Is the world being destroyed?

After Omicron comes pi in the Greek alphabet. And then rho, sigma, tau.... Before SARS-CoV-2 finishes its grand tour through the Greek alphabet, the global public health establishment should do what it should have done long before this coronavirus emerged. It must put in place the basic health systems needed to detect new outbreaks and deploy technologies that allow for vaccines and medicines to be manufactured and administered in low- and middle-income countries.

Because they have often refused to treat COVID as a common threat that demands a unified response, policy makers have yet to thwart the predations of a virus that, to channel the Greeks again, affects all (pan) people (demos). This myopia means that these mistakes could be repeated when a new pandemic arrives.

The next time could be worse. The National Academy of Medicine predicted in November 2021 that a flu epidemic akin to the one in 1918 and 1919 could prove more catastrophic than COVID-19. The preconditions for such a disaster are in place. A warming planet, megacities, mass migration, intercontinental travel and habitat loss are among the reasons that infectious diseases, like intensifying typhoons and hurricanes, have become part of our lives.

Fast-tracked development of diagnostics, vaccines, monoclonal antibodies and antiviral drugs marks an undisputed medical triumph of the COVID era. Also notable, however, is the failure of governments and international organizations to use our current predicament to rectify glaring public health deficiencies.

The Global Health Security Index for 2021 rated the world’s 195 countries as “dangerously unprepared” to deal with future epidemic and pandemic threats. The average score for individual countries came in at 38.9 out of 100, about the same as the 2019 rating—before the pandemic began. Many countries failed to grasp that the pandemic presented an unparalleled opportunity to lay the groundwork for coping with not only this public health crisis but also future ones.

Readiness for a COVID-30 or a new pandemic flu strain—or, for that matter, an out-of-control bioweapon—will require new generations of surveillance tools, diagnostics and drugs, as well as, say, a “universal” coronavirus vaccine that can counter any strain. Having sufficient available vaccine formulations with long shelf lives would also help alleviate the inequities that have accompanied distribution of shots. Underscoring the absence of “global” in “global public health,” Portugal had fully vaccinated 89 percent of its population by mid-January but Mali only 2.8 percent.

The most pressing priority should be a return to basics, both globally and locally. COVID has served as a painful demonstration that public health is as essential to national security as a standing army. And the cost of health security is minimal. In 2016 the Commission on a Global Health Risk Framework for the Future estimated that for 65 cents a year for every person on the planet, we could upgrade national pandemic preparedness programs worldwide. An investment of $4.5 billion—far less than the price of a single new ballistic missile submarine—might prevent the global loss of millions of lives and an economic hit in the trillions of dollars.

The basics entail not only building new systems to prepare for pandemics but a major strengthening of institutions already in place. Public health legal expert Lawrence O. Gostin notes in this issue that the World Health Organization has a 2022–2023 budget of $6.12 billion, which is less than those of some major U.S. teaching hospitals. The WHO needs not just money but reforms that give it the authority to better monitor and intervene when new infectious diseases emerge. At the country level, the most basic of basics consist of functioning national systems that furnish medical care for all and financial help, as needed, for child care, food and housing and other measures to waylay the poverty-related chronic diseases capable of sending even a relatively young adult onto a ventilator during a future pandemic.

After repeated outbreaks of horrific diseases such as SARS, Ebola and Zika, perhaps this calamity will prove traumatic enough to allow for a coherent remake of the current system. Deaths from COVID worldwide by mid-January about equaled the population of Norway—and the pandemic is still with us. Only when global public health commands the attention of policy makers in the same way as a new contract for nuclear submarines will Greek letters return to their more familiar role in American life as naming conventions for student groups on college campuses.

Stretching for 186 miles along the border of Utah and Arizona, Lake Powell serves as one of two major reservoirs that anchor the Colorado River. Last week, the lake reached a disturbing new milestone: water levels fell to their lowest threshold ever, since the lake was created by the damming of the Colorado in 1963.

The precipitous drop is the result of the decades-long drought in the American West that has ravaged the Colorado River for years, forcing unprecedented water cuts in states like Arizona. This newest milestone on Lake Powell, though, is significant for another reason. The reservoir also sustains a hydroelectric power plant, Glen Canyon Dam, that provides energy to millions of people. That power source, critical for rural and tribal communities across the region, is now in jeopardy.

The federal government expects Lake Powell’s levels to rise again this spring as mountain snow melts across the West, but there’s still a significant chance that the reservoir will reach the so-called “minimum power pool” stage some time in the next few years, at which point it will stop producing hydroelectric power altogether. The dry spell has been causing slowdowns or shutdowns at power plants in California and Nevada, creating yet another challenge for officials trying to adapt to a seemingly endless water shortage.

If reservoirs like Lake Powell keep falling, millions of people across the West will have to turn to dirtier and more expensive energy at a time when transitioning to renewable power is of paramount importance for reducing carbon emissions.

The Colorado provides water for more than 40 million people. While the river has gone through several wet and dry spells over the past century, it’s never faced a challenge like the present “megadrought,” which scientists say has no precedent in the last millennium. As precipitation levels have remained low year after year, inflow from the river’s tributaries has slowed to a trickle, and its reservoirs have started to run dry.

When Lake Powell is full, its surface sits some 3,700 feet above sea level, but the reservoir hasn’t reached that threshold in some time. Water levels have fallen over the past several years of rainless winters, reaching a new low of 3,525 feet last week. The lake is now only a quarter full, and water levels are just 35 feet above the threshold for power generation. Officials say there is a significant risk the lake will fall below that threshold in the next few winters.

When federal officials built a dam at the southern end of Glen Canyon, forming Lake Powell, they assumed there would always be enough water moving through the Colorado River system to turn the turbines, and thereby generate a supposedly endless supply of cheap renewable energy. The customers who bought this clean power were rural towns, electrical cooperatives, and tribes, many of whom didn’t have many alternate power sources.

In recent years, as Lake Powell has begun to dry up, the turbines have become less efficient. The federal Bureau of Reclamation has already shaved down power deliveries from the dam.

“We are already seeing reduced generation from Glen Canyon Dam,” said Lisa Meiman, a spokesperson for the Western Area Power Administration, a government authority that markets hydroelectric power from around the region. “[Generation] has been dropping pretty consistently as the lake elevations have declined, so we’re about a third less efficient in terms of power production now than we are at an average elevation.”

When that happens, Meiman said, “we have to go out and purchase replacement power in the spot market, which is typically more expensive.” It also comes from dirtier sources like coal and gas, she said. For most customers who buy power from the dam, losing it won’t be all that big of a deal. For them, hydroelectric power accounts for only a fraction of their overall power needs, and any price increases get spread out over thousands of users, keeping costs down.

For some customers, though, the shutdown of the dam will be far more painful. Utility bills have already started to rise as the dam becomes less efficient, and a total shutdown would lead to significant cost increases for the small and remote entities that rely on it.

Hardest hit will be the 50-odd tribal nations dependent on hydroelectric power not only for residential energy needs but also to power revenue-generating commercial ventures like casinos. Thanks to generations of underinvestment by the federal government, many tribes that buy electricity from Lake Powell don’t have their own power generation capacity to replace it, and building new power sources isn’t cheap. According to a report produced by a consulting firm looking at the impact of a Glen Canyon Dam shutdown, tribal nations would experience the “the most troubling” consequences of the power loss.

The dam’s largest tribal customer is the Navajo Tribal Utility Authority, or NTUA, which provides electricity to some 30,000 residential customers on the Navajo reservation.

“It’s a very sensitive issue for all of us right now,” Walter Haase, the tribal utility’s general manager, told the Associated Press last week on the heels of the water level announcement from the Bureau of Reclamation.

The NTUA is spending millions of dollars to build out renewable energy capacity that could help soften the blow of a dam shutdown. Other tribes that can’t afford to build such new power sources, though, will have to pay higher rates for replacement electricity out of pocket, which could strain revenues. The consultants’ report pointed to the Hopi Tribe, which does not have a casino to bolster its finances, as being especially vulnerable to these cost hikes.

Small municipalities that depend on the dam are also feeling the pain.

“Hydro is very low-cost, renewable energy, [so] our energy costs will go way up,” said Bryan Hill, the general manager of Page Utility Enterprises. The company services the town of Page, Arizona, which sits on the edge of Lake Powell. Hill said he’s already been feeling the pain as deliveries have slowed down.

“They’ve got a tourniquet on in the form of slowing down the generation and trying to reduce the bleeding,” he said, “but we’re already losing money. Unless things change, there will be a significant rate adjustment.” The exact scale of that adjustment isn’t clear, but residents of Page who have come to rely on cheap power will see a noticeable rise in their annual bills. Because spot-market energy is also getting more expensive as the nation’s power system transitions from coal and gas toward renewables, the rate increase will be compounded.

Glen Canyon Dam isn’t the only hydroelectric source that’s struggled amid the drought: Power generation at the larger Hoover Dam in nearby Lake Mead has fallen by around a quarter, and officials in California shut down a hydroelectric plant at Lake Oroville last year as water levels in the lake fell below the generation threshold. The two dams together serve about 2 million customers. These power losses further drive up prices and strain the grid at a time when energy is already getting more expensive as older coal plants come offline.

To make matters worse, though, the power shortage in Lake Powell is intertwined with the larger water shortage on the Colorado. If the water level in Lake Powell continues to fall, federal officials will have to balance between the needs of water users and the needs of power users. If they hold enough water back in Lake Powell to keep the turbines running, they’ll be withholding water from farmers and homeowners who rely on it farther downstream. If they push as much water as they can toward the end users, they’ll spike the power bills of the small entities who rely on the dam.

The agency has yet to decide on its priorities should the historic lows continue, but time is running out. The latest models suggest there’s a 1 in 4 chance the dam won’t produce power by 2024.

“Glen Canyon Dam and Lake Powell serve many purposes, many divergent purposes,” said Meiman. “For a ton of stakeholders who are all going to be affected by declining lake elevations, there is not going to be a simple solution or an easy solution.”

The discovery shows the particles can travel around the body and may lodge in organs


Microplastic pollution has been detected in human blood for the first time, with scientists finding the tiny particles in almost 80% of the people tested.

The discovery shows the particles can travel around the body and may lodge in organs. The impact on health is as yet unknown. But researchers are concerned as microplastics cause damage to human cells in the laboratory and air pollution particles are already known to enter the body and cause millions of early deaths a year.

Huge amounts of plastic waste are dumped in the environment and microplastics now contaminate the entire planet, from the summit of Mount Everest to the deepest oceans. People were already known to consume the tiny particles via food and water as well as breathing them in, and they have been found in the faeces of babies and adults.

The scientists analysed blood samples from 22 anonymous donors, all healthy adults and found plastic particles in 17. Half the samples contained PET plastic, which is commonly used in drinks bottles, while a third contained polystyrene, used for packaging food and other products. A quarter of the blood samples contained polyethylene, from which plastic carrier bags are made.

“Our study is the first indication that we have polymer particles in our blood – ​it’s a breakthrough result,” said Prof Dick Vethaak, an ecotoxicologist at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in the Netherlands. “But we have to extend the research and increase the sample sizes, the number of polymers assessed, etc.” Further studies by a number of groups are already under way, he said.

“It is certainly reasonable to be concerned,” Vethaak told the Guardian. “The particles are there and are transported throughout the body.” He said previous work had shown that microplastics were 10 times higher in the faeces of babies compared with adults and that babies fed with plastic bottles are swallowing millions of microplastic particles a day.

“We also know in general that babies and young children are more vulnerable to chemical and particle exposure,” he said. “That worries me a lot.”

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Since the start of the 2020s, humanity has faced worldwide calamity after worldwide calamity, all of them raising questions about our survival as a species. The COVID-19 pandemic has already claimed millions of lives and not yet finished its rampage. Russia's invasion of Ukraine has raised the specter of nuclear holocaust, which many assumed has subsided with the end of the Cold War. Even as these problems worsen, climate change continues to quietly creep along in the background, overheating the planet for future generations.

Yet what if, on top of all these things, there is an even more dystopian crisis in the offing — one in which humans are no longer able to reproduce without artificial help because we have filled the environment with chemicals that have altered our bodies?

Scientists believe this is not only possible, it is likely to happen within our lifetimes.

Understanding why involves three statistics: First, that a human male who has fewer than 15 million sperm per milliliter is considered infertile; second, that in the 1970s sperm counts in Western countries (where there is available data) showed an average of 99 million sperm per milliliter; and third, that this number had dropped to 47 million sperm per milliliter by 2011. Scientists agree that plastic pollution is a likely culprit.

The trailblazer here has been Dr. Shanna Swan, a professor of environmental medicine and public health at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City, whose most famous book has a conveniently self-explanatory title: "Count Down: How Our Modern World Is Threatening Sperm Counts, Altering Male and Female Reproductive Development, and Imperiling the Future of the Human Race."

The main culprit is believed to be chemicals within everyday plastics known as endocrine disruptors. These chemicals, including a range of phthalates and bisphenols, are literally inescapable. They can be found in the dishware, food cans and containers from which you eat your food, and in the water bottles and other plastic receptacles from which you drink. They are in virtually all of your commonly used household electronics, your eyeglass lenses, your furniture and even on any commercial receipts that come from a thermal printer. Because endocrine disruptors are in pesticides, they have also entered the foods that we eat thanks to the agriculture industry. Even without pesticides, though, we would still wind up eating these endocrine disruptors. Microplastics — that is, plastic particles which are five millimeters or less across or in length — have entirely covered the planet. Animals accidentally eat microplastics all the time and plants regularly absorb them through their roots. Humans themselves ingest the rough equivalent of a credit card's worth of plastic each week.

"First society needs to identify and agree we have a very serious problem; this takes time like climate change," Bjorn Beeler, international coordination at IPEN — International Pollutants Elimination Network — told Salon by email. "Scientists knew in the 1970s/80s climate change was coming due to [greenhouse gas] emissions, and now we are discussing adaptation and climate crisis 40+ years later (late). So to curb the threat, we need to define the problem, then turn off the toxic chemical tap."

Even if that happens, however, there is so much plastic everywhere that humanity simply cannot escape at least some of the consequences from this constant exposure. Swan told Salon by email that federally funded assisted reproduction technology — something currently provided in only one country, Israel — will help in making sure that people impacted by this pollution can still have children.

"Disadvantaged communities are more highly exposed to risky chemicals and they are more affected (on average) by the same level of exposure," Swan wrote to Salon. "So, it's a 'triple whammy' for these communities."

John Hocevar, the Oceans Campaign Director for Greenpeace USA, explained to Salon by email that "reduced sperm counts and other reproductive ailments disproportionately impact low income communities and people of color. Poor communities are more likely to be located closest to incinerators and landfills, as well as refineries. Access to expensive treatments to compensate for reproductive health issues are not equitable today, and even with an optimistic view of the US political landscape it is clear that this problem is not going to go away any time soon."

Not surprisingly, the plastic industry and others that rely on these chemicals dispute that the endocrine disruptors are responsible for the drop in sperm counts. As Beeler pointed out, they will provide alternate data just like industries do when they dispute the validity of climate science. Hocevar added that plastic companies also have an advantage because plastics are so pervasive that "it is difficult to design controls where plastic can be excluded as a factor. The plastic industry uses this terrible situation to try to claim that we don't have enough evidence to be sure that these chemicals are dangerous."

And, to be clear, there are other factors that no doubt contribute to fertility issues for both men and women: Obesity, smoking, binge drinking, stress. Still, the science about endocrine disruptors is clear.

"Chemicals in plastic (phthalates, bisphenols and others) as well as pesticides, lead and other environmental exposures are linked to impaired reproduction including sperm count and quality," Swan told Salon. "Some, like phthalates and BPA, have a short half-life in the body (4-6 hours), so it is possible to reduce the body's exposure if we can stop using products containing these." At the same time, society will have to exercise collective will and make sure that the most vulnerable among us are not left behind.

"Low-income communities can't afford to 'buy their way out' of the problem by purchasing organic, unprocessed foods, safer cosmetics etc. (which are more expensive)," Swan explained. "But the 'mass infertility scenario' is a threat to everyone (not just the disadvantaged)."

Abstract
During the period 2018–2020, Europe experienced a series of hot and dry weather conditions with significant socioeconomic and environmental consequences. Yet, the extremity of these multi-year dry conditions is not recognized. Here, we provide a comprehensive spatio-temporal assessment of the drought hazard over Europe by benchmarking past exceptional events during the period from 1766 to 2020. We identified the 2018–2020 drought event as a new benchmark having an unprecedented intensity that persisted for more than 2 years, exhibiting a mean areal coverage of 35.6% and an average duration of 12.2 months. What makes this event truly exceptional compared with past events is its near-surface air temperature anomaly reaching +2.8 K, which constitutes a further evidence that the ongoing global warming is exacerbating present drought events. Furthermore, future events based on climate model simulations Coupled Model Intercomparison Project v5 suggest that Europe should be prepared for events of comparable intensity as the 2018–2020 event but with durations longer than any of those experienced in the last 250 years. Our study thus emphasizes the urgent need for adaption and mitigation strategies to cope with such multi-year drought events across Europe.

Plain Language Summary
This manuscript demonstrates that the 2018–2020 multi-year drought event constitutes a new benchmark in Europe, with an unprecedented level of intensity over the past 250 years. What makes this event truly exceptional compared with past events is its temperature anomaly reaching +2.8 K. This finding provides new evidence that the ongoing global warming exacerbates current drought events. The key message of this study is that the projected future events across the European continent will have a comparable intensity as the 2018–2020 drought but exhibit considerably longer durations than any of those observed during the last 250 years. Our analysis also shows that these exceptional temperature-enhanced droughts significantly negatively impact commodity crops across Europe.

Plastics have shaped our daily lives like no other material: from packaging to footwear, from household goods to furniture, from automobiles to architecture. A symbol of carefree consumerism and revolutionary innovation, plastics have spurred the imagination of designers and architects for decades. Today, the dramatic consequences of the plastic boom have become obvious and plastics have lost their utopian appeal. The exhibition »Plastic: Remaking Our World« at the Vitra Design Museum examines the history and future of this controversial material: from its meteoric rise in the twentieth century to its environmental impact and to cutting-edge solutions for a more sustainable use of plastic. Exhibits include rarities from the dawn of the plastic age and objects of the pop era as well as numerous contemporary designs and projects ranging from efforts to clean up rivers and oceans to smart concepts for waste reduction and recycling through to bioplastics made from algae and mycelium.

An exhibition by the Vitra Design Museum, V&A Dundee and maat, Lisbon

Scientists fear that their last-ditch climate warnings are going unheeded amid international turmoil caused by the war in Ukraine, and soaring energy prices.

The third segment of the landmark scientific report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – which could be the last comprehensive assessment of climate science to be published while there is still time to avoid the worst ravages of climate breakdown – will be published on Monday, warning that the world is not shifting quickly enough to a low-carbon economy.

But the previous instalment of the vast report – known as working group 2 of the IPCC – was published a month ago, just as Russia invaded Ukraine, and received only muted attention, despite warning of catastrophic and irreversible upheavals that can only narrowly be avoided by urgent action now. Scientists told the Observer that Monday’s fresh scientific warning must spur governments to belated action.

Deborah Brosnan, adjunct professor of biology at Virginia Tech University in the US and a scientific consultant, told the Observer: “That [working group 2] report was widely anticipated, but completely ignored. Eclipsed mostly by the war in Ukraine, and domestic issues such as inflation, most major media have barely reported let alone analysed the findings.”

She said people were shocked by the Ukraine war, and concerned about soaring prices, but that the climate crisis also needed urgent attention. “The war in Ukraine is a terrible tragedy playing out before our eyes, and families rightly fear being pushed into poverty by inflation. Yet we seem blind to the fact that an even larger and existential crisis is already unfolding today – one that will result in a global humanitarian crisis and on a scale never seen before.”

Daniela Schmidt, professor at Bristol University and one of the lead authors of the working group 2 report, said the world’s current upheavals show how vulnerable we are to the impacts of the climate crisis, already being felt. Policymakers should consider where their resources are allocated, she advised. “Due to the geopolitical challenges, little political capacity is spent on climate action, and vast amounts of funding are allocated to defence,” she told the Observer.

“[But] the current situation also clearly shows people’s widespread vulnerability to climate change.”

Governments have at least been waking up to the problem behind the scenes, said Bob Ward, policy director at the Grantham Institute on Climate Change at the London School of Economics.

“The IPCC report did struggle to gain attention. But while public discussion may have been muted, governments around the world are now studying the details of the report, and particularly its findings about how to make countries, companies and communities more resilient to those consequences of climate change that cannot now be avoided,” Ward said.

The report, due to be published ,Monday’s will deal with ways governments and the public can reduce greenhouse gas emissions, including greater use of renewable energy, growing trees and cutting-edge technology to suck carbon from the air. But its warnings – that the world is failing to deploy these methods at the scale required to limit global heating to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels – will be muted by the bureaucracy of the IPCC’s processes.

The report itself – part 3 of the sixth comprehensive assessment of climate science to be published by the IPCC since its foundation in 1988 – is based on thousands of scientific papers from the last seven years. But the key document published on Monday, the summary for policymakers, could be as short as 20 to 30 pages, consisting of a series of short messages and data.

These messages are subject to intense wrangling by both scientists and governments. Under the IPCC methods, all governments have the right to make changes to the final summary – and some are exercising those rights by toning down findings and vetoing some of the strongest statements.

Saudi Arabia, India, China and a few other countries have sought to make changes that would weaken the final warnings, the Observer understands. Some governments are anxious to avoid policy advice such as cutting subsidies to fossil fuels, even though these are widely espoused by leading authorities.This process of refinement – which has also been a complaint in the previous chapters of the IPCC assessment – is defended by some, as producing a document that all governments must “own”, as they have all had input. But many scientists are growing increasingly frustrated, as it produces a conservative and sometimes watered down document that many feel does not reflect the urgency and shocking nature of the threat.

Microplastic pollution has been discovered lodged deep in the lungs of living people for the first time. The particles were found in almost all the samples analysed.

The scientists said microplastic pollution was now ubiquitous across the planet, making human exposure unavoidable and meaning “there is an increasing concern regarding the hazards” to health.

Samples were taken from tissue removed from 13 patients undergoing surgery and microplastics were found in 11 cases. The most common particles were polypropylene, used in plastic packaging and pipes, and PET, used in bottles. Two previous studies had found microplastics at similarly high rates in lung tissue taken during autopsies.

People were already known to breathe in the tiny particles, as well as consuming them via food and water. Workers exposed to high levels of microplastics are also known to have developed disease.

Microplastics were detected in human blood for the first time in March, showing the particles can travel around the body and may lodge in organs. The impact on health is as yet unknown. But researchers are concerned as microplastics cause damage to human cells in the laboratory and air pollution particles are already known to enter the body and cause millions of early deaths a year.

“We did not expect to find the highest number of particles in the lower regions of the lungs, or particles of the sizes we found,” said Laura Sadofsky at Hull York medical school in the UK,a senior author of the study. “It is surprising as the airways are smaller in the lower parts of the lungs and we would have expected particles of these sizes to be filtered out or trapped before getting this deep.”

“This data provides an important advance in the field of air pollution, microplastics and human health,” she said. The information could be used to create realistic conditions for laboratory experiments to determine health impacts.

The research, which has been accepted for publication by the journal Science of the Total Environment, used samples of healthy lung tissue from next to the surgery targets. It analysed particles down to 0.003mm in size and used spectroscopy to identify the type of plastic. It also used control samples to account for the level of background contamination.

A 2021 study in Brazil on autopsy samples found microplastics in 13 of the 20 people analysed, whose average age was higher than those assessed by Sadofsky’s study. Polyethylene, used in plastic bags, was one of the most common particles. The researchers concluded: “Deleterious health outcomes may be related to … these contaminants in the respiratory system following inhalation.”

A US study of lung cancer patients in 1998 found plastic and plant fibres (such as cotton) in more than 100 samples. In cancerous tissue, 97% of samples contained the fibres and in non-cancerous samples, 83% were contaminated.

Huge amounts of plastic waste are dumped in the environment, and microplastics contaminate the entire planet, from the summit of Mount Everest to the deepest oceans. Microplastics have been found in the placentas of pregnant women, and in pregnant rats they pass rapidly through the lungs into the hearts, brains and other organs of the foetuses.

A recent review assessed cancer risk and concluded: “More detailed research on how micro- and nanoplastics affect the structures and processes of the human body, and whether and how they can transform cells and induce carcinogenesis, is urgently needed, particularly in light of the exponential increase in plastic production.”

Microplastics from European rivers are finding their way to Arctic seas, research suggests.

These tiny plastic particles, which come from clothing fibres, car tyres, cosmetics and many more sources, have been found across the entire planet, from the summit of Mount Everest to the deepest oceans.

People are known to consume the tiny particles via food and water, as well as breathing them in. Microplastics have been shown to harm wildlife but the impact on people is not known, though microplastics do damage human cells in the laboratory.

They have also been found in the Arctic, and until now the source of these tiny particles has not been known.

A new study in Scientific Reports, led by Mats Huserbråten from the Institute of Marine Research, in Bergen, Norway, suggests particles in the Arctic Ocean, the Nordic Seas and Baffin Bay have spread from Europe.

The scientists used modelling to predict how many microplastic particles would be in certain parts of the ocean, and compared it with water samples from these places. Their analysis suggests microplastics have been circulating in the Arctic for at least a decade.

To work it out, they combined models of ocean currents between 2007 and 2017 with simulations of floating microplastic movements. Then, they simulated the release of microplastics from 21 major rivers across northern Europe and the Arctic every day over a 10-year period and modelled their movements over decades.

After this, they simulated the release of microplastics from 21 major rivers across northern Europe and the Arctic every day over a 10-year period and modelled their movements over decades, then compared the results of their model with the distribution of floating microplastics across 121 seawater samples that were collected from 17 sites off the west coast of Norway between May 2017 and August 2018.

They found that most simulated particles drifted along two main pathways after being released from rivers, with 65% drifting along the Norwegian coast towards the Laptev Sea, north of Russia, before going to the Arctic Ocean, across the north pole, then exiting the Arctic Ocean via the Fram Strait east of Greenland. Thirty per cent went in another direction, travelling across Greenland then farther south along the north-east coast of Canada.

Analysis of seawater found in each of these areas revealed the distribution of these floating microplastics was consistent with what was predicted by the models.

The researchers warned that better waste management is required so the health of the Arctic ecosystem is not compromised.

They said: “The equal distribution of sampled synthetic particles across water masses covering a wide time frame of anthropogenic influence suggests a system in full saturation rather than pronounced injection from European sources, through a complex circulation scheme connecting the entire Arctic Mediterranean.

“This circulation of microplastic through Arctic ecosystems may have large consequences to natural ecosystem health, highlighting an ever-increasing need for better waste management.”

Current methods to reduce microplastic release include adding filters to washing machines to catch particles. They can also be removed by some wastewater and drinking water treatments.

Since farmers began tilling the land in the Midwest 160 years ago, 57.6 billion metric tons of topsoil have eroded, according to a study published recently in Earth's Future. The loss has occurred despite conservation efforts implemented in the 1930s after the Dust Bowl, and the erosion rate is estimated to be double what the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) says is sustainable. Future crop production could be severely limited if it continues, reports Rachel Crowell for Science News.

Degraded soil makes growing food more difficult and expensive. Without healthy soil, farmers won't be able to grow nutrient-dense food to feed our growing population. The calculated loss in the region is part of a critical issue; some experts suspect that Earth will run out of usable topsoil within 60 years.

The team of researchers led by geoscientists at the University Massachusetts Amherst measured the elevation differences between native prairie and farm fields across Midwestern states to see how tilling has changed landscapes. Native prairie remnants are higher than the surrounding land, the study explains.

The majority of the 20 investigated sites were located in central Iowa, but other places were studied in Illinois, South Dakota, Minnesota, Kansas and Nebraska, reports Katie Pikes for Harvest Public Media. "These rare prairie remnants that are scattered across the Midwest are sort of a preservation of the pre-European-American settlement land surface," says Isaac Larsen, study author from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, to Science News.

The research team had help from the Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation to identify sites for the study. On average, farmed fields were 1.2 feet below the prairie, per Science News. After measuring soil height in each area, the team found that, on average, topsoil is eroding at a rate of 1.9 millimeters per year, Harvest Public Media reports.

When topsoil erodes, the nutrients crops need go with it, making it more difficult for soil to store water and support plant growth. Farmers can lose 50 to 70 percent of their yield potential because of the loss of topsoil, reports Harvest Public Media. Rapid erosion is a problem because recovering topsoil is a slow process that takes years. Generating just over an inch of topsoil takes 1,000 years, said Maria-Helena Semedo of the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organization in 2014.

Topsoil can erode due to strong winds, hard rains and flowing water. Farming practices like tilling, the process farmers use to overturn the ground to prepare it for crops, leave the soil vulnerable to surface runoff. One way to help mitigate the loss of topsoil is to have farmers use no-till practices to grow crops. "By and large, we have the technology now to make no-till work or something that approximates it, maybe strip till," Richard Cruse, an agronomy expert at Iowa State University not involved with the study, says to Harvest Public Media. "So, it's realistic. It's more challenging with some soils than others."

According to the USDA, no-till practices have already been implemented by 51 percent of soybean, cotton, corn and wheat farmers in the U.S. Cover crops may also be a solution—they are plants grown during the offseason—but are only used in about 5 percent of cases, Bruno Basso, an agricultural researcher at Michigan State University not involved with the study, says to Science News.

"As erosion degrades our soils, it reduces our ability to grow food," Larsen explains in a press release. "Combine this with increasing global population and climate stress, and we have a real problem."

GENEVA, April 26 (Reuters) - A U.N. report on Tuesday called for urgent action to avert a "sand crisis," including a ban on beach extraction as demand surges to 50 billion tonnes a year amid population growth and urbanisation.

Sand is the most exploited natural resource in the world after water, but its use is largely ungoverned, meaning we are consuming it faster than it can be replaced by geological processes that take hundreds of thousands of years, the U.N. Environment Programme (UNEP) report says. read more

Global consumption for use in glass, concrete and construction materials has tripled over two decades to reach 50 billion tonnes a year, or about 17 kilogrammes per person each day, it said, harming rivers and coastlines and even wiping out small islands.

"We now find ourselves in the position where the needs and expectations of our societies cannot be met without improved governance of sand resources," Sheila Aggarwal-Khan, director of the Economy Division at UNEP said in the report's foreword. "If we act now, it is still possible to avoid a sand crisis."


A worker operates a front loader in an area cleared for sand mining on a dried lake bed of Poyang Lake in Jiujiang, Jiangxi province, China December 11, 2019.

UNEP's Pascal Peduzzi who coordinated the report written by 22 authors said that some of the impacts of over-exploitation were already being felt. In the Mekong River - the longest in Southeast Asia -sand extraction was causing the delta to sink, leading to salinisation of previously fertile lands.

In a Sri Lankan river, sand removal had reversed the water flow, meaning that ocean water was heading inland and bringing salt-water crocodiles with it, he told journalists.

Demand is now seen as shifting to Africa where villagers often remove sand from beaches to build growing cities. In some cases, this can make coastlines more vulnerable to the impact of climate change, such as more powerful storms, the report said.

Among the report's recommendations were a ban on beach extraction and the creation of an international standard for marine dredging that can harm ocean biodiversity.

It also called for reducing demand by reusing sand from recycled materials like concrete and mining tailings instead of using naturally occurring sand.

More than a fifth of all reptile species are threatened with extinction, which could have a “devastating” impact on the planet, a new study warns.

The largest ever analysis of the state of the world’s reptiles, published in Nature, found that 21% of reptile species are facing extinction. From lizards to snakes, such a loss could have disastrous impacts on ecosystems around the world, the study says.

“We would lose a combined 15.6bn years of evolutionary history if each of the 1,829 threatened reptiles became extinct,” said Neil Cox, co-leader of the study and manager of the biodiversity assessment unit at the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). “This is evolution that we could never get back. It would be a devastating loss.

“If we remove reptiles, it could change ecosystems radically, with unfortunate knock-on effects, such as increases in pest insects,” he added. “Biodiversity, including reptiles, underpins the ecosystem services that provide a healthy environment for people.”

Fifty-two experts analysed data from the Global Reptile Assessment, which has received contributions from more than 900 scientists across six continents in the past 17 years. While 1,829 of 10,196 species are known to be threatened, the status of 1,489 could not be determined. Allowing for these data deficient species, the authors estimate that, in total, 21% are threatened.

The study was led by NatureServe, the IUCN and Conservation International.

Although many reptiles live in arid environments such as deserts and scrubland, most species occur in forests, where they suffer from threats such as logging and conversion of land for agriculture. The study found 30% of forest-dwelling reptiles are at risk of extinction, compared with 14% in arid habitats. The king cobra (Ophiophagus hannah), for example, listed as globally ‘vulnerable’, is declining across much of its range in Asia, largely due to the loss of forest habitat.

Hunting is also a major threat to reptiles, especially turtles and crocodiles, half of which are at risk of extinction. Another major contributing factor is the introduction of invasive species.

Like birds or freshwater fish, reptiles tend to be less popular than iconic species of land mammals or marine life, but more reptile species are threatened than birds, suggesting more work is needed to protect them, said Mike Hoffmann, head of wildlife recovery at the Zoological Society of London, and one of the scientists involved with the study.

“From turtles that breathe through their genitals to chameleons the size of a chickpea and giant tortoises that can live to more than 100, they’re utterly fascinating. Our hope is that this first-ever assessment of the world’s 10,000-plus reptiles helps put them in the spotlight and goes some way to highlighting this diversity, and just how much we have to lose.”

As well as controlling rats, mosquitoes and other “pests”, reptiles deliver many other benefits. “They help disperse seeds, especially in island environments,” said Hoffmann. “We’ve also achieved many medical advances from studies of reptiles. Snake venom, for example, has resulted in critical drug discoveries, including for treating hypertension.

“The impending loss [of reptile species] could lead to wide-ranging and unforeseen impacts on our environment and our own wellbeing.”

In Australia, home to about 10% of the world’s species, reptiles face a growing number of threats. “Most of Australia’s threatened reptiles have declined due to habitat loss and predation by invasive cats and foxes,” said Nicki Mitchell from the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Western Australia, who also contributed to the study.

“Climate change is an emerging threat to species confined to small fragments of habitat, as the microclimates they occupy will change and may no longer be optimal for a population to thrive.”

The study is not all doom. Scientists noted that conservation efforts to help other animals are likely to be protecting reptile species as collateral. “We found, surprisingly, that if you set out to protect places where threatened birds, mammals and amphibians live together, you’ll simultaneously protect many more threatened reptiles,” said Bruce Young, co-leader of the study, and chief zoologist and senior conservation scientist at NatureServe.

Yet reptiles also require direct, global, efforts to protect them, said Cox. The UN Convention on Biological Diversity is scheduled to convene Cop15’s second phase in Kunming, China, later this year, where governments will negotiate new targets to protect biodiversity, including reptiles.

“We need solid conservation plans, global policy agreement, and to have countries fully invest in turning around the looming biodiversity crisis if we are to prevent the ongoing extinction catastrophe,” he said.