Posted on 08/23/2002 12:04:32 AM PDT by JohnHuang2
Two years ago, when the West Nile virus was just making headlines for the first time in the United States, I offered a simple solution to wipe out the mosquitoes that carry the plague.
I said then we should bring back DDT.
Nobody listened.
As the death toll rises and as more Americans get sick from West Nile virus, I hope my plea will reach more receptive ears today.
The very name DDT conjures fears among people too young to remember exactly what a miracle wonder this pesticide was through the 1960s.
Up until the 1960s, malaria was perhaps the biggest killer in the world. Tens of millions of people would die every year as victims of malaria.
What happened? The disease was virtually wiped out in the United States in the 1950s and 1960s. How? Are you sitting down?
According to no less an objective source than the Centers for Disease Control, credit goes to the draining of vast wetland areas, usually to make room for housing developments, and extensive spraying with DDT.
What? You mean destroying swamps was a good thing? Spraying DDT was a good thing?
You bet it was. Guess what? Malaria is on the rise again around the world. From Russia to Africa to Indonesia, malaria is still ravaging populations.
In fact, since 1999, 625 million people have contracted the disease worldwide and more than 4 million of them have died. Of those, most were pregnant women or children under the age of 5.
That's why I say it is time to bring back DDT. You think I'm kidding? I'll go further: DDT is one of the greatest chemical accomplishments in the history of mankind.
I know you don't believe me. You've been conditioned to think of DDT as an abhorrent toxic agent that caused cancer and nearly wiped out the bald eagle. Nonsense. Junk science. Hysteria.
DDT saved lives and reduced human suffering. And it could do so again, if only people would wake up and stop believing propaganda spoon-fed to them by those whose only goal must be to reduce the world's human population by any means necessary.
Here's what the National Academy of Sciences had to say about the chemical as late as 1970: "To only a few chemicals does man owe as great a debt as to DDT. ... In a little more than two decades, DDT has prevented 500 million human deaths, due to malaria, that otherwise would have been inevitable."
What about cancer? I know one of the scientists responsible for creating DDT. His name is Dr. Joseph Jacobs. In his 80s, he is still active, working every day and of sound mind. He has related stories to me about falling into a vat of DDT and emerging unscathed with no after-effects.
The truth is that population-control advocates decided in the 1960s that overpopulation must be prevented. The best way, they determined, was to let children in poor nations die of malaria by the millions.
Extensive hearings were held on DDT before an Environmental Protection Agency administrative law judge, Edmund Sweeney, who concluded in 1972, "DDT is not a carcinogenic hazard to man. ... DDT is not a mutagenic or teratogenic hazard to man ... the uses of DDT under the regulations involved here do not have a deleterious effect on freshwater fish, estuarine organisms, wild birds or other wildlife."
But the EPA hearing examiner was overruled by EPA administrator William Ruckelshaus – a lawyer and politician, not a scientist. He reportedly did not attend a single hour of the seven months of hearings, nor did he read any of the transcripts, according to aides.
The latest scientific study on DDT, published in 1985, found no correlation between DDT and cancer. A 1972 study actually found it reduced tumors in animals.
Has anyone considered that the spread of West Nile virus could be a result of 20 years of misguided wetland preservation and the banning of DDT? I say it's time to start cranking up production once again. If not for the people of the United States, at least for the innocent children of the Third World.
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Sean Hannity was puzzled yesterday afternoon. A caller told him that they now have a West Nile Virus vaccine for horses and other animals, but not for people. I found that puzzling too.
And, this guy suggests draining wetlands? Ask Ducks Unlimited what disaster that would cause. Ducks Unlimited is no off the wall bunch of "greenies". Any serious duck hunter is probably a member of DU. Draining wetlands would also do severe damage to the fish populations because the wetlands are where many fry grow to adult with is's rich source of food and cover.
And oh, I'm sure that guy fell into a vat of DDT. I think the author did too.
I'm very sympathetic to this article, but I have to admit that I never once saw a hawk or an eagle while growing up. I looked for them, too -- I'm an Eagle Scout. Now I see them two or three times a week right here in the suburbs of Dallas. If we could only teach them to eat grackles....
The greenies are so often wrong and exaggerate almost everything. On a few things they are right, and DDT is one of them.
So you prefer ducks to people?? You prefer to let PEOPLE DIE so some jerk jock can get his jollies banging away at innocent birds??
Here's a clue -- there were plenty of ducks before Bush the First's "wetlands" policy started. The "wetlands" thing has zip to do with ducks, and everything to do with government taking yet more control of private property. Read up on the things that define a "wetland"--it is NOT a place where there is standing water year-round--just a damp spot in the dirt where specific PLANTS happen to grow. What good is THAT to a duck??
I love the comment, "condition to think." It was called "brainwashing" when I was a pup. IOW, telling a lie long and loud enough that people accept the lie as the "truth."
But the EPA hearing examiner was overruled by EPA administrator William Ruckelshaus – a lawyer and politician, not a scientist. He reportedly did not attend a single hour of the seven months of hearings, nor did he read any of the transcripts, according to aides.
Ruling by fiat.
The latest scientific study on DDT, published in 1985, found no correlation between DDT and cancer. A 1972 study actually found it reduced tumors in animals.
Three different studies, all comming to the same conclusion, yet people prefer to believe propaganda over truth.
God, help us!
Notice all those small ponds beside the highway filled with 10" of stormwater and runoff? Wetlands, that's why the landowners aren't allowed to drain them.
Yea, that's precisely what I implied. That's such a standard no answer to the problem.
If you don't think tidal or freshwater wetlands are important to all of us, then pave them over where you live. I don't hunt ducks, but I do fish and realize that wetlands are important. I prefer "most" people to ducks, fish, gulls, and birds of prey. And if you really believe that true wetlands are just a place where "specific plants" happen to grow, you need new specs and a hearing aid. And you live on the Puget sound? Why?
Citatation? Where did someone recommend letting children die of malaria? Mr Farah really ought to give sources for statements like this.
You're just not paying attention. Flu gets lots of media attention. Yearly vaccination programs are also covered.
It ain't what "I" believe--its what the damned EPA regulations say. IOW "its the law". Go learn something about what the damned green/red bureaucrats are doing before opening your pie-hole.
Nobody is talking about draining tidal or freshwater wetlands that actually are associated with year-round bodies of water--they are talking about the little one-or-two acre potholes that are good only for breeding mosquitoes and have never seen a duck in their entire existence (too small). TRUE wetlands support FISH and other life-forms that EAT the mosquito larvae, and are associated with year-round bodies of water.
BTW--I'm from South Louisiana originally. I grew up between the Mississippi and Atchafalya Rivers, and right next door the the Atchafalya Floodway, with a bayou across the road from the front yard, so I have seen more wetlands, both freshwater and tidal, than you have ever thought about.
That is precisely what you missed in my criticism of the author of this article. He is saying " credit goes to the draining of vast wetland areas."
You jumped on my case when I criticized the author of the article on his proposal to bring back DDT and drain "vast" wetland areas. Those very areas you grew up around.
...so I have seen more wetlands, both freshwater and tidal, than you have ever thought about.
That wouldn't be a good bet on your part.
I think you and I actually agree more than you realized.
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