This figure is on the rise and what alerts scientists even more is that several of the species caught are threatened with extinction, a picture in which researchers stress the need for new measures to save these animals.

The study recently published by Science specified that for its elaboration, the authors used data from 2012 to 2019.

Broadly speaking, they found that the annual mortality of sharks increased from 76 million in 2012 to more than 80 million in 2017. Of the total, 25 million are threatened species.

The researchers responsible for this work, drew data from 150 countries, interviews with other specialists and computer models.

Lead author Boris Worm, a marine ecologist at Canada’s Dalhousie University, said they tried to be as proactive as possible to obtain the highest quality data for an analysis never before conducted on this scale.

He pointed out that the research showed that fishing sites are becoming more and more important, as the demand for shark meat increases, a global issue that needs to be addressed directly attacking mortality, and not just finning.

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