Carson's Malaria Legacy
Perhaps the greatest impact of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring was the negative publicity that it generated for the pesticide DDT, which at the time was used both in agriculture and for public health uses to fight malaria and other insect-borne diseases. This negative publicity actually led many nations to ban or stop using DDT even in limited applications where it was needed to control mosquitoes and save lives. As a result, every year millions of people around the world die from malaria—needlessly.
Some might deny Carson’s role in this scenario by pointing out a couple comments she made early in the book suggesting some pesticide use might be necessary. She notes:
“All this is not to say that there is no insect problem and no need of control. I am saying, rather, that control must be geared to realities, not mythical situations, and that the methods employed must be such that they do not destroy us along with insects.”
Who could disagree with this statement? Unfortunately, the rest of Carson’s harsh rhetoric about DDT led the world in the complete opposite direction. Carson discussed DDT in her chapter on “Elixirs of Death,” in which she postulates that man-made chemicals affect processes of the human body in “sinister and often deadly ways.” Regarding DDT, she concluded that “the threat of chronic poisoning and degenerative changes of the liver and organs is very real.” In a chapter on cancer, she says that one expert “now gives DDT the definite rating of a chemical carcinogen.”
Ironically, while Carson called for policy based on reason over myths, she opened her book up with a “Fable for Tomorrow,” describing a town in which chemicals have destroyed wildlife and people die from chemical exposures. She admitted it doesn’t exist, but somehow we are supposed act on her myth because, “It might have easily have a thousand counterparts in America.”
But Rachel was wrong. Humans were exposed to massive amounts of DDT without showing ill effect. And unlike Carson’s fable, malaria is a harsh reality today, killing more than a million people a year and making 300 million seriously ill, mostly in the developing world. Follow the links on this page to learn more about the malaria crisis and how DDT could help remedy the problem.
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