Conference Examines Impact of DDT on Health, Environment
Is DDT a killer or a savior? Is it really possible that DDT could be back on the sales shelf in the not-too-distant future?
With some special interest groups questioning the national and
international restrictions on the use of DDT, Alma College and the Pine
River Superfund Task Force have organized an international conference
that examines the impact of DDT on human health and the environment.
The Eugene Kenaga International DDT Conference on Environment and Health
takes place Friday, March 14 in the Tyler-Van Dusen Campus Center at
Alma College. International experts will frame and lead discussions of
current knowledge of DDT and other persistent organic pollutants (POPs).
Participants
include South African scholars Riana Bornman, Tiaan de Jager and Henk
Bouwman; Aimin Chen of Creighton University; Barbara Cohn and Brenda
Eskenazi of the University of California at Berkeley; Amy Dailey of the
University of Florida; Suzanne Snedeker of Cornell University; Darwin
Stapleton of the Rockefeller Archive Center; and John Giesy of the
University of Saskatchewan.
Dailey, a 1997 Alma College graduate, will present a luncheon speech on
community involvement in public health. Giesy, Canada Research Chair
and a world-renowned expert in industrial pollutants and their effects
on the environment, is a 1970 graduate of Alma College.
The conference agenda includes summary presentations by the presenters;
round table discussions on DDT’s impact on human health, the
environment and malaria; and the development of consensus statements on
research, health and environmental needs.
“This conference has grown from three related developments: the
on-going massive remediation of contamination arising from DDT
production in St. Louis, Mich., recent efforts to undermine
international restrictions on DDT use, and Alma College’s long-time
emphasis and focus on environmental health,” says Edward Lorenz, Public
Affairs director and faculty member at Alma College.
Alma College students and faculty planned the conference after becoming
aware of a campaign by special interest groups that questions the
national and international restrictions on the use of DDT, said Lorenz.
“Our goal is to bring together international experts and concerned
citizens to discuss what is known and needs to be known about the
impacts on human health and the environment arising from exposure to
DDT and other POPs,” says Lorenz.
DDT, or Dichloro-Dephenyl-Trichloroethane, is a synthetic pesticide
that was used as an agricultural insecticide in the 1950s and ‘60s.
Concerns regarding its effect on human health eventually rose in the
1960s, and most uses of DDT were banned in the United States in the
1970s.
The conference is jointly sponsored by the Alma College Center for
Responsible Leadership, the College’s Public Affairs Institute, the
Ohio Valley Chapter of the Society for Environmental Toxicology and
Chemistry (SETAC), the International Society for Environmental
Epidemiology, and the Pine River Superfund Task Force, a U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency community advisory group.
The Superfund sites in the Pine River watershed resulted from the
massive dumping of byproducts from the production of DDT and a fire
retardant based on polybrominated biphenyls (PBBs) by Velsicol Chemical
Company more than 30 years ago. In addition, PBB was erroneously mixed
with animal feed in a 1973 food contamination incident that was
undetected for more than a year.
The conference is named after Kenaga, a former national DDT scholar and
research scientist with the Dow Chemical Company who died in 2007. In
1968 he served on an advisory panel for Michigan Gov. George Romney
that recommended the restricted use of DDT in the state. He was one of
the founders of the International Society of Environmental Toxicology
and Chemistry (SETAC) and served on a variety of EPA advisory panels.
Posted: Wed, March 5th, 2008 at 10:02AM
