Toxic mercury poisoning the Amazon

Alongside the all-too-visible deforestation, the Amazon is facing an invisible but increasing threat from mercury pollution according to a new WWF report released today at the Second Conference of the Parties to the Minamata Convention on Mercury in Geneva, Switzerland. Healthy Rivers, Healthy People highlights the dangers mercury pollution poses across the Amazon and calls for urgent action to reduce the use of mercury in small-scale gold mining to protect the world's largest river system and the people and species that depend on it. The mercury pollution crisis in the Amazon is unfortunately both invisible and largely ignored despite growing evidence of the dangers it poses for people and wildlife across the river system