The Northern Territory is expecting more COVID-19 cases after an infected resident from a locked-down community fled to a nearby town.
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The woman and four others walked from Binjari Aboriginal community, 330km south of Darwin, to a nearby caravan park where they called a taxi.
It took them about 10km to the town of Katherine, where the group spent 12 hours, before police found them at a gathering of 11 people on Wednesday morning.
Meanwhile, those in NSW could soon find out if they are able to ditch wearing masks in shops next month.
The NSW COVID-19 cabinet sub-committee will meet on Thursday to consider if the mask mandate will be extended beyond December 15.
Staying in NSW and a Byron Bay hostel has been locked down.
More than 80 backpackers have been placed into a week-long lockdown after a guest tested positive to COVID-19.
The ARIA goes to...
Hip-hop artist Genesis Owusu has claimed four ARIAs, including Album of the Year, at the 2021 music awards.
The singer and rapper collected trophies on Wednesday including Best Hip Hop Release and Best Independent Release for his title Smiling With No Teeth. And, along with Bailey Howard, he also received the ARIA for Best Cover Art.
Wednesday evening's awards also favoured rapper The Kid Laroi, who was named Best Artist. The 18-year-old Indigenous Australian from Sydney also scored Best Pop Release for his three-time-platinum single, Stay, recorded with Justin Bieber.
In politics...
South Australia is set to get a new deputy premier with the man currently acting in the role, Energy Minister Dan van Holst Pellekaan, a strong contender to win the support of his Liberal colleagues.
Government MPs in the House of Assembly will meet on Thursday to choose the permanent replacement for Vickie Chapman, who resigned from the position ahead of facing an ombudsman's inquiry.
Meanwhile in NSW, a bill to legalise voluntary assisted dying is just nine votes short of passing the lower house in NSW, but will face an onslaught of amendments.
In federal politics, the debate around the faith discrimination bill continues. Today, Prime Minister Scott Morrison is set to personally introduce the contentious bill into federal parliament.
Sweden had its first female leader for just 12 hours
Social Democrat leader Magdalena Andersson has quit as prime minister less than 12 hours after being appointed when her coalition collapsed, plunging Sweden into political uncertainty.
Andersson said a decision by the Green party, the junior party in the coalition, to quit had forced her to resign but added that she had told the Speaker of parliament she hoped to be appointed prime minster again as the head of a single-party government.
Mice are coming back
Those with musophobia might want to skip this story.
Mice are making a "patchy comeback" across Australia, with warnings recent wet weather in parts of the country could see a further build up of the pest.
High mice activity has been recorded by farmers and scientists, with hotspots on the Queensland and NSW border, parts of South Australia, Northern Victoria and southern NSW.
Oxfam has released its naughty list
Just Jeans, Lorna Jane and Peter Alexander have been put on Oxfam's naughty list ahead of the silly season.
The human rights organisation has called out those brands, as well as Myer, to be open about how and where they manufacture their clothes to help lift the women who make them out of poverty.
Pentagon forms group to investigate UFOs
The US Department of Defence says it will establish a new group to investigate reports on the presence of UFOs in restricted airspace.
The formation of the group comes after the government released a report in June, encompassing 144 observations, which said there was a lack of sufficient data to determine the nature of mysterious flying objects.
- with Australian Associated Press