WHO, DDT and the Persistent Organic Pesticides Treaty: Historic view from the inside

March 19, 2011

Rollback Malaria (RBM) was established in 1998 in part to reinvigorate the worldwide fight against malaria, and in part to facilitate the negotiations for what became the Stockholm Convention, the Persistent Organic Pesticides Treaty of 2001.

RBM World Malaria Day 2011

That’s about the time the ungodly assault on WHO and Rachel Carson started, by hysterical DDT advocates.  We now know that Roger Bate, Richard Tren, Donald Roberts and their comrades in pens are stuck in that 1998 fight.

Here’s a short account, from RBM, about just what happened:

The DDT Controversy

In 1999 the RBM Secretariat was called upon to help resolve a controversy emerging from intergovernmental negotiations to establish an international environmental treaty. At the centre of this controversy was DDT, former hero of the malaria eradication campaign and current totemic villain of the environmental movement. The treaty being negotiated was intended to eliminate the production and use of twelve persistent organic pollutants. DDT, still used for malaria control in over 20 countries, was included among ‘the dirty dozen’ chemicals slated for elimination, eliciting a strong reaction from public health activists and malaria specialists who claimed that its elimination would result in unacceptable increases in malaria morbidity and mortality. Environmental specialists and others claimed that environmentally friendly alternatives to DDT, although more expensive, could easily be deployed to guard against such a negative impact.

The controversy over the role of DDT in malaria vector control and the dangers posed to the environment escalated and attracted considerable media attention. The controversy was perpetuated in part because of a relatively weak evidence base on the human toxicity of DDT, the cost-effectiveness of proposed alternatives, and the probable impact of public health use of DDT (compared to agricultural use) on the environment. Resolution was also hampered by the relative lack of public health expertise among the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee delegates, who were primarily active in the fields of foreign and environmental policy.

The challenges presented to the RBM Secretariat in responding to the controversy were many and varied. They included: evaluation of the evidence base and the drafting of policy guidance (a WHO normative role); a major communications effort; and the establishment of new cross-sectoral partnerships and working relationships. In the process, RBM formed new and highly effective ‘partnerships’ or ‘working relations’ with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the US Environmental Protection Agency, the environmental policy apparatus of core RBM partners, as well as a variety of health and environmental NGOs. RBM conducted country and informal expert consultations and convened and chaired a special working group on DDT which was able to establish a position on the use of the insecticide in public health and the process for evaluating and moving to alternatives. The weight of WHO’s technical authority contributed greatly toward establishing the credibility of the working group. Information about the treaty negotiations and the WHO position on DDT was disseminated to health specialists via the WHO regional networks and to treaty focal points via UNEP.

The RBM Secretariat led the WHO delegation to all meetings of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee and prepared information and media events for each, supporting the participation of health/malaria specialists from a number of countries. The RBM Secretariat also served as the media focal point on malaria and DDT and provided interviews and information to all major media, as well as presentations to professional meetings and interest groups.

RBM’s objectives throughout this process were:

  • to establish consensus on the present and future role of DDT and alternatives in malaria control;
  • to encourage greater involvement of public health specialists in country-level discussions about the treaty and in country delegations to the negotiating sessions;
  • to provide information to negotiators and others that would reduce controversy and result in a win-win situation for public health and the environment (in which the longer term goal of DDT elimination is achieved through strengthened, more robust malaria control);
  • to benefit from the media attention to inform the public about malaria; and
  • to mobilize resources to support malaria control from outside the health sector.

All of these objectives have been met and the final treaty, known as the ‘Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants’ provides for the continued public health use of DDT and international assistance for the development and implementation of alternatives.

Resources to support the initial work of the RBM Secretariat were provided by environmental agencies/offices. In addition, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and the WHO Regional Office for the Americas (AMRO) and most recently the WHO Regional Office for Africa (AFRO) have been awarded project development grants from the Global Environment Facility (GEF) to promote regional efforts to strengthen malaria control and reduce reliance on DDT.

From Final Report of the External Evaluation of RBM, Roll Back Malaria to Date, Chapter 2, page 15 (circa 2001).


DDT hoaxsters predictably spinning India/malaria deaths story — wrongly

October 28, 2010

People so wedded to a hoax, or just wrong, view of events cannot be swayed away from their convictions easily.

Elizabeth Whelan’s hoax science policy group, the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH), put out a press release taking note of the study published in Lancet that calls into question the count of malaria deaths in India promulgated by the World Health Organization (WHO).  You remember, the study suggests the malaria death toll among adults in India may be as high as 200,000 annually, compared to the 15,000 estimated by WHO.

ACSH can’t resist the spin.  Implicit the debunking may be, but the study thoroughly debunks ACSH’s claim that more DDT will help defeat malaria.  India is the world’s greatest user of DDT, using more than all the rest of the world together.  Clearly a surplus usage of DDT has not created the miracle end to malaria that ACSH and other hoaxsters claim it would.

Still, ACSH sticks to their views, even when those views are grossly wrong.  ACSH said, “ACSH has called for resumed use of indoor residual spraying of small amounts of DDT to prevent mosquito bites, repel mosquitoes, and reduce malaria deaths.”

No word from India on whether it will dramatically reduce DDT use to meet ACSH’s call for “small amounts.”

ACSH’s press release calls attention to a Wall Street Journal Blog article describing WHO’s response to the Lancet-published study of India malaria deaths — WHO questions the “verbal autopsy” methodology, and says it stands by its estimates of malaria deaths in the nation:

“The new study uses verbal autopsy method which is suitable only for diseases with distinctive symptoms and not for malaria,” WHO’s India representative Nata Menabde said in an email statement Thursday.

The WHO says it takes into account only confirmed cases of malaria and surveys those using healthcare facilities.

Malaria symptoms include fever, flu-like illness and muscle aches. Malaria is endemic to parts of India, where many people live in mosquito-infested areas. Confirming the presence of malaria requires tests like the “Peripheral Smear for Malarial Parasite” and “Rapid Malaria Antigen”.

Lancet said the determinations made by its field researchers were reviewed by two of 130 trained doctors for all the 6,671 districts who determined whether or not the person had died from malaria.

The data concluded that 205,000 deaths before the age of 70, mainly in rural areas, were caused by malaria each year – 55,000 in early childhood, 30,000 among children ages five to 14 and 120,000 people 15 and older.

The WHO called for further review of the study.

“Malaria has symptoms common with many other diseases and cannot be correctly identified by the local population,” Dr. Menabde said, adding: “The findings of the study cannot be accepted without further validation.”


Does Africa Fighting Malaria actually fight malaria?

June 11, 2010

This spring’s publication of a book, The Excellent Powder, by Richard Tren and Donald Roberts, repeating most of the false claims about malaria and DDT, got me wondering. Their organization, Africa Fighting Malaria (AFM):

Does AFM do anything to fight malaria? At its own website it makes some astoundingly grandiose claims:

In its seven years of operation, AFM has helped transform malaria control by taking on and turning around failing public health institutions, donor agencies and governments.

Offhand I can’t think of any public health institution AFM has even been involved with, other than its undeserved criticism of the World Health Organization — and if anyone knows of any donor agency or government AFM has “turned around,” the history books await your telling the story.

Africa Fighting Malaria springs to life every year around World Malaria Day, April 25, with editorials claiming environmentalists have killed millions. AFM seems to be one of the sources of the bizarre and false claim that Rachel Carson is a “mass murderer.” AFM makes noise whenever there is difficulty getting a DDT spraying campaign underway in any part of Africa, for any reason, quick to lay the blame on environmentalists, even though the blame generally rests in other places. AFM is quick on the draw to try to discredit all research into DDT that suggests it poses any health threat, though so far as I can tell AFM has published no counter research, nor has it conducted any research of its own.

In its 2009 Annual Report, AFM proudly states “AFM is the only advocacy group that routinely supports IRS [Indoor Residual Spraying] and through its advocacy work defends the use of DDT for malaria control.”

Cleverly, and tellingly, they do not reveal that IRS in integrated vector (pest) management is what Rachel Carson advocated in 1962, nor do they mention that it is also supported by the much larger WHO, several nations in Africa, and the Gates Foundation, all of whom probably do more to fight malaria when they sneeze that AFM does intentionally.

Google and Bing searches turn up no projects the organization actually conducts to provide bed nets, or DDT, or anything else, to anyone working against malaria. I can’t find any place anyone other than AFM describes any activities of the group.

AFM has impressive video ads urging contributions, but the videos fail to mention that nothing in the ad is paid for by AFM, including especially the guy carrying the pesticide sprayer.

Looking at the IRS Form 990s for the organization from 2003 through 2008 (which is organized in both the U.S. and South Africa), it seems to me that the major purpose of AFM is to pay Roger Bate about $100,000 a year for part of the time, and pay Richard Tren more than $80,000 a year for the rest of the time.

Can anyone tell me, what has Africa Fighting Malaria ever done to seriously fight malaria? One could make the argument that if you sent $10 to Nothing But Nets, you’ve saved more lives than the last $1 million invested in AFM, and more to save lives than AFM in its existence.

Tip of the old scrub brush to Pharyngula and Antievolution.org, even though AFM wasn’t what they were targeting.

Update: Tim Lambert at Deltoid sent some traffic this way, which caught the attention of Eli Rabett, which reminded me that there really is more to this story about Africa Fighting Malaria, and you ought to read it at Deltoid and Rabett’s warren.

Formatting issues More (updated September 24, 2013):


Does Africa Fighting Malaria actually fight malaria? (format fix)

June 11, 2010

[Editor’s note: This post is an attempt to fix a formatting error in the earlier post with the almost-same headline, which has some corruption in it I have been unable to find or fix, but which renders the text almost unreadable.  My apologies.  Have not yet figured out how to move comments, alas; check the old post.]

This spring’s publication of a book, The Excellent Powder, by Richard Tren and Donald Roberts, repeating most of the false claims about malaria and DDT, got me wondering. Their organization, Africa Fighting Malaria (AFM):

Does AFM do anything to fight malaria? At its own website it makes some astoundingly grandiose claims:

In its seven years of operation, AFM has helped transform malaria control by taking on and turning around failing public health institutions, donor agencies and governments.

Offhand I can’t think of any public health institution AFM has even been involved with, other than its undeserved criticism of the World Health Organization — and if anyone knows of any donor agency or government AFM has “turned around,” the history books await your telling the story.

Africa Fighting Malaria springs to life every year around World Malaria Day, April 25, with editorials claiming environmentalists have killed millions.  AFM seems to be one of the sources of the bizarre and false claim that Rachel Carson is a “mass murderer.”  AFM makes noise whenever there is difficulty getting a DDT spraying campaign underway in any part of Africa, for any reason, quick to lay the blame on environmentalists, even though the blame generally rests in other places.  AFM is quick on the draw to try to discredit all research into DDT that suggests it poses any health threat, though so far as I can tell AFM has published no counter research, nor has it conducted any research of its own.

In its 2009 Annual Report, AFM proudly states “AFM is the only advocacy group that routinely supports IRS [Indoor Residual Spraying] and through its advocacy work defends the use of DDT for malaria control.”

Cleverly, and tellingly, they do not reveal that IRS in integrated vector (pest) management is what Rachel Carson advocated in 1962, nor do they mention that it is also supported by the much larger WHO, several nations in Africa, and the Gates Foundation, all of whom probably do more to fight malaria when they sneeze that AFM does intentionally.

Google and Bing searches turn up no projects the organization actually conducts to provide bed nets, or DDT, or anything else, to anyone working against malaria.  I can’t find any place anyone other than AFM describes any activities of the group.

AFM has impressive video ads urging contributions, but the videos fail to mention that nothing in the ad is paid for by AFM, including especially the guy carrying the pesticide sprayer.

Looking at the IRS Form 990s for the organization from 2003 through 2008 (which is organized in both the U.S. and South Africa), it seems to me that the major purpose of AFM is to pay Roger Bate about $100,000 a year for part of the time, and pay Richard Tren more than $80,000 a year for the rest of the time.

Can anyone tell me, what has Africa Fighting Malaria ever done to seriously fight malaria?

One could make the argument that if you sent $10 to Nothing But Nets, you’ve saved more lives than the last $1 million invested in AFM, and more to save lives than AFM in its existence.

Tip of the old scrub brush to Pharyngula and Antievolution.org, even though AFM wasn’t what they were targeting.

_____________
Update: Tim Lambert at Deltoid sent some traffic this way, which caught the attention of Eli Rabett, which reminded me that there really is more to this story about Africa Fighting Malaria, and you ought to read it at Deltoid and Rabett’s warren.

More (updated September 24, 2013):


Annals of malaria fighting: 863,000 malaria deaths in 2008

January 10, 2010

From World Health Organization statistics, World Malaria Report 2009:

* Half of the world’s population is at risk of malaria
* An estimated 243 million malaria cases occurred in 2008
* An estimated 863 000 malaria deaths occurred in 2008; 767 000 of those (89%) occurred in Africa.


“Not Evil, Just Wrong” opens to thunderous silence

October 24, 2009

It’s the air conditioning one hears, not applause.

Did your local newspaper review the movie?  Odds are the movie didn’t play in your town (did it play anywhere other than local Republican clubs?).

“Not Evil, Just Wrong” promoters and producers appear to have abandoned hopes for a wide-scale debut of their film on October 18, instead choosing direct-to-DVD release in order to salvage something from the effort.

Well, they can take solace in the fact that the John Birch Society, itself trying to rise from the dead, liked the film according to the comments in The New American.  But even the Birch Society reviewer watched it on DVD, not on a big screen.

At the Birch Society site I responded, and will be astounded to see if it stays (in three parts).  The review started out noting that if one asks a friend to explain the cap-and-trade system of controlling carbon air emissions, one is not likely to find that one’s friend fully understands the ins and outs of government regulation of air pollution, commodities markets, and deep economics (why should they?).

Ask a friend or associate, “Can you explain ‘cap and trade?’” More than likely you will be astounded at what a poor grasp (if any) he or she has of the subject, even though the future of our economy and even our country hinges to a large extent on whether or not cap-and-trade legislation passes or not.

I said:

Ask a friend to explain the right to bear arms, and you’re likely to get a bad explanation, too.

Does that mean the Second Amendment is evil?  I don’t think so.

This movie [“Not Evil, Just Wrong”] is greatly riddled with errors, and it presents a false portrait of science, history, and government.

For example:

In one scene that made one want to throw bottles at the TV set, a well-to-do environmentalist showed no concern to a Ugandan mother, Fiona Kobusingye-Boynes, over the loss of her child to malaria, a disease that was almost eliminated by the use of DDT, but then resurged when the EPA banned DDT’s exportation and insisted other countries adopt the same policy.

When DDT was heavily used in Africa, about two million people a year died from the disease.  Today?  About one million die.  The rates aren’t low enough, but does the movie need to lie about history to make a point?  Why?

Malaria was never close to being eliminated with DDT.  Most of the nations that got rid of malaria did it with the combination of better housing (with screens), better health care, and concentrated programs to attack mosquitoes to hold populations down long enough that the pool of malaria in humans could be wiped out.  Mosquitoes get malaria from humans — if there is no malaria in humans, mosquito bites are benign.

DDT was never used in an eradication effort in most nations of Africa, because the governments were unable to get a campaign to fight the disease on all fronts as necessary.  Do we know whether DDT was used in Uganda prior to 1967?

And if it was, are we really supposed to believe that Idi Amin refused to use DDT out of respect for little birdies and fishies, while killing and [it is often said] personally eating his countrymen?

I don’t think that environmentalists are the root of the problem in today’s malaria rates in Uganda, and any perusal of history suggests a dozen other culprits who could not be considered lesser threats by any stretch.

Now the death toll of malaria victims worldwide, but mainly in Third World countries, mostly young children, is estimated by the World Health Organization to be one million per year.

Near the lowest in 200 years.

Recently the World Health Organization, under strong pressure from human rights organizations, particularly in Africa and Asia, rescinded its ban on the pesticide that has been shown in test after test to be harmless to humans and animals, including birds.

WHO never had a ban on the use of DDT.  DDT didn’t work well.  It’s foolish to require malaria fighting agencies to use tools that don’t work.  [Ooooh.  I forgot to note the junk science claim that DDT is harmless to humans and animals — were it harmless, why should we use it?  It’s odd to see the John Birch Society organ campaigning so actively to kill America’s symbol, the bald eagle.  Are they really that evil, or just that poorly informed?]

The environmentalists continue to push to overturn this ruling, regardless of its toll in human misery and death.

[Gee. I should have responded, “The environmentalists continue to push this goal even as malaria deaths and infections drop — regardless the improvement in human health and reduction of misery and death.”]

Environmentalists have been lobbying since 1998 to allow DDT use in extremely limited circumstances, with controls to protect human health (the National Academy of Sciences notes that DDT, though among the most useful substances ever created, is more dangerous than helpful, and must be eliminated). [I should have noted here, “Opposition came from the George W. Bush administration.”]  In the past three years opposition to DDT use in Uganda has come from large agricultural companies, tobacco growers and unnamed groups of “businessmen” who sued to stop DDT use.

Africans have been free to use DDT since the substance’s discovery, and some nations used it extensively throughout the period since 1946.  Interestingly, they also experienced a resurgence of malaria anyway. If Africans want to use DDT, let them use it.

In the interim, tests across Africa demonstrate that bed nets are more effective than DDT, and cheaper.  DDT alone cannot help Africa much; bed nets alone help a lot.  But eradicating malaria will require great improvements in the delivery of health care to quickly and properly diagnose malaria, and provide complete treatments of the disease in humans to wipe out the pool of disease from which the little bloodsuckers get it in the first place.

This film is not interested in helping Africans, however.  The film’s producers are interested in trying to make hay besmirching the reputations of people who campaign for a clean environment.

How long is this film?  90 minutes, IMDB saysUNICEF notes that a child dies from malaria every 30 seconds.  So while you watch this film, 180 children will die from malaria, and you will have done absolutely nothing to stop the next one from dying.

Send $10 to Nothing But Nets instead.

Look at it this way:  Every sale of the DVD of “Not Evil, Just Wrong,” deprives Nothing But Nets of a donation of two more life-saving bed nets.  So every sale of this DVD more than doubles the chances that another kid in Africa will die from malaria.

Help ban ignorance about world affairs:

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Cranks refuse to budge on influenza hoaxes

September 27, 2009

Friday came and went.  President Obama did as he was scheduled to do, chairing a session of the United Nations Security Council in a meeting directed at nuclear weapons non-proliferation.

This should have silenced some of the cranks, crackpots, crank scientists and hoaxters who had “warned” us that Obama was going to use that opportunity to take over the world and order people to get inoculated against influenza — with some unstated fears that those inoculations would be more dangerous than the flu itself, or turn us all into Volvo-driving, chablis-loving, union-belonging, line-dancing Democrats, or something like that.

:::Sigh:::

No.  Never such luck.

At the post where I debunked the claim that WHO is planning to take over the world with inoculations at the point of a gun, instead of with Auric Goldfinger, SMERSH, KAOS, or Lex Luther, a guy named Simon McDermott complains I don’t give him enough credence.  His letter doesn’t help.

Look:  The World Health Organization is a group of distinguished medical care specialists, public health specialists, and policy wonks, most of whom are too nerdy to want to hold great power — heading up WHO is a stepping stone to no great governmental power position anyone has ever found, least of all at the United Nations, which has no army, no troops of its own of any sort, and advises nations on bettering health care.

The claim that WHO is plotting to take over the world is not just moonbat-shagging silly, it’s completely insane.  It makes no sense on any level, nor is there any evidence to corroborate the claims.  Jane Burgermeister’s website notwithstanding, I have my doubts that she could demonstrate mental competence to enlist as a private in the Russian armed forces.

Moreover, the world faces a crisis in influenza.  With luck and a lot of hard work, we can avoid a spread of a killer flu virus that might make Zero Population Growth look optimistic.  We don’t need hoaxsters, pranksters and fools claiming that influenza is all a great hoax.

Simon said:

I am a freelance writer and have heavily researched the ‘well known’ and ‘established facts’ written in my article that I posted in my previous comment.

The facts are that the H1N1 vaccine has not been safely tested. It takes years to accurately test and research the effects of a new vaccine.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1208716/Half-GPs-refuse-swine-flu-vaccine-testing-fears.html

I have posted a link above to the Mail Online a highly respected national newspaper here in Britain.

The article says that health officials say the vaccine has been thoroughly tested.  No one in the article offers any credible denial of that fact.  The headlines feature an earlier poll of general practitioners alleging that they said the vaccine had not been tested well enough.

Simon:  An out-of-date, nonscientific poll of  GPs in Britain who were underinformed, is not science.

Nor is your reading that story doing “heavy research.”  Googling is not generally considered serious research.

‘First, you exaggerate. Second, that outbreak and the aftereffects are very much on the minds of health officials. Guillan Barre was never linked to the vaccine, by the way. Get some facts, will you?’

This is established fact; although experts now believe that it will be more like one in one million that will contract GBS rather than one in ten thousand.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcnIojjzvvg

No, a badly researched, poorly produced story on a local CBS affiliate, migrated to YouTube, does not make something “established fact.”

GBS is rare, but occurs all the time.  We don’t know the cause, and no one has been able to pin any vaccine as a cause of GBS.  After several million people were vaccinated, a few fell ill from GBS.  No research has ever been able to establish any vaccine as a cause of GBS, however — it may be that those people would have fallen ill with GBS whether they got any vaccine or not.  See the CDC’s information page on GBS:

What causes GBS?

It is thought that GBS may be triggered by an infection. The infection that most commonly precedes GBS is caused by a bacterium called Campylobacter jejuni. Other respiratory or intestinal illnesses and other triggers may also precede an episode of GBS. In 1976, vaccination with the swine flu vaccine was associated with getting GBS. Several studies have been done to evaluate if other flu vaccines since 1976 were associated with GBS. Only one of the studies showed an association. That study suggested that one person out of 1 million vaccinated persons may be at risk of GBS associated with the vaccine.

We’ve had that many kids die of swine flu already this year, in Dallas and Tarrant counties in Texas.    Right now, GBS from all causes is less prevalent than deaths from swine flu.

Also here is a list of dangerous substances that are in other vaccines; we can also expect similar material to be in the swine flu vaccine.

http://www.stunnedmullets.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=130:official-facts-on-vaccines&catid=78:vaccines&Itemid=141

Did you know that potatoes contain carcinogens?  Are you aware that the essential nutrient, selenium, is also carcinogenic?  Did you know that an excess of salt can kill a person?  Are you aware that plain old tap water can be deadly, in several ways?

Gosh, a list of “dangerous substances.”  Did you look at the list?  Did you see that the “dangerous substances” include eggs and yeast?  Are you aware that almost every loaf of bread in America contains more eggs and yeast than three years’ worth of all vaccines for a person?

You’re being irresponsible to the point of recklessness. Yes, people with allergies to eggs should avoid flu vaccines.  No, that doesn’t mean the vaccines are inherently dangerous, that they vaccines don’t work, nor does it mean eggs are inherently dangerous.

It means people who are allergic to eggs should avoid flu vaccines (vaccines are grown in eggs, and some egg proteins remain in influenza vaccines).

Almost all substances are dangerous, when out of place, or in the wrong quantities.  You could note that fact without alarmism and without hysterics.  Dangerous things are all around us.  Flu vaccines fall near the bottom of the danger scales, but near the top of the life-saving scale.

You’re aware that we annually lose around 30,000 people to the pedestrian, seasonal flu?  How many thousands of times greater is the risk of death to flu than death by vaccine?

Research has shown that there are plenty of natural preventative actions that can be taken to protect against catching flu viruses. These are a healthy organic diet, vitamins; such as vitamin D3, regular exercise and certain herbs – all of these are known to boost and strengthen the immune system.

Staying healthy is always a good idea.  H1N1, however, attacks healthy kids. It’s not a question of natural prevention.  Some people have never been exposed to this particular strain or its cousins, and they have no natural immunity to it.  When it strikes, it strikes quickly.  Most of the deaths in the U.S. from H1N1 are to young people who have taken your natural preventive actions.  Vitamins and organic diets don’t work.

In fact, that’s dangerous advice right there.  A medical professional could be subject to malpractice for the advice you just issued.   Kids, Simon is an amateur — don’t try that at home.

I used to regularly take the seasonal flu vaccine before finding out the dangers of vaccines in general; on the two occasions that I did take it I ended up getting flu shortly after taking the vaccine. Since then I have not taken it and decided to go down the alternative route, which has served me very well as I have not had so much as a cold in over three years.

As people grow older they have fewer colds — you never get the same cold virus twice.  When you’re over 30 or 40, you’ve been exposed to most of the variations on cold viruses.  Your reduction in colds is because you’re older, not because you’re healthier.

Ironically, that’s exactly what you argue against.  You’re more resistant to colds because you’ve been “vaccinated” against them.  The vaccination was natural, by catching the viruses and developing immunity.  For flu, we have to have flu shots for the greatest safety.

Don’t argue against flu vaccines by telling us how effectively the natural method of vaccination has protected you from colds, okay?  You look like an idiot when you do that, suggesting you really don’t understand viruses, how they are passed, nor how human immunity occurs.

Since you seem so eager to poison your body with a substance which is clearly more dangerous than swine flu itself, then who am I to stand in your way.

That’s just a crass, cold and craven lie.  There is not even an insane argument to be made that flu vaccines this year are more dangerous than the flu itself.  That’s crazy talk, terrorist talk.  What do you have against old people that you want to see thousands of them die from the flu?   Since the “death panels” claim turned out to be bogus, you decided to go on a one-man campaign to encourage death among the elderly and ill?

Since you are so eager to poison minds with completely bogus attacks on science, let me urge you to volunteer to forego all flu vaccines, but be exposed to the viruses, for the sake of research.  That way the rest of us could benefit from your bizarre animus to life.

I am sorry to hear that there have been a couple of deaths where you live due to swine flu, but there are much safer alternative and natural preventative actions that can be taken. A healthy nutritionally rich diet should be first on the list before we even consider vaccines, of which there is a huge amount of evidence calling into question, their overall safety and effectiveness when fighting disease.

Call the CDC.  Volunteer for flu exposure now, before the rush.  You’re not sure that the vaccines are safe, but you argue that the flu IS safe?  Let’s see you put your life where your mouth is.

I don’t think you’re that big a fool.  Your that whopping dishonest, but not so big a fool.

The problem is that the majority of western doctors are taught absolute fallacies at medical school and in some cases have been brought up to become nothing more than glorified pill prescribers.

The human immune is an extremely powerful and efficient tool when it comes to fighting disease. The reason that it is susceptible to diseases like swine flu at all is because our diets are so nutritionally poor. In many cases this is due to processed foods (filled with additives and preservatives) and poisons such as aspartame in many of our soft drinks.

http://www.naturalnews.com/026168.html

I have posted a link above to a site that lists natural preventives and explains that viruses such as swine flu cannot be contracted by a healthy well maintained immune system.

Don’t look now, but you’re obviously suffering a dementia produced by lack of immunity.

In your case, that dementia could be cured with a trip to a library.

What you wrote in that last excerpt is pure, unadulterated bullshit.

Thank you, but we’ve already heard the “smart pills” joke.

I am not a ‘crack pot’ and neither are others who show a distinct lack of trust in bodies like the WHO and companies such as Baxter, because history has taught us that they have seriously let us down in the past.

You mean, you advocate crackpot ideas for noble reasons?  Alas, that leaves you in the category of crackpot.  Anyone who thinks killer flu is safer than vaccines is a crackpot, or an idiot, or an agent of evil.  I’m assuming you’re not an idiot, and not an agent of evil.  Can you convince me otherwise?

If after examining the evidence that I have provided you still believe that the vaccine is safe, then be my guest, take it, it is your right to choose, but please do not belittle with your derogatory use of humour those who do not!

The reason I talk about this information is because I want people to be safe, and nobody wants a repeat of the 1976 debacle.

Better to keep quiet and be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.

Shut up.  Nobody wants a repeat of the 1918 debacle, either — and you should be ashamed of campaigning for it as you are.

If we all lived clean and healthy natural lives then there would be no need for vaccines at all.

There you go with that crackpot stuff again.  If you think that chicken pox and shingles would disappear without vaccines, you’re a fool.  If you fail to understand that polio can’t be beaten without vaccines, you’re a greater fool.

If you claim that people could beat chicken pox, smallpox, measles and polio without vaccines, you’re a dangerous tool of crackpot evil.

Maybe it is our social system that needs a rethink, because if you examine Amazonian tribal communities, who have had little to no contact with the outside world, you find a distinct lack of disease in these societies.

There’s a whopper I’d like to see some serious studies on.

That testifies to a lack of virus transmission, but you will also find a distinct surplus of diseases that diet can’t cure.  Someday spend some time studying Huntington’s Disease, Huntington’s Chorea, and how the prevalence of the disease in one of those isolated Amazonian tribes contributed to the search for a cause.  Of course, almost every member of that tribe had the disease.  (It’s genetic, and no vaccine can prevent or cure — yet.)  You’ll also find they die of bacterial diseases that modern medicine can treat — those physicians you mock.

Dirty living equals disease; an unclean polluted environment equals disease; the addition of chemicals to our food, drink and drinking water equals disease; when are we going to wake up and realise that the cause of disease is not some unknown, unfortunate ‘random factor’, but the way we live our lives.

Of course, clean living increases asthma.  A lack of pollution tends to correlate with lack of civilization.  The absence of chlorine in our drinking water contributes to cholera epidemics and typhoid, the lack of fluorine in our water means more dental caries and brain infections.  Trace amounts of iodine in salt have all but eliminated goiter.  When are you going to wake up and realize that some disease causes are well known, some diseases easily preventable, and life is complex and cannot be made perfectly safe with today’s technology, but was a minefield of deadly infections without today’s technology?

If we live our lives soaked in superstition and crank science, we haven’t even a prayer (full irony intended).  You’re not advocating for better health.  You’re ranting about stuff you don’t know about.

Although in the case of Baxter the cause of the so called ’swine flu virus’ may well have been them!

I think there’s a better case that you are the cause of swine flu than there is a case that any drug company manufactured the stuff.  Among other clues you should look at is the prevalence of swine flu in swine populations around the world — today and historically.  Influenza viruses tend to be species specific, and it’s actually quite rare for them to jump species.  That’s why, when they jump, they can be so deadly.

But then, that’s what you’re campaigning for, right?  You’d love to see a virus wipe out most people, especially those with scientific knowledge — right, Simon?

Ugh.

Get an education about flu and other viruses:

Don’t let your friends go without this information, please:

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Straight talk: Berenbaum on DDT and malaria

August 12, 2009

Plus, she’ll answer your questions.

But hurry.

One of the world’s great authorities on mosquitoes, May Berenbaum at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, spends this week talking about mosquitoes and malaria, and answering your questions.

Public Radio International runs a feature this week with Dr. Berenbaum answering questions.

(Hey, Beck!  Are you decent this week?)

(Steven Milloy?  Got the guts to ask a real scientist a question?)

You should see these first:

Life Cycle of Malaria, WHO and Campaign to Roll Back Malaria

Life Cycle of Malaria, WHO and Campaign to Roll Back Malaria

You like straight talk – why not share it with others?

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DDT falsehoods, taken as an article of faith

December 31, 2008

Brown pelican egg rendered uncapable of protecting the (now dead) chick when DDT prevented the mother pelican from forming an adequate shell for the egg.

Brown pelican egg rendered uncapable of protecting the (now dead) chick when DDT prevented the mother pelican from forming an adequate shell for the egg. Pelican Media image.

Just when you start thinking the world is safe for the facts — safe for the truth — some well-meaning-but-poorly-informed person comes along to remind you that it’s a constant struggle to keep the flame of truth from being snuffed out for no good reason.

Henry I. Miller didn’t publish a screed demanding DDT be misused against West Nile virus this year, which I count as a major victory.  As you know, DDT is the wrong stuff to use to fight West Nile, so calling for DDT in that case merely means you’re an ideologue who wants to slam science, and it probably means you wish disease victims would hurry up and die.  (“More statistics to use against libruls!”)

Henry I. Miller. How many years at the Hoover Institute before he finds the library at Stanford to check his claims on DDT?

Henry I. Miller. How many years at the Hoover Institute before he finds the library at Stanford to check his claims on DDT?

And even Oklahoma’s reigning Senate fool Tom Coburn lifted his hold on the bill naming for Rachel Carson the post office in her hometown.

But, on the second to last day of the year, comes Bob Mattes at Reformed Musings, to claim that climate change is a hoax, and say he knows it’s so because DDT is safe and Rachel Carson was wrong. Mattes is a deacon in a Presbyterian church in Virginia; the name of his site is a reference to reformed theology, I gather.

When someone claims as a matter of faith, things that are well known to be wrong and easily debunked, that someone is unlikely to be swayed by the facts. In fact, Mattes allows no criticism of his post at his blog — he’s turned off comments on that post.

Will he drop by here to read his errors?  Not likely.  Would he correct the errors if he knew?  It’s not good to gamble when the odds are long against you.

Reformed Musings said:

Want a concrete example of the impact of eco-socialism? Three letters – DDT.

Well, no, I don’t want an alleged example of eco-socialism from an eco-fascist, one whose mind is made up, incorrectly, and who will not let the facts sway him.  Notice that the authority he cites is that well-known purveyor of junk science, Junk Science, the ethically-challenged website run by the industry campaign in favor of DDT.  If one dances to the devil’s tune, one should not claim not to be doing the devil’s work.

If this be eco-socialism, it’s God-blessed, and we should revel in it and make the most of it.

In the 60’s, there was the big DDT scare, with activists claiming that the pesticide was killing off our birds and bees.

Right.  And it was true, DDT was killing our birds and bees.  It took more than 30 years of not using DDT to rescue our national symbol, the bald eagle, from DDT’s killer effects.  Is it fair to call it a “scare” if it’s true?

Rachel Carson sold the big lie in her famous book Silent Spring, which was full of misrepresentations.

See, here’s how we know Mattes doesn’t know what he’s talking about, and probably hasn’t read the book.  Carson was very careful in her book.  She offered more than 50 pages of citations to science papers and hard research to support what she wrote — a “don’t take my word for it, check it out for yourself” kind of honesty.

Discover magazine carried an article about DDT and Carson’s book in November 2007Discover said that, since 1962, more than 1,000 peer-reviewed publications support Carson’s conclusions, a record remarkable in any branch of science.

In fact, Carson may have underestimated the impact of DDT on birds, says Michael Fry, an avian toxicologist and director of the American Bird Conservancy’s pesticides and birds program. She was not aware that DDT—or rather its metabolite, DDE—causes eggshell thinning because the data were not published until the late 1960s and early 1970s. It was eggshell thinning that devastated fish-eating birds and birds of prey, says Fry, and this effect is well documented in a report (pdf) on DDT published in 2002 by the Department of Health and Human Services’ Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR). The report, which cites over 1,000 references, also describes how DDT and its breakdown products accumulate in the tissues of animals high up on terrestrial and aquatic food chains—a process that induced reproductive and neurological defects in birds and fish.

Had Mattes been paying attention (was he even alive then?), he’d have noted that President John F. Kennedy tasked the President’s Science Advisory Council to check out Carson’s book, to see whether it was accurate, and whether the government should start down the path of careful study and careful regulation of pesticides as she suggested.  In May 1963 the PSAC reported back that Carson was dead right on every issue, except, maybe for one.  PSAC said Carson wasn’t alarmist enough, that immediate action against pesticides was justified, rather than waiting for later studies or delaying for any other reason.

So, here I issue a challenge to Bob Mattes:  Tell us where Rachel Carson was wrong.  Cite for us a page in Silent Spring where she made a significant error in science, a point that has not been borne out as correct in later studies.

I’ve been making this challenge for a year and half now, and not even Stephen Milloy has been able to offer a single error Carson made.  A few have said they “heard” Carson erred in one thing or another, but upon checking, we’ve always found that the claimed errors were nowhere to be found, or the errors alleged were misstated, or, more often, what was claimed as error simply was not.

It’s a very odd situation:  We have a deacon of the Presbyterians assaulting the honor of a distinguished scientist, using false claims as his ammunition.

As usual, the ignorant entertainment industry frothed at the mouth for the new fad cause. Joni Mitchell sang: “Hey, farmer, farmer, put away that DDT now. Give me spots on my apples but leave me the birds and the bees.” Cute, huh?

As a result, DDT was banned world-wide. Problem was, not only were the zealots wrong, but nothing killed deadly malaria-carrying mosquitoes better than DDT.

DDT has never been banned worldwide.  It’s still manufactured in several places — it’s still a deadly hazard in India.  It’s been in constant use in many nations, such as Mexico and South Africa.  Limitations on DDT use have always included a loophole allowing DDT to be used to protect against malaria — even the 2001 Persistant Organic Pesticides Treaty has a special clause allowing DDT to be used against malaria.

So it’s false to claim that DDT was banned worldwide, ever.  We might be much better to get to that position because it would keep nuts from claiming that all we have to do is poison Africa to make Aricans healthy — but in any case, there is no ban on DDT to fight malaria.

Use of DDT began to decline in the mid 1960s when mosquitoes began to exhibit resistance and even immunity to the stuff.  Genetic studies now find that almost all mosquitoes in the world have multiple copies of a gene that allows the bug to digest DDT more as a nutrient, rendering it ineffective as a pesticide.  The World Health Organization had begun an ambitious campaign to knock down mosquito populations long enough that malaria would die out; but by the mid 1960s, the burgeoning resistance to DDT rendered that campaign untenable.  DDT use against mosquitoes, which was never undertaken in much of Africa because some local governments were not stable enough to manage an anti-mosquito campaign, declined, and stopped in places where DDT simply did not work.

In fact it was gross overuse of DDT by agricultural interests that drove the resistance among insects.  Had that overuse been controlled earlier, we might have been able to kill of malaria.  It was not a ban on DDT that caused its use to decline.  It was that DDT stopped working.  No one in their right mind will spend money on a pesticide that doesn’t work, no matter how cheap the stuff is.

But it wasn’t popular culture that got DDT banned.  In the late 1960s litigation on DDT spraying worked through the courts.  By 1972, two federal courts ruled in separate cases that the federal government had failed to carry out its obligations to control the use of DDT as required by law, based on evidence presented in court that demonstrated clear harm.  Both courts ordered the government to promptly hold the administrative hearings necessary to alter the registration for DDT.  The hearings started in the Department of Agriculture, which moved slowly.  When the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was created, it got the authority to regulate pesticides from Ag.  The courts ordered EPA to get off its duff and speed the process.

In the midst of a nine-month-long hearing process that accumulated thousands of pages of scientific documentation of the harms of DDT, manufacturers of the pesticide voluntarily changed their labels to limit use of DDT essentially to emergency situations, not general broadcast applications. Judge Edmund Sweeney, the EPA administrative law judge, thought that change, which was what was pending, meant that EPA did not need to act, and he so ruled at the end of the process.  EPA Administrator William Ruckleshaus, a veteran of more recent environmental litigation, understood the courts had ordered a more ironclad change, and he imposed tighter registration standards on DDT that prohibited its use on agricultural crops, except in emergencies.  There was also a loophole built in to protect public health.

DDT manufacturers sued EPA to overturn the rule.  The courts ruled that the scientific evidence was overwhelming, and that EPA’s rule was firmly grounded.  The manufacturers did not appeal further.  So, DDT use in the U.S. was severely restricted by the end of 1972, following earlier restrictiosn in Sweden.

Can Mattes read a calendar?  How does a ban on DDT in Sweden in 1970, in the U.S. in 1972, make Africa stop using DDT in 1965?

Literally millions of poor have needlessly died from malaria in Third World countries as a result of the ban. Malaria is the 4th leading cause of death in the world. Drug-resistant strains are starting to dominate. Eradication is the real answer. Only recently have countries like South Africa defied the ban and started spraying DDT again to fight malaria. Ideas have consequences – eco-socialism routinely kills, just not in the comfy apartments of the self-serving eco-socialists.

What ban is he talking about? South Africa suspended DDT use only briefly at the end of the 20th century — but South Africa’s problems are not caused because South African mosquitoes roared back when they were not sprayed wholesale with DDT.  Malaria in South Africa rose when the disease came over the border from other nations where the disease was less controlled.  South Africa brought back DDT use, though in a more limited fashion.  There was no ban to defy.  Mattes is telling a whopper here.

Mattes cites the Centers for Disease Control when he says malaria is the fourth leading killer in the world.  He either fails to notice or fails to say that CDC does not ask for DDT to be brought back to fight malaria.  CDC calls for bednets, for draining of breeding areas, for better medical care and better diagnosis, but not for more DDT.  Why?  When the leading disease fighting organization in the world does not ask for DDT, we might assume it puts DDT way down on its list of priorities (as it does).  Remember, CDC’s origins were in the fight against mosquito-borne diseases.  CDC speaks with authority on mosquito eradication.  CDC does not ask for more DDT, anywhere.  His own authority — he should listen to them.

Health care professionals note that malaria made a serious resurgence when the malaria parasites themselves became resistant to the pharmaceuticals used to treat them.  This has nothing to do with DDT, because DDT is not given as a drug to humans (it’s a poison, mildly carcinogenic, and there is no demonstrated effectiveness against the parasite).

Can Bob Mattes read a map?  How do restrictions on spraying DDT on cotton fields in Texas, cause malaria to increase in Africa?

Mattes closes his post:

History shows that the eco-socialists have NEVER been right. EVERY scare prediction they’ve ever tried fails to materialize. Unfortunately, history starts today for most folks. We don’t teach logic or real science in public schools anymore, just the religion of political correctness. Ignorance breeds disaster, especially for those in developing countries who can’t speak for themselves and don’t have a George Soros funding their latest fad cause. Remember DDT. Remember global cooling. Remember the limitations of computer modeling. Don’t be duped.

Except, the “eco-socialists” as Mattes mislabels them were right about DDT, they were right about malaria, they were right on the science about wildlife damage from DDT, and they were right on the history.

Ignorance does indeed breed disaster, which is where Mattes’s views will take us.  He should carefully consider his closing trio of words, and follow them religiously.

If Mattes is so wrong on every claim about DDT, do you think we should trust anything he says about climate change?

Updates: