In the #2 spot is humans, which isn't surprising. We kill about a half million other people per year (475,000), but the #1 spot is held by a wide margin by mosquitoes, with about 725,000 deaths every year. (This doesn't even account for people being sick; around 200 million can be incapacitated for days at a time).
Mosquitoes can be found in about 2,500 species everywhere on Earth except in Antarctica - it's too cold there. Mosquito-borne diseases, like malaria and dengue, threatened about 3 billion people and cause many billion dollars of lost productivity each year, so any money spent on eradication of the disease is well-spent from a financial point of view.
However, we rarely see mosquitoes on the news. Why is that? As Bill Gates says, "Sharks kill fewer than a dozen people every year and in the U.S. they get a week dedicated to them on TV every year. Mosquitoes kill 50,000 times as many people, but if there’s a TV channel that features Mosquito Week, I haven’t heard about it."
For that reason, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has been working hard on the problem, and Bill Gates has been holding Mosquito Week on his blog this week to raise further awareness about the problem. Watch the video below to learn more!
Photo Credit: TreeHugger.com