Global health. The current scenario and future perspectives

76 other and how they interact with the natural environment they live in. Loss of BD is occurring at two levels. Firstly, plant and animal species are becoming extinct at an unprecedented rate that far exceeds the natural historical rate and, secondly, entire ecosystems in coastal and marine areas, continental watersheds, forests and drylands (deserts, grasslands and savannahs) are being destroyed by pollution, land conversion and climate change. The global Living Planet Index developed by the WWF, based on population trends of hundreds of species and their percentage changes measured in terms of abundance since 1970, in the latest 2020 report showed an average collapse of 68% in the analyzed populations of mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles and fish between 1970 and 2016. The loss of BD is important for numerous reasons: i) Living organisms provide irreplaceable environmental services that humanity critically depends on, such as maintaining fertile land, absorbing pollution, decomposing waste and pollinating crops. ii) BD supports human health by facilitating the development of medicines. According to UNEP, nearly half of the top 25 selling drugs in the world have natural origins, and it is estimated that such naturally sourced pharmaceutical products have a global market value of between USD 50- 75 billion annually. iii) BD provides genetic resources for food and agriculture. The unique and lucrative human capacity to domesticate and breed more productive animals and crops, such as chickens that lay more eggs and drought- resistant maize, relies on the genetic diversity within these species. iv) Many people protect BD for ethical and spiritual reasons. John Muir, an American naturalist, wrote in 1912, “Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and cheer and give strength to body and soul alike.”. The WWF also argues that it works to protect endangered animals and plants, in part simply because they are “beautiful and rare”. Therefore, for many groups of people, including indigenous peoples, the preservation of nature is a valuable end in itself. Again, the primary global instrument for biodiversity protection is the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), which explicitly recognizes that the conservation of biodiversity is a common goal of humanity and the fundamental basis for the development process. The CBD has three mechanisms to promote biodiversity: an information exchange hub for technical and scientific cooperation, a national reporting process on measures taken for biodiversity and a financial provision that aids developing countries in this effort.