<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
The COVID-19 pandemic is a world-shattering event whose far-ranging consequences we can only begin to imagine today, hence, I am certain that, there is no individual whose smart phone is without the never-ending beeps of COVID-19 messages, videos, audios, memes, etc. blinking on our screen which we are glued to. Some Medias are imparting precautionary measures and essential guides whilst several are a congestion of unauthenticated information, which is misguiding and misinforming citizens. <\/p>\n
My attempt and intent of this piece is not to disclaim and ignore the herculean negativity of the pandemic where thousands have lost their families and loved ones or to evoke fear, anger or misconceptions of any kind, but I, as an environmental scientist (doing my job) would like to drift you, my readers, to another scenario- how nature is reclaiming its spaces amidst the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n
Whilst the world is grappled with the pandemic and its impact is utterly disheartening and sad and it seems clearly incorrect and foolhardy to conclude that pandemics have an optimistic impact, there is another truth that is increasingly taking hold and gaining momentum.<\/p>\n
1. Imagery shared by NASA shows a steep decline in nitrogen dioxide levels – which mainly stem from the burning of fossil fuels for traffic and industry (and for this, you can visit the NASA website).<\/p>\n
2. As a result of pause of industrial work, reduced travel, increasing business closure and lockdown of several countries, pollution levels are dropping all over the world, and the environment is thriving.<\/p>\n
3. As humans everywhere are forced to self-isolate due to the pandemic, lowering pollution levels have led to the unexpected prevailing of nature.<\/p>\n
4. Data from the European Space Agency (ESA) has demonstrated a distinct drop in the air pollutant nitrogen dioxide between the months of January and March.<\/p>\n
5. In many European cities, following the reduction of water traffic from boats and cruise ships, residents are noticing that the usually murky waters are becoming crystal clear. Even more incredibly, dolphins have begun to swim in the canals, joined by schools of fish and even swans.<\/p>\n
It is incredible to see how in such a short span of time, nature can adapt to the changing of human habits. These improvements in nature, albeit due to human restrictions, are inevitably something to take note of. If there is one thing this pandemic has proven, it is human activity that is the foremost cause of pollution on earth. Hopefully, this is something the world can remember once the pandemic is over, and apply to the ways we think about environmental policy moving forward, so as to build ourselves a sustainable planet.<\/p>\n
Alino Sumi, Senior Research Fellow (SRF), Martin Luther Christian <\/p>\n
University, Shillong<\/p>\n
Every cloud has a silver lining<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-216783","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216783","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216783"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216783\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nagalandpost.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}