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Since the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, more than three million people have passed through Lviv, a city in the west where the borders of five neighbouring countries converge. Most travel further into Europe becoming refugees, but the city and its surroundings has taken in around 500,000 internally displaced persons (IDPs) since the start of the conflict, according to official data, and there are probably even more.

The WHO global estimates on excess deaths during the COVID-19 pandemic raise many uncomfortable truths about how we as a global community value the lives of older people and those in low- and middle-income countries.

It is impossible not to notice signs of Moldovan solidarity with Ukraine. One such story is that of Argentina, 45, who is the manager of Zarea Hotel in the centre of Chisinau.

When the war in Ukraine began, Moldova, a small country nestled between Ukraine and Romania and Europe's poorest nation, initially thought it could accommodate 15,000 refugees. To nearly everyone's surprise, it received nearly 27 times that number.

Our colleague visited Moldova's border with Ukraine at Palanca, where thousands of refugees cross every day to escape the war.

Women and children have always been victims of war and Ukraine's conflict is no different. Yet the faces are markedly older in this crisis: 25% of Ukrainians are aged 60 or over, making this the world's 'oldest' war.

How HelpAge staff and their families cope as war takes hold, again.

The war in Ukraine has destroyed everybody's lives regardless of who they are.

Read the Q&A with Dr Alexandre Sidorenko, eminent international policy expert on ageing and HelpAge board member.

In response to the warning for all civilians in eastern Ukraine to evacuate the area, HelpAge International's CEO Justin Derbyshire outlined a more complicated picture.

Twenty years ago, the Second World Assembly on Ageing adopted the Madrid International Plan of Action on Ageing (MIPAA). Dr Alexandre Sidorenko, a HelpAge board member and policy expert on ageing who coordinated the Second World Assembly on Ageing, where the MIPAA was drafted, looks back on what progress, if any, has been made.

As part of our ageism stories competition, older people share their experience of everyday ageism, whether in their communities, during health visits or dealing with social services.