Do we really need bad news this bad?

 

There's the bad news, and then there's the worse bad news.

This is the latter.

Mass deaths of elephant seals recorded as bird flu sweeps across the Antarctic

Researchers warn of one of ‘largest ecological disasters of modern times’ if the highly contagious disease reaches penguin colonies

Really.  Of course, there's always the chance, though low, this could jump into human populations.

"The Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research said recently: “Given the dense breeding colonies of wildlife in the Antarctic and sub-Antarctic regions, HPAI is expected to have devastating impacts on the wildlife and to lead to catastrophic breeding failure and mortality events in the region.”

The virus has killed an estimated 20,000 sea lions in Chile and Peru. Dewar said: “If we start to get outbreaks similar to what we’ve seen in South America that could have very big impacts. Emperor penguins and chinstrap penguins have been taking significant declines, so if we get large outbreaks in those species, that could cause further pressure on those colonies.”

Well, for one thing (and I mean this seriously), we need more bird doctors.