Suzanne Harrington: The good stuff that made the world better in 2025
2026 FIFA World Cup Qualifier, Ireland’s Troy Parrott and Séamus Coleman celebrate after the match Photo by ©INPHO/Ryan Byrne
I am laughing at the idea of compiling a list of all the things that made the world better during the past year. Actual, factual things, rather than fantasy, fake news. Can it be done? Well, yes, actually...
Thank you to the Irish football team for stepping in and sprinkling us with fairy dust hat-trickery, so that suddenly there is not just hope in the air, but actual magic.
The year’s greatest single moment is – initially at least – that incredible Caoimhin Kelleher save against Portugal on October 11. Like a ninja, Kelleher uses the tip of his toe to deflect a 76th minute Ronaldo penalty at the Group F qualifiers in Lisbon. Ireland is still defeated, but that save is up there with Zlatan’s 30 yards out bicycle kick goal in 2012.
Hold my beer, says Troy Parrott at the Aviva Stadium on November 13, as he puts Ireland 2-0 ahead by half time. Ronaldo gets sent off for elbowing Dara O’Shea, and is hilariously mocked by fans for being a massive knob. We can hardly believe what we are seeing. What’s the Irish for schadenfreude?
But wait, there’s more. Away at Budapest, Troy Parrott scores a hat trick against Hungary – the winning goal in the last seconds of the 96th minute. Ireland becomes hysterical as people wear out the parrot emoji on their phones. Parrott cries “for the first time in years.” So does everyone else – with joy. On social media, the official account of Dublin International Airport changes its name to Troy Parrott Airport, and Roy Keane keeps repeating the words ‘amazing’ and ‘fantastic’. Kneecap – banned from Hungary by its leader Viktor Orban – have their own vivid moment of schadenfreude.
On March 26 next year, Ireland will play Czechia. Until then, we continue to ride those blissful waves of Italia 90 nostalgia. COYBIG.
As our closest neighbours increasingly succumb to far-right filth funded by far-right billionaires, we continue to vocally support the people of Palestine, amid the deafening silence echoing around much of the EU.
We enjoy a collective moment of unity while electing our 10th President, Catherine Connolly. In a landslide victory, she receives 63% of the vote. She says she wants to make Irish the working language at the Aras when she takes office. And – uniquely for a head of state, and in keeping with the national mood – she is brilliant at keepy-uppies.
The departure of Michael D and Sabina Higgins is made super-cute by a procession of Bernese Mountain dogs – and their humans – lining the goodbye route in Dublin’s Phoenix Park. The lady who crochets Michael Tea Higgins tea cosies is already inundated with requests for Catherine Connoll-Tea items.
Politics and culture continue to overlap as Kneecap’s Mo Chara has a case against him thrown out in a London court. Made up ‘terrorism’ charges are dismissed by a London judge, to the great annoyance of the UK’s Crown Prosecution Service, who immediately appeal the decision.
“This entire process was never about me, never about any threat to the public and never about ‘terrorism,’ a word used by your government to discredit people you oppress. It was always about Gaza. About what happens if you dare to speak up,” states Mo Chara outside court. Kneecap, now regarded as free speech heroes, play their biggest gig to date at London’s Wembley Arena.
A cultural phenomenon known as the Kneecap Effect sees increased interest in the Irish language all over Ireland – enrolment for Irish language courses increase by 227% at Queens University Belfast – and people signing up for Irish language classes as far away as Australia. Iontach!
Another persecuted Irish artist, Oscar Wilde, is celebrated throughout Ireland 125 years after his death, with literary events held around the country, from walking tours to literary pub crawls. In the UK, the British Library gives his grandson back his library card, after Wilde had been banned in 1895 from the British Library’s reading room.
In Co Clare, The Outing queer matchmaking festival, in its 13th year, continues to delight, while teeny-tiny Liechtenstein becomes the 38th country to legalise same sex marriage. Just another 157 countries to go.
2025 is a bumper year for Irish musicians, partly thanks to our Basic Income for the Arts (BIA) which allows creatives to create, and is the envy of skint creatives everywhere else who are working three jobs in between gigging in toilets and starving in garrets. Fontaines D.C. and CMAT are both shortlisted for the Mercury. The real winner, however, is the Dunboyne Diana’s magnificent Kerrygold handbag created by Kimberly Tino.
2025 is the year we are most effectively able to tackle obesity and its co-morbidities without expensive surgical intervention, thanks to Mounjaro, Ozempic, Wegovy etc. We finally understand that obesity is a metabolic condition, rather than a character flaw. However, while the drugs are effective, they are not yet available for all.
Healthwise, new blood tests to diagnose Alzheimer’s show 95% accuracy in trials, with new drugs to treat the condition currently being lab tested. Another study finds a unique antibody found in camels and alpacas may be able to help treat the disease. Genomics – the study of how our genetic coding impacts our long term health – is shifting the focus from treatment to prevention.
The popularity of yoga continues to grow, with around 300 million global practitioners. Its physical and mental health benefits are multiple, and it can be practiced anywhere, with zero equipment, despite what the wellness industrial complex tells us about needing fancy mats and expensive leggings.
Irish people, finally realising that it’s an addictive carcinogenic, are drinking less alcohol – there’s been a drop in consumption of 34.3% since 2001. These days we are increasingly socialising in the sauna, sweating out toxins rather than gulping them down. We have also retained our fondness of sea swimming, a positive hangover from the pandemic.
As a result of greater health awareness, we are living longer – a baby born today can expect to live twice as long as a baby born in 1900. Child mortality – once the killer of half of all children globally before their 15th birthday – is currently at around 5%. At the other end of the age
spectrum, we have the wellderly, as science continues exploring – and finding – ways of keeping us alive and well (as opposed to just alive) for longer. Life expectancy in Ireland in 1950 was 65.5 for men and 66.9 for women – in 2025, it’s 81.3 and 84.9.
Awareness continues to grow about the crucial link between our bodies, our planet and our nutrition. A US survey of 550,000 people finds that 42.9% recognise how healthy eating is connected to feeling more energetic and enjoying better muscular performance – while 39% link healthy balanced nutrition to better mental clarity.
Instead of restricting calories and making ourselves miserable with cottage cheese and weighing scales, like the generations before us, these days it’s all about optimising health with nutrient rich foods.
An almost extinct frog is doing well in the Californian mountains. Those little frogs, clinging to life despite
humanity’s best efforts to annihilate them, symbolise the hope we all desperately need. See also the photogenic pointy-eared Iberian lynx, back from the brink – just 100 remained wild in 2002 – but now enjoying being alive in record numbers. Other good news for animals includes the UK announcement of a planned phase out of animal testing. Finally.
More broadly, the positives happening in the world tend to be happening gradually and therefore get buried under all the shouty awfulness and headlines of horror. After significant progress between 1990 and 2014, global poverty reduction has slowed in more recent years – due to Covid, climate change and conflicts – but is still slowly going in the right direction.
We are waking up to plant-based diets for health and
environmental reasons, as a new Oxford study shows. How plant protein is better for everything from your very own ass (plant based diets see 16% less incidence of colorectal cancers) to the planet. It takes 50% - 100% more land to produce one gram of animal protein than to produce one gram of plant protein, which means if we switched to plant protein we’d reduce global agricultural land use from 4 billion to 1 billion hectares – and possibly save
ourselves from climate catastrophe. We know this now, and can’t unknow it.
We are using more solar energy, which is now cheaper than coal. In fact 91% of renewable energy is now cheaper than fossil fuels. Someone needs to tell Trump.
And finally – the more hopeful you are, the better your life. A new Australian study confirms that hope is the most impactful emotion when it comes to long term
positive outcomes – a random selection of 25,000 people shows how those who identify as more hopeful enjoy better well being, health, social and economic outcomes, and are less lonely. Hope is associated with greater
resilience, ability to adapt, and greater internal sense of control, even when faces adverse external events. You read it here first. Hope is good for us. Hang onto it, and spread it around. Happy 2026!
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