'We are finished!' Jane Goodall issues warning for humanity – 'Brought this on ourselves'

The environmentalist insisted food systems need to change in response to the devastating outbreak. She said: “We have brought this on ourselves because of our absolute disrespect for animals and the environment.

“Our disrespect for wild animals and our disrespect for farmed animals has created this situation where disease can spill over to infect human beings.

“If we do not do things differently, we are finished.

“We can’t go on very much longer like this.”

Dr Goodall was speaking at an event organised by the charity Compassion in World Farming on Tuesday.

She called for an end to factory farming and to stop destroying natural habitats.

Dr Goodall added: “We have come to a turning point in our relationship with the natural world.

“One of the lessons learnt from this crisis is that we must change our ways.

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Dr Goodall warned of the risks of wildlife markets in a video call last month to students from her Roots & Shoots programme.

She said: “The sad thing is we brought it on ourselves. We’ve been very disrespectful of the environment, very disrespectful of animals. We’ve been gradually invading the world of the animals.

“We’ve been forcing them to spend more time together which enables a virus or a bacteria to cross the species barrier from an animal into a human.

“We’re hunting, killing, eating and trafficking them.

“The wildlife markets are the worst because animals of many different species are crowded together, often in very unhygienic conditions in tiny cages.

“Do remember that these are individual beings. They have feelings like we do and can be stressed and frightened. They can certainly feel pain and fear.

“These are the conditions which make it easy for a virus from a certain animal to spillover into a human and if it finds a cell it can bond with, that may become a new disease like Covid-19.

“I pray that we will emerge from it better people and that we’ll start thinking about our relationship with the natural world.”

source: express.co.uk