U$ ecology dramatically altered by fertilizers and acid rain...

One of the big problems with the government in the US and I would suspect in other countries as well, is that we have law makers setting the policy. What this means is that someone with an ear to the political leaders says, "Look this study and that study suggest that this is a safe tolerance rate." Then they listen to industry, who says, "Ah, if we are forced do that it will bankrupt us and you don't have sufficient proof that this is even so." Then the political leaders come up with a ruling on what they think will do.

Now industry would rather not sink money into making a preventive if they don't have to. No money in it for them unless it is fending off law suits and fines from enforcing bodies like EPA. So naturally they are alarmist if it comes to changing anything. So you wind up with this hodgepodge of ruling that doesn't seem to make sense. In otherwords the vocal few always have more effect than the silent majority. Those that are vocal are usually the activist involved in getting their agenda addressed, such as the removal of ddt from the world markets. Many times it is later found that the fear was not justified. Welcome to the new friendly enviromental economy...
 
Edufer, why so derisive? What do you expect from Justagirl? You asked for reliable sources and she came up with a chemistry prof at Duke University. Presumably that professor agrees with the information on his web site. Want to argue with the information on that site? Fine. Take it up with the prof.

This hamster also made a cursory survey of that site in order to detect any obvious bias. Seemed to be an honest attempt to provide accessible information to lay persons. Yes, it was presented in a simplistic manner. That does imply certain complexities are glossed over.

You made a major issue of the author describing DDT as “water insoluble”. Right before the section you quoted, the author said, “DDT's long life is due to its low solubility in water and it's relatively high solubility in fats.” As your quote shows the author then simplified by referring to DDT as water insoluble and fat soluble, presumably to explain the danger of DDT accumulation in fat tissue and the persistence of DDT in the environment since it is not easily washed away by water. (This hamster did further online search to determine that DDT does have very low solubility in water. Whether you personally take it in water or not.) The author’s simplification when later referring to DDT as water insoluble does not seem unreasonable. Only by interpreting the author’s statement to mean that absolutely no DDT will dissolve in water do the “contradictions” you criticize arise. As the author’s first statement referred to low solubility, total insolubility was not implied. (This seemed clear from this hamster’s reading of the presentation.)

This hamster has also came across references to other species being sensitive to DDT (geckos, cats, bats, and crustaceans, e.g.). The issues don’t seem quite as clear as you have presented.

You may or may not be correct about the safety of DDT. (You make an interesting case.) You do seem correct that banning DDT has led to a resurgence of Malaria. In this hamster’s opinion you go overboard in your zeal and that hurts your credibility.

(Hopefully you recognize your statements regarding DDT helping your cancer are non-scientific.)
 
The discussion on DDT is a long ways from over. Saying eating veggies full of DDT is healthy because of VIT's A and B is not the end as I can say that eating a veggie without DDT is healthier. YOu have thrown a lot of facts on the screen and think I am going to change my opinion because you laid out your credentials. I don't think that way as now I am going to see how many of those facts I can get my hands on. It will go slow as I am in a little town but you can rest assured I will find what I can. But knowledge is like a set of encyclopedias and what we know today will be history in a few years and you are quoting facts from many years ago. As we learn something about "A" it can change what we thought we knew about C, H, G, L. I find it very interesting all of your facts are "old". You can jump up and down all you want but any encyclopedia written in the 60s is full of facts and theory we have proved were not accurate. That is how knowledge evolves and 500 years from now people will look at our set of encyclopedias(2002) and laugh at us for many of our so called facts that have been proven wrong. I even found it interesting you say the discusion is over after agreeing to give me the case studies that proved your case the best so I could go do a search at the libray. I was prepared to learn your side of the story and now you want to change the subject and say DDT is over. The debate on DDT is still an active debate among the world and you didn't end it here or the world. I can't end it either but a real search of the truth means I should look at facts discovered in 2002 more than I should the 1960's and 70's. Your search for the truth seems to be over as you still can't quote a source that is current.
 
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quote

In order to investigate its effects on humans, groups of volunteers were fed daily DDT doses of 35 mg, during periods of 21 to 27 months, whitout observing deleterous or harmful effects, either then and after more than 30 years (Hayes, Wayland J., 1956, "Effects of Known Repeated Oral Doses of DDT in Man", Journal of the American Medical Association, Vol. 162, pp. 890-897).
--------------------------------------------------------------
Now this study should be able to teach us a lot. But in this simple statement they don't say how those humans died . How old they were???A true result would be to show the cause of death of each and every one of them. This is the study I am going to look for and see if the followup studies revealed anything new. How did they die???It diesn't show the cause of death of any of them in that statement,.
 
Its unqualified success came at a price, however, as Rachel Carson chillingly documented in Silent Spring, her 1962 landmark book. Biologists linked DDT's increasingly indiscriminate use to the disappearance of songbirds and raptors. By then, the chemical had permeated the bodies of fish, livestock, and house pets. Health officials indicted the pesticide for causing cancers in people who had applied it recklessly-----
-----------------------------------
Then there is studies like this one that dispute the facts of the one listed above. I will look for this one as well as it claims DDT wiped out two species of life and did cause cancer.
 
Sept 7, 1999


WWF Study Finds Effective Anti-Malarial Alternatives to DDT
Geneva, Switzerland -- A report released today in Geneva by WWF, the conservation organization, demonstrates that a variety of innovative mechanisms can control malaria and other diseases just as effectively as the notoriously dangerous pesticide DDT. These alternatives would be less harmful to the environment and human health, and just as cheap.


Is this true??
Detailed case studies focused in six areas - Africa (Botswana and Western Africa), India, the Philippines, South America and Mexico - focused on variety of alternative techniques. These are pesticide-impregnated bednets (which reduce the need for indoor spraying); odor-baited cloth targets to attract and destroy disease-carrying insects; lower-risk pesticides used in rotation to avoid the development of resistance; and widespread elimination of mosquito breeding grounds and introduction of natural predators and sterile insects.

The results confirmed that 34 million people in West Africa were protected from river blindness and 700,000 Indians from malaria. There was a 50 percent reduction of malaria in certain Tanzanian villages, and a 50 percent reduction in malaria cases in the Philippines with 40 percent less expenditure.

WWF's New Issue Brief:

Download WWF's new Issue Brief, Successful, Safe, and Sustainable Alternatives to Persistent Organic Pollutants in PDF format.


"If DDT were the only tool to fight malaria, we would not even consider advocating its phase-out," said Clifton Curtis, Director of WWF's Global Toxics Initiative. "However, as these case studies show, people around the world are using innovative methods to fight tropical diseases that do not rely on a pesticide so dangerous it has been banned in most countries."

WWF is pushing for a phase-out of DDT, helped by strong commitments from Western countries of financial and technical assistance to developing countries if they stop relying on DDT. "Helping the developing world achieve their goals of turning away from familiar but dangerous chemicals like DDT is the moral and ethical responsibility of the developed world," said Dr. Richard Liroff, WWF's Malaria Policy Expert. "WWF will be a strong voice in the global POPs treaty negotiations advocating such assistance."

DDT has long been banned in most of the world. It can travel long distances in air and water, and builds up in the fatty tissues of living things. Studies associate it with disrupted hormone systems, and impaired nervous, immune and reproductive functions. In some wildlife species, exposure to DDT and its breakdown products has resulted in population instability or near-extinction.

I wish he would have said what studies??Do you know???

However, due to its ease of use and relatively low cost, DDT is still widely used in developing countries to fight malaria, a deadly disease that kills four children every minute. Public health practitioners are understandably reluctant to stop its use.

DDT is not the only deadly chemical that can be replaced by innovative alternatives. A new issue brief from WWF examines alternatives to all 12 chemicals targeted by the international POPs treaty. PCBs, dioxins, furans, DDT, hexachlorobenzene and others. It discusses techniques such as crop rotations, pest barriers and insect traps, introduction of natural predators and pathogens, release of sterilized pests, pheromones, impregnated bednets and medical treatment.

CONTACT:

Clifton Curtis, tel.: +41 22 909 3909 (Hotel Mon-Repos);

Lee Poston, tel.: + 41 79 221 7834 (mobile) or +41 22 909 3909 (Hotel Mon-Repos);

Olivier van Bogaert, tel.: +41 22 364 9554
 
SYMPTOMATOLOGY ( ... 2-3 HR AFTER INGESTION): 1. VERY LARGE DOSES ARE FOLLOWED PROMPTLY BY VOMITING, DUE TO LOCAL GASTRIC IRRITATION. DELAYED EMESIS &/OR DIARRHEA MAY OCCUR (THE MECHANISM IS NOT UNDERSTOOD). 2. NUMBNESS & PARESTHESIAS USUALLY 1ST OF LIPS, TONGUE, & FACE. 3. MALAISE, HEADACHE, SORE THROAT, FATIGUE, WEAKNESS. 4. COARSE TREMORS (USUALLY 1ST OF NECK & HEAD & PARTICULARLY OF EYELIDS), APPREHENSION, ATAXIA, & CONFUSION. 5. CONVULSIONS BOTH CLONIC AND TONIC ... MAY ALTERNATE WITH PERIODS OF COMA & PARESIS. 6. IN ABSENCE OF CONVULSIONS, VITAL SIGNS ARE ESSENTIALLY NORMAL, BUT IN SEVERE POISONINGS THE PULSE MAY BE IRREGULAR AND BE ABNORMALLY SLOW. WHETHER DDT, THE SOLVENT, OR THE CONVULSIONS ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR OCCASIONAL DISORDERS IN THE CARDIAC MECHANISM IS NOT CLEAR. ... IF PULMONARY EDEMA SUPERVENES, IT IS PROBABLY AN EXPRESSION OF SOLVENT INTOXICATION ... 9. DEATH IS USUALLY DUE TO RESP FAILURE FROM MEDULLARY PARALYSIS. 10. IN ACUTE EXPOSURES, RECOVERY IS USUALLY COMPLETE WITHIN 1-3 DAYS, BUT SOMETIMES WEAKNESS OR PARALYSIS & ATAXIA MAY PERSIST FOR WEEKS.
[Gosselin, R.E., R.P. Smith, H.C. Hodge. Clinical Toxicology of Commercial Products. 5th ed. Baltimore: Williams and Wilkins, 1984.,p. III-136]**PEER REVIEWED**
 
EARLIEST SYMPTOMS OF /ACUTE/ POISONING BY DDT IS PARESTHESIA OF MOUTH & LOWER PART OF FACE. THIS IS FOLLOWED BY PARESTHESIA OF SAME AREA & OF TONGUE & THEN BY DIZZINESS (AN OBJECTIVE DISTURBANCE OF EQUILIBRIUM) PARESTHESIA & TREMOR OF EXTREMITIES, CONFUSION, MALAISE, HEADACHE, FATIGUE, & DELAYED VOMITING. VOMITING IS PROBABLY OF CENTRAL ORIGIN & NOT DUE TO LOCAL IRRITATION. CONVULSIONS OCCUR ONLY IN SEVERE POISONING. ONSET MAY BE AS SOON AS 30 MINUTES AFTER INGESTION OF LARGE DOSE OR AS LATE AS 6 HR AFTER SMALLER BUT STILL TOXIC DOSES. RECOVERY FROM MILD POISONING USUALLY IS ESSENTIALLY COMPLETE IN 24 HR, BUT RECOVERY FROM SEVERE POISONING REQUIRES SEVERAL DAYS.
[Hayes, Wayland J., Jr. Pesticides Studied in Man. Baltimore/London: Williams and Wilkins, 1982. 198]**PEER REVIEWED**
this one is real interesting as he disputes his own study

In order to investigate its effects on humans, groups of volunteers were fed daily DDT doses of 35 mg, during periods of 21 to 27 months, whitout observing deleterous or harmful effects, either then and after more than 30 years (Hayes, Wayland J., 1956, "Effects of Known Repeated Oral Doses of DDT in Man", Journal of the American Medical Association, Vol. 162, pp. 890-897


-------------------------------------------------------
INVOLVEMENT OF LIVER HAS BEEN MENTIONED IN ONLY SMALL PORTION OF CASES OF ACCIDENTAL POISONING BY DDT. IN 3 MEN WHO ATE PANCAKES /WHICH HAD BEEN CONTAMINATED/ WITH DDT ... /THAT RESULTED IN THE INGESTION OF 5,000 TO 6,000 MG DDT/, SLIGHT JAUNDICE APPEARED AFTER 4 TO 5 DAYS & LASTED 3 TO 4 DAYS. ... DEATH HAS BEEN CAUSED ... BY INGESTION OF SOLN OF DDT, BUT IN MOST OF THESE INSTANCES SIGNS & SYMPTOMS WERE PREDOMINANTLY OR EXCLUSIVELY THOSE OF POISONING BY SOLVENT. THIS DOES NOT MEAN THAT THE TOXICITY OF THE SOLVENT PREDOMINATES. WHAT ... IS KNOWN ABOUT EFFECT OF DDT ON HUMAN HEART FAILS TO SHOW WHETHER CARDIAC ARRHYTHMIA MIGHT BE POSSIBLE CAUSE OF DEATH IN ACUTE POISONING AS IS TRUE IN SOME SPECIES OF LAB ANIMALS. PALPITATIONS, TACHYCARDIA, & "IRREGULAR HEART ACTION" HAVE BEEN NOTED IN SOME BUT NOT ALL CASES OF ACUTE POISONING.
[Hayes, Wayland J., Jr. Pesticides Studied in Man. Baltimore/London: Williams and Wilkins, 1982. 198]**PEER REVIEWED**


disputing his own study again.
 
A 13-yr-old Mexican was admitted to hospital with anemia, bleeding, high fever, & unconsciousness. His home had been sprayed with dicophane every other day for 4 months preceding admission & repeatedly for the past 2 years. Laboratory investigation showed low hemoglobin, low reticulocytes, low white cell count, & diminished platelets. He started to recover after transfusions of packed red blood cells, & prednisone & tetracycline. But spraying of the hospital room with a 10% solution of dicophane provoked an allergic reaction; he slowly ... /became more ill/ & died about 30 hours later. Post-mortem examination showed hypocellularity of the bone marrow & massive bleeding in the lung.
[Reynolds, J.E.F., Prasad, A.B. (eds.) Martindale-The Extra Pharmacopoeia. 28th ed. London: The Pharmaceutical Press, 1982. 835]**PEER REVIEWED**
 
Originally posted by Edufer
*Banshee, your claim that GN corn has made virtually impossible growing old strains of corn without specialized techniques*

You think so? I got that information from someone who is working in a lab where they examine genetically modified food. All kinds! Not only corn. I can't find her name back now. I will do a search for this and get back to you with the information.

Because Justagirl has made very clear what a garbage DDT and other pesticides are, I give you something else. Something completely different, as important for the Earrth and human beings as the rest is. Of course you shall argue this. I don't expect anything else. Enjoy...!:(

NASA Listening To Native Elders

The Nome Eskimo elder lamented that nowadays his homeland in winter is too warm for the life system to sustain itself-only 20 degrees below zero instead of 70 below. His people have learned to live in balance with the ice and cold. But now the Bering Strait is sick. Sea ice is forming later, affecting the animals who breed on it. The sea pups aren't ready to leave when the ice melts, so they die or are abandoned. The hunters say the walrus
are skinny, and they have to hunt farther into the tundra because the caribou know the thin ice won't sustain their weight. In the old days, the elders in Alaska could forecast the weather by watching the stars. But now, says one Siberian Yupek elder, "The Earth is so fast now. We can't predict the weather anymore."

Many native prophesies warned of a time when the people would be confused, and the old and the young would die first. The prophesies said the trees would die from the tops down and the world would be in danger.

Using "eyes" from space, NASA officials have seen that the elders are right. Its officials conclude that the "Earth is a living system that is distressed." So now, NASA has turned to native elders for counsel as it examines the effect of climate change on the U.S. population, environment and economy. NASA brought together a gathering of several hundred elders for a five-day climate-change workshop in Albuquerque, N.M., last fall. NASA is seeking to merge the knowing and wisdom of people who understand the
responsibilities that humans have to the Earth with the knowledge of non-native scientists.

The elders who attended the conference, called the Circle of Wisdom Native Peoples/Native Homelands Climate Change Workshop, stated: "It is this spiritual connection to Mother Earth, Father Sky and all Creation that is lacking in the rest of the world. . . . We call upon the people of the world to hold your leaders accountable."

According to documents issued by the workshop, temperatures will become warmer in the Northern Hemisphere by 5 to 15 degrees Fahrenheit within the next 20 years. The primary source of human-induced climate change is the burning of oil, gas and coal. The melting of sea ice "affects the exchange of energy continuously taking place on the Earth's surface," according to
NASA. While it might seem a distant problem to many people in the United States, all life is interconnected.

We have long said that native prophesies are misunderstood. They not only are spiritual visions, but often also come from a life-science observation of the natural world. When people understand that they are not separate from the natural world, they will seek to honor and understand it.
This is why Chief Joseph said long ago that the Earth was part of his body and they were of one "mind."

Native people traditionally have understood that the Earth and universe have a mind and a spirit, a cosmic intelligence that responds to us, to our intentions. "Earth is a living mother, an organism. I know none of us would think of abusing our birth mother. She is a spiritual woman . . . that gives life. Through our ceremonies, we honor her life-giving power so that she can
continue to nourish us," says Cheyenne elder Henrietta Mann.

When people no longer live and learn from the land, their disconnection to it leads to the abuse of Mother Earth. Along with the land, native people's traditions die: their food, their ceremonies, medicinal plants, their fibers for making sacred baskets. And much of it has been through the greed of market economies and the perversions of science and technology that
have claimed or contaminated the land, particularly native lands, through deforestation, pesticides, industrial waste, radioactive poisoning and mining. "What good is an economic system if our children die anyway?" asked a Kanaka Maoli elder from Hawaii. A nearby flip-chart read, "There is no post-environment economy."

There are myriad things to be done, including requiring companies to factor the environmental impact of their projects into their businesses, and demanding that all public projects invest in clean and renewable forms of energy. But most of all, we must begin to value life in all its manifestations.

Corbin Harney, a Shoshone elder, says the spirits of the land and the ancestors are waiting for people to recognize their responsibility to Mother Earth. "They want to hear us pray so that they can work with us, so everything can heal."

Your assistance is needed.

http://www.labyrinthina.com/elders1.htm

As a last remark: This message is also posted in the Parapsychology Forum, in the full version, for those who are interested...
 
So the DDT ban discussion is alive. Good!

<i>Now this study should be able to teach us a lot. But in this simple statement they don't say how those humans died . How old they were???</i>
Click to expand...
The statement you are referring to is from me, not from the study. I must admit that I quoted it without going to my database, (my apologies) so the information I kept there is this:

<i>Tests by Dr. Wayland Hayes for the U.S. Public Service involved feeding human volunteers tremendous quantities of DDT to see if any adverse effects developed. The men ingested up to 35 mg of DDT in their food, <b>every day for 18 months</b>, and had no resultant difficulties either at the time or within the following 6 to 10 years while they remained under observation. (Hayes, Weyland, 1956. <b><i>Effect of Known Repeated Oral Doses of DDT in Man"</b>, Journal of the American medical Association</i>, Vol. 162, pp. 890-897).</i>

I read a comment on that study, saying that the DDT intake was 21 to 27 months, so I quoted that. My database says the duration was 18 months. Even so, 18 months is ample time to show any deleterous effect --especially at the high dose of 35 milligrams (imagine that people were scared when they learned they were intaking 0,065 mg a day), then 35 mg would be a lethal dose. I keep telling you, I am very much alive after 4 years of 25 mg a day.

Quote: <b><I>(Hopefully you recognize your statements regarding DDT helping your cancer are non-scientific.)</i></b>

I did not recognize such a thing. My decision of ingesting DDT for preventing my prostate cancee from making a comeback, was based on the scientific studies I mentioned: (1) Wayland Hayes, (2) Charles Silinskas, (3) Edward R. Laws and Allan E. Okey. And from professor J. Gordon Edwards eating every year a spoonfull of DDT (about 6 grams) before his students at the Opening Class at the Univeristy of California at San Jose. He must be 90 years old by now.

justagirl: <i>Saying eating veggies full of DDT is healthy because of VIT's A and B is not the end as I can say that eating a veggie without DDT is healthier.</I>
Click to expand...
Please show me where I said such a thing. i have never mentioned vitamins or anything of that kind. And your claim is a nice example of twisted logic. I have been insisting on the Golden Axiom of Toxicology: <b>"The Dose Makes the Poison"</b>, but you seem to keep forgetting it. If the "full of DDT" means 200 grams a day, I wouldn't recommend it at all. But if it means 25 mg a day, I strongly recommend it.

And justagirl made a point when she stated: <b>"...and you are quoting facts from many years ago ... I find it very interesting all of your facts are "old" ... Your search for the truth seems to be over as you still can't quote a source that is current.".</b>

Facts remain facts even after a million years have passed. There are "eternal, fixed laws" as Gravity, the laws relating to thermodynamics, chemical and physical laws, etc. If you fed DDT to rats back in 1968, and the rats didn't get cancer when treated with carcinogenics, they will keep doing the same thing today, if you repeat the experiment.

But why the scarcity of "new and updated" studies about the innocuousness of DDT? Money talks here. Those researchs were made at the time when the DDT hysteria was on the rise, but the levels of politics in science was still low. There were money for research then, but now there is not a single scientists that would get money from the government if he tried to investigate if DDT is really dangerous. On the contrary, he will get carloads of money if he tried to prove "definitely" that DDT is the worst poison ever made.

Moreover, why make a research that won't be accepted for publishing in "top level" scientific journals as Science, Nature, the New England Journal of Medicine, etc.? In the lecture given by professor J. Gordon Edwards at Dartmouth College in April 1999 he said this, when talking about the "thinning eggshells" studies by Dr. Bitman, widely accepted as "proof" of the effect of DDT on eggshell thinning:
<blockquote>
"<i>In my testimony before Congress, I presented information and I was highly critical of Bitman's work. The next year, Bitman repeated his experiments, and this time he added the adequate doses of calcium in the diets. The avians fed with DDT and DDD did not produce thin eggshells. The study was presented again to <i>Science</i> magazine for publishing. Unfortunately, the editor of Science always refused to print articles favorable to DDT, so this time he rejected Bitman's article. Instead, the article was published in <i>Poultry Science</i>, and poultry industry and honest scientists applauded when they saw the real results. Of course, circulation of that magazine was not as big as <i>Science's</i> so very few scientists had the opportunity of hearing about the retreat by Bitman of the accusations that DDT and DDE caused thinning in eggshells.

Why did <i>Science</i> rejected such studies? His editor, Philip Abelson, had previously informed Dr. Thomas Jukes that Science would never publish any article that were not contrary to DDT. He even refused to consider for publication a manuscript by the WHO (World Health Organization) favourable to DDT. As a result, articles on DDT were always written by the members of the same brotherhood, and peer-review became a shame. DDT authors were quoting each other and supported each other claims. There wwere not accepted any dissenting views. Without the refuge given by <i>Science</i>, the case of DDT would have been promptly archived!</i>
</blockquote>
But, if you want some "fresh" news about DDT, at the Conference held in South Africa on December 12th, 2000, DDT was removed from the "dirty dozen" (persistent chemicals in the environment) list and it has been approved for use in countries fighting malaria. Even so, the political pressures by US Embassies in those countries will make DDT hard to use. They would lose economic aid by the US. Could we call this blackmail?. It reminds me of Chicago in the 20s...

The DDT myth persists in the news as well as in the scientific literature. On April 21, 1993, Mary G. Wolff and colleagues published a study on DDT residues in blood and breast cancer in the Journal of National Cancer Institute ((Mary S. Wolff et all., 1993, <b<"Blood Levels of Organochlorine Residues and Risk of Breast Cancer"</b>, <i>Jour. Nat. Cancer Inst.</i>, (April 21) Vol. 85, No. 8, pp. 648-652). The findings were seized on by the media, including Associated Press and <i>Time</I> magazine, with headlines <b>"DDT linked to Risk of Breast Cancer"</b>, and <b>"Relentless DDT"</b>. The <i>New Yorker</I>, which had launched <i>Silent Spring"</i> in 1962, exulted on June 6m 1993, that <b>"Rachel Carson Lives"</b>.

One year later, a new study to correct the first was published by N. Krieger and coworkers in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, covering a much larger group of subjects (150 vs. the 58 breast cancer patients in Wolff's report) and drawing on thousands of blood samples collected and frozen during the 1960s, when average DDE levels were four to five times higher. The 1994 report showed <b>no association</b> between serum levels of DDE and the risk of breast cancer.

This disproof of earlier claims did not make the headlines. There were no stories of <b>"DDT Not Linked to Breast Cancer"</b>, or <b>"DDT Relents"</b>. The New Yorker has not said that <b>"Rachel Carson Does Not Longer Lives, After All"</b>. Many activists may be expected to ignore the disproof of the 1993 claims and to link DDT falsely to cancer. The first, desired report is now "locked in" and has become a part of the evaluation of DDT by critics.

The British historian H.R. Trevor-Ropper wrote in 1962:

<blockquote>"<b>Whatever else history may say of Dr. Goebbels, it must credit him with one positive contribution to the science of politics--a terrible but a positive contribution. He created a system of propaganda, ironically styled public enlightment, which persuaded a people to believe that black was white."</b>
</blockquote>
I must add that Goebbels did that advising (ordering) his accomplices to <font color="red"><b>"Lie, lie, and lie! It will there something remain in the people's mind"</b></font>.

Should I mention more studies that would give the same results if they were repeated today? The California Department of Health was concerned about the effects of DDT on reproduction, and Dr. Alice Ottoboni, the department's toxicologist, consequently carried out extensive studies with rats and dogs during the 1960s and 1970. (Alice Ottoboni, 1969 <b>"The Effects of DDT on Reproduction in the Rat</b>", <i> Toxicol. Appl. Pharmacol.</i>, Vol. 14, pp. 79-81). Rats were fed levels of DDT of 0, 20, and 200 ppm in the diet. There was no apparent effect on fecundity of dams or viability of the young. The females receiving 20 ppm DDT had <b>a significantly longer average reproduction life span</b> (14.55 months) than their littermate controls (8.91 months). If you won't let me say that DDT prolonged the life span of rats, then you must allow me to say that "the lack of DDT in the diet shortened the life span of rats".

Ottoboni's studies with beagle dogs were through four generations, and 650 pups were born to parents that received 1, 5, and 10 milligrams (mg) of DDT <b>per kg of body weight per day.</b> (Here you may find a dose level that it is harmless: 10 mg DDT per kg of body weight.) There was no effect of DDT on survival, growth, and sex distribution of pups, nor was there any influence on morbidity or mortality or gross or histologic findings in any of the dogs. DDT-treated females had their first estrus cycles two to three months earlier then the control dogs. The highest level of DDT, in contrast to the control or 1 mg groups, was associated with <b>freedom from roundworm infection</b> in the pups.

More recently (1994) Unnur P. Thorgeirsson and coworkers reported (Unnur P. Thorgeirsson et al., <b>"Tumor Incidence in a Chemical Carcinogenesis Study of Non Human Primates"</b>, in the <i>Journal of Regulatory Toxicology and Applied Pharmacology</i>, (April), Vol. 19, No. 2, pp. 130-151), a 32-year study of chemical carcinogenesis using Old World monkeys, who live about 30 years, to test a variety of chemicals, including DDT.

In his DDT study, 25 monkeys were fed 20 mg/kg of DDT by mouth five times per week for 11 years. So far, 10 monkeys have died of various causes, and the other 15, ages 19 to 25, are in good health. The single cancer that occurred in a 20-year-old monkey cannot be attributed to DDT because of the monkey's age, and the fact that these monkeys have a spontaneous cancer rate of 3.2 percent. On the other hand, the common fungal food contaminant, aflatoxin B, and a compound produced in cooked meat, IQ, induced cancers in more than 60 percent of the animals.

These studies shows that DDT is not as dangerous as alleged by the anti-DDT brotherhood, and most of these studies at least suggest that it can a strong cancer preventive. In view of the factual evidence of its lack of carcinogenicity, and the evidence suggesting it could be a highly beneficial cancer preventive, why don't start doing research in this direction? That high can be the prejudice and hysteria against DDT?. I repeat: this is not sound science, it its pure hysteria. Neurosis and paranoia...

But there is the issue of DDT persistance, that you have mentioned as the main reason for its banning in the US. Because this post is too long --and I don't want to bore you with factual information-- I propose to continue on the subject of DDT persistance in the environment in further posts.
 
Huge Doses, Trifle Doses...

SYMPTOMATOLOGY ( ... 2-3 HR AFTER INGESTION): 1. <b>VERY LARGE DOSES</b> ARE FOLLOWED PROMPTLY BY VOMITING... EARLIEST SYMPTOMS OF /<b<ACUTE</b>/ POISONING BY DDT IS PARESTHESIA ... OR AS LATE AS 6 HR AFTER SMALLER BUT STILL <b>TOXIC DOSES</b> ... THAT RESULTED IN THE INGESTION <b>OF 5,000 TO 6,000 MG DDT</b>
Click to expand...
There you go! You keep insisting on <b<VERY LARGE DOSES</b>, that are known to provoke adverse effects, and that applies to ANY KNOWN SUBSTANCE IN THIS PLANET! Do you really understand what means "Large doses", "Acute poisoning" and "toxic doses"?

I beg you to stop doing this and stick to the trifle doses present in the environment!

<i>A 13-yr-old Mexican was admitted to hospital with anemia, bleeding, high fever, & unconsciousness. His home had been sprayed with dicophane every other day for 4 months</i>
Click to expand...
Dicophane is not DDT. Try again.

Please go to: <A HREF="http://www.junkscience.com/ddtfaq.htm#16">DDT: FAQs and FACTS</A>

90 percent of the answers and facts have their proper scientific reference. The page is by Dr. J. Gordon Edwards.
 
Science vs Esoterics

<i>"Edufer: Banshee, your claim that GN corn has made virtually impossible growing old strains of corn without specialized techniques"

Banshe: You think so? I got that information from someone who is working in a lab where they examine genetically modified food. All kinds! Not only corn."</I>
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I think so. In Bolivia you find 26 original strains of corn (not to mention strains of other crops). How many there are in Argentina, Brasil, Peru, Ecuador, Mexico, etc, etc.? Your friend gave you "rotten meat". You gulped it. No wonder, you believe anything written ink on paper.

<i>The Nome Eskimo elder lamented that nowadays his homeland in winter is too warm for the life system to sustain itself-only 20 degrees below zero instead of 70 below.</i>
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Yeap! You believe anyhting. Do you really believe that temperatures in the Artic (or Alaska, Northern Canada, Siberia) had gone from minus 70 degrees Farenheit to minus 20 F.? Take a look at the temperature charts from the Arctic regions (in this page you'll find temperature records from every place in the world):

<A HREF="http://www.john-daly.com/stations/stations.htm">What the Stations Say</A>

That website will make see red! Of course, when you see real science on the screen you get enraged...:D

I'll make it faster for you, and selected the first stations on the long, long list:

<A HREF="http://www.john-daly.com/stations/frobishr.gif">Frobisher Bay, Northern Canada. (Up to 1999)</A>

<A HREF="http://www.john-daly.com/stations/barrow.gif">Barrow station, Alaska. (2000)</A>

<A HREF="http://www.john-daly.com/stations/arctic.gif">Arctic Rim (Four stations: Ostrov Vize, Danmarkshavn, Svalbard and Franz Josef Land, data up to 2000)</A>

Quite curiously, the same NASA you mention is the one that supplied the temperature data taken with their satellites, and used in the "Station" webpage. Now don't tell me they are lying! When they lie? When giving temperature data, or when speaking about eskimo's prophecies?

Please, let's be serious. We are talking about science, not esoteric matters.

Read some remarks on the "global warming" going on (taken from <A HREF="http://www.john-daly.com/">Still Waiting for the Greenhouse!"</A>:

<b>March Cold</b>
(30 Mar 02)

Some reader comments on the weather this March from the western half of North America -

"I thought I'd update you on our winter weather here in the Seattle area. This year, we are definitely having a colder than normal winter, with above average snowpack in the Cascade Mountains. While much of the U.S. has been basking in record warmth this winter, that is certainly not the case here. As for our past few summers, they also have been cool. On average, we have three days per year that reach 90°F in Seattle. We have not had ANY day reach 90°since 1998, so that at minimum, assuming we have a normal summer this year, we still have a four year streak of cooler than normal summers. As I prefer cooler weather, I hope that this is a trend of future things to come."

<b>`Coldest March on record' </b>
<b>CALGARY</b> - It may be the first day of spring, but it's the coldest one many can remember. Alberta is well on its way to setting a weather record. The average temperature so far this month has been close to minus 16 degrees. "The month of March record is minus 13.0," says Brian Steffora, meteorologist with Environment Canada. "That record was set back in 1899, so its quite an old record, 103 years ago. And like I say, we're at minus 15.6; we're about two and a half degrees below that record yet."

"I live and work in Calgary, Alberta and the month of March has been brutally cold."

"I wanted to let you know that the month of March 2002 has seen many record low temperatures set in the western provinces of British Columbia (BC), Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. The cold has lasted longer and was deeper than I have seen in my 30 years in the central part of BC. Many temperatures were in the range of -15°C to -32°C in the interior (continental influence), and Vancouver (west coast) had snow and below freezing temperatures. Highly unusual! We normally refer to the month of March as "break-up", as this is the time of year that the warm weather returns, ice breaks up in the rivers and the ground starts to thaw. Until today, we have been in winter. Today we got to about +8C, which is about normal; spring might finally be close!"

Remeber that I told you that we had in Argentina an exceptionally cool summer? It is still cooler than normal. We made a record of cold temeperatures in Argentina this year. Well, add it up to what's going on in the Northern Hemisphere and prepare for the Global Cooling. :D
 
Edufer, deciding to use DDT as a cancer preventative based on your interpretation of science papers may or may not be rational. (This hamster chooses to use vitamin supplements based on similar extrapolation from science papers.) Claiming that DDT has kept your cancer from re-occurring is not science. Likewise your ingesting DDT over several years is not scientific evidence that DDT is “safe” for the environment or for the general populace.

Mixing scientific claims with non-scientific claims lowers credibility.

You mentioned several species that don’t seem harmed by modest doses of DDT (this hamster tends to agree humans don’t appear to be harmed) but there do seem to be species that are vulnerable as mentioned in a prior post. Focusing on animal species that aren’t affected while ignoring those that are does not seem reasonable. Possibly if the risks are understood methods to mitigate the worst damage would be possible and that might shift the risk/benefit equation in favor of DDT.

In this hamster’s opinion it is unfortunate that science does not set environmental policy. While this hamster is not convinced DDT is safe for the environment, this hamster does agree with Edufer that the political climate would not support DDT usage in the US even if DDT were completely safe.

This hamster is aware of several cases in which policy was set before good science was available. Once policy becomes entrenched, better science is often not sufficient to change policy.
 
Science or knowledge?

<i>ImaHamster2: Claiming that DDT has kept your cancer from re-occurring is not science.</I>
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Hamster, you are a cool cat ...oops!, I mean, a cool hamster. I appreciate your posts because they show a lot of common sense, one of senses man is losing. About "claiming that DDt kept me safe from re-occurring is not science", I would like to elaborate of that.

The word science comes from Latin: "scientia". A synonym is "notitia" (noticia in Spanish, news in English), and also "cognitio" --- "knowledge" (you might find it familiar because the English word "recongnition"). In Greece, science and knowledge were the same thing. We use the term "science" in a different way, having a more "technical" meaning, that is, not simple knowledge of common things, but the understanding of higher and specialized matters, as maths, medicine, astronomy, etc. Words are like coins, they lose their value (or meaning) with time. The words Democracy, Freedom, Justice, etc, have quite a different meaning todat than say 100, or 500 or 2,000 years ago.

So I received a piece of information on DDT (scientific information, peer-reviewd, for that matter) thta became "knowledge", acquired knowldege, acquired science. Based on that "science" I made a rational decision of ingesting DDT. You have made the same decision when accepting to be injected with penicilin, or subjecting yourself to surgery, or jumping aboard a brand new car. In all those decisions there were some degree of risk involved (when Pasteur tried his rabbies vaccine on a little boy was running a risk, that luckily turned out to be a fortunate decision). Would you say that he use of that vaccine was not based on science, or was unreasonable?

After four years of ingesting such a high dose of DDT (25 mg a day) and seeing there has been not any harmful effects on me, and that the prostate antigen went down from 2 to 0.1, I had collected information (or knowledge) enough to make me claim: (1) DDT is not harmful for humans --at least at 25 mg a day, (2) DDT <b>seems</b> to be the primary agent in my diet and drug regular intake, that has kept cancer from re-ocurring (or perhaps, developing in other organs). I emphasize the word "seems", because my epidemiological study is a "one-man case", and many more patients are needed in order for such a study to be of medical or "scientific" significance.

So, that's all. It served for me. It may be useful for other people. That's why I insist on my question: Why hasn't this line of research kept going? Lack of interest? Don´t think so. Lack of funds and grants? Most probably. Why all those charitable foundations fighting against leukemia and cancer are leaving aside a promising subject as this? Are they informed? If they are, why then don't do something about it?
 
Animal sensitivity to chemicals

<i>Focusing on animal species that aren’t affected while ignoring those that are does not seem reasonable.</i>
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Here we come again to the subject of dose levels. All experiments made on animals (with any substance) for carcinogenesis, are performed by giving the poor critters huge amounts of the suspected chemical. As Bruce has demonstrated, this kind of experiment will always develop what is known as "mitogenesis", a wild an uncontrolled division of the cells, something known as "tumoral cancer". Current lab tests ordered by the EPA or the FDA are based on this weird approach, and they completely ignore the "threshold" level of substances. Drugs given below the htreshold levels are harmless, while going over that level become toxic. When scientists find that "safe" level", they apply a "precautionary" measure and set the threshold level 100 times below of what found as "safe level". But environmental extremists have been battling for pusihing those levels to unbelievable stupid dimensions. They want 10,000 or 100,000 times lower levels than the known "safe" level. And this leads to unbelievable high costs for anything that is manufactured in the world.

Both print and electronic mass media have confused "safe" with "risk free". This confusion is prepetuated in the public and there is a constituency (in fact an industry) that benefits from the retention or enhancements of such confusion. In a celebrated 1980 case, the Supreme Court of the US defined unsafe as a condition that posses "a significant risk of harm". This is different from saying that safe means zero risk. In fact, the concepto of zero risk defies the rule of probability.

I will give some figures taken from a table in a report by the federal Council on Environmental Quality, It shows ths cost in dollars "per premature death averted" for various governmental regulations designed to protect public safety and health in regard to different risks. The number of premature deaths is calculated for regulatory actions intended by the government to reduce the probability of lost lives for the regulated item.

It is important to note in the table that the items related to radiation, radioactive materials, chemical including asbestos, and similar environmental risks are usually calculated in the upper boundary (the upper 95 percentile) of the cost per premature death averted. The median or "average" values, are often one to several orders of magnitude lower than these upper bound values. Other risks are calculated at "average" values, while the actual values are likely to be much higher. For example, the cost of the hazardous waste disposal ban, which is shown as $4.19 billion (using average values) is likely to be in the range of $20 billion to $80 billion. Even more astonishing is the median cost of putting wood preservation chemicals on the hazardous waste list: $5.7 trillion per premature death averted.

<CENTER><B>THE COST OF SELECTED SAFETY REGULATIONS (1967-1991)</B>
(in millions of dollars)</center>

<b>Regulation ----------------------------- Year issued -- Cost per premature death averted</b>
<HL width=250 height=2>
Unvented Space Heater Ban: ----------------- 1985 ------------------$ 0,10
Aircraft Cabin Fire Protection Std. ------------ 1985 ----------------- $ 0.10
Trihalomethane Brinking Water Std. ---------- 1979 ---------------- $ 0.20
Auto Fuel-System Integrity Std. ---------------- 1975 ---------------- $ 0.40
Children's Sleepware Flammability Std. ------ 1973 ---------------- $ 0.80
Electrical Equipment Stds. (metal mines) --- 1970 ---------------- $ 1.40
Arsenic Emission Stds. (glass plants) --------- 1986 --------------- $ 13.50
Benzene NESHAP (transportation) ------------- 1990 -------------- $ 33.00
Asbestos ban ----------------------------------------- 1989 -------------- $ 111.00
1,2.dichloropropane Drinking Water Std. ------ 1991 -------------- $ 653.00
Hazardous Waste Land Disposal Ban ---------- 1988 -------------- $ 4,190.00
Municipal solid Waste Landfill Std. --------------- 1988 -------------- $ 19,107.00
Formaldehyde Occupational Exposure Limit --- 1987 ------------- $ 86,202.00
Atrazine/Alachlor Drinking Water Std. ------------ 1991 ------------- $ 92,070.00
Hazardous Waste List-Wood Preservation ------ 1990 ------------- $ 5,700,000.00

Remeber: these are <B>MILLIONS OF DOLLARS</B>

Regulators usuallyx consider only two factors: risk and the technology available to reduce it. Typical regulations require the use of best available technology to mitigate risk. Since risk is never zero, and "even one health effect is one too many ", regulations become tighter as soon as a new technology becomres available. What's wrong with that, you might ask?

The problem is nobody asks where it makes the most sense, nationally, to invest the government's or industry's resources to get the greatest reduction in risk. Sssssome industries spend large amount of money to reduce risks that many factors of 10 lower than the risks that are routinely tolerated in other, similar enterprises (for example, nuclear and nonnuclear transportation).

The solution for these astronomical costs would be to establish a more uniformily high economic value for risk reduction --so many dollars to avoid a potential health effect. In other words, setting a range of dollars costs per premature death averted above which and below which no regulation on risk would go. This would give some flexibility but have an upper bound. This may sound cold--but it will save more lives and illness per dollar spent. Such policy would would also redirect some budget dollars now being spent to ameliorate inconsequential environmental risks into programs that can deal with major societal risks.

For example, expenditures of a few million dollars in metropolitan areas to support security and police forces would surely save more lives at less cost than many of the costly regulations in the table. But this would imply that there are politicians and bureaucrats that can actually use their brains. Hopeless cause.

And seen the matter from a quite cynical point of view, seeing the huge amount of deaths produced by crime and drug dealing, pedestrian and home accidents, why spend billions of dollars in trying to avert a hypotetical death from highly exaggerated risks? That person would be free of the asbestos risk, for example, but it will surely be killed by a heroine overdose, or a burglar, or slippng over a banana peel. Those billions of dollars saved could be invested in health care programs, medical research, education programs, etc. Lowering the costs of regulatory enforcement, would make goods cheaper, the commercial activity would increase, the industry would become larger (more employement), and the living standard would increase. Higher living standars means less crime, more security, better lifes for everybody. So, my cynical point of view is not that cynical.
 
Edufer, your post shows you understand the difference between scientific studies showing efficacy of a treatment and anecdotal accounts of personal cures. Stories of cancer and AIDS cures are particularly pernicious in that there may be no medical treatment and desperate people may grasp at any hope.

This hamster does find your report of the lack of cancer in DDT handling Monsanto employees interesting. However this hamster is skeptical of conspiracy theories in science and medicine. In the case of cancer there are plenty of people willing to ingest poison if it might cure their disease. This hamster guesses this issue has been looked at and discounted. If not, good luck in pushing for research.

“All experiments made on animals (with any substance) for carcinogenesis, are performed by giving the poor critters huge amounts of the suspected chemical.”

This statement is misleading. The issue is not just carcinogens. In a quick search this hamster came across references to geckos, cats, bats, crustaceans, and fish dying due to DDT in the environment. (Humans, rats, quail, and pheasants were pretty much immune.) The statement is also incorrect in that other methods to detect carcinogens exist and are used. This hamster would agree that the Ames test is often used (and misused) to detect potential carcinogens.

This hamster agrees that pushing allowed contaminants to absurdly low levels is poor environmental policy. That does not mean that all low levels are absurd. Requires case-by-case analysis. In the US contentious environmental climate this process may fail. While this hamster is skeptical about the magnitude of the cost estimates you provided (Industry tends to spin the numbers to favor its view.) this hamster largely agrees that much environmental policy is irrational.

(Irrational response to risk is a worth a thread of its own.)
 
justagirl: Saying eating veggies full of DDT is healthy because of VIT's A and B is not the end as I can say that eating a veggie without DDT is healthier.
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Please show me where I said such a thing
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As a matter of fact I do eat legumes and vegetables sprayed with pesticides, because they are more healthy than "organic" ones. Don´t take my word for it; listen to what Dr. Bruce Ames has been telling the world about the toxicity of pesticides since the 1970s. There are lots of information on Bruce Ames --just search the internet under "Bruce Ames" and you'll be overwhelmed with information
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That's where you said it and I did read Bruce Ames theory and made a entry on it. His basic theory is the banning of DDT wil increase the cost of veggies and people will eat less of fresh veggies because of the cost and that veggies provide vits that can prevent cancer.(I think we all agree vits can prevent cancer)


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Facts remain facts even after a million years have passed. There are "eternal, fixed laws" as Gravity, the laws relating to thermodynamics, chemical and physical laws, etc.
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When someone starts a theory and later we learn something that goes against that theroy it doesn't prove his theory was wrong as we just correct the theory to show the new knowledge. I will take Gravity as NASA is conducting research on it trying to learn more. AS mush as our world likes to think our theorys are correct , future generations will find flaws in it and correct it, and history proves it.
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SYMPTOMATOLOGY ( ... 2-3 HR AFTER INGESTION): 1. VERY LARGE DOSES ARE FOLLOWED PROMPTLY BY VOMITING... EARLIEST SYMPTOMS OF // POISONING BY DDT IS PARESTHESIA ... OR AS LATE AS 6 HR AFTER SMALLER BUT STILL TOXIC DOSES ... THAT RESULTED IN THE INGESTION OF 5,000 TO 6,000 MG DDT
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There you go! You keep insisting on , that are known to provoke adverse effects, and that applies to ANY KNOWN SUBSTANCE IN THIS PLANET! Do you really understand what means "Large doses", "Acute poisoning" and "toxic doses"?
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I introduced that statement because you had said this

quote
"In order to investigate its effects on humans, groups of volunteers were fed daily DDT doses of 35 mg, during periods of 21 to 27 months, whitout observing deleterous or harmful effects, either then and after more than 30 years (Hayes, Wayland J., 1956, "Effects of Known Repeated Oral Doses of DDT in Man", Journal of the American Medical Association, Vol. 162, pp. 890-897
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I found many examples of Wayland Hayes showing harmful effects to humans. In the statement above he also said this "OR AS LATE AS 6 HR AFTER SMALLER BUT STILL TOXIC DOSES ."
 
... SINGLE DOSE ... OF 10 MG/KG PRODUCES ILLNESS IN SOME BUT NOT ALL SUBJECTS EVEN THOUGH NO VOMITING OCCURS. ... CONVULSIONS HAVE OCCURRED ... WHEN DOSAGE LEVEL WAS 16 MG/KG OR GREATER ... LARGE DOSES LEAD TO PROMPT VOMITING, SO AMT ACTUALLY RETAINED CANNOT BE DETERMINED ACCURATELY. IN ACUTE POISONING SLIGHT DECR IN HEMOGLOBIN & MODERATE LEUKOCYTOSIS WITHOUT ANY CONSTANT DEVIATION IN DIFFERENTIAL WHITE COUNT HAVE BEEN OBSERVED IN VOLUNTEERS. THESE FINDINGS ARE CONSIDERED SECONDARY TO NEUROLOGICAL EFFECTS.
[Hayes, Wayland J., Jr. Pesticides Studied in Man. Baltimore/London: Williams and Wilkins, 1982. 195]**PEER REVIEWED**


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Here is some more by Wayland Hayes and personally I don't find it ok to make the population sick. It can and does have harmfull effects and for about the 4th time I remind you, as long as you debate it is unharmful, I will post more more evidence showing it can be harnful, The debate is at what level and not if is harmful.

THe very nature of it proves it is harmful as countries wanting to use it want to use it to kill insects.


Here is what you said he said
In order to investigate its effects on humans, groups of volunteers were fed daily DDT doses of 35 mg, during periods of 21 to 27 months, whitout observing deleterous or harmful effects, either then and after more than 30 years (Hayes, Wayland J., 1956, "Effects of Known Repeated Oral Doses of DDT in Man", Journal of the American Medical Association, Vol. 162, pp. 890-897).
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He clearly shows doses of less than 35mg makes humans sick and That is considered harmful by many of us. How many more of your facts an I going to find like this???
 
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I would ask you to stop with your facts Edufer. I am getting sick from it. We all know by now that DDT indeed is harmful and that humans get the poison in their bodies without even knowing it. Your statistics and facts have been enough.

Get over it, and admit Justagirl has points here. With the necessarry 'evidence' you want so badly. I don't discuss DDT any more. It's a subject that made me angry and protesting everywhere, some years ago. I am really not in the mood to start all over again.

Justagirl is right! DDT has done much more harm to human and animal life, not to speak about the rest of nature, then is admitted by the so called governments...

(end of message)
 
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