Well into the third year since a little-known virus emerged and changed everyday lives across the world, COVID-19 continues to add pressure to our health system.
Australians with the condition known as "Long COVID" are faced with months-long waiting lists for clinics as cases rise in "sobering" projections.
A University of NSW study estimated Long COVID affects about 5 per cent of people who contract COVID-19.
On current daily rates, that translates to 1300 new Long COVID cases a day, cardiologist and Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute Professor Jason Kovacic said.
"The projections are quite sobering," Professor Kovacic said.
"That's happening day-on-day, and it's possible that as people get exposed to second and third re-infections that 5 per cent might rise," he said.
Meanwhile, the true cost and failure of the former government's controversial and now dumped two-year contact-tracing initiative, the COVIDSafe app, has been revealed.
ACM can reveal the app, once described by Scott Morrison as the early "ticket" out of lockdowns and as essential as sun protection, cost Australian taxpayers $21 million to keep switched on since it was launched in April 2020.
Describing COVIDSafe as "wasteful and ineffective", Health Minister Mark Butler said the app found only two positive COVID-19 cases not found by manual contact tracers.
That works out to $10.5 million per case.
As well, the app only identified 17 close contacts that hadn't already been identified through manual contact tracing.
If the thought of that much money down the drain makes you reach for sweets in search of comfort, you may be disappointed.
The popular fruit-flavoured chews, snakes, jelly babies and more have started to disappear from supermarket shelves after Mars Wrigley stopped importing the lollies in recent months.
A Mars Wrigley spokesperson said the decision was made in an effort to focus more on products made in Australia.
Photos of the often brutal reality of nature have emerged from the NSW South Coast over the weekend.
A daring seal took onlookers by surprise with its calculated attack on a Maori octopus, the largest octopus species in southern Australia.
The spectacular scene was captured by photographer Sophia Quach, who was aboard a whale-watching cruise at Eden on Saturday.
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- 'Failed' COVIDSafe phone app scrapped
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- Share your tribute to Australia's sweetheart Olivia Newton-John
- Iconic lolly discontinued in Australia