Dubai
As of late Monday night, the total number of cases crossed 23 million. More than 16 million patients suffering from the Covid-19 coronavirus have now recovered.
As of late Friday night, the total number of cases crossed 23 million while fatalities crossed 800,000, global trackers revealed. Infections have been reported in more than 210 countries and territories since the first cases were identified in China in December 2019. The United States has suffered the most deaths, followed by Brazil, Mexico and India.
Humanity will have burned through all the natural resources that the planet can replenish for 2020 by yesterday (Saturday), according to researchers who said the grim milestone is slightly later than last year after the pandemic slowed runaway overconsumption. So-called Earth Overshoot Day – the date when humanity has used all the biological resources that Earth can renew annually – has crept steadily earlier since the 1970s, according to the Global Footprint Network.
The group calculates the point will be reached on August 22, compared to July 29 in 2019, marking a rare reversal after lockdowns to slow the new coronavirus caused a temporary decline in emissions and wood harvesting.
This reduced humanity’s footprint by 9.3 per cent compared to last year, they said. But that is ‘not something to celebrate’, said Mathis Wackernagel, president of Global Footprint Network, in an online presentation.
‘It’s not done by design, it’s done by disaster,’ he added. Researchers calculate the date humanity overshoots its planetary budget by looking at ‘all the human demands’ for food, energy, space for houses and roads and what would be needed to absorb global C02 emissions, Wackernagel said. Comparing that with what is sustainably available, they estimate that humanity is using 60 per cent more than can be renewed – the equivalent of 1.6 planets.
‘It’s like with money. We can spend more than what we earned, but not forever,’ said Wackernagel. The study estimated that the pandemic had driven a 14.5 per cent decrease in humanity’s carbon footprint compared to 2019, while forest products saw an 8.4 per cent fall, largely because of smaller harvests anticipating poor demand.—Agencies
