by David Shane

Created on: September 13, 2009   Last Updated: October 08, 2009

Malaria, from the Italian for "bad air," is an often-deadly parasitical disease carried by several different species of mosquito. According to the World Health Organization, in 2006 roughly 1 million people died of the disease, and 247 million were infected [1]. It is more common in "third-world" nations, and often thought of as a tropical disease - but the truth is it was once found all over the United States. One big aid in its eradication was the widespread spraying of the contact poison DDT, or dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane.

As a killer of malaria carrying mosquitoes (and other insects and their associated diseases), DDT is cheap and long-lasting. That low-cost is particularly important because many of the nations where malaria is still a problem are quite poor. When used for health purposes, it is often sprayed on the inside walls of houses. It continues to be effective for a long time, only requiring spraying once or twice a year.

And, it works. In 1970, the National Academy of Sciences stated that "in little more than two decades, DDT has prevented 500 million human deaths due to malaria that would have otherwise been inevitable [2]." South Africa, which used DDT until 1996, abandoned it under environmental pressure, then began using it again in 2000, provides an interesting case study.

From 1971-1996, the number of malaria cases in the country remained under 10,000. After abandoning DDT, the number shot up to a peak of around 65,000 in 2000. By 2003, the number was back down to around 10,000. [3]

So, DDT sounds great, right? So why was it banned in America, and should it be illegal? The answer begins with a book by Rachel Carson called "Silent Spring," and a then-nascent EPA. In her book, published in 1962, Carson popularized what she believed were the dangers of some synthetic chemicals, especially DDT.

Several environmental groups soon began lobbying the federal government to ban the chemical. The EPA, soon after its formation in 1970, held hearings on the risks of DDT. At the end of the hearings, Edmund Sweeney, the head examiner, announced that the scientific evidence provided no basis for a ban. The head of the EPA, William Ruckelshaus, who didn't attend a single hearing, overruled him, and a ban went into effect.

Why did he do this? The EPA was a brand new agency at the time. It has been suggested based on statements of some of the ban advocates that "it was important for the EPA and environmentalists to succeed in banning DDT, so that their

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