The Queensland Government is being urged to fund more mental health positions as a 90 per cent increase in emergency department presentations have been reported.

Queensland doctors are also reporting a 30 per cent spike in people seeing their GPs for mental health problems.

Queensland Health says it will be providing $46.5 million as part of a Mental Health and Wellbeing Community Package.

However, Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists' Queensland branch chair Professor Brett Emmerson says it is a drop in the ocean of what was needed.

Allegations of sexual and physical assault within the New South Wales Rural Fire Service ranks have been referred to police.

More than a dozen RFS volunteers made claims on facebook of sexual assault, bullying, harassment and physical violence within RFS ranks.

RFS Commissioner Rob Roger says these matters have been referred to NSW Police for their attention.

The population of the critically endangered regent honeyeater bird has dropped so low that  experts say young birds are failing to learn their own bird song.

Research from the Australian National University (ANU) says with no adult birds around to teach them, some juvenile regent honeyeaters had taken to copying the songs of other species.

Regent honeyeaters are found from northern Victoria to southern Queensland.

Congresswoman Deb Haaland has won Senate confirmation to lead President Biden’s Interior Department, making her the first Native American cabinet official in history.

As Interior secretary, Haaland will be tasked with overseeing nearly 500 million acres of federal lands, including regulating drilling and other fossil fuel activities on them. 

Congresswoman Haaland is a member of the Laguna Pueblo Native American tribe in new Mexico.

A turtle first documented by Steve Irwin could be facing extinction due to plans to build a dam. 

The Urannah Dam, proposed by the federal government, will flood the Urannah and Massey Creeks and will destroy the turtle’s habitat. 

The species, named Elseya irwini, was photographed by Steve and his father, Bob Irwin in 1990 during a fishing trip and  confirmed as a new species three years later.

Round 6 of the Queensland Feral Pest Initiative is set to go ahead with 1.4 million dollars worth of grants being given to rural pest control programs.

Minister for Rural Communities Mark Furner said “there is also funding to continue coordinated ten eighty baiting programs.”

Ten eighty baits are specifically used to kill wild dogs. However, a 2019 study by the University of New South Wales found that almost all wild dogs in NSW are dingoes or dingo-dominant hybrids.

PM Scott Morrison announces the distribution of eight thousands doses of COVID-19 vaccine to Papua New Guinea while the government will suspend flights between Port Moresby and Cairns.

PNG records about a hundred cases a day and a half of the 500 tests conducted by Queensland facilities for PNG on Monday came back positive.

Foreign Minister Marise Payne says the 8000 vaccine doses will fill a critical gap in PNG’s vaccine program which awaits delivery of further vaccines through COVAX.

Australia’s Race Discrimination Comissioner is calling the federal government to back an anti-racism framework to be implemented nationally. 

Chin Tan says he is deeply troubled by a recent resurgence in racism both in Australia and nationally and it's time to approach the problem in the same way we look at issues like domestic violence. 

The federal government has not funded a national anti-racism campaign since 2015. 

People on JobSeeker and the community sector are calling on Parliament to stop cuts to JobSeeker and Parenting Payment in Parliament House today.

Australian Council of Social Service are calling for the base rate in the JobSeeker bill to increase by at least $65 a day which they claim will keep it above the poverty line and ensure it delivers on gender equality and justice for First Nations peoples.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison previously announced a 43 dollar a fortnight increase.  The legislation will be voted on this week.

Brazil’s newest health minister says he intends to continue implementing far-right President Jair Bolsonaro’s policies.

Cardiologist Marcelo Queirogar is the country’s fourth health minister since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Brazil has reported 11.5 million COVID-19 cases and more than 279,000 people deaths to date.