Welcome to your breakfast serving of the day’s breaking news from South Australia, the nation and abroad.
GPs to drive vaccine pace pick up
The federal government and health authorities have assured Australians the COVID-19 vaccine rollout will pick up pace as more general practice clinics this week join the program.
By the end of this week the number of clinics involved will double from 1500 to 3000, while Melbourne-based CSL is now pumping out the AstraZeneca vaccine for domestic use to assist supply after the European Union earlier blocked some shipments.
“The daily and weekly numbers will continue to rise,” acting Chief Medical Officer Michael Kidd told reporters on Monday.
Almost 842,000 doses have been administered since the program started more than a month ago. Of these, SA Health has administered just 28,933.
The figures fall well short of the four million vaccinations originally promised by the Morrison government by the end of March.
Nationals deputy leader David Littleproud said Australia had been “badly let down” by the EU.
“The arithmetic is simple on this. We are three million short because of the EU, who cut us short,” he said.
Labor sees the situation differently, ascribing it to the “chaos and dysfunction” of the government.
Meanwhile, the Australian Technical Advisory Group is planning to meet on Wednesday this week to further discuss the case of a 44-year-old Melbourne man who developed blood clots after receiving the AstraZeneca jab.
It has been in contact with medicine and healthcare agencies analysing similar cases in Europe and the UK.
Professor Kidd said it was important to note from the overseas experience that one to two cases of thrombosis have been recorded in one million people who receive the AstraZeneca vaccine.
“By contrast, we know that the risk of death from COVID-19 remains at 1 to 2 deaths per 100 people infected,” Prof Kidd said.
In South Australia, a man infected with the South African strain of the virus remains in a critical condition in the Royal Adelaide Hospital.
There were 10 new cases of COVID-19 recorded in the 24 hours to Monday morning among returned overseas travellers already in quarantine, including two unrelated men in their 40s in Adelaide.
But there were no new cases of community transmission anywhere across the country.
April 19 tipped for NZ travel bubble start
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is set to reveal the start date for quarantine-free travel for Australians to Aotearoa in a 1.30pm announcement today.
Ardern’s cabinet will meet to sign off a plan to create the trans-Tasman bubble on Tuesday morning, before a 4pm local time (1.30pm SA time) announcement.
The prime minister has remained tight-lipped on possible start dates, but Air NZ may have given the game away.
The national carrier is selling a vastly increased number of quarantine-free flights across the Tasman from April 19.
The Australian newspaper also reports industry chief John Hart saying “the 19th was pretty much definite”.
In Wellington on Tuesday morning, Ardern said “they do not know cabinet’s decisions. We have not told them the date we will be opening”.
Ardern said she was pleased to finally be able to announce a date, after a tortured 11-month journey from when it was first agreed in principle last May.
“The public, tourism operators, families and friends will have that certainty,” she said.
“I’m a Kiwi like everyone else … I have family and friends in distressing situations because we have had this border in place.
“We are now able to take this next step and it is a world first.”
Australian and New Zealand borders have been shut to almost all non-citizens since March last year, with both countries requiring arrivals to spend a fortnight in quarantine before entering the community.
Success in fighting the virus has prompted calls for the two allies to re-open borders to each other.
Australian states began scrapping their restrictions last October, but to date New Zealand is yet to do so.
Kiwis have been fearful of a return of the deadly virus to their country, but University of Auckland professor Shaun Hendy said the re-opening was worth the risk.
“It’s not greatly increasing the risk to New Zealand… and it will be good for many people with family in Australia,” he told Radio NZ.
“We are going to have to make these small incremental risks.
“We do want to get something like normal life back over the next year.”
Families separated by the Tasman Sea have been among the loudest voices calling for a resumption of normal travel.
Tourism-related industries and businesses are also desperate for travel to resume.
“We’re all looking forward to hearing what the New Zealand government has to announce,” Auckland Airport executive Scott Tasker told AAP.
Tasker was one of 40 representatives – including airports, airlines and government officials – in the Trans-Tasman Safe Border Group which last June put together a logistical plan for the aviation system to re-open.
While Australia picked up the report and put it into action, New Zealand left it on the shelf.
“Australia determined it was safe to consider opening inbound travel to New Zealand last October,” Tasker said.
“It’s pleasing to see that the New Zealand government now obviously do see that conditions are conducive to some serious thinking about the possibility of opening.”
In any re-opening scenario, borders would be closed temporarily in the case of new outbreaks.
Probe into fatal Hills crash
Police are investigating the circumstances surrounding the death of an Adelaide Hills man in a crash at Brukunga last night.
Emergency services were called to Pyrites Road, just north of the township of Brukunga, about 5.30pm yesterday after a Ford ute crashed into a tree.
The driver, a 28-year-old local man, was airlifted to the Royal Adelaide Hospital with life threatening injuries.
The passenger, a 39-year-old Nairne man, died at the scene.
Pyrites Road was closed for several hours while Major Crash officers were at the scene.
Anyone who saw the vehicle prior to the crash, or who has any information that may assist the investigation is asked to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or report on line at www.crimestopperssa.com.au
The man’s death is the 35th life lost on SA Roads this year, compared to 31 at the same time last year.
PM rallies around sick senator
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has led messages of support after Liberal Senator Jim Molan revealed his diagnosis with an aggressive form of cancer, becoming the latest in a string of Liberal politicians to take leave from Canberra.
The 70-year-old announced on Monday he would take time away from the Senate to confirm his prognosis before commencing treatment.
In a statement, the NSW Senator admitted the diagnosis last week came as a shock but said he had many reasons to remain positive.
“I am receiving the best possible care from my clinicians, and have the love, support and prayers of my family,” Senator Molan said.
A former major general in the Australian army, the senator said he had never been afraid to fight battles that need fighting.
“This is no exception,” he said.
Senator Molan joins fellow government members Christian Porter, Linda Reynolds and Andrew Laming on different forms of leave ahead of federal parliament next sitting in mid-May.
Both sides of the political aisle wished him well in his treatment and recovery, with the prime minister paying tribute to Senator Molan’s work.
“We’ve worked together for over a decade now and you’ve always put your service above all else,” Morrison wrote.
“Even now, in sharing this news of your illness, your thoughts still turn to how you can continue to serve.”
Labor senators Penny Wong, Kristina Keneally and Katy Gallagher also reached out to show support along with Eden-Monaro MP Kristy McBain.
Molan’s Senate term is not due to expire until mid-2022.
George Floyd murder trial enters second week
The Minneapolis police chief has testified that now-fired officer Derek Chauvin violated departmental policy in pinning his knee on George Floyd’s neck and keeping him down after Floyd had stopped resisting and was in distress.
Continuing to kneel on Floyd’s neck once he was handcuffed behind his back and lying on his stomach was “in no way, shape or form” part of department policy or training, “and it is certainly not part of our ethics or our values,” Police Chief Medaria Arradondo said on Monday, day six of Chauvin’s murder trial.
Arradondo, the city’s first black chief, fired Chauvin and three other officers the day after Floyd’s death last May and in June called it “murder”.
While police have long been accused of closing ranks to protect fellow members of the force who have been accused of wrongdoing, some of the most experienced members of the Minneapolis department have taken the stand to openly condemn Chauvin’s treatment of Floyd.
As jurors watched in rapt attention and scribbled notes, Arradondo testified not only that Chauvin, a 19-year veteran of the force, should have let Floyd up sooner but that the pressure on Floyd’s neck did not appear to be light to moderate, as called for under the department’s neck-restraint policy; that Chauvin failed in his duty to render first aid before the ambulance arrived; and that he violated policy requiring officers to de-escalate tense situations if they can to avoid or minimise the use of force.
“That action is not de-escalation,” the police chief said.
Arradondo’s testimony came after the emergency room doctor who pronounced Floyd dead testified that he theorised at the time that Floyd’s heart most likely stopped because of a lack of oxygen.
Bradford Langenfeld, who was a senior resident on duty that night at Hennepin County Medical Center and tried to resuscitate Floyd, took the stand as prosecutors sought to establish that it was Chauvin’s knee on the black man’s neck that killed him.
Langenfeld said Floyd’s heart had stopped by the time he arrived at the hospital.
Under questioning by prosecutor Jerry Blackwell, Langenfeld said that based on the information he had, it was “more likely than the other possibilities” that Floyd’s cardiac arrest – the stopping of his heart – was caused by asphyxia, or insufficient oxygen.
Chauvin, 45, is charged with murder and manslaughter in Floyd’s death.
The white officer is accused of pressing his knee into the 46-year-old man’s neck for nine minutes and 29 seconds, outside a corner market, where Floyd had been accused of trying to pass a counterfeit $US20 banknote for a pack of cigarettes.
The defence argues that Chauvin did what he was trained to do and that Floyd’s use of illegal drugs and his underlying health conditions caused his death.
Nelson, Chauvin’s lawyer, asked Langenfeld whether some drugs can cause hypoxia, or insufficient oxygen.
The doctor acknowledged that fentanyl and methamphetamine, both of which were found in Floyd’s body, can do so.
Putin extends presidential potential
Russian President Vladimir Putin has passed laws that make it possible for him to stay in power until 2036 as the health of jailed opposition leader Alexei Navalny continues to deteriorate.
The law, which rolls back Putin’s previous time in office to now stand at zero, was published on a government portal on Monday.
The State Duma passed the law in late March, implementing a key point of the new constitution that Russians approved in a referendum in July.
Under the previous 1993 constitution, Putin would have had to leave the Kremlin in 2024.
But by annulling his previous terms in office since 2000, the 68-year-old can now run in the next two presidential elections – and theoretically continue to govern Russia until 2036.
The biggest constitutional restructuring in Russian history also gave Putin significantly more powers.
At the time, Russian opposition members accused the president of abusing his power and overthrowing the constitution.
Meanwhile, jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny has been moved to a medical facility to be treated for a possible respiratory illness and has been tested for the coronavirus, the Izvestia newspaper has cited the prison service as saying.
He has been diagnosed with a fever of 38.1C and a “severe cough” but he will continue his hunger strike, which he started a few days ago, Navalny wrote earlier on Monday on Instagram.
In February, Navalny was sentenced to several years in prison in a much-criticised trial.
The Russian judiciary accuses him of violating reporting requirements in an earlier criminal case while he was recovering in Germany from an assassination attempt involving the nerve agent Novichok.
Myanmar unrest sparks regional talks
Protesters in Myanmar have clapped together in a show of dissent against the military junta as a regional bloc prepares for talks on the crisis that has killed nearly 600 people.
Clapping began in various parts of the main city Yangon at 5pm on Monday in response to a call by protest organisers, residents said.
The gesture would honour “Ethnic Armed Organisations and Gen Z defence youths from Myanmar including Yangon who are fighting in the revolution… on behalf of us,” Ei Thinzar Maung, a protest leader, wrote on Facebook.
Despite the killing of at least 564 people by the security forces since the February 1 coup, protesters have come out across the country every day to voice opposition to the overthrow of the elected government led by Aung San Suu Kyi and the return of military rule.
Brunei, chair of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), threw its support on Monday behind a leaders’ meeting to discuss Myanmar.
After talks between Malaysian Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin and Brunei Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah, Brunei said both countries would make preparations for a meeting to be held at the ASEAN Secretariat in the Indonesian capital Jakarta.
No date was given.
The divergent views of ASEAN members on how to respond to the Myanmar army’s crackdown on civilians and the group’s policy of non-interference has limited its ability to act.
Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and Singapore have all expressed alarm over the killings of demonstrators and support an urgent high-level meeting on Myanmar.
Besides Brunei, the other ASEAN members are Myanmar itself, Thailand, Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia.
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The junta said on Monday that comments last week by UN Special Envoy Christine Schraner Burgener about an impending “bloodbath” in Myanmar were inaccurate and misleading.
“Ms Burgener’s remarks contravene the basic principles of sovereignty, and the fact that the United Nations is meant to work towards peace and stability of the world’s nations,” it said in a notice in the state-run Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper.
Schraner Burgener told the UN Security Council on March 31 it must consider “potentially significant action” to reverse the course of events as “a bloodbath is imminent”.
The junta said the remarks were “a far cry from reality and could delay and destabilise the efforts by the State Administration Council to establish a genuine and disciplined multiparty democracy”.
A total of 2667 people have been detained under the junta, the Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP) activist group said on Monday.
The junta at the weekend announced arrest warrants for about 60 celebrities, social media influencers, models and musicians on charges of incitement.
– with AAP and Reuters
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