The world’s population of mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fish has plummeted 53 percent since 1970, according to a World Wildlife Fund report released on Tuesday.  “Population sizes of vertebrate species have halved over the last 40 years,” the report said. “The state of the world’s biodiversity appears worse than ever.” During the same time, the world’s human population has doubled, it noted.  The study used a Living Planet Index to measure more than 10,000 populations of the world’s vertebrates.

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