The Breakthrough In Coeliac Testing & Understanding Port Arthur's Legacy

Imagine a world where diagnosing coeliac disease didn't involve getting sick on purpose. Turns out we might be one step closer to that reality.

Plus, nearly three decades on we finally now know why Martin Bryant unleashed terror on the small Tasmanian town of Port Arthur. 

And in headlines today Harvey Weinstein has again been found guilty on one of the sexual assault charges he's facing at his New York retrial, one charge still has the jury divided; Tasmania will head to the polls on July 19 after the state's governor granted Premier Jeremy Rockliff's request for a snap election following his no confidence vote loss; Elon Musk is walking back some of the comments he made about Donald Trump last week; Beach Boys co-founder Brian Wilson has died age 82

LISTEN: What Really Happened At Port Arthur: A Survivor's Story

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CREDITS

Hosts: Claire Murphy & Taylah Strano

Guest: Dr Mariam Chaalan, GP & Cohost of WELL.

Audio Producer: Lu Hill 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:10):
You're listening to a Muma Mea podcast. Mumma Mea acknowledges
the traditional owners of land and waters that this podcast
is recorded on.

Speaker 2 (00:21):
Hey, I'm Taylor Strano. This is Mumma MIA's twice daily
news podcast, The Quickie. Other researchers have developed a world
first test that could revolutionize how we diagnose Celiac disease
without making people sick in the process. Plus, after twenty
nine years, leaked psychiatric reports have finally revealed why Martin

(00:41):
Bryant carried out the Port Arthur massacre. Before we get there,
here's Claire Murphy with the latest from the Quickie newsroom
for Thursday, June.

Speaker 1 (00:49):
Twelve, Thanks Taylor. Former movie exec Harvey Weinstein has again
been found guilty of some of the sexual assault charges
he was again facing in his New York retrial, as
he made an unusual request to address the court himself.
Weinstein was first convicted five years ago, but the conviction
was overturned last year and the case sent back for
a retrial in the Manhattan court. The mostly female jury

(01:11):
found Weinstein guilty on one of the top charges of
forcibly subjecting Miriam Hayley to a criminal sexual act in
two thousand and six, but acquitted him of another charge
of forcible oral sex brought by Caius Scola. As they
remain unable to reach a verdict on the third charge,
Weinstein accused of raping Jessica Man. The jury four person
asked to speak to the judge, explaining that he didn't

(01:32):
want to change his position on the third charge, but
felt he was being bullied, indicating one of the other
jurors had said comments along the lines of I'll meet
you outside one day, the four persons saying there had
been a lot of yelling and screaming. The now seventy
three year old Weinstein denies sexually assaulting or raping anyone.
Before any verdict was reached, he asked to address the court, saying,

(01:54):
my life is on the line, and you know what,
it's not fair. He went on to say, it's time,
it's time, it's time, it's time to say this trial
is over. Tasmanians will go to the polls on July nineteen,
after the state's governor granted Premier Jeremy rockley gif's request
for a snap election following his no confidence vote loss.
The election will be Tasmanius fourth in the past seven years. Rockliffe,

(02:17):
who was returned to power in minority at the last
election back in March last year, has refused to step
down after the no confidence vote put forward by Labour,
vowing to come back stronger after this election. The Liberals
have been empowering Tasmania since twenty fourteen, presigning over worsening debt,
which is tipped to more than double to almost eleven
billion by twenty twenty eight twenty nine. There's also been

(02:39):
concerns over the delays and cost blowouts in the delivery
of two new Bastrait Service ferries. There are fears this
election will derail the license bied for Tasmania's first AFL team.
Part of the condition for being granted the license is
to build a new stadium as the Devil's Home Ground,
a bill that is supported by both the Liberals and Labor,
but opposed by the Greens and several crossbenchers who all

(03:01):
voted against Rockliffe to force this election. Elon Musk is
walking back some of the inflammatory comments he is made
about President Donald Trump, saying he went too far. Mask
has been working for the Trump administration as head of
the Department of Government Efficiency after donating hundreds of millions
of dollars to the Trump campaign. However, when his role
came to an end, it seemed the relationship between the

(03:22):
pair began to sour, with Musk throwing accusations at Trump
on his social media platform and Trump responding with threats,
including to cut all of Musk's government contracts. Musk deleted
a post that claimed the government was concealing evidence that
Trump was involved in the Jeffrey Epstein child sex trafficking ring,
but he also called Trump's Big Beautiful Spending Bill and

(03:42):
abomination and claimed credit for Trump getting elected. Trump then
suggesting that if Musk chose to throw his money behind
the Democrats instead of his Republicans, he would face serious consequences.
Mask has now posted on social media that he regrets
some of his posts about President Trump last week, saying
they went too far. The genius behind iconic songs like

(04:03):
Good Vibrations, Surfin USA and California Girls Beach Boy co
founder Brian Wilson has died aged eighty two. Wilson had
been suffering from dementia and was unable to care for himself,
his family placing him under a conservatorship in twenty twenty four,
after his wife Melinda passed away. A statement from his
family said they were at a loss for words and

(04:23):
realized that they will be sharing this grief with the world.
They did not disclose Wilson's cause of death. Brian Wilson
was the eldest of the three brothers who formed the
band in nineteen sixty one. They, along with their cousin
and a school friend, played in their garage until their
debut single, Surfin, created waves. Their second studio album, Surf
and Safari, rocketed them to start im in nineteen sixty three.

(04:45):
They've since sold more than one hundred million albums worldwide.
Brian was the last surviving brother. Dennis drowned in nineteen
eighty three and Carl died from lung cancer in nineteen
ninety eight.

Speaker 2 (04:56):
Thanks Claire Next a breakthrough for siliac testing. What if
I told you getting a celiac disease diagnosis no longer
included making potential patients sick on purpose. Well, a new
world first blood test might just be the ticket for

(05:17):
more than three hundred and fifty thousand Australians living with
coeliac disease. Getting diagnosed has always meant making themselves deliberately sick,
but now researchers at Melbourne's Water and Eliza Whole Institute
have developed a simple blood test that can diagnose the
condition without requiring patients to eat gluten. Coeliac disease is

(05:37):
an autoimmune condition where your body reacts badly to gluten,
the protein that's found in wheat, barley, and rye. Basically,
eating gluten damages you're small intestine and can we be
feeling pretty awful think floating, fatigue and gut issues. Okay,
so before we toss out the old for the new,
well co host and GP doctor Mariam explains how we

(05:59):
currently diagnose coeliac disease.

Speaker 3 (06:02):
Traditionally, if we suspect someone has Celiac's disease, we'd start
with a blood test looking for certain antibodies, but that
it was just the warm up. If they came back positive,
it need to have a gastroscopy, which is a fancy
a of saying we'd pop a camera down your throat
and take a little bilbcy from your small intestine. Not
exactly anyone's idea of fun, especially for your little ones.

Speaker 1 (06:25):
But here's the real kicker.

Speaker 3 (06:26):
You had to be eating a decent amount of gluten,
so think about two slices of bread a day for
weeks beforehand. That's what we call the gluten challenge. So
if gluten made you feel like crap, you had to
keep eating it just to get a diagnosis. And for
a lot of people, especially kids, that was pretty confronting
and put them off getting tested at all.

Speaker 2 (06:46):
So what is this new test potentially promising?

Speaker 3 (06:49):
This is where it gets exciting. Aussie researchers have developed
a world first blood test that's a real game changer.
Unlike the old tests, you don't need to be eating
gluten for this one to work, so no more gluten
challenges making you feel sick. They take a sample of
your blood and mix it with gluten in our test shoops,
So if you've got Celiac's disease, your immune systems tea

(07:10):
will react to the gluten and the test picks up
on that. It's super accurate, even for people who have
already gone gluten free. So just a simple blood test
with a.

Speaker 2 (07:19):
New test on the horizon, this could be a game
changer for patients. As doctor Mariam explains, the traditional diagnose
its process was actually putting a lot of people off.

Speaker 3 (07:29):
I've seen plenty of patients who couldn't face the gluten
challenge or the thought of a biopsy through gastroscopy. Some
even went gluten free on their own, which made it
even triggier to get a proper diagnosis down the track.

Speaker 2 (07:41):
So with a new potentially faster path to identifying Celiac disease,
doctor Mariam is hopeful it'll also stop the flow and
effects of the autoimmune condition.

Speaker 3 (07:51):
This means people can get diagnosed and start feeling better
much sooner. Plaster encourage more people to get tested, and
so we'll catch a lot more cases that it would
have otherwise slipped through the cracks. And let's not forget
getting the right diagnosis is so important. Celia disease isn't
just about gut symptoms. If left untreated, it can lead
to serious long term issues like osteoporosis, infertility, and even

(08:12):
some cancers. So this new test isn't just convenient, it
could actually save lives. It's a massive win for patient care.
I reckon or make a real difference for lots of
ossis living with Celiac's disease.

Speaker 2 (08:28):
The horror of the Port Arthur massacre has left a
scar on Australia's history, affecting major changes to our gun
control laws.

Speaker 1 (08:36):
The primes to John Howard Tonight detailed sweeping plans to
reform Australia's national gun.

Speaker 2 (08:41):
Laws, becoming the subject of a feature film, I.

Speaker 3 (08:46):
Know your friends are You have to promise me, I
can't keep on.

Speaker 2 (08:51):
All the time Forever Etched into the dark history of
a small Tasmanian town.

Speaker 3 (08:57):
With the dead outnumbering the survivors two to one, there
aren't many who can tell police exactly what happened. Those
who can are told of how they'll be haunted by
their narrow escapes.

Speaker 2 (09:07):
Now, newly leaked psychiatric reports have finally revealed the why
why Martin Bryant carried out one of Australia's deadliest mass shootings.
Before we get there, a reminder of how the events
of April twenty eighth, nineteen ninety six, played out, Bryant
killed thirty five people and wounded eighteen others at Tasmania's

(09:29):
Port Arthur historic site. The massacre began around midday when
Bryant murdered David and Noline Martin at their seatscape guesthouse.
He then drove to Port Arthur, where he open fired
in the Broad Arrow Cafe around one point thirty in
the afternoon, before continuing his rampage across the site. According
to the reports, Bryant's original plan was to murder the

(09:51):
Martins over their refusal to sell his family their bed
and breakfast. He told psychiatrist Paul Mullen that he decided
to kill a few more people because well, it wouldn't
make any difference now. Bryant remains in Hobart's Risden Prison,
serving thirty five life sentences plus one thousand, six hundred
and fifty two years without parole. He's currently fifty eight

(10:16):
years old. The massacre led to John Howard's government introducing
the National Firearms Agreement just twelve days later. It dramatically
restricted access to automatic and semi automatic weapons across the country.
If you want to learn more about the event, our
True Crime Conversations podcast actually look back on what happened

(10:36):
that day. Hearing from one of the survivors of the massacre.

Speaker 1 (10:40):
The next few nights, I actually had a dream of
him running after me with the gun, hunting me down.
So that was a really horrible nightmare.

Speaker 2 (10:48):
There'll be a link to that episode in our show notes.
Thanks for taking some time to feed your mind with
us today. The quickie is produced by Me, Taylor Strano,
and Claire Murphy, with audio production by Lou Hill Mum
of MIAs Studios. Are styled with furniture from Fenton and Fenton.
Visit Fenton and Fenton dot com dot au.