Malaria, DDT, and Rachel Carson

This is an interesting dilema for those of us with an environmental bent. It is more complex than either side would like to admit. This is one of those many areas where our races knowledge outpaced our wisdom. Like so many things, it seemed like a wonderful idea. Easy to synthesize. Dirt cheap, and very stable. It stays where you put it and keeps on killing bugs long after the fact.

Of course it wasn't the answer to everything because it wreaked hell on the environment. Legitimate concern probably did swing into a bit of hysteria, but it's not a case of liberals and tree huggers wantonly dooming African kids to death. There have always been exceptions in place for controlled use to fight malaria, but if you were a chemical company, would you want to market the stuff after it got a bad rap and a general ban? It virtually guarantees a quadrillion-dollar class action suit. Secondly, DDT isn't a magic bullet for malaria because mosquitoes become immune to the stuff.

Malaria is not primarily a problem of unkilled mosquitoes and overbearing environmental laws. It's a problem of ass-grinding poverty. If people had houses with screens or air conditioners, and decent sewer systems, they'd still have malaria but they wouldn't be dying by the millions from it. But they don't have these things because the live in whatever slash and burn tract or mining town shanty they can find because they have to save up their 85 cents a day to buy a handfull of starch for dinner, the result of "free market" policies and globalization (and corruption). Another key is coming up with a vaccine or better drugs, but that brings us back to the market is god problem. You get your billion a year returns from developing a ninth-generation copy of an old cholesterol drug or by giving pasty white guys better erections. You don't make bank developing cures for broke black kids.

The other side of this is that a lot of us today enjoy the benefits of environmentally damaging actions our ancestors took. Until very recent times, malaria was a hell of a problem in the southern US, parts of England, Holland and Italy. It was eradicated by draining millions of acres of wetland, by spraying lots of DDT, and before DDT, even worse chemicals. They used to dump salts of copper and arsenic into waterways!

Maybe it all circles back to the pagan notion of balance. Maybe environmental types have to get over some of our morbid fear of chemicals, and maybe conservatives need to entertain the idea that not all of the worlds evils can be laid at the feet of us hippies.

The author tips his hand in his final sentence, in which he impugns "critics of environmentalism." For here he reveals himself to be an "environmentalist," an ideologue, a person with an agenda -- just like the rest of us! "Environmentalism" is an "ism," just as much as Roman Catholicism. The real question is, what is the source one's most basic personal self-definition? The alcoholic's is (obviously) alcohol. The environmentalist's is the natural physical environment. The Roman Catholic Christian's is Jesus Christ as revealed and interpreted through the magisterium of the Roman Catholic Church. "A Pagan's Blog":The candor is refreshing!

Concern for the "well-being of the earth" as an end in itself is the root cause of the pernicious damage for which environmentalism has too often been responsible. When this concern impinges upon the overall well being of humanity than the measure of excessive concern has been reached. Incidentally, a common characteristic of the "truly ignorant" is self complacent indulgence in excess of every kind.

Nice of you to compliment the great work done by Tim Lambert and Jim Easter. Your readers also may want to check out posts on the topic at the blog called Bug Girl: http://membracid.wordpress.com/2009/04/25/world-malaria-day-2009-2/

If we don't lose our reason, there's a chance we can beat this disease.

For those who only care about human life - there is concern that DDT causes harm to more than "just" wildlife.

My mother grew up in an area regularly sprayed with DDT. They would drive the trucks down the street and fog each side of the street with it. They were doing that every few weeks during the Summer from the early 40's (when my Mom's family moved there) through the 1960's and I remember seeing it myself when visiting my grandmother (same house where my Mom grew up).

There was never a history of breast cancer in my family. My mother had NONE of the risk factors. She developed breast cancer and died from it in 1995.

Was there a connection to her being exposed to DDT as a child and later developing cancer? I don't know. But there are articles suggesting that exposure to DDT may cause breast cancer. Here's one of them:

http://envirocancer.cornell.edu/FactSheet/Pesticide/fs2.ddt.cfm

DDT is a toxin. We have to be careful when dumping ANY toxins into the environment or they'll come back and bite us in the butt. We don't want to trade one killer for another.

Your Name said;
April 26, 2009 2:57 PM
I like DDT. I don't like mosquitoes. I don't like death by malaria. So, you see, I am not an intellectual, just a person who feels sorry for the children that are allowed to die for the glory of environmentalism.
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The relationships between chemicals and the environment are complex, and even the best science about them is fraught with errors. I don't think any children are "allowed to die for the glory of environmentalism" but I know very well that many children are dying now as we speak because people who are "not an intellectual" are making decisions based on ignorance, propaganda, and emotion rather than the best hard science.
Thermal

We're all tired of illiterate knee-jerkers Gus. The problem is, the ones with the least intelligent contributions to make, are so often the ones making the loudest contributions. What concerns me, is how much power the people who think "Intellectual" is an insult really do have. Why are the stupid so self-congratulatory about their very stupidness? And why don't those of us who ARE capable of thinking our way out of a wet paper bag get together and create a better "mousetrap" to rid ourselves of these fools. Let them HAVE the DDT.

Malaria eradication involved f**king the environment. There is no way around it. By trying to find a way to eradicate malaria by not f**king the environment you are condemning millions of human beings to slow painful deaths.

Get over your green messiah complex, real people are dying over it.

Well, you are too clever by one half on two counts; firstly, although Carson may have written what she did about not completely banning Chemicals, it is somewhat like me giving a speach in which I wip up racial hatred and then claim that "I did not want or tell anyone to kill those Ni---s" While I do not hold her personally resopnsible in a criminal sense, she is responsible in initiating a chain of events which led to the deaths of more than Stalin, Mao and Hitler combined. Also, I have read several studies in which gross amounts of DDT was fed to chickens and eggs shell densities were constant. ALso, aledgedly affected bird population were in decline in the 30's according to Audobon and royal society for the preservatin of birds...several years before DDT was even envented much less , widely used. SO I gues you are saying so nafarious is this chemical that it can affect things in both directions of the time scale :-) Cheers, Terry

Have you actually read the article? You haven't read the post apparently. Take the time some time to study what the words mean? Some of us use them to communicate meaning rather than bellows.

Seems not.

Like the imbecile above you who could not get his name right, actually thinking in patterns other than "THIS GOOD THAT BAD" seems beyond your level of skill. I am getting very tired, over tired, of conservatives and their supporters consistently lying about and distorting every position they disagree with.

Given your level of incompetence at reading what was posted, why o why should I take he time to check out your unlinked reference to DDT being off the hook?

I won't.