There's a good reason locusts are considered plague-worthy. Despite their size, swarms of these insects can cause considerable damage by shredding plant life to bits like ravenous piranhas.. The bugs destroyed millions of American lives during the so-called "Dust Bowl" of the 1930s and caused massive hardship in East Africa from 2019 to 2020 — perhaps the authors of the Exodus were right to vilify the notoriously gluttonous insects.
Despite the human tendency to demonize these bugs, they are a natural part of the world and can serve important ecological functions while at the same time being extremely destructive. Nonetheless, locusts pose big risks to human agriculture and food security, as laid bare by a recent study from the journal Science Advances. It details that, as climate change worsens, locusts will expand their ranges in the very same North African and Middle Eastern regions where the Bible is set.
