits are more about management decisions on staffing costs, availability of recovery beds and how to distribute operating theatres between acute and elective work," Sarah Dalton, executive director of the Association of Salaried Medical Specialists told Mediawatch . "The barrier to providing more elective surgeries is a refusal to pay staff required to work longer hours ... and inability to provide sufficient staff to run our operating theatres to their maximum capacity." "We don't have anything in place that would stand in the way of doctors opting to work in a different work pattern or longer hours. And in fact, many of them frequently do. "Typically surgeons and anaesthetists work 10 hour days. A number of hospitals sometimes run what are sometimes called twilight theatres in the early evening or on weekends. "I don't think the way that the discussion has been presented is entirely fair - and it is somewhat misleading. "It is concerning to us that 'private' is seen as the answer when in fact they are already near capacity for what they can do. And we also have significant doctor shortages." Sarah Dalton Photo: LDR / Stuff / Kevin Stent Hosking [ returned to the issue] with Health NZ's Chief Clinical Officer Dr Richard Sullivan on Thursday. He said the proportion of "early finishes" in theatres doing elective surgery is declining - and under the government's 'elective boost' programme they had been doing some surgeries on Saturdays and Sundays too. "It's more than just the unions. You'd need a quite a big workforce to run full Saturday lists all the time. That's not to say we shouldn't look at that, but we need the most efficient way of getting people through our theatres," Dr Sullivan said. Hosking told his listeners the bottom line in public hospitals was: "If it's 4:30, we're going home." There's a bit more to it than that. While there is some extra capacity in theatres, many more people would have to be paid for more hours to do more out-of-business-hours. They don't have all the staff to do a lot more of elective surgeries, in either public or private hospitals And as the Herald' s Thomas Coughlan reported earlier this week, Treasury reckoned the Health Delivery Plan targets could mean increased spending cut targets in the year ahead. Health workforce pay increases would be limited to a degree described as "unprecedented," Treasury documents also stated. In the Herald , Brown rejected Treasury's conclusions. He said government provided Health NZ additional funding in three successive Budgets and Treasury had not consulted the Ministry of Health or Health NZ before reaching its conclusions. "Why do we still have 10 days' sick leave?" Hosking also asked the PM last Monday. He said the question had been put to him by "my tech guy" working at his house. The tech guy got a headline-making response on that from the nation's leader. "So we had five sick days until Jacinda [Ardern] decided we needed ten for Covid. Can we agree that it's gone-ish - and therefore we might need to do something about sick leave?" Hosking asked. "We might need to do things about pro rata and sick leave as well, because you know, people who are on part time contracts are getting full-time 10-day equivalency. Brook Van Velden is working through some of those issues," Luxon replied. The possibility of that went straight into Newstalk ZB's news bulletins. When the prime minister did his turn on RNZ's Morning Report soon after that, he was asked if he would support a cut in sick leave. "Well, I think there's probably a need for us to look at it ... and just make sure that we've got that setting right," he replied. ZB's political editor Jason Walls was puzzled. "Sick leave is an entitlement that everybody has. So it's not just some beltway story. It is an interesting thing for the Prime Minister to bring up. It was just Mike's mate that was talking about it." But Mike's mates behind the mic at Newstalk ZB were teed up to talk about sick leave all day. "A very strong hint that 10 days of sick leave might be going the way of the dodo," was Kerre Woodham's take when she followed the Mike Hosking Breakfast . "I get that it's a godsend if you are prone to infections during winter, but really spare a thought for the employers." Employers such as perhaps Nick Mills, a hospo guy in the capital who's also the host of Wellington Mornings on Newstalk ZB. "I go with the flow. But I'm in an industry where people take the absolute mickey," Mills told his listeners in the capital. "They're just teasing it a bit at the moment on the fact that it's going to be for only part- time employees, but that's going to change," he said. One hour later they were hearing more on this on ZB in Canterbury from the local host, John MacDonald. When Matt Heath and Tyler Adams took the ZB mic for the full national ZB network at noon, they had a similar sense of what was common sense. "10 days a year? Does the average person walking around need 10 sick days a year? I don't think so," Heath said. The questions for the workplace relations minister Brooke van Velden followed. On ThreeNews and Checkpoint she batted back questions about whether it was a gender issue. She was also taken aback that this was a talking point at all. "The only reason we're talking about this is because Mike Hosking was talking about it this morning. There was nothing from the government side to say we had an announcement to make," she told ThreeNews . In the end it will be months before all this is fully aired in Parliament, long after Mike Hosking's tech guy first put it on the agenda. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
