Please Explain: Coronavirus Daily

For the duration of the COVID-19 crisis, Please Explain is coming to you five days a week. In today's episode, Archie Miles (9) asks Miki Perkins all the things that are on his mind about the virus. It's a great episode to play to your kids, to share with other parents, and to get some practical ideas on how to discuss the crisis with young people. Please take the time to rate & review us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your pods. We love to hear your thoughts and it makes it easier for the rest of the podcast world to find us. Become a subscriber: our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe https://subscribe.theage.com.au/ or https://subscribe.smh.com.au/  

For the duration of the COVID-19 crisis, Please Explain is coming to you five days a week. In today's episode of Please Explain,Tory Maguire and Jordan Baker discuss the contention around the shut down of Australian schools. They delve into the confusion parents and teachers are experiencing after hearing different messages from the state premiers and the Prime Minister as well as what this means for childcare services. Please take the time to rate & review us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your pods. We love to hear your thoughts and it makes it easier for the rest of the podcast world to find us. Become a subscriber: our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe https://subscribe.theage.com.au/ or https://subscribe.smh.com.au/  

From today, Please Explain goes daily, Monday to Friday, bringing all the latest news on the coronavirus. In today's episode, Tory Maguire talks to Steph Peatling about the increasingly fractious relationship between the Prime Minister and the states over school closures, and what the latest stimulus package is intended to do. Please take the time to rate & review us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your pods. We love to hear your thoughts and it makes it easier for the rest of the podcast world to find us. Become a subscriber: our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe https://subscribe.theage.com.au/ or https://subscribe.smh.com.au/  

Like so many other Australians, most of the team at The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age are now working from home - part of the effort to flatten the curve. The COVID-19 story is moving so fast it’s hard to pick which element to discuss on this week’s Please Explain podcast episode. In this week's episode of Please Explain, Tory Maguire will talk to Eryk Bagshaw who is one of the people leading our coverage out of Parliament House in Canberra about whether or not the Government has a plan for flattening the curve in Australia. Later on in the show, Europe Correspondent Bevan Shields will talk about how the United Kingdom has switched this week from the controversial herd immunity approach to containment. Become a subscriber: our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe https://subscribe.theage.com.au/ or https://subscribe.smh.com.au/ Please take the time to rate & review us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your pods. We love to hear your thoughts and it makes it easier for the rest of the podcast world to find us.

On December 9 2019, 47 tourists and guides were visiting the White Island volcano in New Zealand when it erupted.  20 people were killed, and 26 were injured, and many Australians were among those numbers.  Many of the injured suffered serious burns, and in the days after the eruption 13 Australians were flown to hospitals in Sydney and Melbourne for treatment.  Six patients ended up in the Burns Unit at Royal North Shore Hospital in Sydney, a statewide burns service that was also treating burns victims from the bushfires. On this week’s Please Explain Feature episode, Sydney Morning Herald Health Reporter, Rachel Clun will take you through the burns unit and you’ll get a glimpse of just what it takes to treat serious burns after a natural disaster

In the past week, the sharemarket has suffered its biggest dive since the global financial crisis. On Monday, Wall Street plunged and the effects have been felt in markets across around the world. So is Coronavirus to blame or were we heading towards a recession anyway?  On this week's Please Explain podcast, Chris Zappone talks to senior economics writer for the Sydney Morning Herald, Matt Wade who will decode what has been happening with the markets and the Australian economy. Become a subscriber Our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe to The Age or The Sydney Morning Herald.

We’ve reached the point all the coronavirus experts told us was just a matter of time - local transmission of COVID-19. Prime Minister Scott Morrison this week called for calm asking people to stop clearing the supermarket shelves of toilet paper and that "Australians should continue to go about their lives in their normal way and just exercise common sense." While Attorney General Christian Porter spelled out existing, as yet unused, biosecurity laws introduced in 2015 which allow the detention of infected citizens if they’re not complying with authorities. He told ABC Radio "It's very likely that these laws will be used on a larger scale and it's very likely that Australians will encounter practices and instructions and circumstances that they'd not had to encounter before." On this week’s episode of Please Explain, Tory Maguire talks to China correspondent, Eryk Bagshaw to discuss the Federal Government’s messaging tactics and later on in the show, Health Reporter from The Age, Melissa Cunningham will talk the latest advice and the mass panic around toilet paper. Become a subscriber Our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe to The Age or The Sydney Morning Herald.

The global COVID 19 virus, which has been simmering intensely since it first emerged in in early January, this week boiled over. The infection rate in other parts of the world has overtaken the growth inside China, where it started. Stock markets around the world have plunged. And Australian authorities are now talking worst-case scenarios. How worried should we be? And if there’s an outbreak in Australia how prepared are we? On this week's Please Explain episode, Tory Maguire is joined by Sydney Morning Herald Health Editor Kate Aubusson to answer all of our Coronavirus questions. And later on in the episode, Europe Correspondent Bevan Shields who is in Italy, comes to us from the near deserted Venice to tell us about life inside the “red zone”. Become a subscriber Our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe to The Age or The Sydney Morning Herald.

A decision by the High Court last week not to deport two men of aboriginal descent has set a precedent in recognising that the Indigenous connection to this land is bigger than citizenship. So what does this mean for future cases and will our constitution need to change? On this week’s episode of Please Explain, Sydney Morning Herald editor, Lisa Davies talks to Peter Hartcher about the legal implications of last week’s high court ruling. Also, journalist Stan Grant will share his feelings on this landmark decision. And later on in the episode, journalists Ella Archibald-Binge and Rhett Wyman will talk about the Dalarinji Project and share some of the stories they have discovered so far. You can get in touch with the team: pleaseexplain@theage.com.au or pleaseexplain@smh.com.au Become a subscriber Our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe to The Age or The Sydney Morning Herald.

It may be only the middle of February but it feels like a year’s worth of news has already occupied the halls of parliament house in Canberra. From the fires to the Coronavirus, sports rorts and Banaby Joyce’s thwarted comeback - there hasn’t been much space for long term agendas during the first parliamentary sitting period of 2020. On this week's episode of Please Explain, David Crowe and Stephanie Peatling join Tory Maguire to dissect the first six weeks of 2020 for the Government and what it means for the year ahead. Become a subscriber Our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe to The Age or The Sydney Morning Herald.

In the wake of the bushfire crisis, journalist from the Age, Rachael Dexter noticed a small 2018 story was being reshared across the globe... as part of a climate denial movement. In this feature episode of Please Explain, Chris Zappone examine the spread of misinformation and disinformation and its larger implications. Also joining Chris is Buzzfeed's Cameron Wilson who compiled a list of bushfire misinformation that was being spread on social media.   Become a subscriber Our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe to The Age or The Sydney Morning Herald.

It’s been a massive week in American politics… From President Trump’s impeachment trial, to the Democratic primaries to Wednesday’s State of the Union address, a lot has happened in the space of just a few days. Welcome to season 3 of Please Explain. This week Tory Maguire talks to North American correspondent Matthew Knott to decode this past week in US Politics. Become a subscriber Our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe to The Age or The Sydney Morning Herald.

In this special episode of Please Explain, Sydney Morning Herald Health Reporter Rachel Clun sets out to seperate fact from fiction around the coronavirus based on what we know about this disease so far. Become a subscriber Our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe to The Age or The Sydney Morning Herald.

This week on Please Explain Tory Maguire talks to Peter Hannam and Laura Chung from the Sydney Morning Herald about lessons learnt from the east coast bushfires. How could we have been better prepared for this bushfire season and what could have been done differently? This is the last episode of the Climate Series special with Peter Hannam. Become a subscriber Our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe to The Age or The Sydney Morning Herald.

This week on Please Explain Chris Zappone talks to Peter Hannam and Laura Chung from the Sydney Morning Herald about how devastating these bushfires have been on Australia's flora and fauna. But from these images of destruction, the tide is turning and public opinion is changing. Just this week, an Ipsos poll found that the environment is the biggest issue confronting and worrying Australians. Become a subscriber Our supporters power our newsrooms and are critical for the sustainability of news coverage. Becoming a subscriber also gets you exclusive behind-the-scenes content and invitations to special events. Click on the links to subscribe to The Age or The Sydney Morning Herald.