By Alex Singleton
adamsmithblog.orgadamsmithblog.orgOpen ↗
Whenever environmentalists get involved in a debate, you know that sound science and reason are
going to get thrown away. Environmentalism is a religion - and one without a basis in reality. The
case of DDT, a chemical essential for killing malaria, is case in point. Thanks to
environmentalists, malaria kills one million people each year. If environmentists did not exist, it
could be eliminated with DDT.
So DDT must be a pretty evil chemical to stop its use? Well, that's what the environmentalists say.
Ever since the publication of Rachel Carson's Silent Spring, they have claimed that it is
carcinogenic and kills birds - and opposed its use in fighting malaria. The scientific evidence
indicates that it has no effect on humans, and that is not carcinogenic. There can be an effect on
birds - the thinning of egg shells - but only when exposed to very high levels of DDT, not the
levels used in fighting malaria. The science thus suggests that the environmentalist claims are
just wrong.
Now Jurassic Park author Michael Crighton has added his weight to the debate:
"I know you haven't read any of what I am about to tell you in the newspaper, because newspapers
literally don't report them. I can tell you that DDT is not a carcinogen and did not cause birds to
die and should never have been banned. I can tell you that the people who banned it knew that it
wasn't carcinogenic and banned it anyway. I can tell you that the DDT ban has caused the deaths of
tens of millions of poor people, mostly children, whose deaths are directly attributable to a
callous, technologically advanced western society that promoted the new cause of environmentalism by
pushing a fantasy about a pesticide, and thus irrevocably harmed the third world. Banning DDT is one
of the most disgraceful episodes in the twentieth century history of America. We knew better, and we
did it anyway, and we let people around the world die and didn't give a damn."
The DDT fiasco remindes of Greenpeace co-founder Patrick Moore, who described his former
organisation, Greenpeace, as "a band of scientific illiterates who use gestapo tactics." How true.
The environmentalists have a lot to answer for.