10 Unexpected T hings That The World Is Running Out Of

10. Sand

Hard to believe, we know, but it's true.  Turns out we use sand for everything from concrete, glass and asphalt to highways, skyscrapers and even your toothpaste.  Sand and gravel make up aggregate which them makes up 85% of all mining that takes place on earth, and it's exceeding its renewal rate at a very worrying pace.


9. Effective Gonorrhea Treatments

The first antibiotics to fight off this STD became available back in the 1940s, but like most bacteria, gonorrhea has mutated and grown stronger and more medicine resistant.  In only 70 years antibiotics have become nearly useless in fighting it.  There is only one antibiotic left to treat it effectively.


8. Helium

Kiss your party balloons goodbye.  Yup, helium is on its way out.  

Turns out, helium is a nonrenewable resource is used in so many more things than just your kids balloons.  Helium is used to cool down superconducting magnets in MRI machines and as a coolant in the large hadron collider at CERN.

Many of helium's applications that it is used for cannot be replicated with any other element unless we start mining it from the moon.


7. Fish

Big fisheries are overfishing and underreporting what they catch and if we keep overfishing at this rate, we will be on track to empty our oceans. Ninety two percent of all fishing goes unreported from Chinese fleets and forty percent of global fishing is kept on the hush. Once the fish are gone, they're gone and the already out of whack food balance will continue to grow out of whack.


6. Gold

Gold becomes more and more elusive as mining companies have had much more limited number of new discoveries in the last decade.  Many mining companies have also had to deal with increased project cancellation due to excessive risk.  As it is, supply is expected to drop by 15-20 percent over the next three to four years.


5. Sperm

A comprehensive study has shown that from 1973 to 2011 sperm counts have dropped 52.4% in North America, Europe, Australia and New Zealand.  Why is this happening?  Scientists have theories that have to do with the our environment, poor diets, stress and unhealthy BMIs are on the rise in all of these countries.  Plus, you can't forget the rise in pesticides in our foods.  These factors surely play a role in spem level decline.

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