Posted on 05/22/2023 7:23:51 PM PDT by ganeemead
Using DDT as an area pesticide for crops was problematical. Overuse of ANYTHING is problematical; hold somebody's head under water long enough and he will die, that does not mean we need to outlaw water...
Using DDT to protect human habitats from the creatures of Pandora's box does not seem to hae had any sort of a downside.
The main problem seems to have been that the patents for DDT had expired before they undeerstood its effect on insects, i.e. there were no obscene profits to be had with it. But, basically, they had a whole host of scourges all but wiped off the planet by 1959 and that was too good for them...
I’m sitting in the backyard and I wish I had some right now.
🦟🦟🦟🦟🦟
The issue with DDT, as I understand it, was that it was massively overused.
The toxicity of DDT to humans is extremely low, regardless of what scumbags like Rachel Carson hyperventilated about.
The deaths of millions of people killed by insect borne diseases because DDT was unnecessarily banned are on the hands of her and her Leftist allies.
And I should add, even if it was massively overused for everything under the sun, its benefits STILL far outweighed the risks.
By far.
India may be the sole source of the product and in 2021 exported 20.6 metric tonnes to Africa though source says that was 75% of Africa’s imports.
No verification that China and N Korea stopped manufacture and export.
Reported that 20 countries still use DDT.
Because the trucks spraying on our Houston streets were like smoke trucks we children would run after or ride our bicycles inside the smoke for as long as our little lungs would carry us, breathing deeply as we ran to stay inside the DDT “smoke”.
It probably wasn’t good that we inhaled so much, so deeply, year after year but we did love getting a break from the mosquitoes.
DDT is good!
Population control advocates blamed DDT for increasing third world population. In the 1960s, World Health Organization authorities believed there was no alternative to the overpopulation problem but to assure than up to 40 percent of the children in poor nations would die of malaria. As an official of the Agency for International Development stated, "Rather dead than alive and riotously reproducing."
[Desowitz, RS. 1992. Malaria Capers, W.W. Norton & Company]
The Ramones beg to differ....
DDT was - is - one of the greatest inventions in the history of mankind. But a loopy Rachel Carson and an unscientific EPA that listened to her, outlawed it. How many millions in Third World countries have died of malaria as a result of this decision? But not to worry, Bill Gates wants to give them mosquito nets.
True story. When I was a kid growing up in Fla in the summer we would all be out in the streets playing at dusk. Then we would hear the engines and a tanker plane would fly over really low like a hundred feet and dump a giant trail of DDT over the whole neighborhood.
Later on they got more sophisticated and a truck would come through blowing the stuff out all over the place. Its a miracle we made it to adulthood. 😉
Logically, it is implausible to think that a persistent artificial compound can be toxic to undesirable insects but does no harm to beneficial insects and to the wildlife that eat insects. Similarly, since DDT and associated compounds persist, they accumulate in the environment and eventually settle in certain organs and fatty tissues in animals and people. As it happens, DDT and its associated class of compounds are part of the considerable burden of persistent organic pollutants on wildlife and on human health.
As for claims that the real issue is money, consider what would happen in court in a fair trial and assessment of liability and damages for pesticide pollution. A great deal of wealth in the form of chemical company stocks would evaporate and the industry would be restructured.
There were guys who fell into vats of the stuff in the fifties who wewre still walking around decades later with no ill effects.
Thank you. I’m glad there is at least one person not mindlessly repeating ignorant statements.
We played tag inside that milky whiteness to our delight... no seemingly adverse effects here.
There are differences between acute toxicity and ill effects from chronic exposure and accumulation. High doses of DDT can cause vomiting, tremors, shakiness, and seizures. As for low levels of DDT, animal studies and in vitro human cell and human epidemiological studies document effects on the liver and reproductive system and possible mutagenic and carcinogenic effects.
Again, I recommend that you take a day or two and dig into the primary source material on PubMed and at a university or med school science library. A key point to consider is that as with tobacco, industry is good at contriving and publishing studies that show no ill effects. What you should look for and assess is well-designed, replicated studies that show ill effects from DDT and its associated compounds. When I did that I was shocked at the weight and quality of the scientific evidence against DDT.
How many Nobel prizes have YOU ever received??
I will never forget taking my family to the Museum of Natural History in DC about 30 years ago. They had a display celebrating Rachel Carson and her book Silent Spring. My eldest daughter was approx 10 years old and I explained to her how this woman was responsible for the deaths of millions of people in poor countries who died from Malaria. There were a couple of women with kids nearby who overheard me and the outraged looks on their faces was priceless.
There were a number of typhus outbreaks in Europpe shortly after WW2 that were stopped like they’d run into a brick wall. I doubt any of the survivers would have wanted to hear anything negative about DDT...
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