National Geographic on malaria

The article did make it clear that DDT became difficult to procure, and that only recently has it become easier to obtain. The quasi-protection afforded by sickle-cell anemia was only tangentially mentioned.

This same issue has a good article entitled "Iceman Murder Mystery." Great illustration of the nature of science - new technologies leading to new evidence and insights into the Iceman's death, overturning/elaborating previous theories - and rather CSI-like. "Were you theeeeere?" becomes even more irrelevant.

Unfortunate for 7-year-old Nick that he was there for Anopheles.

So sad to hear Nat Geo has developed malaria...

I once had a high-school biology teacher who spent a few years teaching in Africa. He contracted malaria more than once to the great amusement of his supervisor. "You Europeans* are so weak", he would apparently say. Turns out that the supervisor was heterozygous for sickle-cell anemia, and a carrier for the malaria parasite.

*The gentleman in question was, in fact, born and raised in Canada, but his boss had a habit of refering to all white people as 'Europeans'.

The article did make it clear that DDT became difficult to procure, and that only recently has it become easier to obtain.

It's possible for there to be reduced demand for a product and an increase in the price provided there is also a large decrease in supply. Crazy ass world of economics.

All that I could find was a 1995 paper which stated, in the abstract, that the quality-adjusted price of pesticides used in US agriculture was 2.5 times higher in 1995 than in 1968.

I have been digging around elsewhere -- one article in Nature says that anti-malarial agencies moved away from DDT (somewhat but not completely) in the 1970s because of widespread resistance due to agricultural spraying.

I suspect that Behe is a double agent.

Recognizing the danger that creationism posed to science, he devoted himself to cleverly imitating a creationist, but in a way that is devastating to creationism.

I'm not endorsing this, but he sure did it well.

Because if there ever is another ID trial (and I suppose there probably won't be, because supreme court or no supreme court, ID is now over and uncool), but if there ever is, then...

Behe will be on the witness stand explaining that according to ID, Jesus deliberately designed the complex malaria parasite to kill little babies.

And they laughed at the bacterial flagellum.

In 1999 only three countries, China, India and Mexico, manufactured DDT.

aren't pyrethrins cheaper and more readily available than DDT anyway?

with the added side bonus that they don't bioaccumulate, so there wouldn't be any arguments from ecologists or environmentalists, either.

Jerome: "By the way, hats off to Rachel Carson for the restricton of DDT and several million dead.
Outstanding scientific foresight."

You mean the part where she correctly anticipated that the widespread agricultural use of DDT would lead to a rise in DDT-resistant malarial strains? You know, as discussed in the article you're commenting on, but apparently didn't deign to read?

Jerome -

This is a short thread, and the lack of clear cut direct connection between limiting agricultural DDT use and malaria has been discussed above.

Public health is probably the single most important factor in development, but it has to be based on sustainable methods, otherwise it will benefit one generation, but fail the next.

The National Geographic article calls the development of DDT a miracle. Insects are developing resistance. The National Geographic article calls the development of chloroquine a miracle. Plasmodia are developing resistance. Thus, evolution seems to be more powerful than God.

Yes, it seems that evolution and global warming deniers also seem to believe in other nonsense such as the DDT ban myth. Tim Lamberts on deltoid has spent many postings addressing the ignorance about global warming as well as the DDT ban. It's sad how ignorance leads people to accept such beliefs as Intelligent Design, Global Warming Denial etc when a few minutes of research would show how most of their arguments quickly unravel and all that is left is ignorance.

You know, citing malaria as an example of intelligent design makes me wonder... do these guys ever think about what such arguments say about God?

Of course maybe malaria was intelligently designed to punish us for the sin of... being outdoors near standing water?

Mmmmhmmmm. What were you doing there, Adam, staring out across that stagnant water, hmmmm?

Coveting your neighbor's ass no doubt.

What kind of parent would expose a seven year old to that threat on a "sabbatical"?

By the way, hats off to Rachel Carson for the restricton of DDT and several million dead.

"People will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it"

This remind me of my childhood when visiting relatives in the Caribbean. We use mosquito nets at night to avoid/prevent bites and prevent dengue fever. Differently to malaria, dengue is a viral disease but transmitted to humans through mosquito bites.

The best way to stop malaria is DDT, but the use was stopped because of course we can't let the poor pelicans break their eggs so we let 1 million Africans (mostly children) die every year because of the decadence of the west. Thank you Rachel Carson for the "junk science".

Thankfully DDT is now being used more often because it was discovered that the enivironmental problems with it had been completely overblown years ago.

Changes in genes due to selection pressures from pesticides: The mosquitoes that are resistant to DDT have evolved multiple copies of the esterase genes that enable them to detoxify it; the cotton budworm has altered the target of the poison, and houseflies have altered the proteins that transport the poison. So there are a wide variety of _possible_ mutations that can reduce the killing effects of a pesticide on an organism, and only one of those very different types of mutations has to occur in order for the organism to develop resistance. This increases the odds that such resistance could occur via the same random mutations that naturally occur in every organism during meiotic divisions of its germ cells.

Also...

The evidence of arms races in nature is well attested. Changes of one species influence the other, especially in cases of predator and prey species, or parasites and hosts. Even humans, being massive killers of species from bacterial germs to mosquitoes, has affected their evolution. The bacteria evolved resistance to antibiotics, while the insects evolved resistance to pesticides. Interestingly, there's a wide variety of ways that a bacterium or insect can evolve resistance to such things. Sometimes a gene is omitted, and that protects them, sometimes a gene is duplicated, and that protects them. Closely related species may mutate in different ways and thus overcome the antiobiotic or pesticide in different ways.

Nature appears flexible, intrinsically so. So much so, that it appears to me evolution is no more impossible than say, the ability of stars to produce every element in the periodic table from simply hydrogen atoms that continue fusing together into heavier and heavier atoms inside each star.

Also, there are quite a few Christian evolutionists out there who are not jumping aboard the I.D. bandwagon for the reasons given above.

The best way to stop malaria is DDT, but the use was stopped because of course we can't let the poor pelicans break their eggs so we let 1 million Africans (mostly children) die every year because of the decadence of the west. Thank you Rachel Carson for the "junk science". Thankfully DDT is now being used more often because it was discovered that the enivironmental problems with it had been completely overblown years ago.

holy crap! it's like people can't be bothered to read the posts or comments before they poot.

Why would they? I mean, what would be the benefit to them in doing so?

I yam a maroon.

— Jerome

I yam a maroon.

— Les

He who is not aware of his ignorance will only be misled by his knowledge.

— Whatley

Les and Jerome -

You don't know anything about malaria.

You don't know anything about DDT.

You don't care about children in Africa.

You were psychologically incapable of even reading the posts in the very thread you chose to post on.

It is most comical that you both parroted almost the exact same outdated right wing buzzwords.

Your behavior is about as voluntary as that of a Skinner pigeon. The conditioning, or should I say brainwashing, was done years ago. (Indeed, present day chemical company executives wouldn't want right wing basement-bots hypocritically arguing for unregulated use of pesticides as the only possible answer to malaria. Not the kind of PR they're looking for.)

Certain environmental cues trigger an involuntary and irresistable urge to parrot decades old right wing talking points. What's that like, anyway?

Man, I was pretty grouchy when I posted that last comment.

All true, of course, but pretty grouchy.

I guess it was the idea that someone would still be arguing that we should go back to the burning lake days level of environmental regulations that set me off...

'Les' and 'Jerome' are certainly the same person, probably some troll who posts here under other names as well. Legion is a good candidate.

He claims to care about Africans but it's obvious his real point is just bashing environmentalists. Yawn.

Since we are talking about DDT and deniers anyway, I have always wondered about ExxonMobil's support of BOTH the CEI and a South African malaria organization. Milloy also has the DDT ban under his skin; we know that Milloy was paid as a contractor by them and we know that CEI's heritage is that of a "medical doubt" machine created by Lorilar, R. J. Reynolds and others. Finally we know that CEI acted to create FUD about global warming on behalf of ExxonMobil and feed it to Murdoch's Fox News. If you have doubts, go here and search for "Milloy".

On the general assumption that these people never do anything that isn't central to their mission of making money off the misfortune of others, why do they push DDT?

Chrichton's misstatements in _State of Fear_ about malaria mortality numbers are what got me looking into global warming denial when I found that he got them from Milloy. I was upset that Chrichton had completely discounted the heroic efforts of WHO staffers and volunteers.

DDT was banned in the USA decades ago. So what happened? Malaria is still unknown. DDT and its breakdown products are lower in human tissue and the environment. And several species of birds including ospreys, the bald eagle, and pelicans that were rapidly declining have recovered.

Meanwhile, there are dozens of other insecticides with more being discovered.

In other words, nothing bad and much good. The rest of the world is a different story. Apparently malarial countries have decided the cost benefit favors DDT. OK, the US jurisdiction ends at our borders. Their country, their problem, their decision. But it seems to me if DDT is so valuable for public health reasons, it should never be used in agriculture or other places where alternatives exist. Evolution predicts and experience confirms that sooner or later DDT resistant mosquitos will arise.

The best way to stop malaria is DDT, but the use was stopped because of course we can't let the poor pelicans break their eggs so we let 1 million Africans (mostly children) die every year because of the decadence of the west. Thank you Rachel Carson for the "junk science".

Thankfully DDT is now being used more often because it was discovered that the enivironmental problems with it had been completely overblown years ago.

we can't let the poor pelicans break their eggs so we let 1 million Africans (mostly children) die every year because of the decadence of the west.

Thank you Rachel Carson for the "junk science".

Those of you who insist there is no ban on DDT ought to read the Malaria Capers, or explain why the Philippines banned DDT under pressure from environmentalists and the US who essentially told them if they wanted to continue to get US aid, they needed to ban DDT.I was there a year ago(the Philippines) and read several articles in Manila papers about how the government is fudging statistics to hide the fact that Malaria is again on the rise. They are seeing people buying and using DDT illegally because of malaria, they are seeing people poisoning their water supplies by pouring oil into the water to kill mosquito larvae.

It's semantics we banned it for agricultural use after we'd managed to eradicate malaria(largely with DDT) in the US. We're now demanding the rest of the world deal with Malaria without using DDT.

It's not a magic pill to make malaria go away but it's absolutely true that if used correctly we could save lots of lives in Africa with DDT, they're already proving that in South Africa. Even the World Health Organization reversed itself and is now
advocating the use of DDT in Africa to fight Malaria.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/15/AR2006091501012.html

Russ -

It is interesting to contrast your dissembling blather, which makes reference to invisible and unmotivated conspiracies that you claim to have read about in unreferenced "Manilla newspapers" (BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!) and crackpot books, to the rational post immediately above it.

George Cauldron -

You may be right, because every troll thinks that posting under multiple names is a brilliant, original idea that he, and he alone, just invented.

However, it's also true that every parrot in this particular shop has been trained to mindlessly shriek the same slogan at the same cue. So they may tend to sound alike, yet be different parrots.

(No insult to actual avian parrots intended.)

DDT was banned in the USA decades ago.

— raven

after we'd managed to eradicate malaria(largely with DDT) in the US.

— Russ

Popper's Ghost:
Where do you guys get this stuff? Take a look at this map. Notice anything significant about the locations of a) malaria and b) the U.S.?

That's a map of the current distribution of Malaria, so it's not particularly relevant to Russ's claim.

Read, and be enlightened:
Eradication of Malaria in the United States, 1947-1951
http://www.cdc.gov/malaria/history/eradication_us.htm

Now that the myth of a DDT ban has been dispelled, we see some desperate attempts to show how some countries, such as the Philippines have banned DDT. Of course, that was hardly the original argument. In other words, blaming Rachel Carson for millions of deaths is just an example of fudged statistics?

Any evidence to support your claims about fudging statistics?

Chris White who is the Malaria Programme Leader with the African Medical and Research Foundation (Amref) responds to the new WHO malaria policy: The World Health Organisation's new stance on DDT, yet again only goes to show how so many in the West throw out opinions without really understanding the context or culture of Africa. ... For effective control of mosquitoes, at least 80 per cent of all households must be covered every 6-12 months by well-coordinated spray teams. Is this possible in Africa? Imagine trying that across the Congo basin! It is not realistic to assume that this will happen. It will just leave the communities vulnerable again. But now imagine every family in Africa having a net. Nets last four to five years and can be carried around by everyone, including internally displaced people and nomadic groups. The distribution of nets in a one-off large-scale vaccination campaign is less challenging than trying to reach 80 per cent of all households with a veritable army of spray teams every 12 months. Like the WHO, Amref supports the continued use of DDT as a means to control malaria, but only in areas where it is cost-effective and possible to spray on a regular basis. ... Those who have managed spraying campaigns know that it is very difficult, much like a full-scale military exercise. The new WHO statement is misleading and operationally unsound. ..

The program consisted primarily of DDT application to the interior surfaces of rural homes or entire premises in counties where malaria was reported to have been prevalent in recent years.

Kind of OT, but...

Ironically (because I'd never seen it before) on the History Channel a few minutes ago, an advertisement for http://www.nothingbutnets.net/ came up. This is an organization dedicated to controlling Malaria in Africa by supplying as many mosquito nets to the populace as possible. From what I can see by briefly perusing the website, they tend to raise funds at basketball and soccer games (both of which, of course, use nets).

So, to Jerome, Les, and Russ:
Since you are all so concerned about the fate of Malaria victims worldwide, can we assume that you will be donating to this worthy cause?

Parenthetically, I have noticed that none of these drive-byes have answered any of the statements directed to them. Wonder why?

(and an additional note: in another note of irony, the ad ran during a show about the WWII fighting in Guadalcanal, where many servicemen developed Malaria)

Well let's see, I never said Rachel Carson's name once, did her book help start environmentalism which ultimately led to the banning of DDT in the US, yes, did I say she killed millions of Africans, no, I never mentioned her.

A map of the current distribution of malaria in the world proves what again? Have you read the malaria capers? if not, I'd recommend it, you'd be surprised since you apparently think there was never malaria in the US. did you know that Mussolini was actually the key guy in getting malaria under control in Italy? Did you even know there was malaria in Italy? Did you know in Europe they used to intentionally infect people with Malaria to fight Syphillis because it warms the body so quickly it can kill syphillis?

Manila papers, yes they have newspapers there, no they don't look like Manila envelopes, and yes more than one article I read said the government statistics are being fudged so they don't have to admit there's a rise in infection since they banned DDT.
There are several islands that were highly malarious that used DDT and now can't. It didn't eradicate malaria, but it helped them keep it under control. The same people that accuse others of being irrational always seem to assume that when people say DDT can help fight malaria, we're advocating stopping everything else, and then literally fogging places with thick clouds of DDT. We're not, we're advocating vector control using safe amounts of DDT sprayed on the inside walls of houses where malaria is a problem. I was there in 2002 and never saw a mosquito, I was there again and there were mosquitoes. 2 reasons, one more fresh water on the island i was on(Siquijor) because of new home construction, two because of the DDT ban. Several members of my girlfriends' family were quite vocal about it they do not like the ban it's politically motivated they weren't using DDT for agriculture they were using it for vector control. It was officially banned in 94 but wasn't widely enforced until many years later. If you ask government officials they insist there has been no rise in malaria connected to the banning of DDT, any rise is cyclical, related to natural events, or due to increases in standing fresh water. If you've never been there its' very easy to sit at your keyboard and say it's not a problem, if you went I'm betting you'd all go and ask your doctor if you need to take any precautions against Malaria.

It's misuse of DDT that led to a problem, not any use, there are numerous examples of that in the malaria capers where overuse led to DDT resistant mosquitoes etc. But it's much easier to just say DDT is bad use something else, especially if you live in a country that can afford to do so. Africa can't, they spend too much money treating people who have malaria to afford to use more expensive methods of prevention. Or do people really think Africa has no problem with malaria? If you admit they do, and you don't want to use DDT, what is your solution, why do so many people in poorer countries suffer with malaria did they just pick the wrong place to be born?

What is misuse, if not simply usage that turns out to cause problems?

(Also - why oh why didn't Noah SWAT those two mosquitos? Sorry, but somebody had to say that.)

Henry

(Also - why oh why didn't Noah SWAT those two mosquitos? Sorry, but somebody had to say that.)

Reminds me of a great cartoon I once saw: Noah is fishing from the front of the Ark, and shouts out: "Bring me the other worm!"

. But it's much easier to just say DDT is bad use something else, especially if you live in a country that can afford to do so. Africa can't, they spend too much money treating people who have malaria to afford to use more expensive methods of prevention.

That's a map of the current distribution of Malaria, so it's not particularly relevant to Russ's claim. Read, and be enlightened: Eradication of Malaria in the United States, 1947-1951 http://www.cdc.gov/malaria/history/eradication_us.htm

But it's much easier to just say DDT is bad use something else

There were suspensions in the spraying programs, but they were not the result of any "environmental hysteria". To understand what actually happened, it is necessary to learn about the realities of pesticide use. One of the major problems with using pesticides is that insect populations soon develop resistance to the chemicals. Insects resistant to DDT began appearing one year after its first public health use (Garrett, page 50). As new insecticides were introduced, resistance to them also developed. Much of Silent Spring is a cataloging of reports of resistance to insecticides. With the problem of mosquito resistance to DDT in mind, a plan to eradicate malaria was developed--several years of spraying, accompanied by treating patients with anti-malaria drugs, would be followed by several years of monitoring....Incredible as it might seem, while public health officials were cautiously limiting the usage of DDT, it was being used in increasing amounts in agriculture, especially on cotton, a cash crop (Chapin & Wasserstrom). This heavy use led to resistance among malaria carrying mosquitoes throughout the tropics. In this instance, the unwise use of DDT, rather than improving life, actually resulted in a resurgence of malaria. According to Chapin & Wasserstrom (page 183) "Correlating the use of DDT in El Salvador with renewed malaria transmission, it can be estimated that at current rates each kilo of insecticide added to the environment will generate 105 new cases of malaria." ... There were a number of other problems in addition to insect resistance to DDT and other insecticides. The heavy use of anti-malaria drugs started to produce microbes resistant to them. Non insecticide control measures that had greatly reduced the presence of malaria in many areas were discontinued when DDT arrived (Chapin & Wasserstrom). There was a chronic lack of funds. Many countries had to abandon their control efforts, or they diverted funds to other areas when the number of cases of malaria had been reduced to a low level. The United States bankrolled the eradication program starting in 1958, with the assurance that it would only take five years. When the five years was up, the funding was cut off, even though it appeared that the eradication program was working (Garrett). This cut off of funds occurred just before the alleged bans went into effect. Political turmoil also might have had an effect. 1964 was a year of major political turmoil in Zanzibar, the country used as an example in Eco-Sanity. The country gained independence in December 1963, there was a bloody revolt in January 1964, and later that year the country joined with the much lager mainland country of Tanganyika to form the country of Tanzania (Kaplan). Any of these events could have disrupted the malaria control program.

Reductions in the use of DDT did occur in a number of developing nations after the US ban in 1972. This reflected concerns over environmental consequences of DDT, but was also a result of many other factors. One of the important factors in declining use of DDT was decreasing effectiveness and greater costs because of the development of resistance in mosquitoes. Resistance was largely caused by the indiscriminate, widespread use of DDT to control agricultural pests in the tropics. This problem, in fact, was anticipated by Carson: "No responsible person contends that insect-borne disease should be ignored . . . The question that has now urgently presented itself is whether it is wise or responsible to attack the problem by methods that are rapidly making it worse."

hmm.

finally finished reading the nat geo article itself, and while only mentioned in a graphic in the article, it appears based on what is shown there that some species of mosquitoes are far more resistant to pyrethroids than others.

OTOH, the same is true for DDT use; it just depends on the species involved.

It does, however answer the question of whether pesticides based on pyrethroids can and have been used in Africa, even if the mention is so short that it's still unclear as to the overall effectiveness wrt to all species and in different places. So there is a bit of supporting evidence to indicate that cost issues aren't all that relevant wrt to choosing DDT or pyrethroid treatments.

I would also expect the effectiveness to have a lot to do with the breeding environment as well, as DDT lingers far longer than pyrethroids do, so different breeding habitats/rainfall patters/etc. will likely have a large influence on effectiveness as well.

Also, having now read the article, I understand why Nick felt the need to post this thread and discuss the myths surrounding the banning of DDT, as the article DOES tend towards supporting the myth, rather than disabusing readers through facts.

but then, that's why I typically don't read nat geo all that often.

great pictures, often intersting stories, but typically a bit short on hard data.

Ghost, since you posted a map that you clearly thought proved there was never malaria in North America, I find anything else you say on the subject to be from someone who clearly knows nothing about it. Read some more and then maybe I'll respond to you. If you read the Malaria Capers you'll get first hand information from a guy who was right there when this was all going on both pre Silent Spring and post.

Toejam,Do I know a cost comparison?Do you, you asked the question again I asked if you want to ban DDT what is your alternative, if that's your alternative you should at least know if it's cheaper or not. South american countries switched from DDT to newer alternatives and saw a rise in malaria, only Ecuador didn't see a rise, Ecuador never stopped using DDT. The same thing happened in South Africa. There are places where DDT is simply more effective and more cost effective because it doesn't have to be sprayed as often. Not every place but there are distinct instances when DDT is part of the best solution, even the WHO has said so, citing one person from the WHO who disagrees is disingenuous, do you really think EVERY person in WHO agrees on anything let alone DDT? Did I even once say I think DDT is the ONLY solution, no, but it's much easier to debate if you throw out things the other person didn't say and then trample him on those points, we call that rigging the game, again it's disingenuous. How about you only comment on things I have said?

Again misuse in agriculture was the problem, not vector control. People have been effectively using DDT around the world safely for years to control malaria, costs go up for a number of reasons including the fact that DDT is persona non grata and it's harder to obtain now although as the article said, that's now changing since orgs like WHO are now behind it again in limited use.

And since people are incapable of not mentioning Rachel Carson, she made good points in her book but remember, she wrote that book because she was dying of cancer and she blamed chemicals, specifically pesticides despite having no real evidence of a link to HER cancer. If you read Silent Spring you'll not that EVEN Carson didn't advocate banning DDT, she said to limit it's use "Spray as little as you possibly can" rather than "Spray to the limit of your capacity." Even Carson understood that DDT had a role in vector control, that it was dangerous when abused for agriculture.

When people talk about DDT to control malari there's a knee jerk reaction from people who don't understand that the problems with DDT before were not caused by vector control.

Do you, you asked the question again I asked if you want to ban DDT what is your alternative, if that's your alternative you should at least know if it's cheaper or not.

But it's much easier to just say DDT is bad use something else, especially if you live in a country that can afford to do so. Africa can't, they spend too much money treating people who have malaria to afford to use more expensive methods of prevention.

citing one person from the WHO who disagrees is disingenuous,

There are places where DDT is simply more effective and more cost effective because it doesn't have to be sprayed as often.

Did I even once say I think DDT is the ONLY solution,

Again misuse in agriculture was the problem, not vector control.

And since people are incapable of not mentioning Rachel Carson, she made good points in her book but remember, she wrote that book because she was dying of cancer and she blamed chemicals, specifically pesticides despite having no real evidence of a link to HER cancer.

When people talk about DDT to control malari there's a knee jerk reaction from people who don't understand that the problems with DDT before were not caused by vector control.

Toejam if you couldn't tell, and apparently you couldn't, not every comment in my post was to you. I was responding to numerous posts that slammed my prior post. For example the person who tried to refute my WHO reference by citing one member who doesn't agree with DDT use.

And no I did not IMPLY that DDT is the only cost effective solution, I implied that it is ONE cost effective solution, at one time it was THE cost effective solution but poor countries like Africa couldn't use it due to political pressure. That's the "ban" people deny existed. Malaria Capers is not my only source I'm merely suggesting it as reading to someone who was so uninformed he/she didn't think we'd EVER had malaria in North America.

Yes I'm aware that other chemicals are used now to fight malaria, DDT is just one, but since the article was specifically mentioning DDT that's what we were discussing.

The problems with DDT use were due to agriculture, if you deny this point it's not worth debating with you because you're obviously not interested in the truth. They used to spray DDT in high volumes over populated areas. If you remember when California was spraying malathion to kill fruit flies, that was nothing compared to the amounts of DDT that used to be sprayed for agriculture, that was NOT to control malaria. That's where all the problems with bioaccumulation occurred. Rachel Carson noticed it because she was a marine biologist and saw it in fish.

Even one of the links cited above, DDT ban myth quite clearly comments that one of the things that lead to resistant mosquitoes in the past was agricultural abuse, they even cite a statistic that said each kilo of insecticide used in El Salvador added 105 cases of Malaria because it was being misused for agriculture and was leading to resistant mosquitoes. They were using it to spray cotton, not for vector control at the time.

DDT has a terrible reputation to live down. Even in places that have never heard of Rachel Carson. There's a story in Malaria capers about I think New Guinea where after years of being refused they were finally allowed to spray DDT in one village ravaged by malaria. They sprayed the huts and then within a week or two all the thatch roofs of the huts collapsed. The primitive villagers took this as a sign that DDT was evil and they threatened to kill anybody who tried to spray their village again. Researchers quickly figured out what had happened, they used a specific plant to bind the thatched roof so it stayed in place, and there is an indigenous insect that eats that plant used for the bindings. DDT spraying killed an insect(IIRC it was a wasp) that ate that insect, so with those dead, that insect population boomed, ate the bindings, and the ceilings all collapsed.

Misuse has always been the problem, most car accidents are caused by speeding which is misuse of a car, we don't see people calling for the banning of cars though.

And no I did not IMPLY that DDT is the only cost effective solution, I implied that it is ONE cost effective solution,

at one time it was THE cost effective solution but poor countries like Africa couldn't use it due to political pressure. That's the "ban" people deny existed.

Malaria Capers is not my only source I'm merely suggesting it as reading to someone who was so uninformed he/she didn't think we'd EVER had malaria in North America.

Harold, wouldn't you say relying on book reviews(Maybe from Amazon) is an inaccurate way of judging a book? It's not even just a book about malaria it's also about another disease(think it's dengue fever I only flipped through that part).

What it's not is a Rush Limbaugh driven book (not that you said it was). I read it because it's listed on a list of books relating to Malaria on Malaria.org. When I came back from the Philippines in May of 06 I had a newfound interest in Malaria since it was a hot topic of conversation around where i was for nearly 3 weeks. People saying for the first time in over a decade they were actually concerned about malaria on their island(Siquijor) because there were so many more mosquitoes. I think part of that is due to new construction, water comes from wells or water tanks and I think there was simply more fresh water to breed mosquitoes in, but they were all pointing to evidence of DDT banning having an impact. One of my girlfriends' uncles has a farm on a nearby island that raises worms of all things, and he's acutely aware of agriculture and pesticides as a result, he brought an article from a Manila paper that specifically referred to accusations made against the government falsifying data to suggest the DDT ban had no effect on malaria. If you're not familiar they've had widespread corruption issues in the Philippines so you can find similar accusations about just about anything, that's not proof they are falsifying data.

I've read extensively about malaria on the web. In general discussions on malaria inevitably go back to DDT, Rachel Carson and someone always throws in something about global warming. There's always a stereotype that anybody who doesn't think DDT is the spawn of satan, must be a denier of the truth.

From Popper's ghosts mea culpa it sure sounded like he/she posted that because they didn't realize malaria had ever been a problem in North America, the original post even quoted my mentioning we'd used DDT to help eradicate it by saying where do people get this, as if we never eradicated it because we never had to. That's why I gave the example of Italy and Mussolini I was trying to figure out just how much that one person knew or didn't know about malaria.

It's a fairly fascinating topic, just yesterday on tv my girlfriend and I were watching a show on the engineering of the Panama canal and there you go they mentioned the French abandoned building it in large part due to losing like 2000 people many of whom succumbed to malaria. It tends to popup in history over and over in similar scenarios.

I'm not claiming to be the leading expert in the world on Malaria and DDT but I do think my original post was met with a bunch of responses based on "oh this again" that ironically didn't even read my post before responding and yet more than one asked me if I'd even read what I was responding to.

There's no question there is exaggeration with DDT right now, and ironically it does tend to be linked to global warming people say the overreaction to GW is similar to the overreacting to DDT and that has led to millions of deaths.

There's a fairly famous quote from a guy who worked for USAID that essentially said when asked about the number of deaths in Africa to Malaria that some people are better off dead. In other words he was saying some people in poor countries are better off dead, that it's better to let them die of malaria than to consider the use of DDT. I don't have the immediate quote in front of me I could find it with a little searching.

What first got me interested in Malaria was reading the Hotzone and a couple of other books about Ebola and hantaviruses, since much of the work done in those fields is based on work done with malaria (although they have yet to find the host species for
ebola).

Just as an aside, most car accidents are not caused by speeding, they are caused by following too closely.

Whether the most severe auto accidents are caused by speeding might be more fairly debatable, though once one gets into the more severe accidents, alcohol use also becomes a considerable factor.

"Misuse" is a pretty broad category. All the different "uses" of insecticides being mooted here would probably qualify under one definition of the term or another.

So it's important to have some factual support for your claimed species of misuse. Based on the auto example given above, my faith that this particular debater understands this critical point is not strong.

There's a fairly famous quote from a guy who worked for USAID that essentially said when asked about the number of deaths in Africa to Malaria that some people are better off dead. In other words he was saying some people in poor countries are better off dead, that it's better to let them die of malaria than to consider the use of DDT. I don't have the immediate quote in front of me I could find it with a little searching.

There's no question there is exaggeration with DDT right now,

Stevie, would you agree that following too close is also an example of speeding? Afterall if you were going slower, you wouldn't be too close to the car in front of you. but since you want to get technical NHTSA says distracted drivers are the #1 cause of accidents, and they then list a bunch of different sub categories. Of course speeding is 4 and aggressive driving is 5 and their own definition of aggressive driving admits there is a crossover from speeding. and their own definition of distracted drivers concedes that often it's a combination of distraction and speeding. Then there is weather, which is 6 and again it's conceded in that description that the most common cause in bad weather is driving TOO FAST for the conditions. Which is why many experts disagree with NHTSA and assert that the leading cause is excessive speed for the situation, which is speeding under the definition of basic speed law. Happy?

And again even the links above mention misuse with respect to agriculture, not vector control. There are clearly cases where it was overused for vector control in the past, thus the problems with resistant mosquitoes, but the problem with DDT was largely one of overuse for agricultural reasons. When people start wanting to split hairs on that point it's because they don't want to concede there is a distinct difference in the 2 uses. Much of the use for vector control is indoors, you spray on the walls, the mosquito lands on the wall, it winds up dead. They don't just go into swamps and unload DDT in the swamp, as someone else mentioned draining swamps is a very common method of vector control.

Russ said: Which is why many experts disagree with NHTSA and assert that the leading cause is excessive speed for the situation, which is speeding under the definition of basic speed law. Happy?

There's no question there is exaggeration with DDT right now, and ironically it does tend to be linked to global warming people say the overreaction to GW is similar to the overreacting to DDT and that has led to millions of deaths.

Harold, wouldn't you say relying on book reviews(Maybe from Amazon) is an inaccurate way of judging a book? It's not even just a book about malaria it's also about another disease(think it's dengue fever I only flipped through that part).

There's a fairly famous quote from a guy who worked for USAID that essentially said when asked about the number of deaths in Africa to Malaria that some people are better off dead. In other words he was saying some people in poor countries are better off dead, that it's better to let them die of malaria than to consider the use of DDT. I don't have the immediate quote in front of me I could find it with a little searching.

I've read extensively about malaria on the web. In general discussions on malaria inevitably go back to DDT, Rachel Carson and someone always throws in something about global warming.

There's always a stereotype that anybody who doesn't think DDT is the spawn of satan, must be a denier of the truth.

What first got me interested in Malaria was reading the Hotzone and a couple of other books about Ebola and hantaviruses, since much of the work done in those fields is based on work done with malaria (although they have yet to find the host species for ebola).

Uh Toejam my comment was there is hyperbole claiming DDT not being used is leading to millions of deaths. I was saying that you often hear it said during warming debates people say the same kind of overreaction led to a ban on DDT that has killed millions of people. Please try to debate what I actually say not what you incorrectly read between the lines. I'll do far less backpedalling if people stop attacking things I didn't actually say.

Somewhat off-topic, but I'll call for banning cars. Especially those that run on fossil fuels...

Yep, speeding probably doesn't have much to do with the ongoing DDT discussion.

Except as an example of an over-extension of a concept.

One of the definitions of speeding, frequently found in "rules of the road" statutes and ordinances, is indeed "speed too fast for the conditions." In this very broad sense, excessive "speed" is involved in almost every accident (and, uh, if you were going just a little slower in thr first place, whether your speed was "appropriate" or not, the two vehicles would never have occupied the same space at the same time...). This definition is simply too broad to be helpful to the average motorist.

But the common meaning of "speeding" is "speed over the posted limit." And it's by far and away the reason most motorists actually get ticketed for speeding.

"Following too close" can be done well under the posted limit. Nor does a person have to have raised their speed in any sense to find themselves too close to the car ahead: the car ahead may have slowed down.

While relative speeds are undeniably involved, the more "useful" way to look at it is that one no longer has the time and distance needed to avoid a collision if the vehicle ahead makes an unexpected stop.

This is why following too closely is "deceiving," and results in by far the most accidents (not accidents of whatever level of police involvement and "reporting" triggers an NHTSA statistic, but of all unwanted contacts between vehicles, including those fender-benders--many never reported to the police of NHTSA--that generate the great mass of insurance claims, repair bills, and whiplash complaints)--the reduction of space between the vehicles happens "insidiously" and often innocently (as opposed to speeding over the limit) as a result of traffic density, the actions of the victim driver, or whatever.

And the "trigger"--the unexpected slowdown or stop that actually precipitates the accident--is usually not caused by the following driver.

But the following driver still picks up the tab--and the post-accident ticket, if the cops do respond, because that driver shouldn't have allowed that critical reaction distance to have been "lulled" away from them...

Relatively obscure, compared with the sexy and revenue-generating "speeding," but highly preventable. Good early instruction in maintaining a safe following distance--and perhaps the occasional preventative enforcement--would be much more effective at preventing accidents, lowering insurance costs, and lowering legal costs costs, than all the MADD scares, than all the speeding tickets, and all of that...

So, don't know whether any of that has further relevance to the DDT debate, but definitions of terms, threshholds for statistical recording, etc., often do figure into these sorts of thrashes.

Well, David Benson's approach would work as well...

Though maybe first we should hook all the tailpipes up to the DDT sprayers, and give the mosquitoes a radically-different blend of chemicals to adapt to.

[/attempts at humorous distraction]

I will look for the direct quote when I have more time this evening or tomorrow, I thought I had it saved but I don't.

Apparently Harold made the same mistake as Toejam regarding my comment about hyperbole so my original comment wasn't clear. I was saying that those who are saying a ban on DDT is killing millions are clearly using some hyperbole at the moment it's a very common analogy at the moment in Global Warming debates people say the reaction to global warming is the same as what led to the ban on DDT.

And again, I didn't bring up Rachel Carson here, my first post never mentioned her but several responses accused me of blaming her for deaths in Africa, that's why I commented on her.

Science avenger, I don't know where you live, but in California there is something called the basic speed law which basically says any speed above what is safe for the conditions, is speeding. You can be cited for going 45 in a 65 zone if CHP feels due to conditions 45 is unsafe.So in California, speeding does not mean driving above the posted speed limit, it means driving above what is safe for the given conditions. Many examples, such as traffic is stopped and you're driving on the shoulder, weather etc. My oldest sister had traffic school 3 weekends ago that's why it's fresh in my mind. One of the first questions asked was what causes most accidents, they then gave the NHTSA answer and said it's open to considerable debate there are many people who will argue if you pick apart their data it's quite clear that speeding is the cause of many things they attribute to something else. With cellphones though it's quite possible inattention to driving is now the #1 cause.

The quote is from Edwin Cohn and it's referenced in the Malaria Capers, you can find numerous references on the web but I'll try to find the exact quote in the book and type it in. Cohn is listed as a former USAID official. He said something to the effect that those in malarious regions might be better off dead than alive and riotously reproducing. But that's a paraprhase I will post the exact quote from the book when I get a chance. Virtually any citation you find on the web will cite that book for the quote.

Russ -

I couldn't find the quote anywhere.

It's irrelevant if it's true (who cares if one guy was a jerk?).

If it's false, or taken out of context, it makes either the author of Malaria Capers and/or you look bad, depending on whether you're accurately describing how it appears in Malaria Capers. Even if you're accurately describing the way the quote appears in Malaria Capers, but the author of the book used the quote in an unfair or inaccurate way, it makes you look a little bit bad for not being more critical and skeptical of what you read.

I'll concede that I haven't read Malaria Capers, but rather, only some reviews.

The reviews suggested that the book was NOT concerned with the false argument that "environmentalists caused Africans to use less DDT and therefore caused millions of deaths from malaria". Rather, the book is about some controversial behavior by malaria researchers, which I was already aware of. (This makes the author look good; he may be "angry" but his book seems to be about controversies that really exist, not right wing anti-environmental BS - of course, I'd have to read it to be sure.)

Now, what is YOUR point?

Are you claiming that "environmentalists" are "responsible" for "millions of deaths from malaria" because they unofficially pressured Africans to use less DDT? Are you making that claim? Yes or no?

Or are you merely making the point that, despite its known harmful effects, DDT may need to be considered as one element in malaria control for the foreseeable future, at least until clearly superior alternatives can be found? If that is your point, please clarify.

Also, how do you feel about the general idea of limiting human damage to the common environment, through government regulation and international treaties where appropriate, at least to the extent that human life can proceed sustainably into the foreseeable future, and no-one suffers excessively from another person's selfishly uncontrolled pollution? Do you think that this is a good idea?

Harold, first off how can you in good conscience criticize a book that you haven't even read? How can you with a straight face say that because you read a few "intelligent reviews" you know the book? Surely you realize that reviews simply give you the opinion of the reviewer. And just because you can't find the quote anywhere does not mean it's not in the book. Page 217 The Malaria Capers by Robert S Desowitz, bear with me as I'm typing this not scanning it.

AID had used similar arguments in obtaining the money and confidence from Congress for underwriting the Global Eradication of Malaria Program. An AID apologist when that program failed was not a malariologist or anyone even remotely associated with malaria, but an economist, Edwin J Cohn, of the AID Office of Policy Development and Analysis. He contended that not only did't the failure of the campaign matter but it may even have been a blessing in disguise. The Third World didn't require a healthy labor force because there was a surplus of workers; better, some people should be sick with malaria and spread the job opportunities around. He said in effect, on behalf of AID, "better dead than alive and riotously reproducing."

That program took place in the 1970's it failed completely in 1972, Desowitz used Cohn as an example of why it failed so miserably, because at the time they weren't really committed to it. The book is NOT just about DDT, and the reason the author is "angry" is that he chronicles in great detail how money was essentially wasted or stolen for decades, money intended for malaria that went right into people's pockets. Chapter 18 is called the Vaccine Felonies, he goes into detail about how an AID grant for 2.38 million was squandered and led to 6 indictments charging the manager, scientists and affiliates with theft, conspiracy, crimimal solicitation and tax evasion. This was in the early 1980's and no I'm not going to type in the entire chapter for you so that you won't accuse me of making it up.

You made an incredible leap from I haven't read the book but it sounds like you're either misquoting it or taking it out of context or the author did. I had pegged you for one of the few here who didn't invent things you think the other person thinks and then attacks them, but now you're attacking me on a book you haven't read because you claim you can't find the quote.

I'll give you just one link of hundreds that pops up if you type in better off dead than riotously reproducing to google.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,194332,00.html I give you this one because I know it is in fact still a valid link there are many more if you couldn't find them, maybe you weren't looking very hard?

I've already stated my point, the reason you don't get it is because virtually every response has ignored it and attacked me for things I didn't say forcing me to go back and point out what I actually did say. I think DDT is not a panacea but it is one part of a viable defense against malaria. I think in many parts of the world it has been unavailable due to poltical pressure much of which has come from the US and environmental groups. For years USAid didn't even have money in its budget for DDT, it does now and is just starting to spend it largely because of the reversal by WHO. There are plenty of cases where it's been shown DDT has helped to control malaria.

One of the points Desowitz makes in his book is that he's not sure they're ever going to be able to make a vaccine and that they may have gotten so driven to prove they could make one that they, the scientists, ignored what their own science was telling them and let a bunch of crooked politicians distort and misstate their work for their own financial gain. That they did irreparable harm because they created such misstrust in the 3rd world. He goes into great detail about a colleague who spent millions of AID money working on a vaccine completely ignoring other experts who pointed out his entire premise was flawed and even his method of testing(he was using monkeys) was flawed. IN the end that guy got nowhere, wasted millions, and the outcome was precisely what people like Desowitz had been telling him it would be all along since he was simply going down a wrong path.
He's angry because he thinks millions of people have died in part due to greed and ego.

And for the record it is not a "popular book", Desowitz is not Stephen King he's a parasitologist and he's been actively campaigning for years to get the restrictions on use of DDT in vector control to be eased so that it can be used in 3rd world countries where it can save lives. Do I think environmentalism is bad, no, do I think there are people with good intentions who are making bad decisions because of environmentalism, sometimes yes, I think DDT has been one of those cases. It needs to be regulated but not banned. Mexico banned DDT for one reason, they were forced to as part of NAFTA. I already mentioned what is happening in the Philippines as a result of pressure from the Unites States.

DDT has been used effectively all over the world, there are people who want it completely banned and IMHO not for valid reasons, but for hysteria.

That's just classic Harold, I haven't read the book but I have read some reviews and based on that I think you made up that quote and the author of the book is angry? What a crock. I do get why the other poster asked me for the quote by the way, he assumed I was talking about the infamous Charles Wurster quote which has been around for years and which Wurster has categorically denied ever making. I wasn't talking about Wurster which is who Toejam thought I was mentioning, that's why he asked for the quote so he could jump all over me and cite links that show Wurster never said it. You guys are still bashing me because you misunderstood my comment about hyperbole over DDT, I was saying people like John Stossel and Limbaugh have gone too far to the point where they've taken a legit complaint about DDT and made it ridiculous. Stossel with a striaght face said 1 million a year die because of a DDT ban, that's like saying if we used DDT NOBODY would die from malaria, which is ridiculous. People still die of malaria in North America of course they'd still die in Africa even with more widespread use of DDT, less would die but many would still die.

So what exactly is YOUR point? I've been running around looking up quotes for you for long enough, why don't you tell me your point on all this and what you think should or shouldn't be done with respect to DDT and Malaria?

Russ -

I notice that you didn't answer my question.

No-one has attacked you. I have responded to you in a somewhat skeptical yet polite way; that is not an attack. Nor did I even say anything negative about the book, nor make any exaggerated claim about the value of reviews.

You can't find anyone here who actually recommends an inflexible ban on DDT without any consideration of other factors.

You can't produce any evidence that DDT was ever "banned" in malaria regions of Africa, or even that any prominent "liberal" or "environmentalist" pushed for such a ban. Because those things never happened.

You can't admit that you oppose the idea of any regulation whatsoever of human damage to the common environment, because when I state it clearly like that, you see how extreme and irrational that position is. Yet to oppose every single environmental regulation, agreement, or recommendation individually, in a knee jerk way, is logically the same thing.

So you keep looking for something to get outraged at.

There's no question there is exaggeration with DDT right now, and ironically it does tend to be linked to global warming people say the overreaction to GW is similar to the overreacting to DDT and that has led to millions of deaths. There's a fairly famous quote from a guy who worked for USAID that essentially said when asked about the number of deaths in Africa to Malaria that some people are better off dead. In other words he was saying some people in poor countries are better off dead, that it's better to let them die of malaria than to consider the use of DDT. I don't have the immediate quote in front of me I could find it with a little searching.

AID had used similar arguments [healthier people make better consumers] in obtaining the money and confidence of Congress for underwirting the Global Eradication of Malaria Program. An AID apologist when that program failed was not a malariologist or anyone even remotely associated with malaria but an economist, Edwin J. Cohn, of the AID Office of Policy Development and Analysis. He contended that not only didn't the failure matter but it may even have been a blessing in disquise. The Third World didn't require a healthy labor force because there was a surplus of workers; better, some people should be sick with malaria and spread the job opportunities around. He also said in effect, on behalf of AID, "better dead than alive and riotously reproducing." This was malaria and the Big Bang all over again: freedom from malaria lowered the crude death rate with sustained high fertility, which caused the rapid population growth, which led to the decline of economic development.

Harold, I'm through being polite with you, what in the hell are you talking about? When did I ever once say I opposed

"the idea of any regulation whatsoever of human damage to the common environment, because when I state it clearly like that, you see how extreme and irrational that position is. Yet to oppose every single environmental regulation, agreement, or recommendation individually, in a knee jerk way, is logically the same thing."

What in bloody hell are you talking about? You're just throwing out non sequiturs and then saying I win you lose, complete nonsense. You've been polite? You've openly accused me of inventing quotes or taking them out of context because you can't use google well enough to find them when I gave you the quote and the person who said it.

Seriously and I noticed YOU didn't answer my question?

For the record Harold, you haven't answered any of my questions and you respond to each post with another series of questions. Like I said, I'm tired of running around answering your questions, how about you respond to one of mine? What is your opinion here, where do you stand, what should be done about malaria in the 3rd world? Or do you think everything is fine and dandy as it is now?

Stevie just because I am not using your own personal definition of speeding doesn't mean I lack integrity. Get over it, you tried to correct me and in fact your correction was wrong since even government agencies don't agree with you on the most common cause of accidents. Note they don't agree with each other either, but they clearly don't agree with you.

The "in effect" if you read it refers to the notion that Cohn was saying that as a representative of AID. He's not saying to paraphrase he said this, he's saying he said this in effect as a spokesman for AID. If you read the sentences directly after what you quoted you'll understand his point. That Cohn and AID were saying that if they get malaria under control, the people will simply reproduce out of control and wind up with a decline in economic development. So in his opinion they were better off before they tried to eradicate malaria than they would be after. If you read that entire chapter it's quite clear what the point is and it's not incoherent at all unless you're only reading one or two paragraphs and trying to discern from that what the point of the whole book is. See my comment to Harold about the wisdom of relying on reviews to tell you the point of an entire book.

And for the last time, quit putting words into my mouth and then asking me to defend them. I said DDT is one case where an overreaction led to a chemical that could have been used to help people, not being used to help them in many countries for many years. I didn't say environmentalists are killing people. But people like Cohn WERE killing people because they were making decisions they had no business making. Decisions that led to a lot of money that could have gone to vector control programs but instead went into people's pockets or into bureaucracy. That's one of the main points in the book that you would prefer to bash rather than read. That one of the reasons Malaria is still such a problem in many places is that politics got in the way of a good eradication program, and still are to this very day.

Sorry tried being polite, just got a bunch of I think you're going to say this so I'm going to attack you before you say it nonsense, through being polite.

I said DDT is one case where an overreaction led to a chemical that could have been used to help people, not being used to help them in many countries for many years.

I didn't say environmentalists are killing people. But people like Cohn WERE killing people because they were making decisions they had no business making. Decisions that led to a lot of money that could have gone to vector control programs but instead went into people's pockets or into bureaucracy.

He also said in effect, on behalf of AID, "better dead than alive and riotously reproducing."

Steviepinhead --- Maybe I've been following this thread too closely?

:-)

And maybe I should just stop following it: all right, pal, back your head slowly away from that brick wall.

What part of stating a claim clearly and providing evidentiary support for your claim are we not communicating adequately.

Leading to that all-time internet favorite: frustration being reinterpreted as hostility.

Ah, well.

What is your opinion here, where do you stand, what should be done about malaria in the 3rd world? Or do you think everything is fine and dandy as it is now?

So in effect you're saying you're fine with what we're doing now? We're already using an intelligent combination of
drug treatment and insect control, but in the form of nets not DDT. The main problem with the nets is they have to be re-impregnated with chemicals very so often which is a huge ordeal and not particularly cost effective. That's why some places are now using DDT in the mix now that WHO has changed their minds and now AID organizations are actually funding DDT again in some places.

As for demanding evidence, everyone here including the bit at the top says the guy from the National Institute of Health is wrong when he says the word ban in relation to DDT, there was no actual ban. So how come people around the world who live in malarious countries like Africa insist that until recently they couldn't get DDT? Why is it so many people who don't live there are so quick to assume these people are all lying when they say that? I've yet to see any of you cite evidence to support your claims these people are lying.

So how come people around the world who live in malarious countries like Africa insist that until recently they couldn't get DDT? Why is it so many people who don't live there are so quick to assume these people are all lying when they say that? I've yet to see any of you cite evidence to support your claims these people are lying.

Stevie, in 1999 the World Wildlife Fund proposed a worldwide ban on DDT by 2007 stating "As long as it is used in the world, nobody is safe." They eventually agreed that South Africa had a legitimate need to use DDT. When South Africa stopped using DDT in 96 malaria rose, when they started using it again in 2001 they saw a 90% decrease in incidence of malaria. South Africa had 27,000 cases of malaria in 96 before they banned DDT, by 1999 they had 62,220 cases, more than double in 3 years. Eventually even WWF conceded that South Africa was justified in using DDT for vector control in limited use.

Mozambique had a similar problem, with mosquitoes that were resistant to pyrethroid insecticides, the obvious answer was DDT, but Mozamique would not use DDT because officials said it would alienate international donors. When asked on the record
why they rejected it they instead said it had nothing to do with alienating donors, they simply weren't sure what the long
term effects would be. Who says they rejected it because of donor concerns, only the malaria program manager of Mpumalanga, South Africa, who was asked for help by his colleagues in Mozambique. When he offered DDT, they refused for the above cited reasons.

"Donors are very reluctant to fund any kind of spraying using DDT because it's
politically incorrect," said Richard Tren, director of the Johannesburg, South
Africa-based Africa Fighting Malaria, which advocates the limited use of DDT.
"They have this strange idea that because DDT isn't being used in Sweden or the
U.S., that they can't use it in Africa. But people in Sweden and the U.S. are not
dying before the age of 5 of preventable diseases."

But what does he know just look at his job title he clearly knows less about Malaria and
DDT than you do right?

This is from a 2003, Feb article in the LA Times.

Even the king of idiots, John Stossel, got a US AID official to admit on camera that for years we would not provide DDT
to countries in Africa who asked for it because they had a policy of not providing a chemical to another country that was
illegal to use in the US. She said it, they aired it, I heard it with my own ears.

All the WWF was trying to do in 1999 was make official what had been an un-written rule for years.

I have submitted a response to the foregoing, but it is apparently being held for moderation due to the inclusion of links (to such insidious sources as wikipedia and the LA Times...).

Moderators, if we wish to encourage our guests to provide evidence for their positions, discouraging the posting of links appears to be a rather strange way to go about it.

...Bah!

In debate, in staffing Congress, and in law, I learned that "what everybody knows" is often wrong. So hit the library.

On the internet, one can discover that some agencies complained about potential public backlash if they used DDT. Notably, USAID in the current Bush administration appeared to be looking for reasons not to send money to Africa to fight malaria as promised (I'm being very cynical, perhaps too cynical, with any luck). At the Environmental Defense website you can find ED's letter urging USAID to use the money to purchase DDT if local African health authorities preferred DDT.

So there you have it: The very organization that FIRST sued to stop DDT use on Long Island (then known as the Environmental Defense Fund, or EDF), in 2004 urged the wise use of DDT against malaria in Africa.

The critics of Rachel Carson get it bass ackward every blessed time. They spin such a web of deceit they can't tell when they get caught in it.

This has been a hot topic over at my blog, Millard Fillmore's Bathtub. (www-dot-timpanogos-dot-wordpress-dot-com)

Nick: Has anyone actually ever seen the "Sweeney" hearing information that CEI and others keep referring to with the bogus citation? They claim Sweeney held 7 months of EPA hearings, then recommended DDT use be not banned, or maybe expanded, and that Ruckelshaus "unilaterally" overruled him. Of course, such an action by Ruckelshaus would be illegal under the Administrative Procedures Act and EPA's own rules . . . but what did the hearings actually conclude? What did Sweeney rule? Anybody know? I'd sure love a copy if anyone has one.

how many pandas are there left