Word: ddt
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...Borgias. The bulk of Miss Carson's book is support for this nightmare curtain raiser. In a chapter titled "Elixirs of Death," she lists the synthetic insecticides, beginning with DDT, that came into use at the end of World War II. All of them are dangerous, she says without reservation. Already they are everywhere: in soil, rivers, ground water, even in the bodies of living animals and humans. "They occur in mother's milk." she says, using emotion-fanning words, "and probably in the tissues of the unborn child." And worse is to come. "This birth-to-death...
...DDT in Every Meal. The chlorinated hydrocarbons, on the other hand (including the familiar DDT), are used in enormous quantities by almost everyone. Much of Miss Carson's case against spraying depends on her contention that DDT and its near chemical relatives are poisonous to humans, especially since they tend to accumulate in fatty tissues. Experts do not agree. A mere trace of DDT kills insects, but humans and other mammals can absorb large doses without damage. Dr. Wayland J. Hayes, chief of the toxicology section of the U.S. Public Health Service in Atlanta says that every meal served...
Exaggerated Importance. While many insecticides are roughly as harmless as DDT, others are considerably more poisonous to humans. But in the opinion of respected experts of the U.S. Public Health Service, none have done appreciable damage to the U.S. public or are likely to do so. In heavily sprayed cotton-growing areas of the Mississippi Delta, says Assistant Surgeon General Dr. D. E. Price, health is as good as in sparingly sprayed neighboring areas. The same-report comes from California, where insecticides are heavily sprayed on orchards and fields. Says Robert Z. Rollins, chief of the division of chemistry...
Doused with DDT. St. Petersburg's problem is twofold. With 25% of its residents aged 65 or older (against a national average of 9%), it is full of people who are susceptible to serious cases of SLE. Many of them also love to feed the birds. even to get them to take seed from their lips. At downtown Mirror Lake last week, old folks were feeding pigeons, house sparrows, mockingbirds and grackles. while laughing gulls, ducks and herons splashed in and out of the water. There, in a half-hour, health workers easily caught 70 mosquitoes (Culex nigripalpus...
...second problem is the choice of mosquito control methods. Like most U.S. cities, St. Petersburg has been doused to a fare-thee-well with DDT, but some mosquitoes survived and multiplied. Spraying kills adult insects but usually not their eggs. The only way to get completely rid of them is to destroy their breeding places. Finally, the city authorities are trying to do just that by cleaning up yards and empty lots, getting rid of old tin cans, coconut husks and automobile tires, and everything else capable of holding stagnant water...