Animals are Disappearing and We're Covering it Up

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Animals are Disappearing and We're Covering it Up
Monday, January 16, 2012

Animals are going extinct for all sorts of reasons, and what's being done to some of them should be a CRIME. Many of the animal species at risk of extinction right here in the US have not made it onto our official Endangered Species Act (ESA) list.

National "red lists" are used by many countries to evaluate and protect locally threatened species. The ESA is one of the best known national lists. When it comes to international extinctions, biologists and lawmakers consult the IUCN Red List, and comparing the ESA list to the Red List, researchers found that of the American species included on the IUCN list, 40% of birds, 50% of mammals, and 80-95% of other species such as amphibians, gastropods, crustaceans, and insects, are NOT recognized by the ESA as threatened. This amounts to approximately 531 American species on the IUCN Red List that have not made the ESA protection list. Is this some sort of cover up by the US?

Alas, it's probably just Congressional business as usual: Australian researcher Bert Harris says, "The ESA has protected species since its establishment in 1973, and it may have prevented 227 extinctions. However, the implementation of the ESA by successive US governments has been problematic, including poor coverage of imperiled species, inadequate funding, and political intervention."