Its no mystery that habitat loss of organisms in forests can have devastating effects on ecosystems or environments. These forests may be responsible for housing thousands of tiny or big animals/insects to better their survivability. The loss of these forests would severely affect these critters and potentially drive them to ecological extinction in the area. In a study, it was found that habitat loss has been shown to decrease population growth. This can have negative effects to every animal involved in that ecosystem. It can potentially lead to animals not having enough prey (food resources) to survive in that area, leading them to disappearing from the environment. Or on the other hand, it can lead to predators being driven out of the ecosystem allowing for their former prey to be overpopulated, potentially ruining that ecosystem. This can also force animals moving into areas where humans usually occupy. Some of these animals such as bats or possums may carry tons of harmful diseases which can be easily transmitted to humans (zoonotic virus). An example of a zoonotic virus would be West Nile virus as mosquitos are responsible for carrying it and transmitting it to humans. In some recent research, it was shown that fast lived species typically tend to transmit zoonotic viruses more. This would ultimately lead to a higher pool of zoonotic viruses occupying environments when biodiversity is lost.
References
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2023540118
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/earth-and-planetary-sciences/habitat-loss
Applied Plant Ecology Winter 2020 