Biodiversity: its importance to human health: interim executive summary

Abstract

E.O. Wilson once said about ants "we need them to survive, but they don't need us at all." The same, in fact, could be said about countless other insects, bacteria, fungi, plankton, plants, and other organisms. This central truth, however, is largely lost to most of us. Rather, we act as if we were totally independent of Nature, as if it were an infinite source ofproducts and services for our use alone, and an infinite sink for our wastes.