DOESN'T GET US, DDT WILL
By Paul Abbott
At the end of World War II, DDT was hailed in the United States as a miracle chemical that could well spell the end of the insect world, especially the varieties considered to be noxious to humanity.
The use of the poison spread at an astonishing rate. It is now consumed in massive quantities on American farms and dairies, and in restaurants where customers frown on the cockroach, In some areas, low-~ flying airplanes apply DDT by the ton to crops and orchards.
Millions of industrious people spraying, blowing and blasting DDT on fields and gardens, homes and businesses, lawns and garbage dumps, coinci-ded well, of course, with the humanitarian instincts of giant chemical corporations who believe that pioneering in human welfare does not. necessarily stand in contradiction to serving the interests of stockholders.
In recent years it began to be noticed that the population of various forms of wild life was dropping alarmingly in the United States, some of them, inoluding valuable species of birds, being threatened with extinction. The accumulation of DDT in certain organs of these vertebrates was suspected to have grown sufficiently high to either kill individuals outright or to render them sexually sterile.
Because of its chemical stability, DDT persists in the environment, being absorbed and stored by the forms of life it does not kill outright. Among animals DDT taken in with food accumulates in fatty tissue, It does not take many fish, sick from DDT, to give an eagle, for example, a heavy: concentration of insect killer, The final link in the food chain is humans,
Medical investigators began to suspect that DDT lies at the bottom of certain new obscure illnesses. They cannot be sure, however. The truth is that the long-range effect of the poison on humans is not known.
Speaking in Kansas City. on November 15, Dr. Luther L, Terry, Surgeon General of. the United States Public Health Service, revealed that the insidious chemical has now "invaded the water environment of the world,"
Exactly how this has occurred is not yet known, he claims, Probably it pours off the North American continent, finding its way down rivers and sewers into the sea where it is then circulated by ocean currents. . Drs. Terry even suspects “air currents," although it seems a little far-fetched to believe that enough DDT dust guns are being worked in the United States to pollute the world's atmosphere sufficiently to then contaminate the seas.
In any case, DDT has observed no passport regulations. It has spread all over the planet. It is found in fish caught off Iceland and Japan and in aquatic plants and wild life of the Arctic, Oily fish, like Tuna, contain "surprisingly large amounts,"
Can anything be done about this new peril? In the United States and
“Loe
England, recent exposures of the danger of indiscriminate use of insect poisons, like Rachel Carson'8 Silent Spring, have led to some alarm and — even official admonitions about the advisability of cutting down on the use of. DDT as well as other even more potent killers,
The trouble is that insect poisons do play a useful role. They are in part to be credited for spectacular declines in certain diseases such as malaria, The chemical companies, vexed by the bad publicity, have stressed this in their counterattack,
More importantly, DDT and its chemical relatives enable farmers to send crops to market unmarred by insects -- they look perfect whatever traces of exotic test-tube products may be present under the attractive exterior, A farmer who does not dump such poisons on his tomatoes. and apples would soon lose out to competitors whose motto is "Let the Buyer. Beware." Thus insect poisons have become.much more of an economic neces~. sity than they used to be, :
An unexpected turn is that some of the worst insects develop immunity, while beneficial insects that could keep the noxious ones down prove to be most vulnerable, In some areas harmful insects have. surged back in plague proportions. Co
. The.chemical corporations have not been caught unawares, however, Their solution is newer and more deadly powders and liquid concentrates oo generally at a higher price, especially if you are able to appreciate the effect of a combination of ingredients Wlike | a doctor's prescription. "
The contamination of the oceans in the few years since DDT first appeared is one more urgent warning to mankind that the establishment of world-wide controls, the kind that can only be applied successfully under international socialism, cannot be delayed much longer.
Otherwise, if the bomb doesn't get us, DDT will.