Kerre Woodham Mornings Podcast Podcast By Newstalk ZB cover art

Kerre Woodham Mornings Podcast

Kerre Woodham Mornings Podcast

By: Newstalk ZB
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Join Kerre Woodham one of New Zealand’s best loved personalities as she dishes up a bold, sharp and energetic show Monday to Friday 9am-12md on Newstalk ZB. News, opinion, analysis, lifestyle and entertainment – we’ve got your morning listening covered.2025 Newstalk ZB Political Science Politics & Government
Episodes
  • Kerre Woodham: Beyond the headlines of the cancer report

    Kerre Woodham: Beyond the headlines of the cancer report
    Dec 11 2025
    Whenever I hear or read news headlines these days, I know that the headlines will be just that for so many people. Headlines. People won't hear or they won't read beyond the headline, and then they'll form their own opinions based on nothing more than 20 words or fewer. I've got numerous examples of that. Even people that I would have thought would understand the media, like journalists, they'll look at a headline and think, "Oh, you know, subscriber only, I'm not going to pay. I'm just going to draw my own conclusions from the headline," which they know is flawed and ridiculous. You have to read the body of the story. If you just go on the headline, then you are going to be misinformed. It's a bit like the cancer diagnosis headline that's in the news today. "Cancer diagnosis numbers set to skyrocket by 50% over the next two decades". As soon as I read that, I could write the text to this show myself. Example: Yeah, have a look at how many of them were vaxed. Join the dots, and variations on that theme. Or I could imagine people thinking, "Oh my god, cancer diagnoses are up. I'm going to die." Or putting my young activist cap on, Māori are around 1.6 times more likely to die from cancer than Pākehā or other ethnicities. So the young activists are like, "Yeah, that's right, man, institutional racism inherent in the system. Yeah. It's colonialism. That's what's causing that." In fact, when you look beyond the headlines, when you read beyond the headlines, there's actually a lot of good news in the story, if you are willing to take the time to read it or listen to the interviews. Since the first state of cancer report five years ago, there has been encouraging progress in key areas of prevention, early detection, and treatment. Cancer diagnoses might be skyrocketing, but that's because they've got better diagnostic tools. We can find it before it does the damage. The chance of surviving cancer has improved over the last 20 years. The five-year net survival for all cancers has improved by 15% in the last 20 years, probably due to the screening and the advances in treatment. And even better is the news that many, many of the cancers that afflict us can be prevented by us. We have the power to reduce our risk of some cancers, as Dr. Chris Jackson, Professor of Oncology at University of Otago and practising medical oncologist, explained to Heather du Plessis-Allan this morning. CJ: 20% of all cancers are related to smoking, 20%. So if you get rid of smoking, you would cut the number of cancers by 20%. So that is undisputed. HDPA: Even though the numbers are so small nowadays? CJ: Yeah, well, it's probably going to, certainly it is going down, but those people who've been smoking are still going to be going through the system for that amount of time. The number the number two cause is obesity. So New Zealand's what, the third most obese country in the world now, I think? And we're seeing a rise in some obesity-related cancers now also, and I think if we could fix that, that would be the other big thing in terms of prevention. The other key thing, which is a very New Zealand thing, is our love affair with the sun. And as we come into summer months, I think we have to reflect on the old slip, slop, slap thing. Australia has done the sun prevention thing better than we have, and our skin cancer rates are now higher than theirs. Absolutely. There are still many, many mysteries around cancers. There are cancer clusters within families, there are rising rates of healthy young people being diagnosed with bowel cancer. There is much work for cancer researchers to do. But they've also done a lot of work in the field of many cancers and have found the cause and effect. Smoking increases your risk of cancer, obesity increases your risk of cancer, ignoring sun warnings increases your risk of cancer. So we need to pay heed, if we want to. Make the changes you need to your lifestyle, you improve your chances of a healthy active life. Don't, get sick. Take advantage of the free buses that will take you to the free screening because early detection is the best prevention, or don't. And you'll pay the ultimate price. I mean, the headline, if you just simply looked at it, you could form your own conclusion. You could absolutely go off onto an interpretive dance of your own misinformation, your own prejudice, your own beliefs. Cancer diagnosis numbers set to skyrocket by 50% over the next two decades. In fact, beyond the headlines, there is so much good news in there. And one of the key messages I think that we need to take from it is the fact that we have a little bit of control and agency over our own lives, that it is not inevitable that we get cancer, we get sick and we die. There is much we can do to prevent it. Early detection is the best prevention. The treatments are good, provided you go along and you get the screenings, and you keep up to date with your health, you pay attention to your body,...
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    6 mins
  • Phil Lester: Victoria University Ecology and Entomology Professor on the efforts to stamp out yellow-legged hornets

    Phil Lester: Victoria University Ecology and Entomology Professor on the efforts to stamp out yellow-legged hornets
    Dec 10 2025

    Efforts to stamp out yellow-legged hornets in New Zealand are widening.

    Biodiversity New Zealand is expanding the 5-kilometre surveillance zone in Glenfield and Birkdale on Auckland's North Shore further out to 11-kilometres, to ensure only one population is at large.

    Victoria University Ecology and Entomology Professor Phil Lester told Kerre Woodham hornets target worker bees one by one and will hurt more than our honey sector.

    He says bees support our dairy, kiwifruit, and avocado industries, and if they get established it will be a real problem.

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    9 mins
  • Josie Spillane: Highlands Motorsport CEO on the Street Smart driving programme, lottery

    Josie Spillane: Highlands Motorsport CEO on the Street Smart driving programme, lottery
    Dec 10 2025

    The Street Smart programme is a hands-on, one-day driver training course for young drivers, teaching crucial real-world skills beyond basic testing, helping reduce road deaths across New Zealand.

    The course focuses on decision-making, hazard perception (like "rabbits" on the road), distraction management, peer pressure, and emergency manoeuvres in a controlled environment with professional coaches.

    Highlands Motorsport CEO Josie Spillane told Kerre Woodham they’re deeply committed to making generational and legislational change around driver training in New Zealand, but until they get to that point, they’re doing what they can to ensure young drivers have the tools to make key split-second decisions.

    The Trust has launched their first lottery to fund the programme, giving Kiwis the chance to win one of three 2025 Subaru WRXs, and go into the draw for three once-in-a-lifetime motorsport experiences.

    With only 10,000 tickets at $100 each, Spillane says the odds are better than Lotto, and help make a life-saving difference for youth on the roads.

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    6 mins
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