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Posted on 07/08/2003 8:40:49 PM PDT by Lando Lincoln
How the greens kill people
Dr Aaron Oakley
BrookesNews.Com
Wednesday 8 July 2003
It is useful when trying to gauge the silliness of greens to use some kind of benchmark. I propose a benchmark based on their attitudes towards DDT. On average, a child in Africa dies every three minutes from malaria. This is a needless and tragic death.
There was a time when it could be said that DDT was saving millions of lives. Not any more. Thanks to comfortably well off and malaria-free greens in the first world, DDT manufacture and use has been drastically curtailed. The science behind the ban is shabby at best. When the EPA administrator Ruckelshaus banned the substance, it was against the recommendation of the EPA hearing examiner who concluded that:
“...DDT is not a carcinogenic hazard to man…”
“...DDT is not a mutagenic or teratogenic hazard to man…”
“... The use of DDT under the regulations involved here do not have a deleterious effect on freshwater fish, estuarine organisms, wild birds or other wildlife…”
But science is only something that greens use when its suits their agenda. Thus we have a politically inspired ban on DDT that is literally killing millions of third-world peasants. So to see how callous and anti-science green organizations are I tested their various waters to find out their attitudes to DDT. Probably the most extreme and most well known group is Greenpeace. They have an awful lot of awful things to say about DDT, most of it inaccurate. e.g:
“DDT has already out lived its utility. Concrete steps must be taken to phase it out, while ensuring concurrent implementation of alternative measures” said Nityanand Jayaraman, Greenpeace's Asia Toxics campaigner in India. I suppose if he regards the lives of third world peasants as worthless then I could see why Jayaraman might say that DDT had out lived its usefulness.
Here is what the Australian Conservation Foundation says: “Studies show alarming amounts of the pesticide DDT in breast milk. The pesticides threaten baby brain development and contribute to miscarriages and birth defects.”
Some studies have indicated trace amounts of DDT in milk but at levels far to low to cause any serious concern. Except to the worry warts down at the ACF. Probably the least irresponsible enviro group is the World Wildlife Fund for Nature (WWF). (They do not deserve to be called responsible.) Here is an interesting story regarding the WWF’s behaviour regarding a treaty to ban DDT related by Roger Bate:
“Most medical and environmental health specialists (including mosquito sprayers) were not aware of the proposed treaty, and most of the country delegates to UNEP were not aware that DDT was still used in malaria control. Indeed, until Amir Attaran, head of the Malaria Project, presented the case for DDT at the UNEP negotiating sessions in Vancouver (1998) and Geneva (1999), it was still likely to be banned. Attaran collected nearly 400 signatures from malaria specialists, including three Nobel Laureates, in 1999 on a letter supporting DDT use.
“The letter was widely reported in the media and led to the World Wildlife Fund retracting its demand that DDT be banned, at the opening plenary session of the U.N. “persistent organic pollutants" meeting last year. Attaran lobbied delegates from numerous countries and with the Malaria Foundation International, made the treaty writers see sense.”
In other words the WWF tried to get away with bad policy but was stopped by concerned scientists. Once again, a callous disregard for human welfare is evident. Even now, the WWF still wants to ban DDT in the long term. The real problem is that almost all green movements have abandoned science in favour of radical agendas that have little to do with the needs of real people living in the real world.
The result is the above demonstrated callous disregard for human life.
Visit Dr. Oakley's blog at: bizarrescience.blogspot.com
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And malaria carried by mosquitos is harmless. DDT has saved many more lives than it has possibly threatend.
What's worse is that the very pests that are targeted for destruction through the use of DDT only end up being temporarily decimated and ultimately produce offspring that can withstand greater levels of DDT than their forebears. Eventually one would be better off dropping a tactical nuke on the infestation rather than pouring in more DDT.
Mind you, I'm no fan of the Greenies. As far as I'm concerned, a lot of their hoo-ha has cost lives (the most recent being the seven astronauts of Columbia, whose fate was sealed by an "environmentally friendly" foam insulation that really didn't meet NASA's original specs).
Anyway, them's me thoughts.
-Jay
Short of a tactical nuke.
Just look at that smirk.
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