Organochlorine+Pesticides

Scott Thayres

Background-

Organochlorines are another one of lifes most useful and helpful pesticides, but costly. An organochlorine is a pesticide that was used to help kepp crops bug free as all pesticides job is supposed to be. The organochlorines used for this or DDT (dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane) for short. Not only was this used for pest control on crops, it was used in a wider range of ways also. DDT was used for mosquito control and malaria control. Because mosquitos carried malaria, people could easily control the mosquitos irritation and the spreading of malaria easily. In World War II, it was introduced to soldiers and military and resulted in the saving of countless lives. When it came down to it, organochlorines are the most easy and useful pesticide there was. It increased insect resistence, it was affordable to make and buy, it was effective, persistent and versatile. The U.S. wasn’t the only country using it though. Many other countries took hold of this glories pesticide including India and China. Through the years though, some had a change of heart. The years past and cons of organochlorines increased. The pesticide was soon outlawed in the U.S. and China. The concerns were that it caused major health issues to arise. It’s toxicity took bug eating birds down out of the skys and almost many species of birds were wiped out including bald eagles and brown pelicans. Also, it rose the percentage of having breast cancer (which was later proven to be false) in women and high amounts of DDT was found in breast milk.

Health and Nutrition-

Organochlorines are not a happy looking fruit that they put up on the kiddy food group charts and for kids, organochlorines are not their best of friends. Mothers hold one of the highest amounts of DDT and other organochlorines in their bodies. Most of it can be found in their breast milk, but the thing is, some children are inheriting them by feeding or birth. Because they have compounds that degrade slowly, are lipid soluble and bioaccumulate in our food chain, organochlorines are real easy to detect and find in the human body. Luckily for women, organochlorines do not promote breast cancer. For children, it’s a far different story. Hypospadias, an not so normal opening of the urethra and cryptorchidism, the failure of one or two testicles to descend are two genital anomalies that ocure due to endocrine-disruptors such as DDT, an organochloride. Endocrine-disruptors are exogenous substances that act like hormones, but the downside is that they do the exact opposite of what a hormone does. When they are in our endocrine system which is the system of our hormones, they disrupt the physiological functions of our hormones. This is just a theory, so if what happens between us and organochlorines is still a mystery.

Enviormental- Organochlorines are not enviormentally friendly. This pesticide may be able to take out pests of crops and irritations, it killed many birds. The bald eagle, peregrine falcon and the brown pelican got lucky because these three species were almost wiped out because of the food that they ate was toxicated by the organochlorines. Rachel Carson, the author of “Silent Night,” wrote about the enviormental issues that arose with the birds dieing from the pesticide. Also, eggshells were also said to be a problem caused by organochlorines, but there are other factors that could thin down eggshells layers.

Production-

Organochlorines are not fully manmade pesticides. Most of the pesticide is organic, hense the name. The process of retrieving this pesticide is call organochlorine synthesis. Slat is one of the most abundant source because of it’s chlorine element inhabitant. Anyway, to get organochlorine, you need it by itself. Once the chlorine is by itself, they need to bond with carbon atoms. The chlorines are unstable when bounded together and when they bond with an organic substance, the chlorine gas dissociate each other and form new bonds with carbon atoms and replace the hydrogen atoms due to chlorine’s electronegativity and urge for an electron. Da da da! You have organochlorine.

Economic and Political-

Organochlorine used to be a very effective pesticide, but due to the enviormental and human health issues that arose, organochlorine has been banned in many countries including the U.S. The issue, enviormental and human health were ak risk. Even though most of them are banned, lindane, endosulfan, methoxychlor, dicofol and pentachlorophenyol are still being produced and used in the U.S. Some organochlorines are recently being banned globally by the Persisten Organic Pollutantsnad nine are now targeted.

Summary-

Organochlorines is a nice big bowl of issues with enviormentalists even though it has great uses. Organochlorines are a very effective pesticide, but it just wasn’t animal friendly and a lot of people including Rachel Carson the author of “Silent Night,” wanted it banned. Pesticide was just one of it’s uses. Medically, it was used to help control malaria and mosquitos, but it can cause major damage to children such as giving male children hypospadias and mothers contain some of the highest amounts in their bodies. Even though it is already banned, it was a very good choice to make because it was a very big problem with human and animal health especially enviormentally because we almost wiped out the bald eagle and brown pelican. I do not know what to say about other countries like India who still use it because their technology is not as advanced as ours and it is still useful to them especially malaria control. So in all, it should be banned, but only depending on the economical and technological status of the country because money makes the world go round now a days.