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Originally Posted by star
Rely on DDT and mosquitoes will evolve a resistance to it. In the meanwhile, we’ll have rendered many other species extinct. I know it’s typical to maintain that human lives are more worthy than that of all other species residing on this planet but that statement will usually come from someone with an uninformed or ill-informed position on our environment. We need other species to survive. We need them for clean water, for the all of the food that we eat and for the oxygen that we breathe.
The problem isn’t that we’re not using DDT. The problem is that access to drugs remains far too costly to get to those that reside in developing countries that require the protection. My U.S. domiciled friend travels overseas has no trouble affording the anti malaria drug to protect him from this risk.
So instead of contaminating the species on which we rely on for our very existence, we should continue to enforce active, regimented programs to treat those that are infected. The statistics reflect that malaria cases had declined upwards of 89% when antimalarial drugs were prescribed in a "test" province.
I read something similar to the link you posted on DDT. I'm attaching it below. It's the actual WHO link that specifies that due to the hazards of DDT, it's recommended that the compound be used indoors only on mosquito netting and such. The hazards to the environment would be vastly reduced with this method of application.
http://72.14.235.104/search?q=cache:...lnk&cd=1&gl=us
Their disclaimer will help prevent them from being sued for any deaths or health problems with this type of application. |
Yeah, WHO didn't completely admit the full extent of their prior, unprecedented stupidity, but they came pretty close. Bottom line: there no evidence that DDT has ever injured a single person, ever. On the other hand, "Sixty million people have died needlessly of malaria, since the imposition of the 1972 ban on DDT, and hundreds of millions more have suffered from this debilitating disease. The majority of those affected are children. Of the 300 to 500 million new cases of malaria each year, 200 to 300 million are children, and
malaria now kills one child every 30 seconds. Ninety percent of the reported cases of malaria are in Africa, and 40 percent of the world’s population, inhabitants of tropical countries, are threatened by the increasing incidence of malaria."
http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.co...umm02/DDT.html
The problem with administering drugs to billions of people is that it costs thousands of times more than using DDT. We're talking about third world countries where people make an average of $50 per year. No one, not even we, have enough money to administer these drugs to all the third world's billions of people. DDT is the only solution.