DDT

Frozen blood samples

Pre-natal exposure to DDT linked to increased likelihood of breast cancer

Health

Though the pesticide DDT was banned in the US in 1972, its effects in the human body may live on. New research has found the strongest link yet between exposure to DDT in the womb and the likelihood of breast cancer later in life.

DDT debate heats up

Environment

WHO reverses policy on DDT to control malaria

Health & Medicine
Dorothy Kalema holds up her bed net with large holes.

Bed Nets for Malaria: Losing the Arms Race?

Health & Medicine

“Silent Spring Turns” 50

The World

Breast Cancer & Pesticides in 1991

Living on Earth revisits a 1991 story on possible links between pesticides and breast cancer. Dr. Mary Wolff, one of the first U.S. researchers to look for evidence to link DDT exposure to breast cancer talks about her controversial results.

DDT Ban Debate

Living On Earth’s science commentator Janet Raloff speaks with host Steve Curwood about the negotiations concluded this week at the United Nations Environment Program’s third conference on persistent organic pollutants (or POPs). A particularly contentious point was the use of DDT to control malaria.

New Threat to Bald Eagles

The bald eagle was headed for extinction in the 1960s de to DDT, that caused eagles to lay eggs with thin shells. Since then the ban of DDT in 1972, eagle populations have slowly rebounded. Now, there is a new threat. In 1994, fishermen found an eagle carcass on Degray Lake near Little Rock. So […]

The World

Bald Eagles Back From the Brink

Catherine Winter of Minnesota Public Radio reports on the comeback of America’s most famous endangered species. Thanks to strong legal protection and the banning of DDT in the United States, bald eagle populations are growing, and the federal government may upgrade the birds from endangered to threatened. Not everyone’s cheering the news; some worry that […]

The World

Breast Cancer and Chlorine

Brenda Wilson reports on the movement among cancer researchers toward examining the link between breast cancer and chemicals found in the environment, including the pesticide DDT. The new momentum is due in part to two recent studies which suggested a link to between breast cancer and DDT and PCBs, both of which are chlorinated chemicals.