Extinction: The Facts

Wednesday, March 31, at 8 PM

Repeats Thursday, April 1, at 1 AM and Sunday, April 4, at noon

Also airs on Fusion on Saturday, April 3, at noon

With a million species at risk of extinction, nature historian Sir David Attenborough explores how this crisis of biodiversity has consequences for us all, threatening food and water security, undermining our ability to control our climate and even putting us at greater risk of pandemic diseases.

Extinction is now happening up to 100 times faster than the natural evolutionary rate, but the issue is about more than the loss of individual species. Everything in the natural world is connected in networks that support the whole of life on earth, including us, and we are losing many of the benefits that nature provides to us. 

The loss of insects is threatening the pollination of crops, while the loss of biodiversity in the soil also threatens plant growth. Plants underpin many of the things that we need, and yet one in four is now threatened with extinction.