Wente has cherry-picked a single paper focused on mathematical models of polar bear population trends using subpopulation estimates that are as much as 19 years old. The paper also contains the following vital caveat:

"As discussed above, our [population vitality analysis] model software (RISKMAN) does not have a way of incorporating a progressive decline in survival or recruitment as might be expected from a continuing decline in environmental conditions due to climate change, industrial development, tourism, or other factors that could result in negative demographic effects on the polar bear subpopulations."