DDT and Malaria

“DDT Research is “Biased and Erroneous” If You’re Gonna Screw Up, You Might As Well Do It Really Well,” by American Council on Science and Health.
Screen Shot 2014-05-09 at 1.58.22 PMIf there is a more obvious case of bad science, and its impact on human health, we’d like to see it. Because it turns out that DDT, the evil chemical blamed by Rachel Carson in her 1962 book Silent Spring for thinning of bird eggs, does no such thing. And the consequences of this “error” are tragic—one million deaths per year, mostly in Africa. This abomination was not helped by the publication of a 2013 paper by Hindrik Bouwman and colleagues in which they once again claimed that DDT causes thinning egg shells. Unfortunately for Bouwman, people were paying attention, and the folly of his study—perhaps intentional— was so thoroughly exposed that we wouldn’t be surprised to find him hiding under a bed in Africa. With mosquito netting, of course. Read more.