Good point. I should add that some countries still use DDT for malaria control and any country that wishes to use it to fight malaria is free to do so, there is no treaty banning its use for malaria control.
However, many mosquito species are becoming resistant to DDT, so it is not really useful any longer. For example, India has greatly reduced the use of DDT because most of its malaria bearing mosquitoes are resistant to it.
DDT kills mosqito predators too and the mosquito predators are usually bigger more complex creatures with longer lifespans so it is much harder for them to evolve a resistance to DDT. Thus the idea that you could wipe out mosquitoes with DDT is ridiculous. Mosquitoes just evolve resistances to it. However, you could wipe out many bird species with it.
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Good point. I should add that some countries still use DDT for malaria control and any country that wishes to use it to fight malaria is free to do so, there is no treaty banning its use for malaria control.
However, many mosquito species are becoming resistant to DDT, so it is not really useful any longer. For example, India has greatly reduced the use of DDT because most of its malaria bearing mosquitoes are resistant to it.
DDT kills mosqito predators too and the mosquito predators are usually bigger more complex creatures with longer lifespans so it is much harder for them to evolve a resistance to DDT. Thus the idea that you could wipe out mosquitoes with DDT is ridiculous. Mosquitoes just evolve resistances to it. However, you could wipe out many bird species with it.
Here is a good fact sheet on the issue:
http://www.ipen.org/ipenweb/documents/work%20documents/ddt_i...