re: #65 Obdicut

It would still be much better, obviously to develop an anti-mosquito agent that didn’t have the nasty side-effects of DDT. But malaria is such a killer. Not just directly, but by making so many too sick to work; people starve in the wake of malaria since they’re too tired to harvest, tend their herds, etc.

Vietnam has had huge success against malaria while not using DDT. Instead, they use pyrethroids, and they ‘poison’ larvae breeding grounds by putting oil on water, dredging and draining standing water, and aggressively treating malarial cases. That takes a relatively well-performing economy, though, which most of Africa doesn’t have.

I have a hard time looking at this from any perspective than as a mother. If I was a mother living in Afrika, I would do whatever it took to prevent my infant/child from getting malaria. I would be really pissed that any government would ban the use of an effective agent against DDT WITHOUT providing an adequate alternative.

We need to step-up the science on this to replace DDT.