[Poll]Organic food will kill you as fast as non-organic food

[Dumbo]

The comments here re DDT caught my eye, here. Just one thing to consider; duration and dose and characteristics of the recipient are really important. DDT is bioaccumulative and has a devastating legacy of ill effects on birds and other groups but humans, not so much.

That, again, will depend on the research one reads. It's still used in some area's of the world where we import food from, and even in the states to control certain disease routes from insects. Banned in many others due not only to apex predator risks, but human risks in getting various types of thyroid disease, diabetes and whatever else.

It is classified as toxic, endocrine disruptor, probable carcinogen, and much more.

How wise would it be to spray this on your garden food, or in your kids bedroom? Would you do it? Safe? No problem? Should we listen to the research to date or the salesmen of DDT who would eat a teaspoon of it to show there were no ill effects... and who later died of strange cancers and/or neurological diseases?

Sure, if the use outweighs the risks of certain disease vectors, it's damned if you do, more damned if you don't.

With the surging increase of West-Nile virus in Ontario will they use it? Should they use it? Will you spray it through-out your home if you could get your hands on it? The risk has to be weighed. It isn't like this stuff has no affect on humans at all. Will there be lawsuits if the Ontario gov does use it? Or will the Ontario gov pass special legislation to prevent lawsuits from it's use (similar to no fault vaccine shots there)?

Is it safe? Safe for all? Safe at what concentration? Safe at what bio-concentration (since it does build up)? Safe when one is not exposed to something else that enhances its toxic effects (or vice-versa)? What does the research actually say? I think we may find the answer to this across the board. So are you saying it's safe to use with people? You did state in a round-about-way that it's not that toxic to humans... gotta run & cut it short... had lots of rain.. pool is over-filling...

Then again, if one looks at what's in hairspray we can probably find worse.

Ha. Discovered my iPhone can post.

[Katherine]

Thats a lot of questions I am on my way to a hearing in YK, and I am feverishly reading and preparing for court all week, so I can only comment on a few of the questions your raise. I am never sure if you are kidding, angry or what, so forgive me if I seem a little vague.

First of all DDT is banned in the US and in Canada, however, the Stockholm Convention (which also banned it in I think 170 +- countries) allows its use for vector control, mainly counties with malarial mosquitoes, and mostly indoor applications. As per BBQ. Its toxicity has been mostly to birds of prey through thinning of shells and embryo death. Its banning has been attributed with the come back of the Bald Eagle in continental US, and the recovery of Peregrin Falcon. DDT was the topic of Rachel Carsons Silent Spring, and its kind of a standard reference for the so called environmental movement. Its use as a vector control is still important in areas where you can expect huge numbers of deaths a year from malaria, in children primarily. Because its usually an indoor treatment, it does not allow for the resistance development that has been seen in the past in mosquito populations.

There are many alternatives to DDT, i doubt that it will ever be used again in Canada, there are just so many other ways to combat mosquitoes, and the organochlorines are so yesterday. Still, very effective against mosquitoes, and if you have literally thousands of children dying a year from malaria, even though there is evidence in the research that suggests DDT is linked with some cancers and with smaller embryo sizes all based on animals studies, some on going for decades now, but not conclusive, I can see why Sri Lanka for example would use this chemical for vector control indoors. (note this reduces the exposure pathway to birds, also). Why do these countries not use the alternatives? Cost and effectivity.

Pick yer poison, is what im sayin.

I am not making a value judgement either. Just relating what I know. I dont work on insecticides, (herbicides, yes occassionally) there just is not a western canadian issue with them. So its not my field usually. Still it was always an interesting problem, Rachel Carson managed to make a huge difference in environmental law around the world, based on banning of DDT and its probably why we have Environment Canada, and the US EPA in many ways, not to mention many regulations re pesticide use.

Its caused the evolution of the precautionary principle: you can look it up.

[Ron Evers]

Family used DDT in our house to kill flies & skeeters. First sister would eat the dead flies off the windowsills. She suffered from migraines throughout her adult life until menopause but that, I suppose, is not unique to some one eating dead flies.

[Dumbo]

Ron?
LOL

[LeeInEdmonton]

Good golly Miss Molly I gotta join the crowd with a comment. I'm now 81 & to my knowledge have never eaten organic food. How cum ? I have never seen a package of food labeled organic that carried a registration number hence suspicious cad that Iam
that organic labeled food is not organic....outright fake so I do not buy. I'm also reasonably healthy except for current sinus problems. I have never been in hospital overnight. Twice in ER having repairs made for shop related damage. Doctors' amazed that I have never had an operation. In fact I never considered myself a senior until the obits in the newspaper listed more people younger than me rather than older.
Given the above, I kinda think that I could now switch to eating nothing but organic & it would lengthen my stay on this old earth not one iota.

Lee

[Dumbo]

lol Lee that cracked me up.

But it's all odds, right?

[Ron Evers]

Lee, mom has 11 years on you & you have 10 years on me. Who ever heard of Organic foods up until a few years ago.

When we move here into Potato country in 74, I watched the taters being planted in the spring & wondered what the white things were being planted - taters covered in what I suppose was a fungicide. Then through the growing season the crops would be sprayed for pests about every 10 days, usually by airplanes. Then in late summer, they would be sprayed again to kill the tops to harden off the tubers for harvesting.

I started to grow my own taters after this.

[davefrombc]

Welllllll, One argument against organic foods is that a lot of us have reached an age where we need all the preservatives we can get

[LeeInEdmonton]

Heck Ron: Eating DDT flies by a sister reminds me of my older sisters' gnawing on coal .Then there is my farmer uncle. I remember him mixing up a pail of DDT & dunking chickens in them to kill the mites. He lived to an age a few months past 100.
I think all of us can recall instances of long life amongst friends & relatives that walked barefoot through sprayed city parks, or breathed sprays by neighbors that believed when mixing their killer compounds that if a little was good lots would be better. None of this proves anything except some people have better immunity to some things than do others. I do think if you make it into your 80's anything that could have damaged you has already been done & changing your lifestyle because of the opinions of others' does nothing but cause you angst for no good reason.

Lee

[bluewillow]

I remember the FLIT gun and the smell of DDT when living in Peru.

Inge, I would totally go organic if I were able to.

This has been an extremely interesting post. Thanks Marc.

bw