Op-Eds and Blogs

Whether or not scientists identify the origin of COVID-19, we can build on the abundance of available evidence showing that wildlife markets continue to pose danger to human health and wellbeing.

Zoonotic spillover is much more likely to occur in urban markets that sell live or fresh wildlife sourced hundreds or thousands of miles away from where indigenous peoples and local communities need to feed their families.

In a new commentary for Medium, WCS's Cristina Mormorunni argues that our commitment to the ecological and cultural restoration of bison embodies a new and much needed conservation model.

In a new op-ed for Devex, WCS’s Aili Kang argues that while a vaccine might help prevent a further #COVID19 outbreak, only effective conservation can prevent the next unknown zoonotic epidemic.

In a new blog, WCS Madagascar's Morgane Cournarie says it's clearer than ever that effective conservation needs a multi-sectoral approach that respects people’s rights and livelihoods, and seeks common solutions to shared problems.

A major research project from the University of Alberta co-authored by WCS Canada's Hilary Cooke outlines pockets of Canada's boreal forest that may give wildlife more time and space to adjust to a changing climate.

In a new op-ed for The Revelator, WCS EU's Arnaud Goessens notes that while the new EU biodiversity strategy represents hope for people and wildlife, and can be a model for governments, it still lacks critical funding to carry out its goals.

In a new commentary for Mongabay, WCS's Jeremy Radachowsky argues that Honduras's Bakinasta territory, already under severe threat due to invasions by land grabbers, is being devastated economically by COVID-19.

Though fully one quarter of the shark fin trade is now regulated under the world’s premier wildlife conservation convention, the importance of maintaining enforcement pressure remains high.

Local nearshore closures are a key part of actions needed for fisheries sustainability and must be integrated into the most heavily fished seascapes to deliver the food security critical to the poorest nations, argues WCS's Tim McClanahan in a commentary for World Oceans Day.

In a new blog for World Oceans Day, WCS's Hollie Booth and Irfan Yulianto cite a recent study suggesting that if sharks were absent from key marine sites, Indonesia’s tourism industry could lose roughly 25 percent of dive tourist expenditures per year

The COVID-19 crisis reminds us of the need for early warning systems for emerging diseases. The WCS Congo wildlife health team has been raising local awareness of what to do when wild animal carcasses are encountered in the forest.

The CITES treaty has little power to prevent spread of pathogens to humans, notes WCS's Sue Lieberman. To avoid future pandemic, the commercial trade in wildlife, especially of birds and mammals, for human consumption must end.

For many rural people across far-flung parts of SE Asia, notes WCS’s Greater Mekong Regional Director Colin Poole, COVID-19 is less a crisis of public health than economic survival.

Instead of deep on a reef, I was deep with worry about friends and colleagues. Every single day I ask myself how the work we do as scientists and conservationists can help communities in this time of crisis and change.

“Spring was always the annual end point for my work studying owls in Russia,” writes WCS’s Jon Slaght in a new blog for Scientific American. “This year, the coronavirus ensured that the expedition would leave me behind.”