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School’s gaming champs
Garad-CEO standoff
Grand hall memories
Hallam’s first triumph
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SPORT
Premier visits Premier Jacinta Allan was warmly greeted by Dandenong MP Gabrielle Williams during a visit to Wallarano Primary School on Tuesday 2 September. Earlier that day, her press conference was gatecrashed by a neo-Nazi and a storm brewed over ex-Premier Daniel Andrews’s photo opp at a Beijing military parade. Meeting the school’s breakfast club friendly volunteers, staff and students must have seemed an oasis. More on the stories, turn to pages 6, 7 and 9
(Stewart Chambers: 499654)
Overdose impact Drastic action is being urged to curb soaring deaths in drug overdose hotspots such as Greater Dandenong. Among the possible solutions are medicallysupervised injecting to arrest the devastating death toll across Australia – more than twice the national road toll, experts say. In the five years 2019-’23, 94 have died in unintended overdoses in Greater Dandenong – the third highest council area in the state behind Geelong and Brimbank, according to a recent Penington Institute paper. The Greater Dandenong toll had risen 62 per
cent in a decade. Penington Institute CEO John Ryan said: “Much like we’ve adopted an ambitious ‘towards zero’ approach to aggressively pushing down the road toll, Australia must now embrace a similarly uncompromising push to stop overdose deaths.” According to a recent state coroner’s report, more harm-reduction measures were required to curb a 10-year high in overdose deaths involving illegal drugs in 2024. Greater Dandenong featured the secondmost fatal overdoses involving methamphetamine in the past decade (73), and the fifth most
involving heroin (114). Turning Point clinical director Shalini Arunogiri said the “devastating numbers reflect significant gaps in our healthcare response”. Medically supervised injecting rooms were a “really effective, evidence-based way to reduce overdose deaths”. “Many areas could benefit from services like these. “It can be a complex decision considering where to situate facilities to achieve the best outcomes for the community, and it depends on
what they’re aiming to achieve. “These services should be accessible and built to meet community needs, both in terms of location and opening hours.“ Victorian Alcohol and Drug Association chief executive Chris Christoforou also called for more medically supervised injecting in high-risk areas. “The continuing debate on the value of medically supervised injecting led by misinformed and stigmatising narratives has sadly stymied further support.” More on the story, turn to page 2
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