Our Team

Natasha Robinson is The Australian’s health editor and writes across medicine, science, health policy, research, and lifestyle. Natasha has been a journalist for more than 20 years in newspapers and broadcasting, has been recognised as the National Press Club’s health journalist of the year and is a Walkley awards finalist and a Kennedy Awards winner. She is a former Northern Territory correspondent for The Australian with a special interest in Indigenous health. Natasha is also a graduate of the NSW Legal Profession Admission Board’s Diploma of Law and has been accepted as a doctoral candidate at QUT’s Australian Centre for Health Law Research, researching involuntary mental health treatment and patient autonomy.

Natasha Robinson

Latest

INQUIRERRelationships

Technology Play Space - Is it about time we moved beyond screen ‘time’? Picture: Supplied

The most damaging screen to kids’ development isn’t smartphones

Even if it’s simply running in the background in a room, TV can be damaging for children.

Natasha Robinson

EXCLUSIVEPolitics

2024, Sydney, NSW. Reverend Bill Crews speaks to the major gap in Australia's mental health support at the Bill Crews Foundation in Ashfield. Photo: Bianca Farmakis

Mental health funds ‘spent in wrong places’

The federal government’s priorities in mental health have come under heavy criticism as money is poured into programs that ‘lack efficacy and do not warrant public funding’.

Natasha Robinson

‘disaster’Nation

A pregnant woman in the hospital delivery room with a IV drip. Childbirth and contractions.

Emergency alert over IV bag shortfall

Stores of IV drip bags have been almost completely depleted in hospitals around the country this week as hospitals move to ‘disaster’ footing.

Natasha Robinson and Joanna Panagopoulos

EXCLUSIVEMedical

MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA - August 07, 2024:, Researchers Professor Anne-Louise Ponsonby (left) and Dr Wah Chin Boon photographed at the University of Melbourne. Picture: Nadir Kinani / The Australian

Experts call for regulation of plastics linked to autism

Medical experts have called for an overhaul of plastics regulation in Australia as growing evidence indicates that neuroendocrine-disrupting chemicals are linked with the development of autism.

Natasha Robinson

EXCLUSIVEScience

Study co-authors Wah Chin Boon, left, and Anne-Louise Ponsonby of the Florey Institute. Inset: The effect of plastic chemical bisphenol A on the body, showing decreased spine density (red dots) and shortened neurites. Picture: Nadir Kinani

Autism detectives link plastics chemical in mother’s womb to spectrum disorder

Boys with lower levels of a key brain enzyme who are born to mothers that have higher levels of plastic chemicals in their wombs are six times more likely to develop autism by the time they are a teenager, a world-first Australian study has found.

Natasha Robinson

exclusiveMedical

woman have bladder or uti pain sitting on bed in bedroom after wake up feeling so illness,Healthcare concept

‘Chronic UTI must be better treated’

The nation’s medical leaders have united to call for the recognition of chronic urinary tract infection amid widespread evidence that thousands of women are being misdiagnosed and undertreated.

Natasha Robinson

EXCLUSIVEHealth

Image that depicts NTRK gene fusion that acts as an ignition switch for tumour growth. Photo: Supplied

New frontier in fighting the cause of cancer

A groundbreaking pan-tumour pharmaceutical – that can act upon multiple different tumour types – has been publicly funded in Australia and is set to offer hope to thousands of terminally ill patients.

Natasha Robinson

exclusiveHealth

12th JULY 2022. Ambulances entry at St Vincent's Hospital in Darlinghurst.Photo by Damian Shaw

Health system ‘at crisis tipping point’

Australia’s health system is at a tipping point, with patients unable to afford basic care, hospitals critically overloaded, and a tide of chronic disease threatening to overwhelm all parts of the system.

Natasha Robinson

costsHealth

Keely Lister. The 31 year old Cairns mum had to fly 1,700 km to the Gold Coast to give birth to her son Archie after the only private,maternity service in Cairns closed. SUPPLIED

Doctors’ fees to blame for maternity shutdowns: insurers

Private insurers are blaming obstetricians’ high fees for the nation’s maternity crisis amid predictions private birthing will be ‘extinct by 2030’.

Natasha Robinson

exclusiveNation

Private maternity ‘extinct by 2030’ because of ward closures

Health insurance is being rendered useless for thousands of families who took out top cover, as maternity ward closures and enormous out of pockets render a private birth impossible.

Natasha Robinson

Original URL: https://www.theaustralian.com.au/author/natasha-robinson/page/15