Early Edition with Kate Hawkesby

The Australian Prime Minister's plan to reopen the country at a 70-80 per cent vaccination rate and treat the Delta variant "like the flu" has been slammed as dangerous and reckless by some of the nation's top health and economic researchers.According to modelling from the Australian National University, if Scott Morrison's current coronavirus plan proceeds, tens of thousands Australians will likely die and hundreds of thousands will likely develop cases of long Covid."We found substantial morbidity and mortality is likely to occur if the Australian government sticks to the national plan," ANU economics professor and study co-author Professor Quentin Grafton said.If Australia reopens with 70 per cent of Australians aged over 16 fully vaccinated, there could eventually be 6.9 million cases of Covid-19, 154,000 hospitalisations, and 29,000 fatalities, Grafton said."We simply can't afford to do that, both in terms of lives and long-term illness from Covid."And even if the PM waits until 80 per cent of the adult