Saturday Morning for Saturday 10 October 2020

Melbourne during lockdown

8:10 Norman Swan: How Australia is coping with Covid-19

Dr Norman Swan is an investigative journalist, broadcaster, and producer based in Sydney.

He's the host of the ABC's Health Report, and Coronacast, a podcast dedicated to informing Australians on the latest in the Covid-19 pandemic.

Dr Swan was one of the country's first medically trained journalists - training in medicine at the University of Aberdeen, in Scotland, where he was born and raised. 

He joined the ABC in 1982, and has won many awards since for his work.

Norman Swan is also the father of Jonathan Swan - a journalist who works as a political reporter in Washington DC, and recently gained fame for grilling President Donald Trump in an interview.

8:30 Petra Straight: Pharmacist on the frontline

Working as a pharmacist in some of the worst conflict zones in the world has given Petra Straight a new perspective on risk.

She was part of the response to the Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone, and now works for Save The Children’s Emergency Health Unit.

It’s a role that has taken Petra all over the world - helping vaccinate against yellow fever in the Congo, and working within a reproductive health programme in Mozambique.

Until just recently, Petra was in Cox's Bazar in Bangladesh, helping set up a Covid-19 treatment centre at the refugee camp there for Rohingya fleeing persecution in Myanmar. 

She's now in self-isolation in London. 

 

9:05 Graham Norton

Graham Norton is a man who needs no introduction.

The host of the Graham Norton show, he’s interviewed some of the biggest names in show business in the world.

He’s also a writer, having already penned both memoir and fiction - his previous novels Holding and A Keeper are both bestsellers.

Graham’s latest book Home Stretch is a story based in his home country Ireland in the late 1980s.

It tells the story of Connor, not only a young gay man Ireland in the 80s, but the driver of a car that’s involved in a fatal accident, who flees his home town for England then the United States.

10:05 Being green to the extreme: Activist Rob Greenfield

Eating roadkill, getting a vasectomy at 25 and reducing your worldly possessions to 44 items.

It all makes sense if you follow environmental ethics to their logical end.

That's just what Rob Greenfield has been doing.

He embarks on extreme projects to bring attention to important global issues and inspire positive change.

10:30 Nathan and Kevin Haines: father and son on their love for jazz

Jazz saxophonist and producer Nathan Haines has been through somewhat of a metamorphosis in recent years.

He's evolved from edgy wunderkind to humble legend, via sobriety, fatherhood and cancer.

Haines is acknowledged to be our country's leading jazz musician. His first solo album Shift Left was a game-changing fusion of acid jazz and hip-hop and won New Zealand Jazz Record of the Year.

A decade long stint in London had him on the vanguard of the acid jazz movement, working with producer and DJ Phil Asher to make now classic albums Sound Travels and Squire for Hire

Nathan was born into a musical family and learnt at the knee of his father Kevin.

Kevin Haines is a jazz bassist and has performed with artists including Nat Adderley, Eartha Kitt, Lee Konitz and Georgie Fame.

Nathan and Kevin will be performing a show Songs With My Father on Sunday, October 18 as part of Auckland's Elemental Nights Festival

11:05 Boy Swallows Universe author Trent Dalton on his new novel

Australian author and journalist Trent Dalton's 2018 debut novel Boy Swallows Universe was a huge hit, selling over  500,000 copies in Australia and winning him Book of the Year at the 2019 Australian Book Industry Awards.

He's just released a hotly anticipated follow-up All Our Shimmering Skies.
 
As with his debut novel the book tackles good and evil from the perspective of a hopeful child

All Our Shimmering Skies is set in Australia’s Northern Territory and tells the tale of Molly Hook, the gravedigger’s daughter and the quest for the man who put a curse on her family.

11:40 Doug Wilson: Keeping your brain healthy as you age

Medical academic, former pharmaceutical executive, and author of Ageing For Beginners, Doug Wilson's back, reporting in from the other side of 80.

This week he's looking at how our brains age and what we can do to keep them in tip top shape.

Books mentioned in this show:

Home Stretch
by Graham Norton
ISBN: 9781473665170
Published by Hachette

All Our Shimmering Skies
By Trent Dalton
ISBN:9781460753903
Published by HarperCollins