Can Australia fix its CovidSafe app and turn the pandemic into a ‘pingdemic’?

The Australian government is refusing to adopt technology used overseas that could speed up notification of close contacts

The federal government is in discussions to tweak its CovidSafe app to pick up more fleeting contacts due to the more infectious Delta variant, but is refusing to adopt technology used overseas that could speed up notification of close contacts.

As England and Wales experience what is being called a pingdemic" - with more than 600,000 isolation alerts sent to users of its NHS app in one week earlier this month - Australia's CovidSafe app has managed to identify just 17 close contacts who were not picked up by other means since it launched in April last year.