Earth’s Condition Is ‘Serious and Getting Worse’ as Climate Change Intensifies

“If Earth were a patient coming in for an annual physical, I would say its condition is serious and getting worse,” Oregon State University researcher Bill Ripple says.

Ripple is the lead author of a new paper chronicling the state of the climate, published on Wednesday in BioScience. The findings show that seven of the 16 planetary vital signs tracked by the researchers have never been in a more extreme state.

That includes the amount of carbon dioxide in the…