Death Toll
As humanity continues to devastate the planet, the death toll continues to rise.
Now, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has added over 7,000 species including “iconic” primates, rays, fish, and trees to its endangered species “Red List,” according to Agence France-Presse. It’s a disturbing sign of just how much destruction is being wrought by human-caused climate change.
We Hardly Knew Ye
It can be hard to visualize numbers that large — hearing about 7,000 separate species on the brink of extinction may conjure up the image of a single primate, one large tree, maybe even a cool bird vanishing. But this means that every single one of those 7,000 species is on the brink of total eradication.
“Nature is declining at rates unprecedented in human history,” IUCN acting director general Grethel Aguilar told AFP. “We must wake up to the fact that conserving nature’s diversity is in our interest.”
READ MORE: Manmade ruin adds 7,000 species to endangered ‘Red List’ [Agence France-Presse]
More on climate change: Doomsday Report Author: Earth’s Leaders Have Failed