April 25 is Malaria Awareness Day and a good time to look back at some of ACSH's oft-repeated warnings (see below) that malaria is one of the world's biggest killers. Unfortunately, the environmental movement must also take its place as one of the world's biggest killers, since it has long supported the ban on DDT, the insecticide that can most efficiently and cost-effectively kill malaria-carrying mosquitoes.
That error by the greens, inspired by the anti-chemical movement that Rachel Carson's book Silent Spring launched in the 60s and institutionalized by the U.S Environmental Protection Agency's ban on DDT in the 70s, meant that rapid progress in eliminating malaria, which had been seen in DDT-using countries since the 1940s, came to a near-halt.
The result has been something on the order of 2 million extra deaths per year for over thirty years now, meaning the anti-chemical greens (who feared that DDT might have some eggshell-thinning effects on birds) have by now racked up a bodycount comparable to that of Hitler, Stalin, or even Mao Tse-Tung. But hey, who says people are a more important species than birds, or for that matter mosquitoes? Go green!
"The DDT Ban Turns 30"
"Let Us Spray! Malaria and DDT in Mozambique"
"DDT and Chemophobia"
"Africa Malaria Day and DDT in Uganda"
"WHO Backs Return of DDT"
"DDT in NYT: The Unfinished Agenda"
"POPS Treaty and the Real 'Stolen Future'"
Todd Seavey is Director of Publications at the American Council on Science and Health and editor of HealthFactsAndFears.com.
