Oysters Vanishing From Oceans Worldwide, Biologists Say

Oysters are important to ecosystems because they filter impurities from water -- yet the delicious mollusks are rapidly vanishing from the world's waterways.

About 85 percent of oyster reefs worldwide  have been lost to disease and fishing, scientists say. In addition to providing jobs and being tasty, oysters also serve this function.
Oysters are "functionally extinct" in my locations around the globe due to disease and overharvesting, a new study has found.
The wide-ranging survey, published in BioScience, the journal of the American Institute of Biological Sciences, compares the past and present condition of oyster reefs around the globe. The international team of researchers led by Michael Beck of the Nature Conservancy and the University of California found that more than 90 percent of former reefs have been lost in most of the "bays" and ecoregions where the prized mollusks were formerly abundant.