[afro-nets] AFRO-NETS is about malaria (38)

[Philip Coticelli <pcoticelli@gmail.com>]

AFRO-NETS is about malaria (38)
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Dear Edward,

To answer one of your questions, there are alternative insecti-
cides to DDT but they come with a catch. Because they are deemed
"safe", they tend to be simultaneously used for public health
AND crop spraying. If you think about the companies that invest
in developing and selling these chemicals, they stand to make A
LOT more money if the chemical can be used for both purposes,
and certainly much more of chemical is used for crop spraying
than public health.

I don't like to malign profit driven companies, but this fact
dramatically increases exposure of mosquitoes to the chemical
and spreads resistant parasites quickly. Hence indoor residual
spraying (IRS), which means literally spraying a residue of in-
secticide to zap mosquitoes coming into contact. DDT has the
confounding advantage of being used primarily as a pesticide be-
cause it is considered "dangerous", and it's limited use slows
the onset of parasitic resistance - which is virtually unavoid-
able with any infectious disease. Alternative chemicals are al-
most all more expensive than DDT as well. Compared to compli-
cated environmental management schemes, IRS with DDT 2x per year
is dramatically more cost effective and better at protecting
people from malaria. With over 3,000 people dying each day on
average from the disease, it's astonishing that it isn't more
widely used.

Our colleagues in contact with African health ministries tell us
that they are nearly unanimous at this time in requesting DDT
from donors in closed sessions. Momentum is clearly gathering,
but it's so important to match that advocacy in developed coun-
tries. Speaking of which, if everyone hasn't heard of "RESULTS
International", they are a very effective grassroots lobbying
organization for development issues based in the US but operat-
ing in several countries around the world. Check them out at
http://www.results.org.

Keep rockin',
Phil

Philip Coticelli
mailto:pcoticelli@gmail.com