I BELIEVE the tragic death of rugby league player Joel Dark from a head-knock shows that we need to change contact sport rules regarding protective equipment ('Heartbreak', Newcastle Herald 12/9).
Although rugby league is a contact sport, no player wants to receive a head knock as a result of a tackle. Most players would hesitate to deliberately tackle an opponent high or so that his head hits the ground. What you dish up, you receive back from your opponents.
Head knocks are impossible to avoid given the speed of the game, but since rugby league and rugby union have become aware they are serious referees have enforced stricter rules regarding high tackles and shoulder charges. There are now tighter rules regarding head injury assessment.
In the modern game most players eschew protective equipment such as shoulder pads and old style ankle-protecting boots since these items inhibit mobility on the field, but perhaps it is time to mandate helmets, à la American football. These may inhibit on-field communication between players, and they may not protect players against long-term brain injury caused by jolting tackles. But perhaps at least they may protect players against short-term concussion and the sort of injury suffered by Joel Dark.
Geoff Black, Caves Beach
An unforgettable difference
I'd like to pay tribute to Marge Sidonio who recently passed away.
My daughter Elizabeth was born in 1979 and was diagnosed immediately with a severe form of spina bifida. After cat scans etc we were informed that she had virtually no brain tissue and would be profoundly retarded and disabled. At six weeks she was sent home to die. We were all devastated.
About eight weeks old a friend suggested we take her to the Early Intervention Class at the Special Education Centre at the uni where we met Marge, the teacher of the baby program. I was so sad and depressed going in for the first time but coming out after our interview I felt so uplifted and happy for the first time since her birth. Marge never promised us anything, but what she did give us was exercises to teach her the most basic movements such as turning her head, and some hope. I left that building on cloud nine and was so happy because there wasn't one negative comment, just positive tips and clues for helping our baby. What a turn around. I will always be grateful to Marge; I felt, and still do, that she saved my life.
Professor Phil Foreman and Marge Sidonio advocated for her to enrol in the baby class when her paediatrician said that it would be a waste of their time and mine for her to attend as she couldn't possibly learn anything.
Eventually he conceded and we attended twice a week for over four years, achieving and learning so much, making many friends with other parents and kids. I loved the time we had there; everyone was so supporting and encouraging.
Elizabeth passed away eight years ago, aged 33. She had a full happy life; she was very sociable and loved her music. I'd like Marge's family to know that she was a beautiful, unique lady and I will never forget her.
Patsy Osborne, Raymond Terrace
Local discounts if we buy it here
I THINK Les Field (Letters, 1/9) misses one very important point in his defence of the NSW Transport Contracts and that is that even if it is a little more costly, initially, to have trains, buses, trams and ferries built in Australia, the benefit to the local economy is many fold with money from the main contractor going to local suppliers and wages being spent locally as well. In addition, we might get trains with reversible seats (so people with motion sickness issues do not have to face backwards), trains that can negotiate local tracks safely and ferries that allow all passengers to fit safely under bridges. So, it may just be a bit more than "being competitive" initially.
John Pritchard, Blackalls Park
Inaction hastened COVID tragedy
As an older person, I have a lot of time on my hands. I only play golf two days a week, so I have been following the debates on the neglect of the aged. It's personal.
The interim report of the royal commission last October urgently pointed out the very obvious need to prevent the continuing neglect and abuse of the aged and made strong recommendations. The Prime Minister decided that he would take no action on the interim report until he got the final report in 2021, ignoring the urgent requests.
I believe this cruel refusal to take action has resulted in hundreds of my fellow aged dying unnecessary and lonely deaths. In my opinion Mr Morrison's inaction has hastened their deaths by not having any plan to deal with the effect of the pandemic in care homes.
I have been a community activist all my working life, for which I was awarded an OAM, and I know so many older people who have spent many years in similar volunteer work running sports and community clubs. Aged people have every right to expect, now that we are in need of care, the society we helped to build would give us the care we gave to our children in their first years.
If the aged believed it was our sole responsibility to make money, as appears to be the PM's belief, our society would cease to function because the free work by the retired aged is what keeps our society going. Mr Morrison, give us your compassion and care in our final years. A recent report on 7.30 revealed that the present private care system is only competing to see who can extract the greatest amount out of the funds allocated for our care, not in providing care.
Frank Ward, Shoal Bay
Days go by but lockdown lives on
DOES anyone watch the regular 11am TV daily updates on the COVID-19 lockdown in Victoria given by Premier Daniel Andrews? There have been five months of these. I've watched many of them, but I have lost count as they all blur into repetition day after day. The numbers change, but the story and clever avoidance of difficult questions remains the same; a sort of COVID Groundhog Day.
Lockdowns were originally meant to be a short, sharp break in community transmission so that medical authorities could catch their breath, so to speak. Instead, after five months, it has become a way of life. It seems as if people are being continually punished for a crime they have never committed. Businesses have gone broke; people have lost jobs, state borders closed, health services cancelled and families divided.
There is no obvious exit strategy to all of this. Our leaders say we're all in this together but with senior bureaucrats and premiers on secure salaries, some of us are more in it than others. Does anyone really care?
Peter Devey, Merewether
It's not purely about life and death
IT'S not the deaths we are trying to stop from COVID-19 in Australia. It's the years of misery you get from getting COVID-19.
Peter Selmeci, Murrays Beach
SHARE YOUR OPINION
Email letters@newcastleherald.com.au or send a text message to 0427 154 176 (include name and suburb). Letters should be fewer than 200 words. Short Takes should be fewer than 50 words. Correspondence may be edited and reproduced in any form.
SHORT TAKES
IF you want our children to become reasonably normal, start now and make schools a mobile-free zone for six hours a day. They will not be influenced by the continual stream of unimportant stuff that fills their lives at present. Teachers cannot teach because of this constant disruption every day in the class. To teach we waste so much time enforcing the school rules that quite frankly this is taking up most of the learning time. Get the kids off the waste-of-time devices and then they may have a chance of working out what is real.
Ian Reynolds, Forster
I THINK there should be far more traditional owners of Australia represented in government. The Indigenous people of Australia have a much better understanding of the land and how it should be managed. We should rely on their expertise whilst planning our future bushfire strategy. They wouldn't be logging into sensitive forests, nor would they be destroying the habitat of precious koalas, one of our national icons that is now well on the way to extinction. The Indigenous community can teach us a lifetime of knowledge that would serve us very well.
Julia Riseley, Swansea
GOOD luck to Mark Latham ('Latham set to move to Hunter', NewcastleHerald 12/9) if he really expects to find a koala at Honeysuckle! Perhaps he's just being facetious.
Pat Scott, Arcadia Vale
ON 11 September 1967, the Herald reported that Indian and Chinese troops clashed on the border in the Himalayas. Now, 53 years later, they are still at it ('India and China to disengage troops on Himalayan border', Herald 12/9). We learn from history that we have not learned from history.
David Stuart, Merewether
IN the Disunited States of America, the COVID-19 responses are being handled by the states, because of lack of leadership at the federal level. Trump's contribution is to sling mud at the states that are doing well, and the Trump supporters are focused on demonstrating against the medical advice. Does this sound familiar? Australia is becoming more and more like the USA.
Peter Moylan, Glendale
MIKE Sargent (Letters, 15/9) your comment made me laugh too because you seem to be another one who refuses to delineate between those of us who understand that the planet is warming, and those who catastrophise the fact unnecessarily.
Greg Hunt, Newcastle West
IF the constitution allows it, I believe the prime minister should sack the Queensland premier now.
John Keen, Gateshead
DESPITE the criticism from Murdoch media, Scott Morrison and the Victorian Liberals on Dan Andrews, COVID numbers are coming down. That means Dan Andrews' plan is working better than no plan.
Col Page, Adamstown
THE POLLS
SHOULD state borders be redrawn?
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