[afro-nets] Roy Innis on malaria (9)

General afro-nets
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Roy Innis on malaria (9)
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Dear Colleagues

Jeff Buderer recently introduced the issue of environment into the dialog about the malarial dimension of African health. While I do believe that we should take reasonable steps to preserve (and improve) the environment, the priority should be to improve quality of life and expectation of life for everyone, including Africans.

With 3,000 children dying daily from malaria, mostly in Africa ... addressing the prevalence of malaria ought to be a clear priority. Almost certainly DDT seems to be the most effective approach and least costly, especially in combination with other interventions in an integrated approach.

Yesterday the LA Times carried an article by Marla Cone about a DDT study done at the University of California Berkeley. The following is a letter I have sent today to the LA Times editors.

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Roy Innis on malaria (10)
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Peter,

1. I don't believe you have to sacrifice the environment to meet human needs.

2. The point of my email was that a noted expert in health care refer to evidence linking global warming to an increase in many health problems including malaria and that this should be considered in the exploration of the malaria problem.

3. As others have noted here...citing Stephen Milloy to back the use of DDT - as has been done here in the past - does does not help to persuade many of us here who are convinced of the need of integrated health care approach that is based on sound science.

Jeff

--
Jeff Buderer
mailto:jeff@onevillage.biz

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Roy Innis on malaria (11)
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Dear Colleagues

In response to Jeff Buderer

Jeff said: > 1. I don't believe you have to sacrifice the environment to meet human needs.

This is NOT what is being said in this current DDT dialog. What is being said is that the DDT is the most effective and least cost way of addressing the global malaria pandemic, and that the collateral damage to the environment from using DDT as the pesticide of choice for interior residual spraying (IRS) is tiny relative to the huge value of reducing the prevalence of malaria and its associated mortality and morbidity.

In good accounting there is the concept of "materiality", and as one of very few professional accountants involved with the international relief and development sector, I would like to see better use made of this concept. Using DDT within an IRS program has an immaterial impact on the environment, but using DDT has a material impact on the health and well-being of the people who are much less at risk of having malaria.

I do not see the people who want to use DDT to reduce the huge crisis of malaria in Africa is sacrificing the environment, though some environmentalists seem happy to sacrifice people in malaria affected areas to the tune of 3,000 children every day, and a good many more including adults.

Jeff said: > 2. The point of my email was that a noted expert in health care refer to evidence linking global warming to an increase in many health problems including malaria and that this should be considered in the exploration of the malaria problem.

Applying the idea of materiality ... there is an existing crisis in which some 3,000 children die every day from malaria, mainly in Africa. Compared to this the likely fact that global warming will increase this is by some percentage is interesting but not very important. Run the numbers to see what I mean.

Jeff said: > 3. As others have noted here...citing Stephen Milloy to back the use of DDT - as has been done here in the past - does not help to persuade many of us here who are convinced of the need of integrated health care approach that is based on sound science.

Others have cited Stephen Milloy ... but I prefer to go back to the various studies that have been done by competent scientists. As you are probably aware, Sardinia was one of the last places in Europe to have endemic malaria and DDT was heavily used to get mosquitoes and malaria under control. Massive amounts of DDT were used, and malaria was brought under control. To the surprise of many the impact on the health of the Sardinian population resulting from these high uses of DDT more than 50 years ago has been OK (not a very scientific term, I know) while the benefit from not having malaria has been huge.

Please do not deflect the dialog about DDT and malaria and legitimate questions about environmental safety into the Stephen Milloy space. I think we can find plenty of good scientific facts without using Stephen Milloy as an intermediary.

My concluding thought is that the international relief and development sector (RDS), which is almost totally donor driven in terms of what it does as a priority has been quite cynical in terms of its analysis of performance and its choice of priorities ... the results of failed development are catastrophic, and yet the leaders in the RDS still seem to think that more money doing things wrong will have a better impact than what we have seen in the past. Few people in leadership positions seem to "get it" and want to get some real reform that will put resources where some real value will be realized. The DDT debate is typical of this situation. 3,000 African children dying every day from malaria ... and use of DDT is being held to ransome by European supermarkets selling organic roses! Where is the materiality analysis in this, unless African children have NO VALUE in the European and "north" context. Hopefully this is starting to change. It is long overdue.

Sincerely

Peter Burgess
Transparency and Accountability Network
Tr-Ac-Net Inc.
1 212 772 6918
mailto:peterbnyc@gmail.com

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Roy Innis on malaria (12)
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Peter,

I agree with you as per my last posting. We are not sacrificing the environment with DDT usage. There are other chemicals but .......? As I have said before the people of Africa do not live under a bed net, they are outside in the evenings because they have no AC. This is when they are bitten by the mosquito. YOU HAVE TO CONTROL THE MOSQUITO.

Craig Audiss
mailto:cybrcollectinc@yahoo.com

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Roy Innis on malaria (13)
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Craig, what is this "AC" that people in Africa do not have?

Regards,

Daniel Chirundu
mailto:dchirundu@comone.co.zw

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Roy Innis on malaria (14)
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Peter,

Thanks for the comments about Kris - that is needed and appreciated - althought i did not see the critical emails. However the point is taken and I often wonder if I myself often sound like a record player talking about the need for an integrated approach to development.

You are misreading my comments and it seems to me like a straw man approach. So I am going to reassert my points

The real disagreement I have with you and some of the others here is not about the use of DDT so much as the approach or way of thinking about this that is put forward in regards to seeing DDT as this panacea. Its understandable that you see Malaria as one of the major health care issues in Africa but it is NOT the only one. And I do believe the issue is more complex than is often put forward in this group.

For the problem is not with malaria, the enviromentalist or DDT but rather with corrupt arrogant and top down oriented instutions all over the world putting forward public and corporate policies (as well as NGOs) that do not truly reflect the public interest. Therefore I do believe Kris' "Transparency and Accountability Mantra" is much more relevant and innovative than the overworn and simplistic Malaria-DDT ones.

I say this because I believe strongly that without an comprenehsive health care and overall development plan, another problem will simply emerge to replace malaria because the real issue is corrupt and ineffective governance and not malaria and deep down i think we all know that. Indeed we see that there is not one world urgent issue but a series of them. In addition we see patterns by which the problems of the developed world complement the developing world. Yes, Malaria needs to be addressed but I think the real and more deeper issue is trust and so that is why such care and thoughtful thinking needs to be used in terms of how we discuss these issues.

My real point of inserting the global warming issue is that it is altering the patterns of the planet in a powerful and unprecedented way. And Craig, I do have to say that your skepticism about Global Warming is to many experts, analogous to saying the EARTH is FLAT. Every year the science is growing stronger about global warming and every year those who still resist this look more uncredible in claiming to make a professional case for disproving it. Indeed many of the Global Warming naysayers such as interestingly enough our good friend Stephen Milloy are paid by (surprise) the very companies that stand to lose the most if we were to adapt sensible policies to reverse Global Warming. We are talking about changes in the climate that may be so destructive that in the next few years that they may drawf concerns about malaria by several orders of magnitude!

So to reiterate, just thinking about malaria will not get us there to the point of global sustainability or even survival. So thinking about malaria in the context and in concert with other global challenges and issues will and national policies need to reflect this more sophisticated way of seeing and understanding how the world truly works.

AIDS, TB, Malaria and malnutrition all seem to be major challenges for health care professionals in Africa and other developing regions. We need to develop comprehensive and sustainable health care development plan that while operating on the regional and national level is truly community and grassroots oriented. It may be that we need to use DDT to improve the health of these societies, but we need to balance this with consideration for the state of the environment and potential long term sideeffects ot using DDT as in the case of the other toxic chemicals that we have grown accustomed to using in the modern world.

A sustainable health care policy in my view is one that is holistic in seeing synergies between various diseases and dysfunctional behaviors in society but also seeking to promote preventative care approaches that minimize the need to see the health professional. For example high levels of pollution in developing countries will lead to more disease over the long term so any cost savings over the short term in running factories without proper controls will be more than compensated by the long term health costs to the society.

So on the same levels using DDT would ultimately have to measured along those lines comparing the short term benefits in eradicating the disease with the long term costs of health and ecological impacts associated with POPs like DDT.

In regards to your comment, Peter about the flowers I would say I have every right as a consumer to DEMAND that what I buy have no trace of POPs or any other toxic modern chemical on them! This is really a hypothetical issue as I dont know the specifics about the flowers in relation to Kenya. Yet it is one thing to say that a people have a right to take extreme measuring including using a POP chemical to eradicate a devastating disease but this should not be equated with another people feeling like that have to import a product from that region that may have traces of chemical which may adversely impact their health.

Jeff
mailto:jeff@onevillage.biz

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Jeff.

I guess I must clarify my point again. Al Gore has been running around for I guess 15 years with a video that proclaims the environment is doomed in 10 years unless we do something now. I am very sure that scientists on both sides of the spectrum work for someone with something to lose.

Unless you think it is impossible for one chemical company to fund research for a new chemical verses say: DDT and it is in the best interest of that company to find a reason why the new chemical is better or SAFER. We are talking about millions of dollars, probably billions. New chemicals cost money to develop and good ol DDT is already out there and cheap. Get the picture.

It amazes me how people can think politicians are crooked but big business is white as snow. Big business contributes to politicians not children dying in Africa.

Yes Jeff I am skeptical about this so called Global Warming. I have been close to the environment my entire life, I am a 4th generation Farmer/Rancher. I have used many chemicals to attempt growing food to feed a hungry world. I have also traveled extensively and am not afraid to tell you that I have read alot and researched alot on these things and I am not convinced. I do not believe in letting people suffer unnecessarily. I do everything in my power to make sure my animals are healthy and the food I raise is nutritious, I would think that we could do the same for humans.

I also have three children that I want to have a chance at a good life, so I am not calous about the environment and the futures of my children.

I do however take strong exception to your comment that," malaria needs to be addressed but the real and deeper issue is trust"? Sorry but I don't see it that way, people are dying by the thousands and trust is way down the list as far as I'm concerned. I want action, I will get trust enroute to real change. As far as your "THE WORLD IS FLAT", comment I felt was a little over the top. If I don't happen to agree with you it does not give you the right to call me stupid.

Oh by the way 3000 people will die today while we argue.

Cheers

Craig
mailto:cybrcollectinc@yahoo.com

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Roy Innis on malaria (16)
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Daniel, I am using AC to mean Air Conditioning

Craig
mailto:cybrcollectinc@yahoo.com

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Jeff attributes the inadequate attention given to malaria mainly to corrupt, arrogant, and top-down oriented institutions. That description of the institutions may be accurate, but I think the more fundamental explanation for the inattention is that the global community really does not care enough.

I have been working on a comparable problem, the problem of widespread malnutrition in the world. Poverty is hardly an adequate explanation for such widespread and persistent malnutrition. After all, the world as a whole is not poor. Fundamentally, malnutrition exists and persists because of powerlessness and indifference. There are three key points:

Disjunction. Hunger and other major forms of malnutrition persist largely because the people who have the power to solve the problem are not the ones who have the problem.

Material interests. The powerful serve mainly the powerful, not the powerless, because the powerless cannot do much for the benefit of the powerful.

Compassion. On the whole, the people who have the power do not have much compassion for the powerless.

Wouldn't this apply to malaria as well?

I have been looking at past global summits and declarations on malnutrition. They try to suggest that the global community is doing something about the problem, but when you look more closely you see that they always push the responsibility back to the separate nations. The world as a whole does not take responsibility. I have essayed on this at http://www2.hawaii.edu/~kent/THE%20MISSING%20GLOBAL%20STRATEGY.doc

I suspect that the same point could be made with regard to malaria: the world as a whole has never really taken it seriously. Am I right? Is there a serious GLOBAL plan for dealing with it?

Aloha, George
mailto:kent@hawaii.edu

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Roy Innis on malaria (18)
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George,

I would have to humbly say that I think you actually get to the heart of the matter. We have to take responsibility for this situation all six plus billion of us.

The people get the government they deserve. The leadership will only be as good as the people in the societies of the world demand it to be. If they/we continue to allow themselves/ourselves to be manipulated by cynical and power driven people, then what does that say about humanity itself. Indeed more to your point most of us are simply - when you get down to it - concerned about our own needs and we have become oblivious to the concerns and realities of others - esp those in absolute poverty.
This selfishness and self-centeredness is actually encouraged by the social mainstreams in nearly all the world societies.

I find Craig's comments to be going against my experiences of the American educational system which for the most part from my view encouraging conformity and discouraging critical thinking. To be fair, I doubt if the US educational model is the outlier globally. So then should we be surprised that the world's citizens for the most gravitate to the logic of the lowest common denominator of human existence which is every person for themselves? This is an important role of consumer culture - keep people distracted on superficial things so that they do not become aware of what is really going on in the world.

The bottom line will be no real solutions to these health problems we are talking about until this pattern of behavior changes on a very large scale.

The US is not the source of the world's ills but it bears a high level of responsibility because it claims to hold itself to a higher standard and has a great deal of influence in the world due to the simple fact that it still controls 30 percent of the world's economy (despite having only about 5 percent of its population!). Yet it still continues to stifle its most creative people by encouraging a superficial approach to exploring and solving the world's complex problems and of course its global policies more reflects the needs of the power rather than considering the needs and views of the people in the country’s' affairs it has intervened in - in the past such as Iran. So the result is not surprising, increasing resentment and distrust of the US and the West among the developing world. Here we go again...Interestingly of course these patterns parallel that which is going in each respective country.

These health issues we discuss here disproportionately affect the very poor who have no resources to deal with them, while the rich get exponentially richer. How encouraging it is that Warren Buffet has donated much of his fortune to help. However one wonders if it is in time to address the world urgent issues that threaten to destabilize the globalization. Will Buffet's donation to Gates Foundation compensate for the negative aspects of his wealth creation on the world? Much of Buffet's profits came from cigarette companies, fast food and the like... So when all those billions are tallied and earmarked for the benefit of humanity, will there be a net gain for humanity - or a net negative?

I only hope that we can form global alternatives to this failed model in a timely manner. Current events seem to indicate that time for a real change in global policies is indeed short.

Indeed as you seem to imply, the issue is not them it is us. We need to take responsibility for the global situation not just as professionals but as human beings.

The real question is not so much about whether to use or not to use DDT to fight malaria but rather can we find the common ground to act in a balanced, comprehensive and thoughtful way.

Thanks for your comments..

Jeff Buderer
mailto:jeff@onevillage.biz

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Thank you Jeff. This sort of conversation helps us to think, collectively, about the way forward.

I am increasingly convinced that we need to put much more attention on serious strategic planning for dealing with the issues. In about a month I will be going to South Africa to work with an NGO on its Human Rights Development Initiative. Its participants are students from law clinics throughout Africa. I will ask them, collectively, to think about what could be done to strengthen the human right to adequate food throughout Africa. I will ask them to look at what could be done not only in individual countries, but also regionally and globally. That is, part of their question will be: what are the obligations of the global community, taken as a whole, with regard to malnutrition in Africa?

One could readily substitute "malaria" or "HIV/AIDS" or a number of other concerns where I have spoken of "malnutrition." I think we need to look beyond the immediate technical and clinical manifestations of our concerns and ask how we can come to grips with these things as a matter of governance, locally, nationally, regionally, and globally. Who should carry what responsibilities? How do we get effective partnerships working across all these levels?

To me, this all adds up to solid, collective, serious strategic planning.

Aloha, George
mailto:kent@hawaii.edu

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George,

I do agree very much with what you are saying. Same goes to your comments about the MGDs.

The money devoted to pencil pushing, traveling, conferences and consultants should be carefully evaluated. I do believe that much of the money now earmarked for development is not used in the most effective way (and there is considerable evidence for this). I do believe that much of the current overhead costs are bloated and need to be channelled into the development of innovative field research centers that incorporate best practices to promote an integrated approach to sustainable development. If this dysfunctional and wasteful pattern of investment/donor funding is not changed, we will not even come close to reaching the MGDs. Indeed the issue is not as Jeffrey Sachs says - that we need to spent more money on development - but rather first spend what we already invest in a more effective way. I think this will partially address the lack of engagement that many in affluent regions have.

Yet we need to also keep in mind that the current scope of spending is so unmatched with the scale of the problem that this leads to many inefficiencies, including spreading funding too thin on too many field projects that all need funding and overall system fatigue. We need to consider a restructuring of the development strategies that involves significantly increased spending in the coming years. In the mean time, how can we get involved so our work becomes the model for that restructuring and reform effort?

One interesting project doing work in this area (combining health care, ICT and microfinance among other things) of multisectorial development is Fantsuam Foundation in Nigeria http://www.fantsuam.org.

OVF is also considering similar themed projects in several countries in Africa at this time. I definitely would be open to considering collaboration with you or anyone on this list (who is interested) in an effort to build a community oriented approach (very much along the lines of what Peter and Kris have put forward in terms of Community Centric Sustainable Development) to address the MGDs.

Jeff Buderer
oneVillage Foundation
mailto:jeff@onevillage.biz

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Jeff, your views expressed here merit consideration by all.

Yes. We should network more closely and develop a rugged model of Community Centric Sustainable Development Model.

I know John is doing a great job. We should be able to replicate it.

I think we need to push International Funding Agencies to accept more social audit and keep a small budget for it. It pays back multifold returns, compared to the huge budget they keep, for administrative expenses.

Like you, I and Peter are open to collaborating with you, John, George and anyone else in this group, to work together for common global benefit. Great people think alike! Fools seldom differ!!

We are promoting the concept of biometric tracking of people and their activities for monitoring project expenses. This is slowly getting recognised in India. More on this later.

Regards,

Kris Dev.
mailto:krisdev@gmail.com

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In Jeff Buderer�s message of Jul 18, 2006, at 1:29 AM, he writes: �The money devoted to pencil pushing, traveling, conferences and consultants should be carefully evaluated. I do believe that much of the money now earmarked for development is not used in the most effective way (and there is considerable evidence for this). I do believe that much of the current overhead costs are bloated and need to be channelled into the development of innovative field research centers that incorporate best practices to promote an integrated approach to sustainable development.� Often what is wasteful or costly to some is beneficial to others.

He refers to �we�. Who is the "we" here, really? So far as I can see, the global community itself has not made a serious commitment to the MDGs. The Millennium Development Program is based on the premise that nations that have demonstrated they lack the capacity and/or will to do what needs to be done will in fact do what needs to be done.

Annan's report to Ecosoc of 8 May 2006 (E/2006/60) says that Official Development Assistance rose to 0.33 percent of gross national income in 2005.

He notes: mention �In the mean time, how can we get involved so our work becomes the model for that restructuring and reform effort?�. Currently, my favorite answer is: multi-level strategic planning.

He also notes �One interesting project doing work in this area (combining health care, ICT and microfinance among other things) of multisectorial development is Fantsuam Foundation in Nigeria�. Can it be brought to scale? nationally? globally?

He further writes: �OVF is also considering similar themed projects in several countries in Africa at this time. I definitely would be open to considering collaboration with you or anyone on this list (who is interested) in an effort to build a community oriented approach (very much along the lines of what Peter and Kris have put forward in terms of Community Centric Sustainable Development) to address the MGDs.�. I'd like to learn about all this.

Aloha, George

--
Professor George Kent
Department of Political Science
University of Hawai'i
Honolulu, Hawai'i 96822
USA

Phone: +1 808 396-9422
Cell: +1 808 389-9422
Fax: +1 808 956-6877
Email: mailto:kent@hawaii.edu
Website: http://www2.hawaii.edu/~kent
Skype ID: geokent

New book: Freedom from Want: The Human Right to Adequate Food
http://press.georgetown.edu/detail.html?id=1589010566

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Roy Innis on malaria (23)
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Kris,

I am interested in your comment about Biometric Tracking. A similar subject came up while studying for my masters and I would like to hear an elaboration on this subject.

Craig
mailto:cybrcollectinc@yahoo.com