Some Reflections on Covid 19 from President Michael D. Higgins Solidarity, Care, Compassion and Kindness “Values such as solidarity, compassion, care and kindness have a special significance in our present situation. There is a renewed urgency about all the questions as to the ethical basis of the policies and actions we advocate in addressing the pandemic, and how we might respond. Let us reflect, too, and draw from the lessons to be learned from the Covid-19 pandemic, such as the questions it raises about how we might best organise our lives together, and in such a way that we care better for each other and for our vulnerable planet.” World Philosophy Day 2020 – 19th November, 2020 “We in Ireland, being acutely conscious of the debt of gratitude we owe to those who have left these shores over so many years, whose hard work, generous support and encouragement to those who remained at home have played such a significant role in the shaping and crafting of the modern Ireland, are confident that we will come through this pandemic together and learn from it. Out of such a crisis, we are presented with perhaps a once-in-a-generation opportunity to do things better, to embrace and bring to fruition a new paradigm of existence with each other in relation to work and living and with the world itself, a renewed and healthier connection of society, sustainable economy and ecology.” The Ireland Funds’ Winter Celebration, New York – 1st December, 2020 “The challenge of the coronavirus pandemic has highlighted the enormous extent to which our lives on this shared planet are intertwined with one another, and how the most vulnerable are most at risk. There is no doubt that the spread of the Covid-19 virus has had a profound impact on all our lives, and many have lost loved ones, lost their livelihoods, or have seen their lives altered in dramatic ways. All of us have had to come to rely on the solidarity of others, in a renewed awareness that no-one will be safe from the virus until every one of us is.” International Day for the Eradication of Poverty – 16th October, 2020 Michael D. Higgins Uachtarán na hÉireann President of Ireland
Lá Fhéile Pádraig Sona Duit Wishing you a Happy St. Patrick’s Day
UACHTARÁN NA hÉIREANN President of Ireland
2021
Áras an Uachtaráin, Phoenix Park, D08E1W3
The World Health Organisation Director General, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, warns that the inequitable distribution of COVID-19 vaccines between rich and poor countries will prolong the global pandemic: “I need to be blunt: the world is on the brink of a catastrophic moral failure – and the price of this failure will be paid with lives and livelihoods in the world’s poorest countries.” (January 2021)
Image: River of Light, streaming from the Light for the Diaspora at Áras an Uachtaráin Photo: Maxwell Photography
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