You may have seen in the news this week that David Attenborough is launching a new programme on Netflix this Sunday (4th October) called ‘A life on our Planet’.
David Attenborough has dedicated the last 60 years of his life to making every attempt to educate us on the negative impact we are having on our planet and how to reduce the damage caused by us, man.
In a BBC interview this week, David explained that he noticed the damage that was occurring to the environment when he was swimming in the sea over 60 years ago and noticed the damaged coral on the seabed caused by the heated water as a result of global warming. It was at this point that he knew something had to change in order to reverse, or at least delay, the negative impact human life was causing to our planet.
It doesn’t take an expert to work out that in the short space of the last 6 months during the COVID-19 pandemic, we have seen a considerable improvement on our planet . The most noticeable difference is the decrease in air travel causing a very large drop in air pollution. As life as we know it has now changed in general, people are working from home and leaving the house less and therefore as a result of this there are less cars on the road and less commuters which is significantly reducing emissions in the air, and slowing down the damage to our planet. There is less rubbish in our waters meaning that often cloudy water is now running clear, having a positive impact on our wildlife as they are not falling prey to our ignorance regarding litter and disposal of certain products.
As life does return back to the new ‘normal’, it is crucial that we remember the positive impact the pandemic has had on our environment and wildlife and continue to do everything we can to keep this going in the right direction. Small changes that can be implemented are walking somewhere instead of driving, taking up cycling or catching public transport so that we can continue to see this drop in air pollution. Even just a quick flick of a light switch off or turning the television off when nobody is watching it, unplugging phone chargers when they are not in use will make an astounding amount of difference to our everyday usage of power. It may seem only a small change to turn off a switch and how would it have any impact, but if every household did the same, we could make some enormous changes to protect our environment for future generations.
We are over-running the planet, as our incredible health service is constantly getting better, our medicines are improving, life expectancy is therefore increasing and the human population is growing and as a result of this our planet cannot cope, or at least it will be unable to cope in the not too distant future. So the message behind this is that it is not too late, soon it will be, but as it stands we can all still preserve the environment and look after our incredible planet. If not for ourselves, then for our children and grandchildren. After all, as David Attenborough says, ‘it’s not for us, it’s for them’.
Tune in to David Attenborough on Sunday 4th October for his take on what we can do and how we can change together in such an inspirational way.