For a Healthier World, Start With Biodiversity

Biodiversity loss threatens not only the health and livelihood of our planet, but humanity, too.

By Andrew Bartlow
Aug 17, 2021 5:50 PMAug 17, 2021 5:51 PM
biodiversity2
One Health is a collaborative, multidisciplinary approach—working at the local, regional, national, and global levels—with the goal of achieving optimal health outcomes by recognizing the interconnection between people, animals, plants, and their shared environment. (Credit: Los Alamos National Laboratory)

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Historically, an estimated 0.1 percent of all species go extinct each year. That may not sound like a lot, but considering that there are 1.7 million species that have been scientifically identified so far, that means an annual extinction rate of 1,700 species, or more than four per day.

This is known as the background extinction rate, which is the number of species that can be expected to go extinct over a period of time, based on non-human factors. Today, the rate of extinction is an unprecedented 1,000 times higher than natural background rates, with recent reports indicating the risk of losing 1 million species in the near future.

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