-By Kevin Roeten
Humans killing humans. It’s happened in the past, and will likely happen in the future. One of the most prolific baby-killing machines has been the banning of the man-made chemical [dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane]. Billions know it by its acronym—“DDT”.
Why would so many feel justified with the deaths of 50-80 million mostly children (2-3 million per year), and mostly in Africa from malaria? (1) This genocide is painfully described by Steve Jalsavec in how National Geographic acknowledges huge loss of life to malaria and …the need for DDT. (2)
Some Americans believe the death of African children is wholly justified for population reduction. Evidently, they are expendable. But Malaria is the biggest killer of African children.
Unfortunately, population control activists blamed DDT for increasing third word populations. In the 1960’s, the World Health Organization (WHO) believed that the only alternative to the overpopulation problem was to assure that 40% of the children in poor nations would die of malaria. An official of theAgency for International Development even stated, “Rather dead than alive and riotously reproducing.” (3)
Alexander King, co-founder of theClub of Rome said (9), “In Guyana…it [DDT] had almost eliminated malaria, but at the same time, the birth rate had doubled. So my chief quarrel with DDT in hindsight is that it greatly added to the population problem.”
Jeff Hoffman, environmental attorney (4) wrote, “Malaria was actually a natural population control, and DDT has actually caused a massive population explosion in some places where it has eradicated malaria.” Hoffman continues, “More fundamentally, why should humans get priority over other forms of life?”
A plethora of information is contained in junkscience.com — 100 things you should know about DDT (5). It goes into great detail about how DDT doesn’t have anything to do with various bird egg thinning, and no other country even mentions it. Even the Wall Street Journal endorses DDT (6), and gives reasoned explanations for its use.
Dr. J. Gordon Edwards describes his path from being an environmentalist to discussing the lies of Rachel Carson (8). As explained in AD: The truth about malaria and DDT – Paul Driessen – Jul 17, 06 (7), DDT-expert Edwards used to eat a spoonful of DDT whenever he lectured on it. He finally died at age 85 of a heart attack while hiking in the mountains.
In Townhall – Deadly Environmentalists (9)—John Berlau (Competitive Enterprise Institute) reiterates “Not a single study linking DDT exposure to human toxicity has ever been replicated.” Dr. Walter Williams (George Mason University) discusses a long-term study where volunteers ate 32 ounces of DDT for 18 months, and 16 years later they suffered no increased risk of unfavorable health effects.
To date, hundreds of knowing people are who’s promoting DDT (11) use, especially in Africa. You hear the common chant there “Bring Back DDT!” (10). Many more people and organizations are behind a DDT comeback, including Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), Patrick Moore (Greenpeace and Greenspirit), Robert Gwatz (malaria specialist/ US National Institute of Health), the African- American Environmentalist Association (AAEA), Sam Zaramba in ending malaria in Africa (14), and hundreds of other experts from over 25 other African countries.
The United Nations has revised its population forecast (12) for 2050. Population will likely stop increasing by 2050, and will begin a decreasing death spiral specifically due to factors such as malaria, abortion, contraception, Plan-B, etc., etc… If one looks at population articles by Jonathan Last (13), one can see where population is headed.
It takes 2.1 children per woman to produce enough babies to keep the population constant. The number of children per woman was 6.0 in 1970. Today the global average is 2.9. The United Nations Population Division (UNPD) says it will decrease to 2.05 by 2050.
History and God are likely to judge us harshly. Population control activists need to be told they are killing off the human species.
- http://www.fightingmalaria.org
- National Geographic, 7/07
- Desowitz, RS; 1992; Malaria Capers
- [grist.org]
- JunkScience, J Gordon Edwards & Steven Milloy
- Wall Street Journal, 8/16/07
- American Daily, Paul Driessen, 7/17/06
- Dr. J. Gordon Edwards, Science and Technology, Summer 1992
- Dr. Walter Williams, TownHall
- Marjorie Hecht, Science and Technology, Summer 1992
- PAN (Pesticide Action Network) North America; “Who’s Promoting DDT?”
- AEI (American Enterprise Institute); “Two Billion Never-Borns”
- Population articles by Jonathan Last
- Sam Zaramba/ Uganda; Ending Malaria in Africa
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Kevin Roeten has written columns for over 10 years, after being a Chemical Engineer with Dupont for 20. A devout Catholic and staunch conservative, he loves to marry the ‘third rail’ of religion and politics into many of his articles.
DDT was an immensely useful substance, but you over sell it astoundingly.
1. No on intended the ban on spraying DDT on cotton in the U.S. to kill people, anywhere. Your claims are grotesque distortions of fact.
2. EPA’s 1972 ban on DDT left it available for export. So there never was any ban on sending lots of DDT to Africa, or Asia — nor is there, now.
3. J. Gordon Edwards never published any of his complaints against the DDT ban in any science journal. No one would accept them — Edwards has no credible evidence. Follow his footnotes.
4. Steven Milloy is in the pay of chemical and tobacco companies. For years he’s told sad, and mostly false, tales about government health officials who regulate his clients’ products. In any case, don’t take my word for it, follow his footnotes. There is no science to back his claims.
5. DDT use was slowed in Africa in 1965 — because mosquitoes became resistant and immune to it. At the same time, DDT remains freely available for anyone who really wants to use it. Check the public health agencies — there is no huge demand to increase DDT use now.
6. Malaria deaths stood at about 3 million a year when DDT use was at its highest. Malaria deaths today are the lowest they’ve been in history, less than half the death rate when DDT was banned in the U.S.
Please get your facts right.