Countries by poverty rate – World Bank, Peter Lonjers
Evil in the name of Good
In my new book I will use Africa as the “poster child” to illustrate the evil that is being continued against the developing world in the name of good. The modern Environmental movement, including Climate Change, is closely associated with and grew out of the overpopulation myth started in the 18th and 19th centuries, and the Population Control and Eugenics movements of the 20th century. Climate Change is just the latest face of Socialist/ Communist philosophy using fear, guilt and shame to control people, and not only keep poor nations poor, but ultimately to bring down Western civilization and its successful free market economic system.
Their agenda is based on an anti-human, anti-freedom, anti-progress de-growth philosophy. They are actually pushing a return to a simpler romanticized life, complete with subsistence farming and shorter lifespans as a way to “save the planet.” Never mind that the romanticized “good old days” never existed, but were actually brutal and cruel. How would you like using an unheated outdoor toilet complete with spiders and snakes, chopping wood for heat, carrying water every day from a spring or well, heating water for baths and cooking on a wood burning cook stove in both summer heat and winter cold, scrubbing your clothes on a washboard and hanging them on a clothesline even in freezing weather? I’ve done it and it’s no fun.
Even this is a cut above the life in poor nations where many don’t even have stoves, washtubs, wells and proper toilets, much less electric lights. This brutal and harsh life is about where the early American settlers were, and it was continued in some isolated areas into the middle of the 20th century. Life was a daily struggle just to live and feed their families. Lifespans were short and disease was rampant. In the 1980s when wood stoves were all the rage, my friends couldn’t understand why I didn’t want one. I had enough of chopping and carrying in wood and carrying out messy ashes when I had no choice. It might have been an adventure when I was young, but give me modern conveniences any day.
While agenda driven proponents of Environmentalism and its daughter Climate Change, aka Global Warming, claim that Western civilization is to blame (for whatever the cause du jour is), it is actually the most environmentally responsible system in the world. It is also the most generous and the most capable of helping the poor. Because we have the means and the incentive, we are able to care for the environment better, clean the water and the air and protect wildlife and habitats. People in under-developed countries who struggle just to feed their families are the least environmentally responsible by necessity. The romanticized “Noble Savage” never existed. They do whatever is necessary to survive. Their homes are drafty and cold or sweltering hot with indoor air pollution from bio-based cooking fires, vermin and disease carrying insects, and poor sanitation even for babies. Many spend hours each day carrying water from streams, which often contain dangerous bacteria and parasites.
I thank God for:
Electricity that can provide light, heat, cooling, cooking, hot water for washing and news and weather reports to avoid immanent dangers; electricity also provides power for many of the items below.
Clean central heat and air conditioning, which have saved countless babies, the elderly and the infirm from heat exhaustion or heat stroke in summer and hypothermia in winter;
Refrigeration to keep food from spoiling and avoid food poisoning;
A clean cooking stove to avoid indoor air pollution and kill pathogens in food;
Purified water on tap to avoid water borne diseases, and flush toilets;
Plenty of safe, healthy foods for good nutrition and health;
A safe place to live for shelter from the weather without disease carrying vermin and insects;
Vehicles and good roads to provide access to medical facilities, jobs and markets;
Modern medicines, antibiotics and vaccines to cure or control diseases and prolong life;
Computers and cell phones for educational purposes and to contact help when needed.
Viva la technology that has kept me alive, comfortable and able to contribute to charities that help the down-trodden[1]. I only wish I could do more. My upcoming book is dedicated to that aim: to raise awareness and prompt others to speak out against the tyranny that is holding poor countries down in the name of “saving the planet.” What hubris to think we could save the planet! The planet doesn’t care about our puny efforts. It has always been out to kill us. Only our efforts, preferably including technology, keep us alive and well. Meanwhile, the earth, as a self-correcting system that acts in cycles, is just fine.
However, there is a tyranny against poor underdeveloped countries that cries out for readily available solutions. We should strive for that better world I described in my previous blog, Anti-Humanism – Disease, Starvation, Poverty, Sterilization, not just for developed countries, but for ALL. It is possible. Poor countries are not hopeless, just helpless against forces aimed at keeping them controlled, primitive and poor. We are within sight of solving these problems, but are being hindered by environmentalists and tyrannical, corrupt governments and international organizations that foster the myths of scarcity, overpopulation and hopelessness.
“Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” —Isaiah 5:20
“… For I was hungry, and you gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and you gave me no drink: I was a stranger and you took me not in; naked, and you clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and you visited me not. Then shall they answer him, saying, Lord, when did we see you hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto you? Then shall he answer them, saying, Truly I say unto you, In as much as you did it not to one of the least of these, you did it not unto me.” — Matthew 25:42-45
“Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” — Source uncertain: evolved from various sources: Indian or Chinese proverbs, or 19th and 20th century writers.
[1] World Vision and Samaritan’s Purse lead my list of charities that use their funds best and bypass corrupt governments to give aid directly to the needy. Aid includes food, clothing, safe shelter, clean water wells, farm animals, seeds, medicines, clinics, schools, training for hygiene, agriculture and small business.
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The new book: Saving Africa from Lies that Kill: How Myths about the Environment and Overpopulation are Destroying Third World Countries will be published in September, 2018. Print and ebook will be available online and in bookstores.
My first book, Perverted Truth Exposed: How Progressive Philosophy has Corrupted Science was published in 2016. It is available in print and ebook, on line only, through World Net Daily store, Amazon, Books-A-Million and Barnes & Noble. See the companion blog atwww.realscienceblog.comfor related posts and pages.
Imagine living in a world where all nations and continents are fully developed, prosperous and healthy. Technological developments have been used to eliminate starvation and extreme poverty, and to improve health, and where stewardship of the environment is the norm. Now imagine you have just discovered an island where none of these things are available. Wouldn’t you be horrified and enraged that this situation is allowed to continue in a world of abundance? Then you learn that the powerful would rather manage the situation than end it, and that they give environmental concerns as their reason for keeping the poor people in their disease-ridden, miserable squalor. Then you also learn that many wealthy nations want to keep it that way and actually block trade from poor nations rather than compete in the marketplace or help them grow their economy as a new market in which to sell their own goods. Wouldn’t your outrage and feelings of frustration and helplessness grow exponentially?
European Union Fat Cats keep more nutritious, more disease & drought resistant, higher yield Biotech Foods (GMO) from poor countries by blocking trade if they grow any — Image Credit: Des Moines Register, Feb 1, 2000
Well, that is the actual situation, as it exists today, especially in most areas of Africa, but also India, South America, the Middle East, China, Southeast Asia and Oceana. Because it has been going on for such a long time, we have come to accept it as the norm that can’t be changed. If this was a new situation, we would want to mobilize to fix it. There are many internal reasons for the on-going situation such as corrupt governments and primitive customs, but there are also outside forces that have insured that it is perpetuated “for the good of the environment.” Through propaganda, these same forces have convinced most people in the developed world that it is an unsolvable problem. It is not. It is a deliberate scheme based on false assumptions and concerted efforts to control population in less developed countries. It is environmental and economic colonialism, meant to suppress those least able to defend themselves in the name of “saving the planet.” When the poor are struggling just to stay alive, they are not capable of caring for the environment. It would be better for the environment if we raised them out of poverty.
In my second book in the Modern Mythology Series, I use Africa as the “poster child” to illustrate the evil that is being continued in the name of good. The modern Environmental movement, including Climate Change, is closely associated with and grew out of the anti-human overpopulation myth started in the 18th century, and the Population Control and Eugenics movements of the 20th century. Climate Change is just the latest face of anti-human, de-growth and overpopulation myths that are used as a tool of the Socialist/ Communist philosophy. They use fear, guilt and shame to control people and not only keep poor nations poor, but ultimately to bring down Western civilization and its successful free market economic system.
“The common enemy of humanity is man. In searching for a new enemy to unite us, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like would fit the bill. All these dangers are caused by human intervention, and it is only through changed attitudes and behaviour that they can be overcome. The real enemy then, is humanity itself.” (emphasis added)
— The Club of Rome
“My own doubts came when DDT was introduced for civilian use. In Guyana, within two years it had almost eliminated malaria, but at the same time the birth rate had doubled. So my chief quarrel with DDT in hindsight is that it has greatly added to the population problem.”
—Alexander King, cofounder of the Club of Rome, 1990
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The new book: Saving Africa from Lies that Kill: How Myths about the Environment and Overpopulation are Destroying Third World Countries will be published in September, 2018. Print and ebook will be available online and in bookstores.
My first book, Perverted Truth Exposed: How Progressive Philosophy has Corrupted Science was published in 2016. It is available in print and ebook, on line only, through World Net Daily store, Amazon, Books-A-Million and Barnes & Noble. See the companion blog at www.realscienceblog.com for related posts and pages.
Developing the Rural Poor in Underdeveloped Countries
The stereotype of those in extreme poverty is that they are lazy and too stupid to learn. Contrary to conventional wisdom, rural people in extreme poverty are not lazy or stupid. They just need education, employment and other opportunities. (Ignorant can be fixed; stupid is either a permanent disability or a choice to reject learning.) Underdeveloped populations are not less intelligent than others, just less educated and with less opportunity. Unless they have suffered brain damage from diseases or malnutrition the people are as smart as any other group or race and are capable of accomplishing great things, given the opportunity. The rural poor are very strong, very resourceful and clever or they would not have survived the insults of contaminated water, insect and worm borne diseases and isolation from both markets and medical facilities by roads that are either absent or impassible except by foot. Every day, a great deal of effort, planning and clever use of limited resources is required in order for them to survive and help their families.
Contrary to popular beliefs, the rural poor are not overpopulated; they are under populated. With a larger population of healthy workers, they can build up their own infrastructure. Population control applied against these people is the opposite of what they need. Their numbers are already kept low by migration of the young to the cities for greater employment opportunities, not to mention their load of diseases through insects and contaminated water.
The UNFPA, USAID, International Planned Parenthood must stop their programs to eliminate and control the poor. Every effort must be made to expose this for what it is – genocide of the most vulnerable – and to end it. How are these population control agencies able to practice as they do? The answer is corrupt governments that are being bribed to support programs that kill and handicap their own economies. This type of funding of corrupt government must be ended. Governments of developing countries must be made to understand that supporting these programs is counterproductive and only prolongs the time it will take to raise their economies out of generational and energy poverty. Democratic elections and investigation of corruption are a good way to begin the process of ending these counterproductive practices that only enrich the corrupt and impoverish their nations.
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The book: Saving Africa from Lies that Kill: How Myths about the Environment and Overpopulation are Destroying Third World Countries will be published in September, 2018. Print and ebook will be available online and in bookstores.
My first book, Perverted Truth Exposed: How Progressive Philosophy has Corrupted Science was published in 2016. It is available in print and ebook, on line only, through World Net Daily store, Amazon, Books-A-Million and Barnes & Noble. See the companion blog at www.realscienceblog.com for related posts and pages.
Are solar and wind power the answers to future clean, reliable energy needs?
When you hear about the international climate change accords redistributing wealth to poor countries, there is a dirty little secret that they don’t want you to know. Their “aid” and “support” only provide for renewables like solar and wind power. Some of this is aimed at individual hut-mounted solar panels, which is OK as a temporary solution supplying personal needs for those areas that are far from electrical grids. For long term growth and economic development, reliable, consistent fossil fuel (coal, oil, gas), hydroelectric, geothermal and nuclear power are needed but are prohibited or discouraged in favor of intermittent, unreliable solar and wind power. Construction of over 200 hydroelectric dams have been stopped in Africa alone on environmental grounds, although hydroelectric power is one of the cleanest and most reliable forms of energy generation. Africa has hydroelectric capacity to supply all the continent’s needs for the foreseeable future, but development is meager. Meanwhile, over 600 million people in sub-Saharan Africa have no access to electricity. Energy Poverty is keeping countries in Africa and other underdeveloped countries from developing a robust economy through manufacturing, mining, agriculture, technology and investment, to join the twenty-first century. They need to develop electrical systems using the “all-of-the-above” approach. The need is extreme, and the need is urgent.
Here are a few reason why solar and wind power are not the answer to clean, reliable power anywhere in the world, and especially in countries in Energy Poverty. They are neither clean nor reliable.
Solar and wind power are NOT the answers to clean energy for the future.
If environmentalists were serious about clean power, they would support hydroelectric, geothermal and nuclear power. All of which are clean, reliable and use well developed technologies.
If CO2 is not causing warming, (see previous post) hydrocarbons can provide clean energy with proper scrubbers to eliminate pollutants from smoke.
Solar and wind power, by their very nature, are intermittent and unpredictable. The sun is not always visible and the wind is not always blowing at ideal speeds.
You can’t run a hospital or a manufacturing plant on unpredictable intermittent and fluctuating power.
Fluctuating power can damage computers and electric motors in appliances like refrigerators, heat pumps, etc.
As primary power sources, solar and wind power require back up power from other more consistent sources. Their unpredictable nature makes it difficult to supply consistent power through back up sources like fossil fuel and hydroelectric power plants, which cannot change their output quickly, and must run constantly at less than peak efficiency to be ready when needed.
More realistically, wind and solar can only provide a small amount of supplementary power to other more reliable sources like fossil fuel or hydroelectric plants.
Solar and wind power sources require covering large areas with turbines or solar arrays to supply power, which necessarily disrupts ecosystems. The area disrupted per megawatt of power, compared to other energy sources is staggering. Even reservoirs behind hydroelectric dams are less disruptive to the environment.
Solar panels and wind generator super magnets require exotic “rare earth” minerals, whose extraction is very polluting due to the naturally dispersed nature of rare earths (thus the name). Mine wastes include radioactive and toxic elements such as uranium and mercury that often contaminate lakes and streams.
Solar panels are very inefficient and short lived, e.g. typically less than 30% efficiency for 15 to 20 years with declining efficiency over time. Efficiency varies with the time of day/angle of the sun, latitude, prevalence of clouds and dust accumulation. Disposal of wastes are also problematic.
Solar plants using mirrors aimed at a steam generator are low tech but their high heat kills birds.
Wind turbines kill birds and bats by sucking them into the blades, and produce infra-sound that is annoying and may be harmful to animals and humans.
Raptors sucked into wind turbine blades
Why do environmentalists hate hydroelectric power, which is the cleanest and most reliable power source
Environmentalists oppose hydroelectric power for two reasons.
The first and real reason is that their socialistic goal is to cripple economies and reduce populations that these sources would support.
“Giving society cheap abundant energy would be the equivalent of giving an idiot child a machine gun.” – Paul Ehrlich, or paraphrased: “Like giving a loaded gun to a child”)
They dream of a return to idealized more primitive times, which were, in reality, brutal and polluting.
In reality, the best way to protect the environment and stabilize family sizes is to raise poor people in developing countries out of their disease ridden squalor. They’re not lazy, just sick and weakened by malaria, parasites and other infections. Poverty, not population size, is the cause of environmental damage.
Africa, for example, has largely untapped hydroelectric capacity beyond their energy needs for the foreseeable future, but that would support a larger population, which the environmentalists fight against.
The second “reason,” aka excuse, is disruption of the environment.
They don’t seem to mind the environmental disruption by wind and solar farms.
Hydroelectric power using large to small waterfalls provides reliable power with minimal impact.
Hydroelectric dams require reservoirs that fill slowly to cover formerly dry land, (so the downstream river is not starved in the process), which temporarily disrupts ecosystems that historically have quickly adapted.
They prevent periodic downstream flooding that causes misery and death.
They provide water for homes, industry and agriculture, and jobs from fishing and tourism.
If there is a shortage of fresh water in the world, as claimed by environmentalists, it is because reservoirs are needed. Reservoirs not only retain more water from loss to the sea, but actually help to replenish ground water through lateral seepage into the underlying and surrounding strata.
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The book: Saving Africa from Lies that Kill: How Myths about the Environment and Overpopulation are Destroying Third World Countries will be published in September, 2018. Print and ebook will be available online and in bookstores.
My first book, Perverted Truth Exposed: How Progressive Philosophy has Corrupted Science was published in 2016. It is available in print and ebook, on line only, through World Net Daily store, Amazon, Books-A-Million and Barnes & Noble. See the companion blog at www.realscienceblog.com for related posts.
Does Carbon Dioxide cause climate change or is it a weapon against development of energy systems in underdeveloped countries?
Advocates say climate change is caused by anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO2). This assumption has been used as a “reason” to deny fossil fuel power plants to needy countries that are suffering from Energy Poverty. Those in extreme poverty need power by all means possible: fossil fuels (coal, gas, oil), hydroelectric, geothermal, nuclear, wind and solar. But is climate change really caused by CO2, man made or otherwise? Let’s look at the facts.
Reason 1. Carbon dioxide is really a minor player in any further warming. It is uniformly distributed in the atmosphere but only absorbs infrared (heat) in a very narrow wavelength range. The CO2 wavelength range is outside the range of most of the solar radiance that penetrates our atmosphere. It falls roughly inside the wavelength range of temperatures re-radiated when solar radiation heats the earth’s surface. The atmospheric CO2 already absorbs almost all of the radiation that it can in that range. Most of the warming effect of CO2 has already occurred in the past and is one of the reasons our planet is not a frozen wasteland. Any increase in CO2 will have only a very minor effect. With CO2 absorption near saturation, almost all of the re-radiated heat in that wavelength range is already being trapped, so CO2 increases can have little or no effect on future increases in temperature or supposed forcing of water vapor. Warming has been less than 1 degree Celsius over the last 200 years. Warming oceans can hold less CO2 than cooler waters, so most of the increase in the CO2 level in the atmosphere have probably been released from the warming oceans, not from mankind, animals, fossil fuels, industry or transportation.
Absorption of gases – note narrow CO2 bands & broad water bands.
This figure requires a bit of explaining. The top spectrum shows the wavelengths at which the atmosphere transmits light and heat as well as the “black body” idealized curves for no absorption. It is a little misleading because the data is not based on actual solar and earth data. It is based on two experimental heat sources, one centered at 5525 K (5252o C or 9485o F), the approximate temperature of solar radiation, and one centered in the range of 210 to 310 K (-63o C to 36.8o C or -82oF to 98o F), the approximate temperature range of re-radiated heat from the earth. In reality solar radiation power, (Watts/m2/micron), shown in red, is six million times as strong as the power of re-radiated heat from the earth, shown in blue.
The other spectra are absorption[1] spectra. The top one shows the relative percent absorption by total atmospheric gases at various wavelengths, (note that this spectrum is practically the inverse of the transmission spectrum above it), and the spectra below that show the absorption wavelength ranges of individual atmospheric gases, but not the relative strength of that absorption in reality. As experimental, not real atmospheric, data they can only tell us the wavelength ranges of the absorption, not their relative strengths.
Note that CO2 absorbs in the 15 micron range[2], which is within both the range of re-radiated heat and the strong absorption by water vapor, of which the CO2 peak forms a mere shoulder. This is used to claim forcing of water vapor by CO2, without regard to the actual near-saturation level of CO2. Lesser CO2 peaks in the 2.7 and 4.3 micron ranges also only contribute in a minor way, the first is completely covered by a water vapor absorption peak and the second forms a shoulder in another water vapor peak. These minor peaks occur in a region where both solar radiation and re-radiation are minimized. Methane and nitrous oxide are also shown to be minor players, having narrow absorption ranges and low concentrations. Note too that ozone blocks most of the ultraviolet light from the sun.
Reason 2. Water is by far the most important greenhouse gas/liquid in the form of vapor, high and low altitude clouds, rain and snow, which both absorb and reflect sunlight and re-radiated heat from the surface. Water vapor is not uniformly distributed in the atmosphere, being concentrated near the earth, but strongly absorbs heat in a wide range of wavelengths. More heat means more water vapor evaporating from the oceans. Sounds pretty scary, doesn’t it? Contrary to what is assumed by climate modelers, who use this to claim forcing by CO2, the extra vapor doesn’t remain as vapor. It quickly forms low altitude clouds that strongly reflect in-coming sunlight and heat into space. Any re-radiated heat from the surface that may be trapped by clouds is a small fraction compared to blocking the in-coming solar radiation. Blocking incoming solar radiance has a net cooling effect that overwhelms any increases in trapped re-radiation. Additionally, high altitude clouds tend to trap heat from being re-radiated into space, but have little effect because the increases in cloud cover due to warming are mostly in low altitude clouds.
Underdeveloped countries are being denied readily available, more affordable fossil fuel electrical power plants based on a claim that does not hold up to scrutiny. Climate agreements only support renewable energy, specifically solar and wind. Even hydroelectric and geothermal power are discouraged or blocked. The development of over 200 hydroelectric dams have been blocked in Africa by environmentalists who claim it will cause environmental damage, but they don’t share the same concerns about environmental disruption by solar and wind power farms that take up far more land per megawatt than reservoirs behind dams.
[1] Transmission and Absorption are inversely related by the formula A = 1/log T.
[2] The horizontal axis is a log scale in microns so that the 1 to 10 range is in units of 1 and the 10 to 70 range is in tens.
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The book: Saving Africa from Lies that Kill: How Myths about the Environment and Overpopulation are Destroying Third World Countries will be published in September, 2018. Print and ebook will be available online and in bookstores.
My first book, Perverted Truth Exposed: How Progressive Philosophy has Corrupted Science was published in 2016. It is available in print and ebook, on line only, through World Net Daily store, Amazon, Books-A-Million and Barnes & Noble. See the companion blog at www.realscienceblog.com for related posts.
Bring back DDT – Save Africa and other impoverished areas
Over 80% of infectious diseases are caused by insects and other arthropods. DDT is desperately needed in impoverished countries where insect borne diseases kill and sicken millions every year, cutting lifespans and productivity. Africa, India and South-Central Americas are most affected. An estimated 90% of new malaria cases and 92% of deaths occurs in Sub-Saharan Africa. This unpardonable crime amounts to continuing genocide of brown races by western powers.
Without these insect borne diseases, populations may increase at first, but better health will facilitate the building of infrastructure, agriculture and industry that can raise millions out of poverty, ignorance and hopelessness. These changes will benefit the environment, because healthy people raised above dire poverty will be able to care for their environment. Recent claims of mosquito resistance to DDT are grossly overblown and used as an excuse to prevent resumption for insect control. WHO has required proof of NO resistance for its use in an area, but that requires proving a negative, which is impossible. The aim is not to kill every mosquito, but to reduce or eliminate the transmission of malaria and other diseases between insect vectors and humans. Mosquitos emerge clean and must acquire malaria from infected people. That’s why it did not return to countries where it was eliminated. Break the cycle to end the misery.
“How much labor and waste of time these wicked insects do cause, but a ray of hope, in the use of DDT, is now held out to us.”
— Out of My Life and Thought: An Autobiography, Dr. Albert Schweitzer (translated from Ma Vie et Ma Pensee)
DDT worked so well that malaria and similar diseases were eradicated in most developed countries and were near eradication in poorer countries before DDT was banned in 1972 by EPA in spite of failure to find any harm to humans or the environment by an overwhelming body of research.
“To only a few chemicals does man owe as great a debt as to DDT. It has contributed to the great increase in agricultural productivity, while sparing countless humanity from a host of diseases, most notably, perhaps, scrub typhus and malaria. Indeed, it is estimated that, in little more than two decades, DDT has prevented 500 million deaths due to malaria that would otherwise have been inevitable. Abandonment of this valuable insecticide should be undertaken only at such time and in such places as it is evident that the prospective gain to humanity exceeds the consequent losses. At this writing, all available substitutes for DDT are both more expensive per crop-year and decidedly more hazardous.”
Rachel Carson’s 1962 book, Silent Spring, was filled with lies, half-truths, misinterpretation of research results and wild speculations. Rather than being an attempt to protect humans and the environment as stated, it was really part of an effort to stop population increases in Africa, India and other impoverished countries.
“My own doubts came when DDT was introduced for civilian use. In Guyana, within two years it had almost eliminated malaria, but at the same time the birth rate had doubled. So my chief quarrel with DDT in hindsight is that it has greatly added to the population problem.”
—Alexander King, cofounder of the Club of Rome, 1990
Population Bomb by Paul Erilich (1968) was a another book based on Malthusian, (overpopulation), eugenicist, racist lies, aka propaganda.
“The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate…”
— Paul Ehrlich, The Population Bomb, 1968
Population control groups such as the Club of Rome, supported by charitable foundations such as the Rockefeller Foundation, continue to spread the myth of overpopulation. Many rural areas have too few healthy people to build roads, other infrastructure and industry.
In 1972 DDT was banned by US EPA Administrator William Ruckelshaus in spite of overwhelming scientific evidence presented at hearings that refuted claims of harm by activist groups such as Environmental Defense Fund and Audubon Society.
“DDT is not a carcinogenic, mutagenic, or teratogenic hazard to man. The uses under regulations involved here do not have a deleterious effect on fresh water fish, estuarine organisms, wild birds, or other wildlife…and…there is a present need for essential uses of DDT.”
— EPA Administrative Law Judge Edmund Sweeney, after months of hearings, “In the Matter of Stevens Industries, Inc., et al., L.F. & R. Docket Nos. 63, et al.). Hearing Examiner’s Recommended Findings, Conclusions, and Orders, April 1972.” (40 CFR 164.32). (Consolidated DDT Hearings) As summarized in Barrons, May 1, 1972
Note that this case was brought on behalf of the Environmental Defense Fund, an advocacy group that opposed any use of modern fertilizers and pesticides as harmful to the environment, regardless of evidence to the contrary.
Beginning in the 1970’s, US AID, UN WHO, UNESCO and the World Bank have pressured leaders of poor countries to discontinue DDT as a prerequisite to receiving essential aid. This continues to the present with exception of WHO recently allowing limited spraying of interior walls in selected areas.
Although DDT is the most studied pesticide on the planet, it is still listed as an environmental toxin and possible carcinogen because the EPA listing has not been changed, in spite of all of the studies that failed to find harmful effects on humans or the environment. It is much safer and more economical than any of the proposed replacements.
Verifying the Claims of Silent Spring
None of Rachel Carson’s “facts” about environmental and human harm were true. Most of the facts below, except where noted, are from “DDT: A Study in Scientific Fraud,” by J. Gordon Edwards, Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons Volume 9 Number 3 Fall 2004. (See link below)
Dr. Edwards examined each of Silent Spring’s claims and found them wrong and possibly fraudulent.
Not one person has been harmed or died from DDT.
The only death associated with DDT was a 3 yr. old child that drank a solution of DDT in kerosene, which is a hydrocarbon known to be toxic.
J. Gordon Edwards was a Ph.D. entomologist who sometimes ate a spoonful of DDT powder at his lectures as a demonstration of its safety. He suffered no significant ill effects and died of a heart attack at age 84 while hiking in the Rockies.
DDT is not carcinogenic, mutagenic or teratogenic
“Workers in the Montrose Chemical Company had 1,300 man-years of exposure, and there was never any case of cancer during 19 years of continuous exposure to about 17mg/man/day.”
“Concerns were sometimes raised about possible carcinogenic effects of DDT, but instead its metabolites were often found to be anti-carcinogenic, significantly reducing tumors in rats.”
Expected rise in leukemia in children and breast cancer years later in girls exposed during puberty never happened.
Bird deaths, thin egg shells and buildup in the environment have proven to be false.
Bird deaths at the University of Michigan, cited by Carson, were not from DDT, but were probably from soil fungicide containing mercury. In later tests, mercury was found in the soil and earthworms there. Other areas did not experience bird deaths from spraying of DDT. Carson’s Source was: Bird Mortality in the Dutch elm disease program in Michigan, Bulletin 41, Cranebrook Institute of Science by George John Wallace; Walter P Nickell; Richard F Bernard
According to Audubon Society Annual Christmas Bird Counts, bird populations actually increased during the thirty years of DDT use. Numbers rose from 90 birds seen per observer in 1941 to 971 birds seen per observer in 1960.
The eggshell thinning studies cited by Carson could not be replicated and had actually reduced dietary calcium, needed to build egg shells, of experimental birds to get that result.
Museum specimens compared to wild population eggs may have led to false claims of thinning because the museums used the best specimens available; natural variability in the wild may have been interpreted as thinning. “the whole idea that pesticides are concentrated as one moves up the food chain, which is crucial to Carson’s arguments about distant and delayed effects, has become increasingly dubious in the years that followed” (Fleming, New Conservation Movement, 31). Source: Reading Rachel Carson by Charles T. Rubin
DDT is not metabolized by birds and is rapidly excreted in their droppings.
“The counts of raptorial birds migrating over Hawk Mountain, Pennsylvania, indicated that there were many more hawks there during the “DDT years” than previously. The numbers counted there increased from 9,291 in 1946 (before much DDT was used) to 13,616 in 1963 and 29,765 in 1968, after 15 years of heavy DDT use.”
Aquatic life has not been harmed by DDT; it is practically insoluble in water, with only 1.2 parts per billion at saturation.
A study cited by Carson claimed 500 ppb DDT in seawater inhibited photosynthesis and killed algae. The problem with this study is that alcohol was added to the tank to dissolve the DDT in the water. Alcohol alone would do that.
The assumption of persistence of DDT in seawater for decades was also challenged. Tests showed DDT and its metabolites disappeared in as few as 38 days.
References:
See “DDT: A Study in Scientific Fraud,” by J. Gordon Edwards, Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons Volume 9 Number 3 Fall 2004. On the web at: http://www.jpands.org/vol9no3/edwards.pdf
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The book: Saving Africa from Lies that Kill: How Myths about the Environment and Overpopulation are Destroying Third World Countries will be published in September, 2018. Print and ebook will be available online and in bookstores.
My first book, Perverted Truth Exposed: How Progressive Philosophy has Corrupted Science was published in 2016. It is available in print and ebook, on line only, through World Net Daily store, Amazon, Books-A-Million and Barnes & Noble. See the companion blog at www.realscienceblog.com for related
Who says the world is overpopulated? And what does that mean anyway? Hunger? Crowding? Environmental harm? For over 200 years we’ve been told that the world is overpopulated. But is it? Check this out.
In 1798, Thomas Malthus thought the world was overpopulated when world population was under one billion. He wanted to deny aid to the poor in his country and praised malaria for keeping the death rate high and life spans short in Africa and other developing countries. He saw disease, famine and war as good things to reduce population. His philosophy, which prompted Britain to pass laws against helping the Irish, was responsible for a million deaths in the Irish potato famine while still exporting wheat from Ireland to Britain. Malthus made two major erroneous assumptions: no improvements in crop yields per acre and the genetic inferiority, enhanced fertility and inability of the poor to improve their economic status. He was wrong.
“Instead of recommending cleanliness to the poor, we should encourage contrary habits. In our towns we should make the streets narrower, crowd more people into the houses, and court the return of the plague. In the country, we should build our villages near stagnant pools, and particularly encourage settlements in all marshy and unwholesome situations. But above all, we should reprobate specific remedies for ravaging diseases; and restrain those benevolent, but much mistaken men, who have thought they were doing a service to mankind by projecting schemes for the total extirpations of particular disorders.”
—Thomas Malthus, An Essay on the Principles of Population, 1798
When world population was about 1.3 billion, Charles Darwin, whose Theory of Evolution was based on Malthus’ book, thought the struggle for survival would cause the extinction of underdeveloped cultures by developed peoples. He was wrong.
“At some future period, not very distant as measured in centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace the savage races throughout the world.”
—Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, 1871
Francis Galton, creator of Eugenics, the so-called science of improving the human race, thought the African races were so inferior genetically that Chinese should be settled in Africa to drive the Negro races to extinction and replace them. He was wrong.
“My proposal is to make the encouragement of the Chinese settlements at one or more suitable places on the East Coast of Africa a part of our national policy, in the belief that the Chinese immigrants would not only maintain their position, but that they would multiply and their descendants supplant the inferior Negro race.”
— The Times, June 5, 1873, “Africa for the Chinese,” Francis Galton
The Eugenics movement in Britain and America wanted to reduce the population by preventing procreation by “genetically inferior” people, including sterilization and institutionalization. The Eugenics movement influenced policies that limited immigration based on racial and ethnic background because of the assumed genetic inferiority of certain races and cultures.
Around 1920 when the population was about 1.9 billion, Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood and a prominent eugenicist, believed we needed to get rid of “human weeds,” including dark skinned people from Southern Europe, Africa and India as well as the mentally or physically impaired. She counted among them the generationally poor and criminals. She advocated for sterilization and birth control, and later for abortion. She was wrong.
“The most serious charge that can be brought against modern benevolence is that it encourages the perpetuation of defectives, delinquents and dependents. These are the most dangerous elements in the world community, the most devastating curse on human progress and expression.”
— Margaret Sanger in The Pivot of Civilization, 1922
In the 1930s when world population was about 2 billion, Adolf Hitler believed the world was overpopulated and, following an older philosophy of German expansion, sought to gain “Lebensraum” (living room) by invading other countries and exterminating “inferior” people, including Jews and Gypsies. By doing so he sought to create a super race of Arian Germans. He was wrong.
“In the limitation of this living space lies the compulsion for the struggle for survival, and the struggle for survival, in turn contains the precondition for evolution.”
— Adolf Hitler in Mein Kampf, 1925
When The Population Bomb was published in 1968 by Paul Ehrlich, world population was about 3.7 billion. He believed the world was overpopulated and required drastic action to reduce the population in order to prevent mass starvation and collapse of the society. He was wrong.
“The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate…”
— Paul Ehrlich, The Population Bomb, 1968
In that same decade, US Indian Health Service, using newly created Medicaid money, began sterilizing or implanting IUDs in Native American women without informed consent or knowledge and it was often coerced. For some tribes, it was near genocide. Department of Health Education and Welfare Population Crisis Committee sterilized up to a third of women in Puerto Rico.
Planned Parenthood clinics, which had been placed in poor, mostly black, neighborhoods began the modern abortion industry targeting African Americans as “human weeds;” the US Office of Economic Opportunity also set up “birth control” clinics in black neighborhoods and schools.
In 1966, under President Johnson, US AID began requiring population control quotas as a condition for receiving foreign aid, even in famines or other emergencies. Mass sterilization camps were set up in poor countries using equipment supplied by the UN and US. This has continued to this day except for a recent Trump ban on USAID and US support for UNFPA being used for sterilization and abortion. However, other agencies have filled the gap.
Meanwhile, Norman Borlaug and others began the Green Revolution by breeding more prolific, more disease resistant and more nutritious varieties of grains along with modern agricultural methods. Crop yields increased by orders of magnitude, making it possible to feed the world without sacrificing forests and other pristine wilderness areas. India went from famine to self-sustainability in little more than a decade.
In 1972, DDT was banned after nearly 30 years of controlling disease carrying insects, based more on political fears of a growing population in developing countries than on real science or perceived harm. It had been largely responsible for eradicating malaria in North America and Europe, and reducing its incidence in developing countries where it was used. US and UN agencies then required developing countries to abandon DDT in order to receive financial support. It is even now only beginning to be used on interior walls in some areas of Africa to control malaria carrying mosquitos. India never banned its use for homes and has greatly reduced malaria by semiannual spraying of interior walls. Today India manufactures and exports DDT.
“My own doubts came when DDT was introduced for civilian use. In Guyana, within two years it had almost eliminated malaria, but at the same time the birth rate had doubled. So my chief quarrel with DDT in hindsight is that it has greatly added to the population problem.”
—Alexander King, cofounder of the Club of Rome, 1990
Today the world population is about 7.5 billion. USAID, UNFPA, (Fund for Population Activities), UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), International Planned Parenthood, Population Council and other groups continue the abortion, sterilization, IUD implantation and birth control activities in poor countries around the world. China has had a draconian one child policy involving forced abortions, sterilization and denial of benefits. Recently China has allowed a second child, but only after 4 years and only with a state approval certificate. A child born outside this requirement gets no government benefits or education.
So, is the world overpopulated? Let’s look at what we mean by overpopulated.
Do we have enough food for everyone?Yes. Thanks to modern agricultural techniques and high yield crops there is more than enough for at least 11 billion people without any increase in acres cultivated. Advancing technology will probably multiply the yield still further as it has in the past. Is the food distributed fairly? No. Hunger has more to do with local politics than with food supplies. Corrupt governments, propped up by government to government foreign aid, are incentivized to help with international population control schemes, but not to build infrastructure, attract investment and help to raise the standard of living of their own rural poor.
Is there enough room for all the people? Compared to the land area of the earth, the population is very small. For perspective, if the entire global population was placed on the big island of Hawaii, everyone would have 1.4 square meters to sit or stand. Using the same thought experiment, if all the people in the world were placed in Texas, each person would have almost 93 square meters. A family of four would have 372 square meters. That’s about 4000 square feet, enough for a 2000 square foot house and a yard or garden. No one is suggesting we actually do this, except for the loony left who are grasping at straws to defeat this argument against the overpopulation myth.
Global average population is 55 people per kilometer of land area, excluding Antarctica. That’s 17.96 acres per family of four. In 2016, over 54% of the population lived in cities, which covers only 2.7% of the land. That means that 46% of the population is rural and lives on 97.3% of the land area. That calculates to 26 people /km2 in rural areas or 38 acres per family of four. Yes, I know that large areas are uninhabitable. Even if we assumed 50% uninhabitable, that’s still a lot of land per person. The fact that only 10% of the land is actually inhabited doesn’t change the picture. There is still a lot of land out there to accommodate and feed a larger population. All this doesn’t even count the 71% of the earth’s surface that is water, which is a food source and a highway between markets.
Is the environment being harmed by too many people? No. Poverty, including subsistence farming, not population, causes environmental harm and deforestation. Modern agriculture and higher yield crop varieties can end deforestation and provide surplus crops to sell. Roads, electricity, clean water and disease control can provide a healthy workforce and energy to attract investors and run industry.
Developed countries have bought into the overpopulation myth to the point that their birth rates are below replacement value. Japan, which reached one of the lowest global birth rates of 1.4 in 2014, has started paying people to have children because of the looming demographic catastrophe. Some of the highest density areas of the world are the richest. Look at Shanghai. It is not only the most populated city in the world, 24 million, but is one of the most prosperous.
Rural poor areas in developing countries are underpopulated. With diseases from insects and contaminated water taking a high toll and attrition from migration into cities by the young and healthy, there are not enough healthy people to build infrastructure and markets and raise the standard of living of the rural poor. They already have population control. They certainly don’t need birth control, sterilization and abortion.
Is the planet overpopulated? By all measures of overpopulation, the earth is far from capacity to support its people. Since overpopulation advocates have been scaring us for 200 years, why should be believe what they keep saying? Quit worrying about an assumed problem that has yet to materialize. The real problem is with the population control advocates, the abortionists, the sterilizers and the international governmental and nongovernmental organizations that keep paying these organizations for killing off the hope of the future while keeping people in extreme poverty poor, sick, isolated, ignorant and controlled. Free market solutions are the answer, not money given to prop up corrupt government officials that the poor never see.
The rural poor in developing countries need disease control, electricity and roads to end isolation. They need Employment, Education, Investment and Infrastructure to join the 21st century.
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The book: Saving Africa from Lies that Kill: How Myths about the Environment and Overpopulation are Destroying Third World Countries will be published in September, 2018. Print and ebook will be available online and in bookstores.
My first book, Perverted Truth Exposed: How Progressive Philosophy has Corrupted Science was published in 2016. It is available in print and ebook, on line only, through World Net Daily store, Amazon, Books-A-Million and Barnes & Noble. See the companion blog at www.realscienceblog.com for related posts.
Control: Communism, Environmentalism and the Overpopulation Myth.
The roots of environmentalism go back to the eighteenth century in the form of the overpopulation myth of Malthusianism, which was all about limiting the human population to prevent a predicted Malthusian Catastrophe, i.e. mass starvation, and for genetic purity, especially among supposedly genetically inferior groups e.g. certain races, cultures and the chronically poor. This is based on the progressive beliefs in materialism, (i.e. there is no spiritual side, only the material we can see and touch), and humanism, (i e. man is the measure of everything and determines morals to suit his circumstances). From these progressive philosophies grew socialism, communism, fascism, the eugenics[1] movement and environmentalism, all of which are about control of the masses by an elite few, and all are basically anti-human, anti-development and anti-freedom.
In 1798 Thomas Malthus published An Essay on the Principles of Population[2] in which he predicted future starvation based on the assumption that the rate of population growth would far surpass the growth rate of food supplies. Using this, he proposed draconian measures to “fix” an assumed overpopulation problem at a time when world population was below one billion. Malthus made two major erroneous assumptions:
Genetic inferiority and enhanced fertility of less accomplished peoples
No improvement in crop yields per acre.
He assumed that the only way to grow more food was to increase the number of acres under cultivation, which limited the total “carrying capacity” of any region and indeed the world. We now know that yields have improved by orders of magnitude through things such as introduction of more prolific, disease resistant plant varieties and high yield hybrids, nitrogen and mineral fertilization, mechanization and control of insect and rodent pests. Nor did he foresee the natural reduction of family size that usually occurs when people are raised beyond near-starvation subsistence, and when diseases are controlled so that high childhood mortality is reduced.
Using these false assumptions as a “reason,” he advocated government measures to reduce population growth rates among the poor such as regulating marriage, educating for moral abstinence, as well as birth control and sterilization. However, he opposed nutritional relief and improved hospital access that would have reduced infant mortality and extended life spans among the poor. In his opinion, helping the poor only made the supposed overpopulation problem worse. He extended this same philosophy to Africa where he observed that the Tsetse fly and Malaria helped to keep human population numbers and lifespans low, which he saw as a good thing.
This same upside down philosophy persists today among progressives who only typically want to manage the poor while keeping them poor. Malthus was pushing evolution and eugenics long before Charles Darwin[3] and Frances Galton[4]. In The Descent of Man, Charles Darwin assumed that the superior races (white Europeans) would eventually cause the extinction of the inferior races (black and brown). Francis Galton coined the term eugenics for a theory about improving the human race through selective breeding and exclusion from reproduction of supposedly genetically inferior groups.
“At some future period, not very distant as measured in centuries, the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate and replace the savage races throughout the world.
—Charles Darwin, Descent of Man
Because genetic inferiority of certain races, cultures and the poor has largely been rejected by more enlightened geneticists and the public in general, (but apparently not for powerful population control supporters), along with vastly improved food production rates, environmentalism is the latest cause celebre to cover brutal inhumanity to man in the form of forced or coerced population control in places like China, lndia and Africa. The shift from eugenics or racial purity to environmentalism is based on the false assumption that the world is overpopulated, resulting in harm to the environment. This makes environmentalism and population control a perfect match and a good fit for the progressive elite seeking control.
Is it true that the world overpopulated? Only if agriculture had remained as it was in the eighteenth century. However, the advances in crop yields are more than enough to feed the world. There is more than enough food for all. The reason for starvation and poor nutrition is usually political mismanagement or worse, such as well-meaning environmental and population control philanthropic societies, NGOs, UN and local governments intentionally keeping the poorest in their disease ridden squalor without adequate infrastructure to provide for basic needs in order to control the people. A healthy and educated population is much harder for a dictator to control and thereby remain in power.
The best way to stabilize population, if that is the goal, is to raise the standard of living by providing employment, transportation, electricity, medical care, education, clean water and adequate food. It is a well known fact that family size is naturally reduced when living standards are improved beyond the point where excess children are needed to insure replacement of those lost in early childhood to disease and malnutrition. It can be argued that the population is too low in many areas to provide the cooperation and man power to provide better facilities without outside aid. Only cities are overpopulated, and that is usually by choice. As population numbers have grown, the world has seen an increase in the standard of living, as reflected in the global GDP per capita, due to division of labor and shared responsibility for both agriculture and developing infrastructure. We should be doing all we can to raise the world’s poor out of poverty. Caring for the environment is the last thing on the minds of people who are having difficulty feeding their children. Raising their standard of living is the best thing we could do to stabilize the population and protect the environment. Unfortunately, the progressives would rather do the opposite for ideological reasons.
I have seen the benefits of higher population and the negative side of low population myself. I grew up in an area of the Appalachian Mountains where population is low. Services that are available in the cities and towns a couple of hours away are not or only marginally available in these mountainous rural areas. Even finding a plumber or electrician is difficult. Although the situation is better now because of improvements in highways, many in the area still must travel to the cities for proper medical care. Lower population means lower tax basis, fewer businesses, less opportunity. It has been difficult getting businesses, whether they are medical facilities, manufacturing, commercial or food and entertainment, interested in locating in an area where the customer and workforce base are low. It has been particularly difficult getting doctors to come and stay. It hasn’t been that long since the first fast food restaurant came into the area. I bring this up to illustrate the logic of raising the population to improve living standards. Granted, this is a far cry from poor villages in other countries, but it still illustrates the point that higher population brings higher living standards.
[1] Eugenics is the “science” of improving the human race by selective breeding of genetically superior people and preventing supposedly genetically inferior people from reproducing.
[2] Thomas Robert Malthus, An Essay on the Principles of Population, 1798, London
[3] Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species , 1858, London, The Descent of Man, 1871
Countries by poverty rate – World Bank, Peter Lonjers
Many international organizations propagate drastic population control measures under the radar while publicly advocating and providing (some) aid to the poor and endorsing environmental concerns. This includes governmental and nongovernmental agencies such as UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization), IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), UNFPA (United Nations Fund for Population Activities), The World Bank, USAID (United States Agency for International Development), the Club of Rome and its many spin-offs, Worldwide Fund for Nature, formerly called World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Green Peace, Population Council, International Planned Parenthood Federation, etc.
As a part of the Population Control Agenda and the overpopulation myth, in addition to enforced sterilization, abortion and birth control methods, other means of limiting both population and life span have been applied to impoverished countries and are often tied to reception or denial of aid or loans[i].
Of these, disease control and electrical power are the most important because they can facilitate many of the other items on the list, and kick-start the economy. A healthy workforce and power to run industry, business, medical facilities and develop transportation systems are key to economic development. Although many African countries need foreign aid and international loans now, the goal should be to help them raise their economy to the point where they are net contributors to the world economy or at least are self sufficient. (NOTE: most actual foreign aid only props up corrupt leaders; the people get very little of it. Some estimate that only 2% goes to help the people or build needed infrastructure.)
Throwing crumbs at the problem is not enough to accomplish this goal without actual investment in infrastructure. See detailed list below of essential necessities that international organizations have denied or failed to provide/ promote :
DDT and Disease Control: Banning DDT has caused a rebound of malaria, once almost eradicated in many areas, and many other insect borne diseases, resulting in an estimated million deaths each year from malaria alone. (Estimates vary, but the real number is unknown.) Many of the agencies named above, as well as many Western nations, withheld funds from foreign aid and loans for development unless underdeveloped countries abandoned DDT. Poorer nations had no choice but to “voluntarily” ban the use of DDT to control insect borne diseases, which account for 80% of infectious diseases in these countries. The economic loss in human productivity from malaria, TB and other diseases is incalculable.
Further research has disproved the claims of Rachael Carson’s book, Silent Spring, that DDT causes environmental harm to birds or aquatic life, cancers or other human harm. Predictions of an upsurge in cancer and extinction of birds failed to materialize. Not one human has ever been seriously harmed or died from its use or abuse, and robins to eagles flourished during and after its 30 year use in the United States. DDT is practically insoluble in water, so no aquatic toxicity is possible and soil bacteria destroy it in a few weeks or months, ending any persistence.
It is cheaper than other insecticides, and is safer and easier to make, handle and distribute. The claims that insects in poor countries developed immunity to it are false or grossly overblown. (Also, many African countries lacking transportation infrastructure never used DDT in the past so that development of resistance was impossible.) India never participated in the ban, manufactures its own DDT and uses it judiciously with occurrence of very little resistance. The UN standards for allowing use of DDT include unrealistic proof of NO DDT resistance in the area. That’s proving a negative, which is impossible. The aim is not to exterminate every mosquito, but to reduce their numbers until there are no more human carriers.
In addition to DDT treatment on interior walls for mosquito control, insect and parasite control must also include replacing thatched roofs where mosquitos hide with metal or tile, sealing the interior of homes from insects with wire screens that allow cooling air in but exclude insects, as well as education, fly swatters and glue strips, clean water to prevent dysentery and waterborne parasites, shoes/ sandals to keep pinworms and other parasites from entering through the feet, closed toilets, preferably with septic systems, to reduce fly-borne diseases.
Malaria Facts: Malaria drugs can cure malaria if available, but symptoms only appear after 9 to 14 days or longer, by which time there may be liver or kidney damage. Once symptoms appear, malaria can kill in as little as one day or persist for weeks or relapse over a longer period of time. Reinfection is possible since the parasite imparts only partial immunity. Each bout of malaria destroys red blood cells equivalent to a pint of blood, resulting in chronic anemia and kidney damage from repeated bouts for much of the African population. Babies, children, pregnant women, the elderly and the infirm are especially vulnerable.
The malaria parasite requires both humans and mosquitos to complete its life cycle. Mosquitos are “born” clean and must pick up the parasite (Plasmodium sp.) from an infected person. It takes another 10 days for the parasite to change into the stage that is infectious to humans. No infected humans, no malaria even though the mosquito vector may still exist. That is why it did not recur in North American and European countries when DDT was banned after 30 years’ use. Human malaria does not infect animals and vice versa, with the rare exception of Plasmodium knowlesi, a primate species found in Southeast Asia.
Power Plants: Over 600 million people in sub-Saharan Africa have no access to electricity. Based on CO2 reduction, Climate Change advocates and international agreements provide funding preferentially for renewable energy such as solar and wind power, which are unreliable, intermittent, environmentally harmful and require exotic elements, meanwhile discouraging or prohibiting development of power plants based on abundant fossil fuel, (coal, oil or natural gas), hydroelectric, geothermal or nuclear energy. Hydroelectric power is necessarily clean, renewable and sustainable, but is hated by environmentalists for assumed harm to ecosystems. Earlier successes in other countries over time have proven this assumption false except for temporary local effects. Nature adapts. (NOTE: the huge areas cleared for wind “farms” disrupt the environment far more than conventional hydroelectric or hydrocarbon fueled power plants.)
Solar and wind power are, by their nature, inconsistent, unreliable and intermittent. Solar only works during the day when the sky is clear or nearly clear. Wind only works on windy days, but only in a narrow range of velocities; too slow doesn’t generate power; too fast and both blades and generators are damaged un less switched off. Wind power kills birds and bats that are important for insect control, and creates infrasound that is harmful to humans and animals. Both solar and wind power require backup generation by other means: fossil fuel, hydroelectric, etc. Solar and wind power are only useful as supplemental sources so they are at best temporary solutions. Single home solar panels are only a feel-good drop in the bucket for the estimated 600 million needy people in sub Saharan Africa. It would be impossible to supply enough of these to make much of a difference, and is at best a temporary solution until rural power systems can be provided. Arguments against other types of power plants usually involved cost of installing transmission lines. However, except for single home solar systems, all types of power have the same requirements, including solar and wind, which require more lines to harvest the power from the sources.
It is well documented that environmentalists have stopped or prevented over 200 hydroelectric dams in Africa, although it is the most sustainable, reliable, cleanest and safest energy source and uses conventional materials and technology. Hydroelectric power doesn’t require huge dam projects. Systems based on even small waterfalls, dams or run-of-the-river systems can supply local power much sooner and cheaper. African rivers have sufficient hydroelectric power generation capacity to supply all of the continent’s needs for the foreseeable future. Only a tiny fraction of it has been developed. One ray of hope is the large Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) being built on the upper Nile with a capacity of 6000 MW. For comparison, the Aswan High Dam in Egypt has 2100 MW capacity and Cohora Brassa in Mozambique has 2075 MW capacity. There are already a number of medium to small capacity systems in Africa including three plants at Victoria Falls. Many more are possible and needed. India was an early pioneer and has become a leader in hydroelectric power generation, exports power and provides engineering support for new systems to other countries.
Geothermal energy is available in seismically active areas in Africa, mostly in the Rift Valley. By sinking wells into thermal strata, steam or hot water can be used to run electricity generators. The technology is well established but development is just beginning in Africa. Other sources of electrical power generation include biomass and tidal generators. Biomass has major drawbacks, including pollution and loss of vegetation from biomass burning. Nuclear is among the cleanest power sources with no emissions, and only limited waste handling issues. Fear of nuclear power is mostly propaganda citing a few rare catastrophes.
The way out of Energy Poverty should involve an all-of-the-above approach, including fossil fuels, geothermal, hydroelectric, nuclear, solar, tidal, biomass and wind. The need is too great in lost lives and productivity to wait. The need is urgent. Once Energy Poverty is eliminated and other systems are in place, then fossil and bio-fuel power plants could be phased out or reduced in favor of hydroelectric, geothermal and nuclear power.
Availability of reliable electricity and natural gas are important for economic development, industry and medical infrastructure as well as home cooking and refrigeration, which are needed to provide a safe, clean food supply and to reduce harmful indoor air pollution from bio-fueled cooking and heating fires. Electricity can solve a host of other problems including water purification, sanitation, roads, railroads, airstrips, access to markets and medical facilities.
Clean Water and Sanitation: Lives and health are impacted by holding as a low priority the development of village clean water wells or providing city slums with at least rudimentary piped-in purified water and sanitation systems. The environmentalist myth of dwindling global water supplies and limited resources is included in the justification of these policies, although village wells and reservoirs behind even modest hydroelectric dams could supply all their needs. Many African women spend hours each day carrying water from streams and lakes, which contains dangerous bacteria and parasites. The result of this is high infant and childhood mortality from intestinal parasites and diarrhea, the number one killer of young children in poor countries.
Sanitation is also needed but ignored, now consisting of open pit toilets, at best, or simply defecation and urination in fields and streams. Flies carry disease from these sources, including tuberculosis (TB), leprosy, typhoid, cholera, dysentery, polio, anthrax, salmonella, parasite eggs and numerous other diseases. With electricity, water pumping and purification as well as flush toilets and local sewage treatment plants are possible. As a start, clean water wells with manual pumps are needed in local villages as well as replacing open pit toilets with septic systems that enclose waste. Without electricity, both hand pumped clean water wells and improved pit toilets to end open defecation can and should be made available as soon as possible.
Transportation: The development of roads and railroads needed for economic development and access to healthcare facilities, employment opportunities and markets is discouraged or prohibited, as disruptive to wildlife habitats. Roads and railroads are erroneously assumed to break up habitats, isolate wildlife populations and disrupt seasonal migration patterns. All of these myths have been thoroughly refuted in areas where new roads and pipelines have not disrupted migration and sometimes resulted in more not less wildlife.
Modern Agriculture: Modern agricultural methods and high yield crops are discouraged or prevented in favor of less productive, more labor intensive subsistence, so-called sustainable, aka organic, farming, “for the good of the environment.” This has the opposite effect and causes soil depletion that naturally results in slash and burn deforestation as depleted fields must be abandoned for freshly cleared land. Modern agriculture is a more sustainable practice, requiring only rotation of crops on fewer acres than subsistence farming and greatly increased yields per acre. Higher yield per acre means fewer acres are needed to feed a population, saves forests and makes surplus produce available to sell or trade. Modern agriculture using fertilizers, pesticides and improved crop varieties are opposed by organic farming organizations and subsidizing governments in developed nations. The Green Revolution of improved varieties and practices, available for 50 years, has been applied successfully in some African nations, but only in areas with adequate roads for access to markets. Building the transportation infrastructure could facilitate introduction of modern agriculture in less developed areas.
GMO[ii] aka Biotech and Improved Crops: Banning or discouraging the use of more productive, more drought, insect and disease resistant and more nutritious conventional high yield and GMO crops for improved yields and better nutrition is a crime against humanity. For example, GMO Golden Rice, provides vitamin A that could end the cycle of blindness and death among the poor whose diets are dominated by rice. The European Union has a ban on all agricultural products, not just GMO, from countries that grow any GMO crops. This ban is largely based on protecting subsidized European farmers from competition by African, Asian and American produce.
Governments of many poor countries choose to ban GMO crops so they can sell their produce to the European Union, not because of any fears of GMO scare stories propagated by anti-GMO advocacy groups. These advocacy groups are backed by Western organic farming organizations to suppress their domestic and imported competition from high yield conventional and GMO crops, thus increasing their market share. GMO is a term used by these groups for biotech improved varieties to imply harmful when it really means improved food crops by inserting specific genes to enhance characteristics such as higher nutrition and crop yields, drought, disease and insect resistance and reduced need for pesticides.
Contrary to scare stories, most companies have given away rights to many of these crops to help poor people, who can choose to grow them or not. Contrary to propaganda of anti-GMO advocates, no one is forced to grow GMO or buy any agricultural chemical. Propaganda would have you believe the big bad Monsanto is holding the world hostage, but the truth is that there are at least 60 developers in a dozen countries involving at least one beneficial modification in each of 30 varieties of fruits, vegetables and fibers. Why would so many develop and promote products that harm their customers? That’s illogical and ridiculous!
In June of 2016, over 100 Nobel Laureates signed an open letter to Greenpeace, the UN and Governments around the world to stop their criminal campaign against Biotech improved crops and in particular Golden Rice that can save the lives and sight of millions. You can read the letter here http://supportprecisionagriculture.org/nobel-laureate-gmo-letter_rjr.html
Industry: Environmentalists and communists discourage development of industry, including manufacturing and natural resource extraction (oil, gas, coal, minerals), as exploiting the workers and harmful to the environment, rather than, in reality, providing employment while raising the standard of living and improving environmental stewardship. The result is high unemployment, unabated poverty and an inability to care for the environment. Control of diseases that now cause high absenteeism and low productivity is as important as reliable electricity for industry. (see DDT above) Foreign and domestic investment and development should be encouraged. Support from industry could further economic and infrastructure development.
Medicine: The UN and environmental organizations have failed to make local medical facilities and medicines available to rural areas. This is tied to failure to provide adequate roads and railroads as well as natural gas and electrical power needed for these facilities and their availability to the rural poor. This is also linked to the population control agenda. In many areas, healing medicines and facilities are lacking essential medicines and devices, while birth control and sterilization facilities are well stocked.
Education: Failure to build schools or to provide instruction in hygiene, nutrition and childcare, and to train the people for skilled and semi-skilled labor, modern agriculture and small business administration. There is also a great need for higher learning facilities to provide medical, technical and leadership personnel.
HIV/AIDS: Diagnosis in rural areas based on symptoms without confirmation of the virus is an excuse for not treating longstanding endemic illnesses and malnutrition. Most of those “diagnosed” with AIDS in poor countries have not been tested for the actual HIV virus. They have been assumed to have HIV/AIDS through disparate symptoms such as fever, headache, rash, sore throat, swollen lymph nodes, weight loss, chronic diarrhea and/or cough, all of which can be caused by malnutrition and many common parasites or infectious diseases as well as severe illnesses such as malaria or tuberculosis (TB). The United Nations has named TB as a leading indicator of AIDS. By the UN diagnosing AIDS from symptoms without lab tests, many TB and malaria victims were left untreated, resulting in higher death rates, (falsely attributed to HIV/AIDS).
While TB and other chronic illnesses often weaken the immune systems and cause acquired immune deficiency, i.e. AIDS, it has nothing to do with HIV or sexual behavior. This deception has a triple whammy for the UN. It excuses high death rates and failure to treat endemic diseases, it incentivizes HIV/AIDS research funding in developed countries by falsely declaring it a pandemic, and it has the potential for vindicating population control programs in the minds of potential donors by creating a false picture of rampant immorality and promiscuity. Even with HIV/AIDS diagnosis, treatment should concentrate on treating the presenting malnutrition and endemic diseases first, e.g. malaria, TB, etc., instead of starting with AIDS chemotherapy, which further depresses the immune system, or no treatment at all.
It should also be noted that those actually tested for HIV/AIDS in urban settings may be misdiagnosed due to low specificity of the test, failure to properly retest and several factors such as pregnancy or other diseases that cause false positives. Manufacturers of the tests require retesting by more than one type of detection protocol for confirmation. The unusually high incidence in South Africa, (60% female at a rate of 15-25% of the population compared to less than 2% in other countries,) may be due to administration at gynecological clinics and failure to retest by more than one method. Any retests are only done by the same protocol as the original diagnosis. Here again, treatment of the endemic diseases first is crucial. HIV/AIDS doesn’t kill people; it cripples the immune system and reduces resistance to other diseases. Note: retesting after HIV/AIDS treatment is started may result in false negatives so it is useless.
Cultural Preservation (Stagnation): Environmentalists promote preservation of primitive cultures in toto as of higher importance than developing higher standards of living while preserving cultural heritages. There is no harm to the cultural heritage by replacing thatched roofs with metal or tile roofs and adding doors and screens to keep out insects and small animals, as well as other “modern” improvements such as electric lights, refrigerators and stoves; a clean water well and proper toilets; a road passable by vehicles to get to markets and clinics, etc.
Political Unrest: Failure to address political corruption, violence and terrorism creates a climate that tends to keep out aid workers from charitable organizations. It also puts roadblocks in the way of developing the economy, industry, education, healthcare, electrical power and transportation infrastructure. Violence in any form must be controlled for development to advance. Pressure by international organizations should be applied to address corrupt governments, lawlessness and violence.
Anticolonial propaganda was and is spread by socialists and communists as a way to control the people and make them suspicious of development efforts by Western charities. Muslim groups have also propagated these scare stories. In the 1960s the Soviet Union stirred up anti-colonialism among African nations leading to demands for independence from colonial powers without adequate preparation for proper self-governance. This was #43 of the 45 Communist Goals revealed by Dr. Cleon Skousen in his 1958 book The Naked Communist and read into the Congressional Record in 1963, “#43. Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government.” 35 African nations became independent in the 1960s, half a dozen in the late 1950s and a similar number in the 1970s. Of course, a large part of the blame falls on the colonial powers that failed to prepare the people for self government or to develop sufficient infrastructure needed for economic development. Rather than a fast overthrow without preparation, a more gradual training and handing over of the government would have prepared them better for self-government and avoided much of the political upheaval, power struggles and violence.
In Summary: As can be readily seen, these priorities are upside down, many having the opposite effect of their stated goals. Keeping people on bare subsistence almost guarantees high birth rates to help farm and in anticipation of high infant and childhood mortality, while causing maximum harm to the environment.
To develop a robust economy, a healthy workforce and infrastructure to facilitate economic development are needed. By far, disease control and electrical power are most needed and can drive development. DDT and electricity could jump-start this development followed by transportation, clean water, sanitation, and medical facilities. Control of insect borne diseases would eliminate high rates of employee absenteeism, encourage both domestic and foreign investment in manufacturing and other industries, and provide much needed jobs and money to raise families out of poverty.
Private corporations in Western countries need to take a fresh look at Africa for investment in foreign production in lieu of communist China. Investment in infrastructure could produce significant benefits while raising the standard of living of millions and developing new markets and protecting the environment. Such successes could have a domino effect. Small starts can become large movements. Already, the future is bright in cities where adequate infrastructure has attracted foreign and domestic investment. In these areas, business sectors outside agriculture and extractive industries are making significant progress.
Get involved. You can do your part as individuals by donating to worthy charities, not UN and Red Cross/Crescent, which squander donations and work through corrupt governments. World Vision http://www.wvi.org/about-world-vision and Samaritan’s Purse https://www.samaritanspurse.org/ ) lead my list of worthy charities for helping needy people directly. Both feature designated donations and have Christmas catalogues that allow donors to buy shares of projects such as clean water wells, medicines, schools, cattle and small animals, agriculture and small business training and support, etc.
Several organizations support biotech, high yield crops and modern farming practices such as: ISAAA, International Service for Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications at http://www.isaaa.org/ and Genetic Literacy Project at https://geneticliteracyproject.org/donate/
[i] See part 1 for more information at International Organizations deny essential services to poor countries, Part 1
[ii] GMO or “Genetically Modified Organisms” is a term invented by the Organic Farming Industry to scare people into avoiding such improved foods. “Non-GMO” is an ignorant term that is used for advertising purposes and to placate Big Organic’s smear campaigns. There is absolutely no benefit to it. The better terms are Precision Agriculture or Biotech Crops. So-called GMO involves a process where a specific plant gene is inserted into a plant to give it beneficial characteristics. Earlier plant breeding processes used a shotgun approach where whole genomes are involved in cross breeding or radiation treatment, and hoping that more beneficial than harmful genes will show up in some off-spring.
The new book: Saving Africa from Lies that Kill: How Myths about the Environment and Overpopulation are Destroying Third World Countries will be published in September, 2018. Print and ebook will be available online and in bookstores.
