Douglas_Knight comments on Open Thread, Jun. 15 - Jun. 21, 2015 - Less Wrong

5 Post author: Gondolinian 15 June 2015 12:02AM

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Comment author: Douglas_Knight 17 June 2015 06:50:26PM -1 points [-]

I have looked for and never found any evidence for this. When pushed, a lot of people retreat to the unfalsifiable claim that it is secret pressure.

Africa does use lots of DDT. It used to use more, until mosquitoes developed resistance. Now it restricts it to the most useful applications in towns, especially residences and bednets.

Comment author: Lumifer 17 June 2015 07:08:44PM 2 points [-]

I have looked for and never found any evidence for this.

Any? Really? Here is a result of a 10-second Google search (emphasis mine):

EPA administrator William Ruckelshaus... banned DDT.

The U.S. decision had a rapid effect in the developing sector, where the State Department made U.S. aid contingent on countries not using any pesticide that was banned in the United States. The U.S. Agency for International Development discontinued its support for DDT spraying programs, and instead increased funding for birth control programs.

Other Western nations—Sweden and Norway, for example—also pressured recipient nations to stop the use of DDT. Belize abandoned DDT in 1999, because Mexico, under pressure from the United States and NAFTA, had stopped the manufacture of DDT, which was Belize’s source. Purchases of replacement insecticides would take up nearly 90 percent of Belize’s malaria control budget. Mozambique stopped the use of DDT, “because 80 percent of the country’s health budget came from donor funds, and donors refused to allow the use of DDT,” reported the British Medical Journal (March 11, 2000).

(source)

Comment author: Sarunas 17 June 2015 10:31:30PM *  1 point [-]

While the statements you have linked may or may not be correct, they may require double checking, since, according to themselves (p.9) and this, "21st Century Science and Technology" magazine is published by Lyndon LaRouche, whom I know very little about, but who seems to be regarded as a controversial figure. He is also on scientific advisory board of that magazine.

Comment author: Lumifer 18 June 2015 01:23:08AM -1 points [-]

Yes, I understand that and tried to not quote the parts where all kinds of bombastic statements are being made, instead focusing on what seems to be simple claims of fact. I am not treating this source as entirely credible, but it was a basic counterpoint to the statement that "I have looked for and never found any evidence for this" (emphasis in the original).

Comment author: Douglas_Knight 17 June 2015 07:30:18PM 0 points [-]

Yes, I have seen such assertions before, but I have tried tracking down these "bans" and as far as I can tell, they are pure fabrications.

Comment author: Lumifer 17 June 2015 07:39:46PM 1 point [-]

Are you saying that USAID did fund DDT spraying in the 80s and the 90s..? That large-scale efforts of the environmentalists to reduce usage of DDT had no effect at all?

Comment author: Douglas_Knight 17 June 2015 07:55:20PM *  0 points [-]

I do not know in particular about USAID, though I have tracked down examples of false claim that organizations did not use DDT. It appears likely that they did use it.

I see no evidence of large-scale efforts by environmentalists to reduce usage of DDT outside of the west. I have not examined claims like the one you quoted above that environmentalists in the US affected Mexico and thus Belize, but it doesn't seem very plausible since it is easy to get Mexican DDT in America today

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