An ethnographic study of the work of nurse practitioners at an outpatient care facility shows how these medical professionals must endlessly multitask to fill gaps in the US social safety net. In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, a new focus on the essential work of nurses and the lack of resources with which they often contend is especially timely.

The COVID-19 pandemic has taken a devastating toll on the lives of older adults, intensifying long-standing challenges in the US health care system. Persistent health and mortality disparities on the basis of race and socioeconomic status, staffing shortages and insufficient financial resources at some nursing homes, and a reluctance among Americans to make formal plans for their end-of-life health care are problems of heightened magnitude in the pandemic era. Policy solutions like extending Medicare benefits to younger people, increasing Medicaid reimbursement rates, and facilitating formal conversations regarding end-of-life care may help Americans to age and die with dignity.

It appears likely that the twentieth-century approach of many aging European societies—relying on migrant workers from a younger, poorer South to prop up their economies—will no longer be a viable option in the coming decades.…

The risk of social and political upheaval could grow throughout the developing world—even as the developed world's capacity to deal with such threats declines.

China's population is likely to peak less than 15 years from now, below a maximum of 1.4 billion. After that will come a prolonged, even indefinite, population decline and a period of accelerated aging.