Erasure: the 'world' according to five rich countries
From healthcare to business, the definition of 'the world' is shrinking with a chilling matter-of-factness.
I wasn't sure if I'd be able to write to you this week. I am down with Covid again, the second time in less than a year. My symptoms this time, while not as virulent as round 1, have been far from 'mild'. I've had high temperatures and nasty chills, a violent cough, a bad stomach, and exhaustion that makes me want to cry except I haven't the energy. Today is the seventh day since the onset of symptoms, and I am hoping the worst is over. But considering I still haven't shed the long Covid niggles caused by my previous infection, I am worried what the afterlife of this bout might bring.
The reason I had to make a brief intervention in your inbox today is to tell you that as exhausting as this illness is, this week I've found it impossible to sustain any feeling except anger.
The romantic view of the pandemic was that it had given us the time to reflect and reconnect with our emotions. But three years into this hell, it is clear that the world has spectacularly failed to reflect on what matters the most. The result? More than half the world's population – our half – has been pushed into a corner where the only viable emotion is not sadness, not weariness, not affection for our shared fragile humanity, but great anger.
Let me explain with two headlines that caught my eye during my downtime this week, published in two international media behemoths: Bloomberg and Fortune. They tell you a story about the absurdity of living in a 'world' where the definition of the word is shrinking with a chilling matter-of-factness.
