At any time it is estimated that there are some 10 quintillion individual insects alive. If you want to picture what this looks like, it’s a lot of zeros 10,000,000,000,000,000,000. And all the while that vast number is pollinating our crops, enriching and aerating our soils, and decomposing our waste. So what would happen if all of this actually stopped tomorrow – would we be celebrating the end to all insect-borne diseases, or rushing headlong into ecological Armageddon?
