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Long COVID is costing countries billions of dollars in lost productivity and increased health and social welfare costs, economists say.

Five years on from the start of the COVID-19 crisis, millions of people are struggling with debilitating health problems that have decimated their lives and livelihoods.

The first cases of long COVID were reported in May 2020.

The OECD, a club of mostly rich nations, estimates long COVID could be costing its 38 members $864 billion to $1.04 trillion annually due to reductions in quality of life and labour force participation. This does not include the extra burden on health services.

Demonstrations for International Long COVID Awareness Day have sparked around the globe. Whether raising awareness about the disease in public or from their homes, people with Long COVID and their allies have raised their voices to demand recognition, research, treatments, support, and prevention of COVID-19 during the ongoing pandemic, as many in the community observe half a decade of Long COVID.

We reached out to international organizers for photos from their actions to document the demonstrations and highlight their demands. From “lie ins” to leaflet handouts to social media campaigns, people with Long COVID and related diseases drew attention to the overlooked disease affecting more than 400 million people globally.

Europe and Ukraine are learning how little the U.S. cares, as the new president aligns himself with their greatest enemy.

The thing about a war is it forces people to pick a side. And Donald Trump, it seems to many in Europe, is siding with Vladimir Putin. 

Seven days of presidential interventions in the Russia-Ukraine conflict have made real the nightmares of Ukrainians and many of their allies, upending the transatlantic relationship that has underpinned European security since 1945.

If there were any lingering doubts about the extent of Trump’s willingness to make enemies in Europe, he ended it Tuesday night when he blamed Ukraine for having “started” the war with Russia. Such blatant defiance of the fact of Putin’s unprovoked invasion three years ago shocked even America’s most loyal friends in the region. 

“Jesus,” one British government official said privately in response to the president’s outburst. 

“We now have an alliance between a Russian president who wants to destroy Europe and an American president who also wants to destroy Europe,” another European diplomat observed in recent days, declining to be identified discussing sensitive matters. “The transatlantic alliance is over.”

(Human Rights Watch)

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