THIS much we know: coral bleaching is a modern epidemic that some biologists predict will kill up to half the world’s reefs this century as climate change raises sea temperatures. What we have missed is that some bleaching may actually be an infectious disease spread by a worm, a “malaria of the oceans”.
Israeli scientists say they have studied a type of coral whose bleaching is triggered by a bacterium, and found that this is carried and transmitted by a coral-feeding worm. If the same is true for other corals, scientists may be able to prevent the disease by targeting…
