From: thant@void.esd.sgi.com (Thant Tessman)
Subject: Re: World Food Prize Awarded for Eco-Friendly War on Pests
Organization: Silicon Graphics, Inc.  Mountain View, CA
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 92 20:04:08 GMT


In article <1bhpsfINNh7@armory.centerline.com>, mrh@centerline.com writes:

> I invite libertarians to cite ONE example of successful eradication of
> introduced pests or diseases by the private sector in any nation.

The March of Dimes is a private organization that sucessfully 
defeated polio.  The use of DDT nearly eliminated malaria all
over the world until it was made illegal by unsubstantiated
claims of environmental damage.

If you're more interested in ecological systems in general, note that
it is private organizations that preserve species and land most
sucessfully.  For example, it is in the public parks in Africa 
where elephant poaching and general political corruption has nearly 
destroyed the populations.  In the private game reserves and community 
vilages in Zimbabway for example, the elephant populations are actually 
growing.

The lumber industry in the U.S. plants 30% more lumber a year then
they cut down.  It is the government lands leased to lumber interests
that get clear-cut because the government has eliminated any incentive
to preserve the future value of the land.  In Brazil the tax structure
actively discourages forest preservation by forcing people to pay 
more taxes on unutilized land than on utilized land (besides ignoring
the property rights of the native populations).

As for feeding people, the world already produces more than enough
food to feed everyone in the world.  The problem is that governments
stand in the way of getting it to them.  For example, in Ethiopia
there are basically two factions.  The wage war on each other by
destroying food shipments heading into the other's territory.  Or 
another example is the way governments force farmers to grow
cash crops for export to pay of international debt, instead of
allowing the farmers to grow food for their own communities.

Government is the problem, not the solution.

thant

***

From Trashing the Planet (Dixy Lee Ray and Ben Guzzo, 1990, Regnery Gateway,
1130 17th Street, NW, Washington, DC 20036).

Excerpt from Trashing the Planet, Chapter 6, pp 69
...  Mosquito-borne malaria has always been man's worst disease, judged by
the number of its victims.  Until DDT came along, about 200 million people
were stricken annually with malaria, and about two million of them died
each year.  [Source given as: Claus, George and Karen Bolander, 1977,
Ecological Sanity, David McKay, pp. 289-91]  Beginning in 1946, a large-scale
spraying program directed against the malaria-carrying mosquito brought
an immediate and dramatic decrease in these numbers...

... Public health statistics from Sri Lanka testify to the effectiveness
of the spraying program.  In 1948, before use of DDT, there were 2.8 million
cases of malaria.  By 1963, there were only 17.  Low levels of infection
continued until the late 1960s, when the attacks on DDT in the United
States convinced officials to suspend spraying.  In 1968, there were one
million cases of malaria.  In 1969, the number reached 2.5 million, back to
pre-DDT levels.  [Source given as: Edwards, J. Gordon, 1983, Saving Lives
With Pesticides, National Council for Environmental Balance, 4169 Westport
Road, Louisville, KY 40207]...

Excerpt from Trashing the Planet, Chapter 6, pp 70-73

...The grwoing chorus from self-proclaimed environmentalists demanding
that DDT be totally banned led to a public hearing in 1971.  It should be
noted that the Environmental Protectionn Agency, the agency responsible for
regulating pesticides and for making the final decision about their use,
actually took part in the hearing, testifying against DDT, along with the
Environmental Defense Fund and other activist groups.  The attack on DDT
rested on three main allegations:  that DDT caused the death of many
birds and could lead to the extinction of some bird populations;  that
DDT was so stable that it could never be eliminated from the environment,
and that DDT might cause cancer in humans.  None of these charges has
ever been substantiated.

It was alleged that DDT was toxic to birds that might ingest it from eating
insects, earthworms, or seeds in sprayed areas.  It was also charged that
sub-lethal amounts of DDT in the bodies of birds caused them to lay eggs
with thin shells that provided insufficient protection, resulting in the death
of many chicks.  These charges have been repeated so often that they are
widely believed, even though they are, at best, "factoids," untrue in most
instances.

Actual counts of bird populations, conducted annually by the Audubon Society
at Christmastime, have shown that many bird populations were in fact
increasing throughout the years of heaviest DDT spraying. [Source given
as: Edwards, J. Gordon, 1981, Silent Spring -- Broken Spring, National
Council for Environmental Balance, Lousiville, KY 40207]  For example,
between 1941 and 1971, there was a 12% increase in robins, 21 times more
cowbirds, 8 times more blackbirds, and 131 times more grackles.  Gulls
also increased, especially along the East Coast.  Aside from robins --
poaaivly America's most abundant bird, which some hysterical
environmentalists said was "doomed" by DDT -- it is the birds of prey
that caught most of the anti-DDT attention, especially the ospra\ey and
the peregrine falcon.  At the Hawk Mountain Snactuary in Pennsylvania,
annual surveys show 191 ospreys in 1946, compared to 600 in 1970.  Each
year showed some population increase.  For the peregrine falcon, the
numbers fluctuated from a low of 14 in 1965 to a high of 32 in 1969.
Dr. Joseph Hickey, an authority on peregrines, testified at the DDT hearings
that the falcon population had been declining since 1890.  Its fate more
closely related to the availability of prey and nesting sites than to
pesticides.  For all hawks, the annual counts showed an increase from
9,291 in 1957 to 20,196 in 1967.  Since it was protected by the endangered
species designation, populations of the American Bald Eagle have increased
significantly.  Although environmentalists claim that this resurgence is
due to banning DDT, there is no supportative evidence.

In the case of thin egg shells, it is a phenomenon that predates use
of DDT.  It has been known for decades.  There are many causes:  diets low
in calcium or Vitamin D, fright, high nocturnal temperatures, various
toxic substances, annd diseases such as Newcastle's disease.  Experiments
designed to show a toxic effect from eating DDT failed, even though the
experimenters fed their birds (pheasant and quail) from 6,000 to 20,000
times more DDT than the 0.3 ppm residue of DDT found in food.  Quail fed 200
ppm in all their food throughout the reproductive period nevertheless
hatched 80% of their chicks, compared with an 84% hatch in the control
groups.  No shell-thinning was reported.  With pheasants handled in the same
way, the DDT-treated birds hatched 80.6% of their eggs, compared with only
57.4% in the control groups.

DDT rapidly breaks down harmlessly in the natural environment.  But in
1968, when DDT was still in wide use, a residue detected in food was
measurable.  An average daily human intake could reach 0.065mg.  To
study the effect on humans, volunteer groups were fed up to 35mg of DDT per
day for periods of 21 and 27 months, with no ill effects then or in the
nearly 30 years since.  Most of the DDT is excreted, with some small
residue, up to 12 ppm, stored in human fat.  No harm whatsoever has been
detected from these trivial amounts.  In sea water, which ultimately
receives all the runoff from the land, more than 93% of all DDT is broken
down in 38 days, but one part per trillion can be detected in inshore
waters.  Compare this to the irresponsible and unscientific claim by
butterfly specailist and environmental guru Paul Ehrlich who charged
that DDT in sea water would kill all algae (phytoplankton) and thus
deprive the earth of 40% of its oxygen.

Finally, as for DDT being a cancer-causing agent, if one concludes that all
growths, even benign tumors and lumps, are cancer, than the answer must be
yes, but.... The "but" is important.  If one accepts as "cancer" only
malignant growth that can metastisize, than the answer is an unequivocal no.
DDT is not a carcinogen.  Laboratory studies have reported liver deformations
in mice, but not in any other experimental animal (including rats).  This is
the basis for the charge that DDT is "cancer-causing."  The doses, given by
injection, required to cause the deformation of a mouse's liver were about
100,000 times higher than any possible ingestion from DDT residues in food.

The National Cancer Institute reviewed the mouse experiment results and, in
1978, declared DDT was not a carcinogen.  It is also interesting to note that
deaths from liver cancer in the United States actually decreased by 30%
during the years of heaviest DDT use (1944-1972).  Moreover, millions of
people were exposed to DDT during the malarial spraying programs, and those
who did the spraying, 130,000 men, were exposed to high concentrations with
no ill effects.

These data and much more were presented at the 1971 hearing and the
recommendation, after considering 300 techincal documents and the testimony
of 150 scientists, was that a total ban on DDT was not desirable, based
on the scientific evidence.  The hearing examiner declared in his final
decision: "There is a present need for the continued use of DDT for the
essential uses defined in this case."

That was in April 1972.  Nevertheless, two months later, on June 14, 1972,
William Ruckelshaus, EPA administrator, banned all uses of DDT unless an
essential public purpose could be proved.  Why did he do it?  Two years
earlier, Ruckelshaus had stated his support of DDT, citing its "amazing
and exemplary record of safe use."  Was he trying to curry favour with
the environmental activist organizations?  (When he left the EPA, he signed
membership solicitation letters for the Environmental Defense Fund, the
organization that led the fight against DDT.)  Or was he trying to demonstrate
muscle and establish the power of the EPA?

Years later, Ruckelshaus admitted that "decisions by the government involving
the use of toxic substances are political... [and] the ultimate judgement
remains political ....  [In] the case of pesticides, the power to make this
judgement has been delegated to the Administrator of EPA.  [Source given as:
Whelan, Elizabeth, 1985, Toxic Terror, Jameson Books, Inc. 722 Columbus
Street, Ottawa, IL 61350]

The banning of DDT could not be justified on scientific grounds -- regulation
yes, control yes, but a total ban, no.  Had Ruckelshaus taken that position,
instead of prohibition, back in 1972, we would still have the benefits of
this imporant chemical today.  The most important fallout from the
Ruckelshaus decision on DDT was that it gave credibility to pseudoscience,
it created an atmosphere in which scientific evidence can be pushed aside
by emotion, hysteria, and political pressure.  It has done inestimable damage.
The technique of making unsubstantiated charges, endlessly repeated, has since
been used successfully against asbestos, PCBs, dioxin, and, of course, Alar...
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