-
1 week ago | 
abc.net.au | Geraden Cann |Madi Chwasta
In an Australian first, a woman from Brisbane has unknowingly given birth to a baby whose genetics belong to strangers. The error was discovered in February, with Monash IVF blaming human error on the mix-up. The baby is now believed to be a toddler. While experts are saying this case is "unprecedented" in Australia, it's happened multiple times in the US, with cases hitting the headlines as early as 1999. It's led to questions about whether stricter regulations need to be enforced here.
-
1 month ago | 
abc.net.au | Geraden Cann
The city streets change at around 11pm, Abdullah Farzad says. Roads choked by traffic become open avenues, and noises hidden during the day emerge. Lonely footsteps on pavements, the closing of unseen doors, the gentle ticking of Farzad's bike chain as he makes his deliveries. Seven days a week, from early afternoon through to 6am, Farzad can be found cycling around Melbourne, glimpsed as a silhouette passing illuminated shopfronts as he delivers Uber Eats orders.
-
1 month ago | 
abc.net.au | Geraden Cann
A liquidator is investigating whether a failed international student agency improperly transferred funds out of Australia in the weeks before its collapse. GrowPro Experience, a Spain-based company which helps arrange global study for international students, was put into administration earlier this year. Its collapse has left hundreds of students at risk of losing years of savings and the opportunity to study in overseas destinations, including Australia.
-
1 month ago | 
abc.net.au | Geraden Cann
Marisela Rivera's student visa expires in two weeks. A week and a half ago she found out the agency she had paid her school, visa extension and insurance fees to had collapsed, likely taking her money with it. "When I found out, it was like everything was crumbling," Ms Rivera said.
-
2 months ago | 
abc.net.au | Geraden Cann
Five hours after Tahlia West gave birth to her son, he was on an emergency helicopter heading from Echuca on the Victoria-New South Wales border, bound for Melbourne. He was initially being rushed to Mercy Hospital because of fluid on his lungs after an emergency C-section, but then doctors noted the newborn had not passed his meconium — his first stool.
-
2 months ago | 
abc.net.au | Geraden Cann
The chemical company at the centre of two industrial fires in Melbourne's west, including one that left a worker dead, has collapsed owing creditors more than $5.3 million. Reports from liquidator SV Partners into the failed ACB Group suggest the site of its factory remains an ongoing fire hazard, stating the EPA advised it posed "significant risk to human health and the environment".
-
2 months ago | 
abc.net.au | Geraden Cann
Rehan Warsi hands over his drivers licence and allows it to be held up and photographed next to his face. He does it so he can get a drink at a bar. "You don't get a choice, if you want to go inside, they take a photo. It kind of sucks," the 20-year-old said. Privacy, he said, was being taken away for convenience. "Your data is going everywhere — email address, home address, phone numbers, it's like you've got no privacy … It's just getting worse every day," he said.
-
Jan 7, 2025 | 
abc.net.au | Geraden Cann |David Estcourt
As the use of artificial intelligence spreads across the online world, so too are concerns about its impact on humans. Now as mental health and youth service providers report growing interest in AI chatbot companions, Australian researchers have found some users rely on the technology not just for friendship - but even sex and romance. And while experts say it raises some troubling ethical concerns, enthusiasts argue these chatbots can provide support, advice, and a way to explore creative worlds.
-
Jan 1, 2025 | 
abc.net.au | Geraden Cann
A property investor sell-off is speeding up in Victoria, with the state's rental stock falling at an increasingly rapid pace. The number of active rental bonds (a proxy for the number of rental properties in a market) fell from 677,492 in September 2023 to 652,766 in 2024 — suggesting the state lost 24,726 rentals in the space of a year. That equated to a 3.6 per cent fall in total Victorian rentals.
-
Dec 30, 2024 | 
abc.net.au | Geraden Cann
The trucking company, Connect Logistics, which was found to be responsible for the tragic crash that killed four police officers on the Eastern Freeway, can't pay a $2.3 million fine or legal costs from the incident. This is because Connect Logistics has been liquidated. At the time of liquidation there were no assets to convert into cash to pay the fine. The liquidator says the April 2020 crash was the beginning of the demise of Connect Logistics.
