THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume XIII, Issue # 85, April 5, 2011
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
DOG LOVERS & BABY KILLERS:
If the World Cared as Much About African
Children & Families, as it Does About Dogs
By Cyril Boynes, Jr.
ENVIRONMENTALISTS, ANIMAL LOVERS, & ANTI-PESTICIDE ACTIVISTS VERSUS HUMAN HEALTH & WELFARE IN AFRICA:
OPPOSITION ON THE PART OF THE ENVIRONMENTALIST MOVEMENT TO THE USE OF DDT & OTHER INSECTICIDES
WHICH COULD PREVENT MALARIA, YELLOW FEVER, & OTHER DISEASES THAT CAUSE SO MUCH SUFFERING, POVERTY, &
DEATH ON THE CONTINENT OF AFRICA
FULL STORY:
A couple months ago, when its dog-sledding business lost customers, a Canadian company had a hundred of its dogs
killed. The incident “shocked” and “angered” people. The employee who shot the dogs said he suffered “post
traumatic stress” from killing them and wants compensation.
Animal rights activists used the incident in campaigns against dog sled rides. “I don’t think society is willing to accept
that animals should be killed just because they are surplus or don’t suit the purpose they were born for,” said one.
“The magnitude of this atrocity is so shocking, our heads are reeling,” another said.
Huskies are beautiful, gentle animals, and I’m really sad that this happened. But the world needs to put this in
perspective. Humans eat animals. Our cars kill them along highways. Wind turbines kill eagles and other birds. More
important, what about people?
My wife Fiona Kobusingye lost her son, two sisters, and four cousins to malaria. Her nephew is permanently
brain-damaged because of it. Almost everyone I know has lost at least one child or sibling to this killer disease. Despite
millions of bednets, malaria still kills more African children than any other disease.
I cannot help thinking it would really be nice if, just once in awhile, animal lovers, environmentalists, journalists, and
other people would care half as much about African babies, children and families, as about dogs.
A hundred dogs are killed, and activists and newspapers make it a huge story.
Last year, almost one hundred thousand Ugandan children and adults were killed by malaria. And, yet, nobody seemed
to care – certainly not enough to write a story about it, or get outraged that callous anti-pesticide activists lie about
DDT risks and prevent the use of DDT and other insecticides that could prevent malaria, yellow fever, and other
diseases that cause so much suffering, poverty, and death on the continent of Africa.
It’s as if anti-pesticide Greens believe we Africans are “surplus” people on an “over-populated” planet and don’t “suit
the purposes” they think people should be born for. It’s as if our misery and deaths don’t mean anything. This is the
real atrocity, and our African heads are reeling.
Yes, government agencies, private foundations, school children, and other kinds people from rich, malaria-free countries
do send bednets, so at least some babies and pregnant women can sleep under one. But nets get torn, people don’t
always use them or hang them properly, and they only reduce malaria by 20 or 30 percent. That’s why we need
additional weapons – like DDT and other insecticides.
DDT keeps most mosquitoes from even going into homes. It irritates any that do come in, so they are less likely to bite.
It kills any that land on walls after a blood meal, so they can't transmit malaria to other victims. DDT is cheap and long
lasting: one spray is good for six months or more. No other chemical in existence does all this, at any price.
To break the transmission cycle and stop malaria, we need to reduce mosquito populations, keep them away from people,
and treat infected people quickly. Nets are essential. So are better houses and hospitals (with screens on doors and
windows), greater efforts to remove mosquito resting areas near homes, and access to the best possible drugs.
But we also need chemicals to kill mosquito larvae, insecticides to kill adults, and DDT as a long-lasting spatial repellant
to keep mosquitoes out of our homes. We need every one of these weapons, not just the ones chemical-hating
ideologues approve of, or we will forever be burying our children.
We are constantly told the DDT we spray on walls to keep mosquitoes out of our houses, and the insecticides we use to
kill these insects, are dangerous, have undesirable side effects and shouldn’t be used. But as Dr. Rutledge Taylor
explains in his new film, 3 Billion and Counting, years of research actually prove that DDT is safe for people and the
environment. See: http://www.3billionandcounting.com/ and read The Excellent Powder, by Donald Roberts and
Richard Tren.)
As Dr. Taylor points out, no one has ever died or been seriously hurt from DDT. Its worst effects are skin rashes and
speculative (but unproven) connections to early lactation failure in nursing mothers and various other minor problems.
Both Dr. Gordon Edwards and Dr. Taylor have actually eaten large amounts of DDT – and not been harmed.
We all know what malaria does. Besides lactation failure and low birth weights in babies, malaria makes people horribly
sick and unable to work, leaves millions permanently brain-damaged, and kills millions more in the most awful, painful
ways imaginable. Why anyone – especially Africans – would oppose using weapons that can stop this terrible carnage
is impossible to imagine.
But a lot of people listen to the constant lies, told by baby-killing, pesticide-hating activists – and believe them. It’s bad
enough that Greenpeace, the Environmental Defense Fund, the Pesticide Action Network and the Stockholm Convention
Secretariat tell these lies and want to ban DDT from malaria programs by 2020. It’s much worse that the Global
Environment Facility, the United Nations Environment Programme, and even some bureaucrats in the World Health
Organization support the ban.
But it’s unconscionable that Ugandan companies and politicians are doing it, too.
Organic food companies claim even a trace of DDT on their produce or flowers will keep them out of Europe. That is false.
Their crops just cannot have DDT above certain levels – and that will not happen from DDT sprayed on walls. But what’s
really absurd is that tobacco companies refuse to allow the barest detectable trace of DDT on cancer-causing tobacco that
they are happy to sell to Europeans, and Europeans are happy to smoke.
It’s not just hypocrisy. For these companies, government agencies, and activist groups to put their salaries, profits, and
ideologies ahead of the health and lives of African babies is immoral. It’s manslaughter.
Decisions about using DDT, larvacides, and insecticides (along with nets and drugs) need to be made by African health
ministers – not by activists, animal lovers, or environmental and agricultural interests. These groups are spending more
money trying to get rid of DDT than the world is spending to control and eradicate malaria – when almost three billion
people are at risk of getting this disease, and a million die from it, year after year.
We need to use DDT and other insecticides carefully, and we are doing so. However, in the end, if we don’t use them, our
wonderful, brilliant, athletic, musical, hard-working children and parents will be struck down, brain-damaged and killed by
malaria.
Or more accurately, they will be murdered by self-centered ideologues, businessmen, politicians, and even WHO and
other medical doctors who are violating their oath to save lives.
This has to end. We need to get our priorities straight, and understand what the real risks are. We need to pray that this
insane opposition to disease-preventing, life-saving chemicals will be replaced soon with a concern for babies and parents
that is equal to their concern for sled dogs.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Science, Ethics, & Human Health:
Human Health & Public Policy
Political Environmentalism Versus Human Progress & Prosperity:
Policy Issues Relating to Energy, Environment,
& Natural Resources
Cyril Boynes, Jr., is Co-Chair of the Congress of Racial Equality Uganda and a tireless advocate for health and prosperity
in Africa and all other developing regions.
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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Conservative Government Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity