Saving Children with DDT

An op-ed piece by Donald Roberts, a professor of Tropical Public Health, in the NY Times today, on rethinking DDT:

DDT, the miracle insecticide turned environmental bogeyman, is once again playing an important role in public health. In the malaria-plagued regions of Africa, where mosquitoes are becoming resistant to other chemicals, DDT is now being used as an indoor repellent. Research that I and my colleagues recently conducted shows that DDT is the most effective pesticide for spraying on walls, because it can keep mosquitoes from even entering the room.

The news may seem surprising, as some mosquitoes worldwide are already resistant to DDT. But we've learned that even mosquitoes that have developed an immunity to being directly poisoned by DDT are still repelled by it.

Malaria accounts for nearly 90 percent of all deaths from vector-borne disease globally. And it is surging in Africa, surpassing AIDS as the biggest killer of African children under age 5.

Background study here, via Africa Fighting Malaria.

And DDT costs pennies to save lives.

I recall attending a seminar on public health challenges in the developing world at my Harvard 25th reunion in the summer of 2001. Most of the talk then was about AIDs drugs, about the risk of a global pandemic, and the enormous costs involved. But one member of the audience stood up, an alum from an Asian country, and asked us not to forget the importance of basic health measures in developing countries-- such as drilling a well for clean water. Killing or repelling disease-bearing insects would be another.