Our Environment Is Our Lifeline - we need to protect it if it is to protect us
Humans have often argued that they are the superior species on this earth.
Humans feel empathy; they have the ability to communicate in not just one language but hundreds; humans have developed maths and science; and they are also the densest species in the world. I know that dense has two meanings, and in this article, both meanings apply.
This feeling of superiority over nature's other species has caused humans to destroy the planet they inhabit and damage the diverse ecosystems that they cannot live without. And as long as it didn't directly affect them, they didn't really care.
But that urgently needs to change, because biodiversity is under threat and as a result, so is the human race. After all, we are in the middle of earth's sixth mass extinction - one which has been entirely caused by humans - and it is the fastest earth has ever seen.
Photo by Nate Johnson
Biodiversity is what keeps everything in our ecosystem functioning properly, including keeping diseases like coronavirus from becoming global pandemics. It refers to "the variety of life on earth, in all its forms and all its interactions" [3] and without biodiversity, no living species can survive. As humans, we are part of a complex web of species and lifeforms, all of which play an important part in keeping our planet alive. We humans are no more important than anyone or anything else. In fact, the air we breathe, the water we drink and the food we eat all rely on biodiversity.
That being said, we have been responsible for extreme biodiversity loss. According to the WWF, in the past 40 years alone, we have destroyed half of Earth's wildlife. Now, we're finally experiencing the repercussions of our actions in the form of a global pandemic that has as yet killed around a quarter of a million people. It has been proven that COVID-19 has not only been a bi-product of bad animal husbandry, but also of extreme biodiversity loss from the destruction of vital ecosystems.
I believe nature is sending us a message. It is reminding us that we are not superior beings, that we have no control over nature, and that if we keep destroying it then we will also destroy ourselves.
Let me explain.
What exactly is biodiversity?
I touched on it briefly in the intro but here's a more scientific definition:
"[...] biodiversity is comprised of several levels, starting with genes, then individual species, then communities of creatures and finally entire ecosystems, such as forests or coral reefs, where life interplays with the physical environment. These myriad interactions have made Earth habitable for billions of years." [3] Biodiversity is a balance to be struck, where everything has a purpose and should be kept alive in order to ensure that nature isn't sent out of kilter.
For example, without plants there would be no oxygen or uptake of carbon dioxide; without pollinators there would be no fruits and nuts; without coral reefs and mangroves there would be no protection from tsunamis; and without cats there would be no lighthearted 3am entertainment. Even the spider monkey, which at first appears to have no direct impact on the preservation of biodiversity, is vital to it because of the hardwood seeds it unknowingly sows when it feeds.
How does climate change and biodiversity loss link to COVID-19?
Every species exists within certain climate-related parameters, like terrain, temperatures and humidity. Experts call this their "bioclimatic envelope". [2] As climate change and human actions, such as deforestation, encroachment on habitats, farming and agriculture disrupts the bioclimatic envelopes for species, these are forced to adapt. They migrate to areas that enable their survival, even if these encroach on human populations or make them vulnerable to new predators. This adaptation may seem harmless, except that the loss of species can have a nasty knock-on effect on a range of ecosystem functions, including the prevention of disease.
Take a rainforest. This large expanse of humid, warm forest inhabits thousands of species and is a hive of biodiversity. As with the natural cycle of life, some species will be predators and some prey, meaning that the wildlife in a rainforest doesn't tend to enjoy mingling with other species. This is why, when it comes to a virus, the more diverse an environment, the more contained a virus will be. Diseases that can be found in rainforests are very unlikely to mutate and to leave the sanctity of the rainforest, where the species finds its home. This all changes if that wildlife is forced to move out or even just forced to move closer to other species, enabling the virus to mutate. [1]
The reason this is important for us is because an estimated 75% of diseases that humans catch are zoonotic. [1] This means they originated from an animal species and mutated to our species through contact. The increase in new zoonotic diseases that have been passed on to humans can be directly traced to human activities. These not only being climate change and biodiversity loss, but also bad animal husbandry. Here is the pattern of causation for COVID-19 which hopefully illustrates the point I'm trying to make:
First there was a bat. Bats are common carriers for disease, because they live in close quarters with other bats and thus spread disease between them. This isn't a problem for us if bats remain in their territories. But as the human population has expanded and the forests been cut down, bats have needed to find habitable environments amongst humans. They will often dwell up high, hanging from street bunting or the roofs of tall buildings where wet markets are held.
Then there was a pangolin. This is illegal wildlife, which has been poached and sold in Chinese wet markets as the government has turned a blind eye. Normally bats and pangolins wouldn't meet, because their bioclimatic envelopes are completely different, and they never would have if humans hadn't intervened.
As it happened, one species was forced to adapt to the drastic changes to the planet's ecosystem that humans have caused; and the other was killed for its "health properties"...by humans.
Photo by Frida Bredesen
What nature does for us and how we treat it in return
The problem of COVID-19 isn't just the fault of the Chinese government, because wet markets are only a small chapter of the story. The real problem lies in the way every single human being has treated this planet and the ingratitude we have all shown it. We need 1.6 earths to meet today's demand, because in the last 50 years, the population has doubled and the global economy has quadrupled in magnitude, but we've shown no sign of slowing down [1]. Until the pandemic.
Every problem we face now can be solved by nature. Inversely, every problem we create for nature, we ultimately create for us too.
The trees take up carbon dioxide in exchange for oxygen and enable us to breathe fresh air into our lungs. Without them we die. And yet, we cut down approximately 250 million trees every single week, or 13 billion trees per year. We have halved the number of trees there once were. [4]
Nature cleans the water we drink and only 1% of all earth's water is drinkable. We not only throw 80% of of this finite source away, but we also turn it into polluted wastewater and leave it untreated, for it to contaminate our environment. Unsafe drinking water kills more people each year than all forms of violence combined, including war. And yet we take it for granted. [5]
Nature provides us with the foods we need to survive but we exploit this resource too! Farmers throw perfectly good produce away due to aesthetic supermarket standards; supermarkets bin food that is not expired due to strict health and safety protocols; and approximately 40% of household waste is food. Meanwhile, in other parts of the world, people are starving. [6]
Nature has also enabled medical researchers to provide developing medicines. Certain species of fungi are found in cancer treatments.
We need biodiversity and yet we destroy it. Around 2000 species go extinct every year and we are close to losing some of the most beautiful creatures on this planet, like African elephants, Bengal tigers and most rhinoceros species. All because of human greed. [3]
According to The Guardian, in financial terms, "the services provided by ecosystems are estimated to be worth trillions of dollars - double the world's GDP. Biodiversity loss in Europe alone costs the continent about 3% of its GDP, or £400m, a year."
In summary, even though we may be comfortable living the way we do now, we need to start making decisions with the planet in mind. We are finally paying the price for everything we've done to the earth and we need it more than we realise. COVID-19 has proven how vulnerable we humans really are and it's time we showed the earth the respect it deserves.
When the crisis is over, I am begging people not to revert back to type. Because if we do, then nature will fight back and we will lose.
Photo by Bruno
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