Nine To Noon for Tuesday 25 June 2019

 

 

09:05 New research: sugar tax reduces consumption of sugary drinks by 10%

A newly released review from Otago University shows there's a direct correlation between the amount of tax imposed and a drop in the consumption of sugary drinks: finding for instance a 10% tax has reduced the purchase and consumption of sugary drinks by 10%. The study looks at the effects of imposing a sugar tax in four American cities, the Catalonia region of Spain, and country-wide in Chile, France and Mexico.  Kathryn Ryan speaks with lead author Dr Andrea Teng, a public health physician and senior researcher at the University of Otago.  The review has just been published in international scientific journal, Obesity Reviews. 

09:15 Fox landfill cleanup - no extra money, is there an end in sight?

The Department of Conservation has now taken the reins from Westland District Council as the lead agency co-ordinating the clean-up of the Fox and Cook riverbeds polluted by the wash out of an old landfill on the West Coast - but without any additional funding. It's a big job with DOC now looking for 30 volunteers a day to help. Meanwhile, environmental action group Forest & Bird has raised questions that without additional funding, the DOC led clean up will come at the expense of  important conservation work on the West Coast. DOC's Owen Kilgour is the Incident Management Controller for the Fox Riverbed Cleanup.

09:25 Chronic fatigue syndrome blood test - new hope for sufferers?

Pioneering geneticist Dr Ron Davis with researchers at Stanford University thinks he may have discovered a blood test that can flag chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) / Myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME). If so it would be the breakthrough that sufferers have been seeking for decades - proof that it exists. While not much is known about CFS many sufferers complain that their condition is often regarded as imaginary, in part due to there being no test for it. Currently a diagnosis is based on the appearance of symptoms like extreme exhaustion, sensitivity to light and unexplained pain. In New Zealand it's estimated that there are around 20 thousand people with chronic fatigue syndrome. Dr Ron Davis is the Director of the Stanford Genome Technology Center with a personal reason to find a cure as his 35 year old son Whitney suffers from a debilitating form of the disease.

09:45 Democrats' primary debates and Trump's Iran sanctions

US correspondent David Smith joins Kathryn for a look at the Democrats' first primary debates kicking off over two nights in Miami this week. It's the most diverse field in US political history, with six women, six people of colour and an openly gay man. He'll also look at Donald Trump's "major" new sanctions slapped on Iran today as tensions between the countries escalate.

US correspondent David Smith is the Washington bureau chief of The Guardian newspaper.

10:05 The Godmother of Silicon Valley Esther Wojcicki

Esther Wojcicki is a leading American educator and  journalist. Founder of the Media Arts program at Palo Alto High School, where she built a highly successful journalism program, she has been involved with Google since its inception and was part of setting up the Google Teacher Academy. She is Vice-Chair of Creative Commons, has worked as a professional journalist for multiple publications,  and speaks at conferences around the world about how to get the best out of children. She's also the mother of three high achieving daughters: Susan -  CEO of Youtube, Anne, co-founder of DNA testing firm 23andMe - married to Google founder Sergei Brin, and Janet - a leading medical researcher. Esther's book is called How to Raise Successful People: simple lessons for radical results.

10:35 Book review - The Parisian by Isabella Hammad

Sonja deFriez reviews The Parisian by Isabella Hammad, which is published by Jonathan Cape.

10:45 The Reading

The Garden - a short story by Michelle Rahurahu told by Cohen Holloway.
The second in a series of short stories from the collection 'Page Numbers 2019' - new writing from the MA Course at the International Institute of Modern Letters.

11:05 Business commentator Rod Oram - banking

Rod Oram talks to Kathryn about movement in the banking industry. The government has announced a deposit guarantee scheme, the Reserve Bank announces further scrutiny of ANZ's capital, and ANZ has more things to explain about its departed CEO. Also, the choices Air NZ faces in picking the right CEO to replace Christopher Luxon, and a look at last week's GDP figures.
 

11:30 Stand up paddle boarding champ Annabel Anderson

Multi-talented Wanaka athlete Annabel Anderson talks to Kathryn Ryan about dominating stand up paddle boarding for more than six years and the mental toughness it takes to return to high performance sport from repeated injury.

Annabel Anderson is speaking at two sessions in this years NZ Mountain Film and Book Festival which runs in Wanaka June 28th to July 3rd, Queenstown July 4th to 6th and Cromwell July 7th.

11:45 Name suppression perils and Luxon ad trouble

Media correspondent Gavin Ellis looks at how permanent name suppression is a fraudster's dream, the ad suggesting Christopher Luxon will be the National Party's John Key is being investigated by the Electoral Commission and new figures about the state of the newspaper industry show a growing gap between the Herald's circulation and readership figures.

Gavin Ellis is a media commentator and former editor of the New Zealand Herald. He can be contacted on gavin.ellis@xtra.co.nz