In Which I Try Valiantly to Cheer You Up : Shared by Kul Gautam

For the past several decades, my favorite New York Times columnist, Nick Kristof, has been writing how each passing year has been the best ever for children and humanity, often citing UNICEF statistics.

Citing the Gates Foundation's projection of increased child deaths in 2025, Kristoff acknowledges that, "This wasn’t the best year in human history. So much went wrong; so many lives lost needlessly, from Gaza to Sudan to Ukraine; so much betrayal of our own values here in America".

Nevertheless, Kristof says this is still the best DECADE for children and humanity, "measured by child mortality, education, nutrition or women’s rights, we humans are probably in the best decade in the past 300,000 years — plus we can glimpse a path forward that would leave Earth worth bequeathing to babies born today."

Let's cherish the hope that Kristof's prophecy that the arc of history will bend towards improved well-being of humanity becomes the reality.

Kul  

In Which I Try Valiantly to Cheer You Up

By Nicholas Kristof, The New York Times, December 27, 2025

Click here for the article

Nicholas Kristof breaks his tradition of declaring each year "the best in human history," acknowledging 2025 as a setback for humanity with the United States playing a role in the retreat. 

For the first time this century, global child deaths under age 5 rose by approximately 200,000, partly due to Trump administration cuts to humanitarian aid. Despite this reversal, Kristof notes 2025 remains among the five best years ever by child mortality metrics, with fewer than half as many children dying as in 2000. 

The Gates Foundation forecasts the positive trajectory will resume after 2025-2026, though progress will be slower than if aid funding had been sustained. 

Kristof highlights encouraging trends including a roughly 30 percent drop in US overdose deaths from 2023 to 2025, breakthroughs like the HIV prevention drug lenacapavir and CRISPR gene editing advances, and the clean energy revolution with solar power installation accelerating dramatically. 

He cites Bill McKibben's optimism about solar transformation and battery technology advances offering hope for averting climate disaster, concluding that despite setbacks, humanity remains in its best decade of the past 300,000 years by measures of child mortality, education, nutrition and women's rights.

Quotes
"That means more than 5,000 classrooms of children, gone before they ever learn to write their name or tie their shoes."

"We're also potentially on the edge of one of those rare and enormous transformations in human history — something akin to the moment a few hundred years ago when we learned to burn coal and gas and oil, triggering the Industrial Revolution and hence modernity."