Pollution Prevention  


What must be done?

WWF's pollution prevention objectives

Why WWF is respected worldwide

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Table of Contents


        
Introduction

     Pollution threatens life on this planet. Every ocean, every continent, from the tropics to the once-pristine polar regions, is contaminated. Wildlife everywhere - seals, whales, alligators, panthers, polar bears - is seriously, often fatally, affected. The world's biodiversity - the basis of its complex and vital ecosystems - is at risk as never before.

In the last 50 years, since the end of World War II, the manufacture and use of chemicals has dramatically increased. The resultant pollution of the atmosphere and contamination of soil and water, already widespread in the North, is on the increase in developing countries. In the South, freshwater pollution by industrial chemicals, fertilizers, and pesticides, as well as sewage, is a major threat to health. The oceans are a dumping ground for everything from crude oil to plastic bags.

Many of the synthetic substances that pervade our environment are highly toxic. Many are also persistent and bio-accumulative (becoming more concentrated as they rise in the food chain), ineradicable from soil and water and capable of poisoning the food chain. Methylmercury ingested by fish, for instance, is found in high concentrations in carnivorous aquatic mammals and is believed to affect humans who eat it. Already over 30years ago, Rachel Carson was pointing out, in Silent Spring (1962), that "what we do to the animals, we do to ourselves".

Toxic chemicals have been found worldwide in both animal and human tissue (which on a cellular level are fundamentally the same). Pesticides have caused death and serious illness, especially among agricultural workers in the South.

Further damage to human health ranges from cancer and immune system depression to birth defects and declining fertility. Furthermore, evidence is now accumulating of so-called "endocrine disruption" - interference with the endocrine system by synthetic substances that can mimic natural hormones. This can wreak havoc with sexual and cognitive development, reproductive ability, and, ultimately, the survival of species.

We know that the loss of biodiversity caused by toxins in the environment is a loss to humankind. Now we know that humankind itself is also at risk. What we don't know is nearly enough about the toxins in our environment: what they are, where they are, why they do what they do, and what they may do in the future.

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