By Human Rights Watch
Click to expand Image Refugees collect water at Mae La refugee camp in Mae Sot, Thailand, March 5, 2025. © 2025 Valeria Mongelli/Anadolu via Getty Images (Bangkok) – More than 100,000 Myanmar refugees in Thailand have lost access to essential food and medical aid due to US funding cuts, putting them at serious risk, Human Rights Watch said today. The Thai government should immediately permit refugees to lawfully work and travel outside its refugee camps.The Trump administration’s dismantling of foreign assistance, along with other donor shortfalls, led to the termination…
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By Peter Crampton, Professor of Public Health, University of Otago
Gabrielle McDonald, Senior Research Fellow in Public Health, University of Otago
Even after poverty is taken into account, Māori and Pacific people have a shorter life expectancy and higher cancer rates compared with people from other ethnic groups.
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By Catherine de Fontenay, Honorary Fellow, Department of Economics, The University of Melbourne
Alex Robson, Deputy Chair, Productivity Commission, and Adjunct Professor, Queensland University of Technology
A new Productivity Commission report looks at how to make workers more adaptable. This starts with making sure school students learn basic maths and English skills.
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By Flora Hui, Research Fellow, Centre for Eye Research Australia and Honorary Fellow, Department of Surgery (Ophthalmology), The University of Melbourne
Pete A Williams, Ulla and Ingemar Dahlberg Professor in Vision Science, Research Group Leader, Karolinska Institutet
A new study shows drugs such as Ozempic come with a small but increased risk of a condition known as an ‘eye stroke’.
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By Aayushi Badhwar, Lecturer in Enterprise and Technology, RMIT University
Today’s consumers are swimming in a sea of information. Products are marketed with big, bold words such as “sustainable”, “ethical” and “organic”. They sound good, they catch our attention, and they make us feel better about what we buy.
The reality is, in today’s market, figuring out which claims are true is no easy task.
One big reason is greenwashing, when brands use these buzzwords to sell…
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By Christopher Pollard, Associate Teaching Fellow, Sociology, Deakin University
Neoliberalism has had an enormous influence on the world, driving policy and governance at the national and international level, particularly since the 1980s, when it was championed by the Reagan administration in the United States and the Thatcher government in the United Kingdom.
It has been associated with programs of economic deregulation, privatisation of state-owned enterprises, massive tax cuts for businesses and high-income earners, reduction of social services and welfare programs, anti-unionisation,…
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By James Watson, Professor in Conservation Science, School of the Environment, The University of Queensland
Maximilian Kotz, Marie Curie Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Barcelona Supercomputing Center-Centro Nacional de Supercomputación (BSC-CNS)
Tatsuya Amano, Associate Professor, School of the Environment, The University of Queensland
Human-driven climate change threatens many species, including birds. Most studies on this topic focus on long-term climate trends, such as gradual rises in average temperatures or shifts in rainfall patterns. But extreme weather events are becoming more common and intense, so they warrant further attention.
Our new research shows extreme heat is having a particularly severe effect on tropical birds. We found increased exposure to extreme heat has reduced bird populations in tropical regions by 25–38% since 1950.…
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Monday, August 11, 2025
In 2021, an Afghan woman could have run for president – although none did. Spool forward to 2025, they can’t even speak in public. There is an edict from the Taliban which labels public speaking by women a moral violation.
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By Michael Rovatsos, Professor of Artificial Intelligence, University of Edinburgh
OpenAI claims that its new flagship model, GPT-5, marks “a significant step along the path to AGI” – that is, the artificial general intelligence that AI bosses and self-proclaimed experts often claim is around the corner.
According to OpenAI’s own definition, AGI would be “a highly autonomous system that outperforms humans at most economically valuable work”. Setting aside whether this is something humanity should be striving for, OpenAI CEO Sam…
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By Donald Heflin, Executive Director of the Edward R. Murrow Center and Senior Fellow of Diplomatic Practice, The Fletcher School, Tufts University
A former US ambassador and career diplomat says that history indicates that the possibilities for a lasting peace coming out of the Trump-Putin summit are pretty low.
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