Due to the climate crisis, polar bears become increasingly exposed to pathogens. This is the conclusion of a study published in the scientific journal „Plos One.“ Researchers analyzed blood samples from polar bears and searched for antibodies against six different pathogens. The samples from the polar bear population in the Chukchi Sea, a part of the Arctic Ocean between Alaska and Siberia, were taken from two time periods: from 1987 to 1994 and from 2008 to 2017.