Report Reveals World's Fourth Largest Lake Now a Deadly Desert
By 2015 most of that shiny surface was reduced to a hauntingly barren expanse, birthing the world's newest desert and impacting 3 million people that live in the surrounding region.
The Aral Sea once spanned 68,000 sq km (26,000 sq mi), but reports now suggest all that currently remains is a few slithers amounting to about 8,000 sq km of water. The rest of its bone-white seabed now forms the Aralkum desert.
"It is certainly one of the biggest environmental disasters in the world," Ibrahim Thiaw, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification, said last year.
Studies have found the loss of this inland sea nearly doubled the region's atmospheric dust between 1984 and 2015, from 14 to 27 million metric tons.
The airborne former lakebed has reduced air quality in neighboring cities, even as far as 800 kilometers (500 miles) away, and is contributing to the acceleration of glacial melt. This is then further exacerbating the region's water crisis.
Storms spread these damaging salts, destroying crops hundreds of kilometers away, and contaminating drinking water.
Aralkum's dust is particularly toxic compared to the rest of the region's desert dust because it contains runoff from nearby USSR chemical weapons testing and is full of fertilizers and pesticides from the same mass agricultural practices responsible for draining the Aral Sea.
Between the 1960s and 1990s, the Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers that flowed from the mountains to supply the lake were redirected to irrigate 7 million hectares (1.7 million acres) of cotton fields for the Soviet Union.
The massive-scale irrigation that's continued since in various forms rapidly reduced the lake, eventually splitting it into two slithers, and connecting its hundreds of islands to their surrounding banks.
Salinity concentrations in the remaining water increased to levels higher than the ocean, destroying most of the native life within and collapsing the local ecosystem. This destroyed the livelihoods of many people, as illustrated by the rusted fishing boats now strewn across the arid sands.
Exposure to the dust has been linked to health issues in adults and children in the region, including increased congenital defects. In an effort to contain the toxic dust, regional governments have been working on vegetating the former lakebed, with local scientists searching for plants hardy enough to tolerate the salty soil.
The EU and USAid have recently offered assistance for this mass undertaking, but this is no longer assured.
What's happened to the Aral Sea isn't just some distant tragedy the rest of the world can afford to ignore, as the same circumstances are being repeated globally. Lakes and other land-based water systems in Africa, the Middle East, Europe, Australia, and the US are all shrinking due to industrialized agricultural and climate pressures.
The Aral Sea is a stark warning of the deadly and complex consequences of failing to prioritize enough water for the local environment.
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Adverse Reactions: The most common adverse reactions (incidence ≥5%) reported in clinical studies were vomiting, nausea, liver injury, pyrexia, and thrombocytopenia. Report negative side effects of prescription drugs to the FDA. Visit or call 1-800-FDA-1088. You may also report side effects to Sarepta Therapeutics at 1-888-SAREPTA (1-888-727-3782). For further information, please see the full Prescribing Information. About Sarepta TherapeuticsSarepta is on an urgent mission: engineer precision genetic medicine for rare diseases that devastate lives and cut futures short. We hold leadership positions in Duchenne muscular dystrophy (Duchenne) and limb-girdle muscular dystrophies (LGMDs) and are building a robust portfolio of programs across muscle, central nervous system, and cardiac diseases. For more information, please visit or follow us on LinkedIn, X, Instagram and Facebook. Internet Posting of InformationWe routinely post information that may be important to investors in the 'For Investors' section of our website at We encourage investors and potential investors to consult our website regularly for important information about us. Forward-Looking StatementsThis statement contains "forward-looking statements." Any statements that are not statements of historical fact may be deemed to be forward-looking statements. Words such as "will," "may," "potential" and similar expressions are intended to identify forward-looking statements. These forward-looking statements include, without limitation, statements relating to our future operations, research and development programs, discussions with regulators and the prospects for approvals or continued approvals, as applicable, of ELEVIDYS and the potential benefits and risks of ELEVIDYS. Actual results could materially differ from those stated or implied by these forward-looking statements as a result of such risks and uncertainties. Known risk factors include the following: different methodologies, assumptions and applications we use to assess particular safety or efficacy parameters may yield different statistical results; our products or product candidates may be perceived as insufficiently effective, unsafe or may result in unforeseen adverse events; our products or product candidates may cause undesirable side effects that result in significant negative consequences; the possible impact of regulatory decisions by, and any halts imposed by, regulatory agencies on our business; and those risks identified under the heading "Risk Factors" in our most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2024 filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) as well as other SEC filings made by the Company, which you are encouraged to review. Any of the foregoing risks could materially and adversely affect the Company's business, results of operations and the trading price of Sarepta's common stock. For a detailed description of risks and uncertainties Sarepta faces, you are encouraged to review the SEC filings made by Sarepta. We caution investors not to place considerable reliance on the forward-looking statements contained herein. Sarepta does not undertake any obligation to publicly update its forward-looking statements based on events or circumstances after the date hereof, except as required by law. Source: Sarepta Therapeutics, Inc. View source version on Contacts Investor Contact: Ian Estepan617-274-4052iestepan@ Media Contacts: Tracy Sorrentino617-301-8566tsorrentino@ Kara Hoeger617-710-3898KHoeger@
