USAID This Year To Begin Using DDT for Malaria Control in Ethiopia, Mozambique, Zambia
USAID in December plans to use nearly $10 million to conduct indoor-insecticide spraying using the pesticide DDT and 11 other insecticides to control malaria in Ethiopia, Mozambique and Zambia, agency officials said, the Washington Times reports (Howard Price, Washington Times, 5/3). Michael Miller, USAID's deputy assistant administrator of the Bureau of Global Health, in January announced that USAID by next year would allocate half of its $90 million malaria control budget on insecticide-treated nets and indoor-spraying programs that implement DDT. The agency previously was reluctant to promote the use of DDT because of concerns about the pesticide's effects on the environment, but some malaria researchers have said that indoor-spraying programs implementing DDT are safe and effective means of curbing the spread of malaria (GlobalHealthReporting.org, 1/20). In addition, Richard Green, director of the Office of Health, Infectious Diseases and Nutrition in USAID's global health bureau, said the Angolan government is considering lifting its ban on DDT so the insecticide can be used along its southern border with Namibia, where malaria is particularly prevalent. The President's Malaria Initiative also might begin conducting indoor-insecticide spraying with DDT in the same region of Angola this year, according to Trenton Ruebush, a malaria adviser with USAID (Washington Times, 5/3). Meanwhile, environmentalists attending the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants in Geneva this week are calling for DDT to be eliminated worldwide. The weeklong conference, which has drawn more than 500 delegates from 130 countries and a number of nongovernmental organizations, aims to increase measures to eliminate some of the "world's most dangerous chemicals," VOA News reports. Henry Rene Diouf, a member of the Pan Africa branch of Pesticide Action Network International, said environmentalists do not believe DDT is the best way to control malaria in Africa because widespread use can lead to resistance in mosquitoes and the chemical remains in the atmosphere for many years. Diouf said governments should promote other effective malaria control strategies, such as improved sanitary conditions and improved access to effective antimalaria drugs. The Stockholm Convention does not require countries to eliminate DDT by a certain date, but parties to the convention must report on their use of the insecticide every three years (Schlein, VOA News, 5/2).
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