"One expert said the island mammal “is just the first of what will be countless species lost to climate change if we don’t get our pollution under control.”"
"The Australian government has confirmed the extinction of a small rodent native to a tiny spit of sand in the northernmost part of the Great Barrier Reef ― the first known mammal lost to human-caused climate change.
Bramble Cay melomys lived on the coral island of Bramble Cay, located in the Torres Strait between Queensland state and Papua New Guinea. The Government of Queensland initially declared the species extinct in a 2016 report, and Australian Environment Minister Melissa Price confirmed the die-off in a press release this week. The whiskered rat has been officially reclassified from “endangered” to “extinct.”
Geoff Richardson, an official with Australia’s Department of the Environment and Energy, told lawmakers on Monday that the declaration “was not a decision to take lightly,” according to The Sydney Morning Herald."
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