DDT is back. Actually, it never went away, but the valve on its use has been slowly closing—until last week when the World Health Organization opened the DDT valve for a campaign in Africa against malaria. The mainstream media were pleased to report that some environmental groups supported the decision (for example, Environmental Defense) while noting that others predictably opposed the WHO decision (for example, Pesticide Action Network North America).
Environmental Defense believes that the threat of malaria in Africa is so dire that only a return to spraying the walls of homes with DDT to eradicate the mosquitoes that carry the disease will work. Environmental Defense is mindful of the harm that DDT can do, but these risks pale in comparison to the cost in lives from an epidemic of malaria.
Fifty years ago, the WHO launched a major DDT campaign to eradicate malarial mosquitoes. Scientists believed they had no other choice. Forty-five years ago, Rachel Carson wrote Silent Spring, which among other things warned of the dangers posed by widespread use of DDT. Thirty-five years ago DDT was banned in the US. Ten years ago, 127 nations signed the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants, an international treaty designed to completely eliminate DDT and other so-called POPs. Five years ago, the WHO drafted a plan for the complete phase-out of DDT to control malaria. That has now changed because Africans are at risk.
In fact, Africans at risk are being held hostage by the WHO and DDT promoters, some of whom are the chemical industry and some of whom are scientists with ideological commitments to better living through chemistry. These fans of DDT ignore the rise of DDT resistant mosquito strains, obsess on the mosquito’s role in malaria’s life cycle, dismiss the research on human health risks, and confine their strategies to chemistry. Countries like Vietnam and Mexico have successfully eliminated malaria outbreaks without DDT by implementing community-based programs for detection and treatment, while mosquito abatement is based on integrated pest management. DDT promoters have set up a false dichotomy: DDT or death by the thousands. If the risk assessment is DDT or nothing, DDT looks pretty good. But DDT in comparison with other workable alternatives doesn’t come out so well. For a good summary, go to the website for the Pesticide Action Network North America at www.panna.org.
One of the claims made by DDT boosters is that it doesn’t harm humans. That’s false. For heaven’s sake, even the EPA has classified DDT as a possible carcinogen. What is true is that it’s difficult to show associations between DDT and illness in humans because DDT is everywhere. We all have it in our tissues because we are all downstream from Persistent Organic Pollutants. We will all be downstream from Africa and the WHO’s new DDT policy.
Why haven’t more African nations adopted strategies like Vietnam and Mexico? One researcher argued that malaria isn’t properly a public health issue but an economic development issue, that social disruption and instability are as potent for breeding malaria as stagnant water. But the WHO can’t do anything about economic development, so maybe it really is DDT or nothing if lives are to be saved.
This might seem far away, even though it gets your back up with indignation. But almost every day we have to choose our battles about what we’ll be exposed to. An obvious one is how a limited budget or simply circumstance affects your exposure to pesticides in the food you eat or where you live. Less obvious are the chemicals health professionals prescribe for you to make you well, especially the humble antibiotic. You don’t need to go to Africa to be confronted with a tough choice between sickness without chemicals and sickness from chemicals. What you do need is better information and better choices.
Related resources are available on the Environmental Health page.
