Poor Countries Affected by Covid Worst, Facing Pandemic Debt Crunch

The pandemic has taken its heaviest toll in some of the world’s poorest countries. Indebted governments from Latin America to Africa spent money they didn’t have to shore up rickety health systems and provide a safety net for citizens, pushing their finances further into the red. Creditor nations helped them by suspending debt repayments and lending them more. Now those waivers have ended and global borrowing costs are on the rise, raising the risk of disorderly defaults.