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The aim of this paper is to outline the impact Coronavirus disease (COVID)-19 has had on health research in New Zealand. We used data from the University of Otago, Christchurch, a research intensive satellite campus of the University of Otago with a large number of research only grant funded staff to highlight challenges and opportunities. All non-COVID-19 related laboratory and clinical research was suspended under New Zealand COVID-19 alert level 4 and the majority under level 3. To date, researchers predict that 95% of research projects have been affected. During the periods of lockdown research salaries continued to be paid from grants resulting in a 'salary gap' to support research staff (both academic and technical). Most funders have indicated there will be no additional funding to support researchers affected by the delays. Early and mid-career researchers have been particularly affected and are currently unable to travel for post-doctoral training and networking. A more robust career structure with adequate funding, particularly for early and mid-career researchers is required to ensure that New Zealand has a stable research work force to address the next health crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In March 2019, a mass shooting at two Christchurch mosques, livestreamed to Facebook, resulted in the deaths of 51 people. Psychologically, this served as a focusing event with high threat salience, shocking a country unused to gun violence despite its comparatively lax firearm legislation. The unprecedented reluctance by the New Zealand media to feature the shooter as a protagonist or even publish his name, concentrating instead on victims and societal issues, helped promote a sense of collective responsibility for change. This was strongly modeled by political leaders. Within weeks, new gun control laws were introduced with bipartisan support. We present this as a national case study, considering psychological and societal enablers for legislative reform in response to extreme gun violence. The shooting also raised the intractable problem of the internet allowing terrorists to promulgate violent content and extremist ideology with regulation in this area harder to achieve than gun control. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On 15 March 2019, Brenton Tarrant destroyed New Zealand's perception of its low threat terrorist risk. Security sector practitioners interviewed for this study before 15 March spoke about the challenges of performing counter terrorism roles in that low threat environment. Their perceptions revealed a fear that terrorist attacks occurring overseas, would sooner or later occur in New Zealand. Their roles were complicated by an overarching sense of social, bureaucratic and political complacency toward the threat of terrorism. They perceived legislative inertia, which fettered the powers and resources agencies had to effectively act against the risks they believed were present. Despite these barriers, security sector agencies continued to look for possible emerging threats across a spectrum of risk, but relied on improvised use of existing legislation to manage it. This was more effective against those motivated by militant jihadism, and as Tarrant demonstrated, less so against other threats. Community engagement was needed and successfully achieved, although difficulties were observed which need to be addressed, and the media was perceived as having an undue influence over New Zealand's security priorities, highlighting the need for a national counter terrorism strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Medical education provides a locus to apply the principles of social justice to advocate for indigenous health inequities. Within the education field, social accountability measures have been used to increase equity. This study uses a social accountability lens to explore the perspectives and experiences of academic and clinical leaders, students, and patients engaged with the Hauora Māori curriculum at the University of Otago Christchurch. Using Kaupapa Māori research as a theoretical framework, and drawing on qualitative analysis, three themes were identified; horopaki/contexts, mihini/mechanisms and tukunga iho/outcomes. These three themes described the activities, enablers and mechanisms that identified the Hauora Māori curriculum as a method for achieving social accountability among Māori communities, medical education, and health services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 2010 Darfi eld earthquake caused extensive damage to a number of unreinforced masonry buildings. While this damage to important heritage buildings was the largest natural disaster to occur in New Zealand since the 1931 Hawke's Bay earthquake, the damage was consistent with projections for the scale of this earthquake, and indeed even greater damage might have been expected. In general, the nature of damage was consistent with observations previously made on the seismic performance of unreinforced masonry buildings in large earthquakes, with aspects such as toppled chimneys and parapets, failure of gables and poorly secured face-loaded walls, and in-plane damage to masonry frames all being extensively documented. This report on the performance of the unreinforced masonry buildings in the 2010 Darfi eld earthquake provides details on typical building characteristics, a review of damage statistics obtained by interrogating the building assessment database that was compiled in association with post-earthquake building inspections, and a review of the characteristic failure modes that were observed. It was observed that structures that had been seismically retrofi tted appeared to perform well, with further study now required to better document the successful performance of these retrofi t solutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]