“Humans” The Worst Virus Earth Could Ever Have
April 22nd was celebrated Earth Day, so I want to remind you all the loss our planet faces due to the human being.
The
world’s 7.6 billion people represent just 0.01% of all living things, according
to the study. Yet since the dawn of civilisation, humanity has caused the loss
of 83% of all wild mammals and half of plants, while livestock kept by humans
abounds.
The
transformation of the planet by human activity has led scientists to the brink
of declaring a new geological era – the Anthropocene. One suggested marker for
this change are the bones of the domestic chicken, now ubiquitous across the
globe.
The
new work reveals that farmed poultry today makes up 70% of all birds on the
planet, with just 30% being wild. The picture is even more stark for mammals –
60% of all mammals on Earth are livestock, mostly cattle and pigs, 36% are
human and just 4% are wild animals.
The
destruction of wild habitat for farming, logging and development has resulted
in the start of what many scientists consider the sixth mass extinction of life
to occur in the Earth’s four billion year history. About half the Earth’s
animals are thought to have been lost in the last 50 years.
I
found all these things really sad, and I would like to
By Dina Reyes, Step 10
