The Australian Bite

When the river runs dry

26 November 2009

Listen and download: MP3

This week on the Australian Bite, what do you do when your river’s about to run dry?  We meet two rural Australians who are facing that prospect.  With World AIDS Day coming up this Tuesday 1st December, we take a look at how rural health services are coping with the growing number of people with HIV who are living in regional areas.  And finally we meet the policeman who decided to spend his long service leave break in a very unusual way – shearing sheep!

Drought hits hard for small town farmers

Booligal is a small town in the New South Wales Riverina that relies on the Lachlan River for its water supply. However that water is expected to dry up in the next four to eight weeks because the NSW State Government has decided to restrict water flows into the Lachlan River in a bid to ensure sufficient water for major towns upstream. Emergency bores will be drilled at Booligal and surrounding downstream towns, but they may not be sunk before the water completely runs out. Matt and Sandra Iresonrun 200 head of beef cattle near Booligal, and they speak with Alison Carabine about the impact of the river running dry.

Read an update on this story here at the ABC Rural website

Map of Booligal, NSW

HIV in regional Australia

Earlier this month, a panel of experts called for the federal government to make urgent changes to the way HIV is addressed in this country- saying there was a danger of new epidemics, especially within indigenous communities.   At the same time, greater numbers of people with HIV are choosing to live outside the major city centres – mainly for lifestyle reasons. So what are the implications for the rural and regional health services? Darren Russell is director of the Cairns Sexual Health Service in Northern Queensland, and President of the Australasian Chapter of the Sexual Health Service. Olga Vujovic is from the HIV consultancy clinic at the Alfred Hospital in Melbourne. They spoke with Michael Cathcart.

Tuesday 1 December is World AIDS Day

Cop takes a “hard” earned break

If you were to take three months long service leave, what would you do with the time off?  Travel overseas? Catch up with family and friends? Or go out shearing sheep?  Sergeant Rick Grimes from the South Australian Police has elected to do the latter.  Tim Marshall had a chat with him to find out why.  

Music (not in podcast)

The seventh season of Australian Idol has just wrapped up, and the big winner was 19 year old Stan Walker. Stan, who is of Maori heritage, was born in Australia and grew up both here and in New Zealand. Before Idol he was working as a shop assistant in Queensland, but now he’s hoping that he can emulate the success of former Australian idol winner, Guy Sebastian, whom he greatly admires. This is Stan’s first single.

Artist: Stan Walker

Track: Black Box