This is true. No one wants to admit COVID still exists or ever existed. Quite incredible. Where are the huge conferences dedicated to COVID, like there still is for HIV?

Earth Day started as a US 'teach-in' 56 years ago. Now it's a global event Millions of people around the world will pause, at least for a moment, to mark Earth Day. The annual event is Wednesday.

Millions of people around the world will pause, at least for a moment, to mark Earth Day.

Social cohesion?

April 20, 2009 - World has Six Years to Act, says Penny Sackett - All Our Yesterdays Fifteen years ago, on this day, April 20th, 2009, the Australian Chief Scientist tried to inject some urgency into the policy debate…, The Government’s chief scientist wants the country to set the tou...

April 20, 2009 – World has Six Years to Act, says Penny Sackett, Australian Chief Scientist.

Oops.

allouryesterdays.info/2024/04/19/a...

Knowledge grows in a child, in an adult, and in an elder, from ME-centred, to US-centred, to All of Life-Centred.

Unintentional and intentional abuses of knowledge happen in a child, in an adult, and in an elder, in their growth from ME-centred, to US-centred, to All of Life-Centred.

How can we hold Human Dignity, Inter-Generational Equity and Planetary Integrity, Altogether, in our Hearts?
Many pursue endless economic growth on a finite planet with limited resources.
Few try to inhabit sustainable or regenerative ways of living, with growth from ego-centric to Universal Love.

Courts to the Rescue! - April 19 - Paul Bongiorno, Alex Fein, and Rachel Smith YouTube video by The Sunday Shot

The #SundayShot is up! Show favourites Alex Fein (@auspoldaily.bsky.social) & @paulbongiorno.bsky.social join us to celebrate recent court interventions to protect our democracies. Plus @punterspolitics.bsky.social’s Citizens’ Lobbyist.

Please subscribe to our channel 🙏.

youtu.be/tGrzI5kgGzY?...

Laura Tingle: “A series of disjointed, hard-to-follow and sometimes-profane statements, capped by his 'a whole civilisation will die tonight' threat to wipe Iran off the map last week…. have left many with the impression of a deranged autocrat mad with power," Peter Baker wrote. #auspol

A collage graphic shows an image of a Black woman wearing a KN95 mask and headscarf, against a background with images of the coronavirus and the ocean. The text reads, “The Sick Times. Long COVID is significantly underreported across the globe. Researchers and advocates are trying to change that. By Jamie Ducharme.”

"We are not treating [Long COVID] with as much seriousness as we should be treating it. And when that doesn’t happen, then people don’t open up." - Sourya Sidhhartha Dash, Long COVID advocate in India

Long COVID, which has affected more than 400 million people around the world, is often underreported, particularly in low- and middle-income countries. bit.ly/4dQALNd

The ceasefire between the US and Iran is only the first step.

What follows must be serious diplomacy: de-escalation across all fronts, a renewed nuclear agreement, and a broader regional settlement.

We need leaders not in love with money but in love with justice. Not in love with publicity but in love with humanity. Leaders who can subject their particular egos to the pressing urgencies of the great cause of freedom … a time like this demands great leaders.
-- Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
#MLK

Victorian Respiratory Surveillance Report (17 April 2026), laboratory surveillance section. Summary of case notifications: COVID-19 decreased by 9% Influenza increased by 37% RSV increased by 16% Text notes laboratory-confirmed cases represent only part of total infections and trends may be affected by testing changes.

Victorian COVID-19 weekly cases chart (13 April 2025 to 11 April 2026). Bar chart shows a sharp rise to a peak around June–July 2025 (~1,500 cases per week), followed by a steady decline through late 2025. Cases remain lower in 2026, with a small rise early in the year and then easing again. Recent data: 245 cases in the week 5–11 April 2026, down from 268 cases the previous week. Overall trend: declining activity, with a reported 9% decrease in the latest week.

Victorian influenza weekly cases chart (13 April 2025 to 11 April 2026). Bar chart shows a sharp rise to a peak around June–July 2025 (~5,000 cases), followed by a gradual decline through late 2025 and very low levels by early 2026. Recent data: 123 influenza cases in the week 5–11 April 2026, up from 90 the previous week (+37%). Breakdown: Influenza A: 103 cases, up from 60 (+72%) Influenza B: 18 cases, down from 30 (−40%) Overall trend: activity remains low in 2026 despite a recent increase.

Victorian RSV weekly cases chart (13 April 2025 to 11 April 2026). Bar chart shows a steady rise to a peak around June–July 2025 (~2,100 cases), followed by a consistent decline through late 2025. Cases remain low in early 2026, with a slight recent increase. Recent data: 291 RSV cases in the week 5–11 April 2026, up from 251 the previous week (+16%). Overall trend: large mid-2025 wave, then sustained low levels with a small uptick in April 2026.

Victorian Weekly Respiratory Surveillance Report: 17 April 2026

From 3 Apr to 11 Apr 2026:

🔸COVID positivity rate: 2.2% (-0.2%)

🔹COVID: 245 (-9%)
🔹Influenza A: 103 (+72%)
🔹Influenza B: 18 (-40%)
🔹RSV: 291 (+16%)

Source: health.vic.gov.au/infectious-d...

A 'super typhoon' just devastated the Mariana Islands - months before peak storm season The strongest storm of 2026 slammed into the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands this week, where it flooded homes, ripped roofs off of houses, and lingered for more than two days, forcing families to shelter without electricity, cell service, or running water as they waited for the worst to pass. Super Typhoon Sinlaku formed southeast of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, or CNMI, and Guam, two U.S. territories that make up the Mariana Islands archipelago in the western Pacific, and rapidly grew to a Category 5, 185-mph monstrosity. First, the storm hit Chuuk in the Federated States of Micronesia, where it left one person dead and one fisherman missing at sea. It then passed north of Guam, which suffered flooding from tropical storm winds, before hitting the islands of Saipan and Tinian in the CNMI, following a similar path as Super Typhoon Yutu eight years ago, which destroyed thousands of homes and forced children to go to school in tents. Destructive storms are familiar to the Northern Mariana Islands, which is home to about 50,000 people, including Indigenous Chamorros and Carolinians. But this typhoon felt different. “It’s still whistling and you can still hear it going on...

A 'super typhoon' just devastated the Mariana Islands - months before peak storm season
->Grist | More on "Super Typhoon Sinlaku Mariana Islands" at BigEarthData.ai | #Island #ClimateChange

Trump Pulls Funding For Catholic Charity That Helps Migrant Children Amid Clash With Pope The Archbishop of Miami called the Trump administration’s move to pull funding for a Catholic charity “baffling” as the government clashes with the Vatican.

The Archbishop of Miami called the Trump administration’s move to pull funding for a Catholic charity “baffling” as the government clashes with the Vatican.

Spiritual qualities, like love, are essential.

Three similar distortions of religion: Khomeinism in Islam, Trumpism in Christianity, Zionism in Judaism. Each of them lacks spiritual qualities, like love.

If you're curious, the Dalai Lama makes a key observation that humanity needs to nourish spiritual qualities, www.sacredweb.com/tag/traditio....
Modern science should be busy finding truth.
But modern science is too often reduced to closed-minded ideologies, defending, protecting vested interests.

Covid-19 Inquiry: UK's vaccine development and rollout was 'extraordinary feat' - live updates An estimated 475,000 lives were saved in England and Scotland, but the inquiry says a lower vaccine uptake among some groups should've been predicted.

The Covid 19 vaccine roll out was an extraordinary feat which may have saved upwards of 475,000 lives.

In the face of a deadly virus dedicated professionals worked hard to make it happen and millions did the right thing and took the jabs.

That's to be celebrated.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cg...

What to Expect at the Santa Marta Climate Conference Colombia and the Netherlands will host government ministers, scientists, Indigenous peoples, and civil society groups from at least 50 states, determined to work together to figure out a just transiti...

By me: what to expect at the first coference on the transition away from fossil fuels in Santa Marta @drilledmedia.bsky.social
drilled.media/news/santa-m...

We need an unequivocal statement from Labor that Australia will not be dragged into an illegal war led by Netanyahu and Trump.
Obfuscation, weakness, sycophancy, fear and appeasement of Trump weakens our economy sovereignty and standing on the world stage. Courage not cowardice!

Angus Taylor and the Liberal Party’s moral decline Paul Keating says Angus Taylor’s embrace of “values” politics marks a return to racism, abandoning the Liberal Party’s traditions in favour of base political appeal.

The Liberal Party is again turning to racism as a political strategy.
In chasing One Nation, it is abandoning the principles that once defined it, Paul Keating writes.
#auspol #Politics #Immigration #LiberalParty

Pope says ‘world is being ravaged by a handful of tyrants’ amid feud with Trump’s White House Pontiff denounces leaders who invoke religion to justify war, after US bishops offer him support after Vance remarks

“Pope Leo XIV has said that the world is being “ravaged by a handful of tyrants” who spend billions on war, in comments that will be seen as another sharp escalation in his almost week-long feud with the White House over the US-Israel war on Iran”

www.theguardian.com/world/2026/a...

A different overview!

A Sunday Thought(#184): ‘The Overview Effect’ - The Artemis II Version Many of us have been strongly and emotionally attached to the Artemis II mission around the moon and back in the last two weeks.

Are we becoming ‘the crew’?

open.substack.com/pub/rthurm/p...

Ham-fisted embrace of 'Australian values' exposes a hollowness Angus Taylor’s latest attempt to grasp any sort of relevance has laid bare the raw politics at the heart of Australia’s conservative movement

Whose values, exactly?
www.thenewdaily.com.au/news/politic...

Knowledge of values changes across the lifespan from egocentric me to groupcentric us to sociocentric experts and achievers to worldcentric collaborators to kosmoscentric unity of being.

Which values are being included? excluded?

Australia’s new dietary guidelines must be road tested by those who will use them Introduction by Croakey: As previously reported at Croakey, the protracted process carried out by the National Health and Medical Research

Australia’s new dietary guidelines must be road tested by those who will use them – Croakey Health Media www.croakey.org/australias-n...

"The masters of war pretend not to know that it takes only a moment to destroy, yet a lifetime is often not enough to rebuild. They turn a blind eye to the fact that billions of dollars are spent on killing and devastation, yet the resources needed for healing, education and restoration are nowhere to be found." -Pope Leo XIV

Age and COVID-19: What's with all the young kids? Inspired by an online conversation and the hard work of others, I set off to examine age groupings among Australians confirmed as COVID-19 cases from 2020 to April 2026. The findings revealed interest...

Inspired by an online conversation and the hard work of others, I set off to examine age groupings among Australians confirmed as COVID-19 cases from 2020 to April 2026. The findings revealed interesting patterns, especially in the very young.
virologydownunder.com/age-and-covi...

TINA! There is no alternative!
Neoliberals in 80s (Thatcher, Reagan, Hawke, Keating, Howard, etc.) decided that their economic growth agendas (maxing profits, increasing wealth, privatisation, deregulation, social inequalities and environmental degradation) were GOOD!
No sustainable ways of living!

Here’s the pupil & teacher illness absence charts side-by-side ⬇️

🔎 In 2024/25, pupil illness absence was still nearly 30% higher than pre-pandemic norms.

🔎 In 2023/24, teacher illness absence was nearly 40% higher than pre-pandemic norms (2024/25 data won’t be published until this June).

Truly remarkable how many people have told the Pope, in some way or another, to "shut up and dribble." Or corrected him on the Bible, despite their thin education on theology. Or told him to stay out of US affairs, despite him being a US citizen. The hubris is amazing.