Will the ocean suffer an epidemic?

Written by a team of European experts from the marine sciences, Navigating the Future VI discusses how the biodiversity crisis is being played out in the Ocean. It notes that Ocean species large and small are far less well described than their terrestrial counterparts, making it harder to measure declines and their impacts. This publication provides governments, policymakers and funders with robust, independent scientific advice on future seas and Ocean research. With the COP16 on biodiversity already in full swing in Cali, Colombia, it is timely to reflect further on the need to better understand our Ocean biodiversity.

“Climate change is causing the Ocean to warm up. This forces species to move to find conditions to which they are adapted. But we do not fully understand the implications of these movements. When species move to new habitats, they might spread microorganisms that could cause an epidemic amongst the native species, or conversely, the new arrivals could be susceptible to suffering an epidemic themselves. To avoid such epidemic events, which could lead to local extinctions, we need to understand far more about pathogenic microorganisms and where they live”, says Carlos Pereira Dopazo, lead author of the chapter on Ocean and Biodiversity.

Critical research questions

The NFVI Ocean and Biodiversity chapter presents the ongoing research questions surrounding Ocean biodiversity and its evolution as the Earth changes. It recommends that we focus on addressing the questions of:

• What combinations of traditional taxonomic and new genomic methods can we use to speed up species’ identification and make monitoring of biodiversity more comprehensive?
• Where do pathogenic marine microorganisms occur, and could they pose a future epidemic risk for marine species?
• Where will marine species, such as commercially important fish, move to as the climate changes and the Ocean warms, and how can we avoid human conflicts when species move to new areas?
• What emerging human activities will affect marine biodiversity in the future, and how can we mitigate these risks?
• How will invasive species affect native marine ecosystems?
• Ocean species’ and ecosystem conservation and restoration are costly, but what is the ultimate economic and societal cost of inaction?

About NFVI

NFVI was written by experts from the European Marine Board, an independent non-governmental advisory body that represents more than 10,000 marine scientists across Europe. The publication focuses on the critical role the Ocean plays in the wider Earth system. The working group (operating from October 2022 – October 2024) comprises 33 experts from 16 European countries, covering a wide range of marine natural and social science backgrounds and career levels.

The document can be access at: https://www.marineboard.eu/publications/nfvi