The fake story of a coming
climate change crisis
has been partially told
through pictures of
starving polar bears.
Four images of
thin or emaciated
polar bears,
falsely blamed
on climate change,
have been used
to scare people,
especially children
in the past 10 years.
First of all, a fact:
Starvation has always been
the leading natural cause
of death for all polar bears.
The Truth:
Rational people realize
that climate change
is almost never
the cause of polar
bear starvation.
November 2009
- Polar bear act of cannibalism
A lean adult male in
November 2009, near Churchill,
was witnessed by tourists
killing and eating a cub.
August 2013
- Svalbard starving dead bear
The carcass of an emaciated
polar bear, blamed on
climate change, with no
evidence that was the case.
2015
– Svalbard starving bear
An apparently injured and
emaciated polar bear
near Svalbard .
The photographer
speculated this was
caused by
climate change.
The picture went viral.
Norwegian polar bear specialist
Magnus Andersen pointed out
that starvation has always been
the leading natural cause of death
for old animals.
2017
– National Geographic starving bear
A film of an emaciated bear
on Somerset Island in the
Canadian Arctic was used
to tell the public that
“this is what climate
change looks like.”
The video
was viewed
more than
2.5 billion times.
National Geographic
only later admitted
there was no evidence
that climate change
had caused the
bear’s poor condition.
The bear could have been
old, ill, or suffering from
a degenerative disease.
The State of the
Polar Report 2018
put the new global
mid-point estimate
[of the polar bear population]
at more than 30,000,
roughly five times larger
than in the 1950s,
and three or four times
larger than in the 1970s,
when polar bears became
protected under
international treaty.
Polar bears were also placed
under the protection of the
Endangered Species Act in 2008.
In The State of the
Polar Report 2018,
zoologist Susan J. Crockford
says updates to IUCN data
put the new global mid-point
estimate at more than 30,000.
The 2019 polar bear count
estimate is the highest
since the polar bear became
internationally protected in 1973.
