In 58 posts with close to 100k words, we shared a lot in 2024! Explore 2024’s biggest geopolitical shifts, cultural battles, and bold insights with Drishtikone’s year in review. See you in 2025! Happy New Year! Be safe!
When you see Russia get into existential war over Ukraine, or Israel bomb Syria or India battle with Pakistan or Bangladesh, it is not because of some whim. It has a historical and geographical context. That is critical to understand for analyzing geopolitics.
As Corona rages around the world and deaths start mounting, most of the countries are unable to deal with the deaths. Spain, for example, now has drive-through funerals. The blessings to the dead before the burial or cremation are being provided just like people get their Starbucks latte.
Spain has been holding drive-through funerals for its coronavirus victims as the country’s death toll continues to mount. The country’s largest cemetery in Madrid was conducting one funeral every 15 minutes at the weekend, with hearses driving up to the doors of the chapel before a quick blessing followed by burial or cremation.Source
The reason for this is how the numbers of the dead are overwhelming the whole system and the system is not even able to cope up.
US death peak is still 10 days away and will be 3 times of today
In the US alone, the deaths per day have already reached around 1300 a day as of April 06. As per forecasts based on health data by The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), the daily deaths in US will rise to over 3000 per day in another 10 days. The nightmare is forecasted to taper off but still take most of May to come down. We have already discussed about how things are quickly devolving in world’s most powerful country.
This is if any new wave does not start and things are back to normal. Worry obviously is that without the vaccine, things may not end so quickly.
Bodies let to rot
In Ecuador, even when the total death toll is still below 200, bodies are being thrown on the road and being left to rot.
Bodies are being left to rot on the side of the road as officials struggle to cope with coronavirus deaths in an Ecuadorian city. At least 150 corpses were left on the street or kept in the homes of grieving relatives in Guayaquil as the deadly bug ravages the horror-struck port city. The bodies were placed on the roadside in the desperate hope that authorities would be able to take them away but removals take up to three days due to a backlog.Daily Mail
How a country handles itself in such disaster defines it’s character.
Handling the Dead
The dead die. The living have to live.
Epidemics bring fear and suffering. Death is not just a body. It is what it leaves behind in people’s lives. When out of less than 200 dead, 150 are lying on the streets, it shows that the bodies are being treated in such a way probably because they fear the disease as much as the morbidity of death.
When this time passes, the visuals, the experiences and the dead will leave everyone different. Corona Deaths will be a watershed in human history.
America's Justice Department and SEC have targeted India's Adani Group with a bribery case. Using Nationalistic sentiment doesn't help. Yes, law has been weaponized and India's sovereignty compromised but not how they think. A definitive guide to understanding the case.
There was a clear warning from Putin on provision of long range missiles that could hit deep into Russia to Ukraine. It would be consider as a direct attack by NATO on Russia. Biden has done just that!
The premise and the mindset apparent in the new Trump team points to an interesting world out there. Things will not be rosy, but they will be very different. Very, very different.
The US, and indeed the world has seen a watershed event of Donald Trump's victory. It will change the US direction and may have pushed a World War by at least 3-4 years.
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