A class of potentially toxic chemicals, known as PBDEs, is being found in higher levels in people in North America. The chemicals are used to prevent fires in everything from couch cushions to televisions. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush has more:
Transcript
A class of potentially toxic chemicals, known as PBDE’s, is being found in
higher levels in people in North America. The chemicals are used to prevent
fires in everything from couch cushions to televisions. The Great Lakes
Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush has more:
PBDE’s are used extensively throughout North America. In Europe and Asia
the chemicals are hardly used at all for this purpose. To date, four studies have
indicated that North Americans have considerably higher levels of the
chemicals in their bodies, than do Europeans and Asians. The most recent
study tested the breast milk of 47 women in Texas.
Linda Birnbaum co-authored the study published in the journal Environmental Health
Perspectives. She says while these chemicals were created to save lives,
other chemicals should be developed that won’t be absorbed by human tissue:
“Personally I’m concerned about chemicals that persist and bio-accumulate.
They eventually get to a point be that they can be a problem.”
Some animal tests have shown that the chemicals can be toxic. That’s why the
European Union and the state of California enacted a ban on certain types of PBDE’s.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Mark Brush.
The Bush administration is making it easier for coal-burning power plants to avoid upgrading to modern pollution prevention equipment. But in some cases the power companies are bowing to public pressure to reduce pollution anyway. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Ann Alquist reports:
Transcript
The Bush administration is making it easier for coal-burning power plants to avoid upgrading to
modern pollution prevention equipment. But in some cases the power companies are bowing to
public pressure to reduce pollution anyway. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Ann Alquist
reports:
Elizabeth Dickinson didn’t get any kind of warning about air quality in her neighborhood. She
really didn’t need one. She says couldn’t avoid noticing the pollution in the air.
“A couple years ago, there was almost a week where the air quality in my neighborhood was so
bad that you literally couldn’t sleep. There was a burning back in my throat.”
Dickinson lives in Saint Paul, Minnesota, not too far from one of the oldest coal burning plants
operated by Minnesota’s leading supplier of electricity, Xcel Energy.
She and many other people have been actively working to pressure the company to address the air
quality problems they believe are caused by Xcel’s older plants.
And in a rare move among power companies, Xcel Energy is doing something. In May 2002, the
company put forth a voluntary proposal to convert its two oldest coal burning plants to natural
gas. The oldest plant, Riverside, lies in northeast Minneapolis.
(sound of power plant)
Since it opened in 1911, the Riverside plant has changed very little when it comes to emitting
pollutants. It was grandfathered in under the Clean Air Act of 1970 – which means the plant isn’t
subject to federal environmental mandates.
It didn’t have to install modern pollution control devices unless it upgraded the plant. And now,
under the Bush administration’s new rules, even upgrading it might not trigger the threshold that
would require it to reduce emissions.
“For a little bit over two years, one of the first things I was charged with was to look at all the
emissions in and around southeast Minneapolis and Riverside plant came back as a sore thumb
because of the glaring emissions.”
Justin Eibenholtz is the environmental coordinator for a Minneapolis neighborhood improvement
group. He says that’s why Excel’s decision to convert Riverside to natural gas is such a big deal.
Once it’s converted, the old plant will cut air pollutants by 99 percent. Mercury emissions will be
completely eliminated.
Neighborhood groups such as Eibenhotz’s and big environmental groups alike are praising
Excel’s decision. The Great Lakes Program Coordinator for the Sierra Club, Emily Green, says
the reduction in emissions will mean a better quality of life for residents who live in the Great
Lakes region. That’s because the mercury and other pollutants that were emitted from the plant
often ended up in the Great Lakes through a process called air deposition. That meant pollutants
got into the food chain and contaminated fish.
“The Great Lakes are like a giant bathtub with a very, very slow drain, so that what we put into
the Great Lakes stays there.”
Green says the pollutants don’t go away. They just end up contaminating the air and the water.
“We swim in them, we drink them, you know, the fish swim around in them, and so it’s very,
very important that we recognize, despite their size, how fragile the Great Lakes are.”
Besides polluting the lakes, the air pollution drifted for hundreds of miles, causing health
problems. The effects are already apparent. An independent report commissioned from the
Environmental Protection Agency says pollution from the oldest and dirtiest power plants kills
more than thirty thousand Americans each year – almost twice the number of people killed by
drunk driving and homicide combined.
While the natural gas conversion won’t reduce the level of mercury in the Great Lakes
immediately, it will mean it won’t add to the problem. It also means a more efficient use of a
fossil fuel.
Ron Ellsner is the project manager for Xcel’s proposal.
“The new combined cycles that we’re going to install are on the order of 30 percent more
efficient than what our current coal cycle is. They do that much better a job converting that
energy into fuel into electricity.”
It comes at a cost, though. Xcel estimates converting its Minneapolis and Saint Paul plants will
amount to one billion dollars. By Xcel’s estimate, it’ll be the most expensive power plant
conversion in the history of the United States, and the cost of the conversion will be passed on to
its customers.
That’s fine by Elizabeth Dickinson. She says she, and her neighbors, were paying for it in other
ways already, such as additional healthcare costs. Dickinson says the estimated extra 15 cents a
day for her power bill will be worth it.
“You know, these are the hidden costs of coal burning and they’re huge, and you know, they’re
usually left out of these equations and we’re saying they can’t be left out any longer, they just
can’t be, because it’s too high a cost for us as a society.”
Government regulators still have to approve the plan. Minnesota’s utilities commission is
holding a final round of public hearings before voting for or against Xcel’s proposal to convert to
natural gas.
If the conversion is approved, it will likely put pressure on other power companies in the Great
Lakes region to do the same.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Ann Alquist.
Some low-income suburbs of major metropolitan areas are dumping grounds for used tires. But who’s dumping the tires continues to stump the authorities. In one state, authorities hauled off more than 40,000 used tires last year… and more keep showing up. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jenny Lawton has this report:
Transcript
Some low-income suburbs of major metropolitan areas are dumping grounds for used tires. But
who’s dumping the tires continues to stump the authorities. In one state, authorities hauled off
more than 40-thousand used tires last year… and more keep showing up. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Jenny Lawton has this report:
Today’s job is a small one — inspectors from the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency
have been called in to remove about 3-thousand tires buried in an overgrown junkyard in a remote
corner of Blue Island, a suburb south of Chicago.
The state is paying for this clean-up, because tires are more than a nuisance, they’re a public
health problem.
This unpenned junkyard is overgrown with weeds and swarming with mosquitoes.
State EPA tire inspector George Skrobuton swats a big one from his elbow as he directs his crew.
“You’ve got all these tires here right now. They’re mixed between mattresses, garbage, clothes,
trash, leaves… See what they do is they get these tires out of the trees, the bushes, and the trash –
and they put them in a nice big pile, and they load the piles into the truck – it’s easier that way.
So, I mean, we’ll do the best we can, we’ll try to get every tire off the ground, if possible. And
hopefully, it’ll stay this way.”
The head of a back-hoe pushes aside a heap of garbage and its jaws close on a pile of almost a
dozen tires. Water streams from the knot of rubber as its lifted and dumped into an open semi
truck.
Skrobuton and his team have been called in to remove thousands of tires across the state, piles left
by rogue transporters who are paid to take them away, but pocket their fee instead of taking them
to be processed legally.
Some speculate the dumpers come from as far as Indiana to dump semi-truck-loads of the tires
under the cover of darkness.
Because these tires are on public land, Skrobuton’s team is cleaning them up for free as part of the
state EPA’s tire removal program.
But Skrobuton says this is a problem that just won’t go away.
“We can’t keep cleaning up these tire sites – it costs a lot of money. Y’know especially out here in
the south suburbs, I mean, there are so many forest preserves, and nooks and crannies like this,
that they could dump tires forever. And we don’t know where they’re coming from and that’s a
problem. Y’know, and unlesss they catch them in the act, we’re stuck with this problem.”
Over the last two years, dumpers left over 35-thousand tires in suburban Dixmoor.
With a population of less than 4-thousand, this poor suburb doesn’t have the money to remove the
tires… or fund a police force to keep the dumpers at bay.
So dumpers left their loads in alleys, vacant lots, even behind a school for years.
Village trustee Jerry Smith says the town was helpless until the state EPA came in and removed
all 18-truck-loads of tires last month.
“It’s just horrible, y’know – you go out there one day and it’s clear. And then you come back the
next day, you got 10,000 tires facing you. Well, what are you going to do with them? You can’t
pay the money to dispose them because you don’t have the money to dispose of them. There’s
nothing in our budget we got in there to dispose of tires what’s been dumped. So it’s just a burden
on us.”
But the state EPA’s Todd Marvel says the town had to move the tires because they’re a health
hazard.
He says the mounds of used tires draw more dumpers. And when tires catch fire, they produce a
toxic smoke, and Marvel says spraying water on them just makes things worse.
“So when that tire burns and you put that water on it, you’ve got a pretty contaminated run-off
there, a very oily run-off. And any surface water that’s in the area can be immediately
contaminated if that oily sheen is not contained properly.”
And, of course, there are mosquitoes. Marvel says each tire off its rim can breed thousands of
them, so these dumps are a breeding ground for West Nile.
Because of health concerns in the past, the state started a program to help get rid of these tires.
The state’s used tire clean-up program was created as a way to get the tires out of the state’s
junkyards, and into a useable industry.
People who purchase tires in Illinois pay a fee of $2.50 for each tire, new or used, which goes to
fund clean-ups and put back into the state’s used tire industry.
Most of the tires are shredded and mixed with coal to burn in power plants. Shredded tires can
also be used as the surface for everything from football fields to highways to playgrounds.
Marvel says the program has been so successful, Illinois’s demand for used tires actually exceeds
its generation rate.
“In fact, Illinois is a net importer of used tires. And the state of Illinois is constantly looking at
other markets and developing those markets to ensure that all of the used tires that we generate
and that all of the used tires that we clean-up through the dumps throughout the state have
someplace to go.”
But not all the tires end up where they’re supposed to go. Even though dumpers charge the fees
to process them properly, some of them steal the money and dump them in places such as
Dixmoor.
Dixmoor trustee Jerry Smith says once the tires show up in his town, they don’t have the money
to process them.
He says one company quoted him a price of $6 a tire. Multiply that by thousands.
So for now, he’s hoping the state EPA’s clean-up will last the town a long time.
Although the state EPA has offered Dixmoor support for added surveillance, Smith says a few
well-placed boulders and barricades seemed to do the trick.
Until last week, when 15 truck tires showed up in an alley.
Smith is cautiously optimistic this most recent find won’t multiply overnight.
“Let’s hope not. (laughs) I hope not. I really hope they don’t.”
But Dixmoor’s a small town and can’t afford a large enough police force to stop all the dumpers.
That means, chances are, abandoned tires will start showing up in back alleys and vacant lots
again soon.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Jenny Lawton.
Beach closings due to high levels of bacteria are still causing problems in some parts of the region. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:
Transcript
Beach closings due to high levels of bacteria are still causing problems in some
parts of the Great
Lakes region. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports:
Health officials are doing a better job of monitoring many of the beaches around the
Great
Lakes… but that leads to the beaches being closed more often. Each year the Natural
Resources
Defense Council compiles data it gathers from its own sources and from the
Environmental
Protection Agency. Nancy Stoner is with the NRDC. She says the data show not all
beaches are
monitored the same.
“There are comprehensive monitoring programs in Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and
Pennsylvania and
more limited monitoring programs in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and New York.
Before
going to the beach, I would encourage people to find out and ensure that that beach
is monitored,
that it’s monitored frequently, and that it’s using criteria that are protective of
public health.”
Stoner says the federal government is not spending enough money to find ways to
reduce or
eliminate the polluted runoff and other sources of bacteria-contaminated water that
cause the
beaches to close.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, this is Lester Graham.
Public health officials in the Midwest are trying to control a virus outbreak… believed to be linked to infected prairie dogs sold as pets. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Sean Crawford reports:
Transcript
Public health officials in the Midwest are trying to control a virus outbreak…
believed to be linked to infected prairie dogs sold as pets. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Sean Crawford reports:
There are several confirmed cases of monkeypox now and more are expected.
Authorities are working to track down more than 100 customers of a
suburban Chicago exotic pet dealer.
Dr. Craig Conover with the Illinois Public Health Agency says those who purchased
prairie dogs during the past two months might be at risk.
“We’re making every effort to contact them personally. Many of the individuals are out
of state so the names of such individuals have been transmitted to other state health
departments.”
Conover says some prairie dogs later were traded at swap meets… making it more
difficult to locate them. This is the first time monkeypox has shown up in the
Western hemisphere. While similar to smallpox, it’s usually not as serious, but can
result in fever, chills, and rashes.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Sean Crawford.
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has launched what it calls “a comprehensive campaign to attack Americans’ sedentary habits.” The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tracy Samilton reports:
Transcript
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has launched what it calls “a comprehensive campaign to
attack Americans’ sedentary habits.” The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tracy Samilton reports:
Those involved in the ambitious campaign say they want to change the mindset of a country
which has engineered physical activity out of daily life – with the result that 60% of Americans
are now either overweight or obese. The campaign will help redesign communities originally
designed for the car, so people can walk or bike to destinations. But there’s a right way and a
wrong way to go about that redesign, according to public health expert Rich Killingsworth.
“Many communities are simply just putting in the facility of a sidewalk and forgetting about where it’s connected to and who it’s
connected to and who will it be used by.”
Killingsworth says another pitfall is people aren’t in the habit of biking or walking where they
want to go, which means they may not automatically use the new greenways, bike paths or
sidewalks. So the Foundation is also funding community public health campaigns to encourage people to become more active.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Tracy Samilton.
Dozens of Canadians afflicted with the West Nile virus will be meeting this month to decide whether or not to launch a class action lawsuit against the Ontario government. A Toronto lawyer says he has as many as 100 clients who want to sue the Ontario government for not presenting all the facts about the risk of the disease. They alleged that public health officials didn’t do enough to protect them from the disease. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Dan Karpenchuk reports from Toronto:
Transcript
Dozens of Canadians afflicted with the West Nile virus will be meeting this month to decide
whether or not to launch a class action lawsuit against the Ontario government. A Toronto
lawyer says he has as many as one hundred clients who want to sue the Ontario government for
not presenting all the facts about the risk of the disease. They alleged that public health officials
didn’t do enough to protect them from the disease. Dan Karpenchuk reports from Toronto:
Official Ontario government statistics show there were 374 West Nile cases in the province last
year. But health experts say the number was closer to one thousand. And many of those experts
say the Ontario government played down the threat, keeping critical information out of the public
domain.
Dr. Colin D’Cunha is Ontario’s medical officer of health. D’Cunha has said that the growing
alarm has been driven by hype rather than by facts:
“And I have to remind people that the serious signs and symptoms are seen in less than one per
cent of people who come down with West Nile Virus infection. And to put it in context,
remember that the flu kills about nineteen hundred Canadians each year.”
The lawyer who may bring the suit, says most people were led to believe that the virus would
affect only the sick and the elderly, which has not been the case.
National health officials are now warning that the virus will hit earlier and harder than last year,
and spread across the entire country.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Dan Karpenchuk.
Duke Wagatha drives down from northern Michigan each year to sell his Christmas trees. While in Ann Arbor, he and his crew live in this 1951 Vagabond trailer.
It’s that time of year again – parking lots across the country are filled with Christmas trees. Just about one out of every three people who celebrate Christmas buys a live tree. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush spent some time with one tree grower in the height of tree selling season:
Transcript
It’s that time of year again – parking lots across the country are filled with Christmas trees. Just about one
out of every three people who celebrate Christmas buys a live tree. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Mark Brush spent some time with one tree grower in the height of tree selling season:
(sound of generator, saws, people chatting)
It’s a crisp afternoon at this Christmas tree lot in Ann Arbor, Michigan. That generator you hear is
powering the electric saws. They trim up the base of the tree so it’ll fit your tree stand. The guys’ hands
are blackened with sap and dirt from handling the hundreds of trees that came off of flat-bed trucks. They
take the bundled trees – open them up, and stick them onto stands. They’ve created a makeshift forest in
the middle of this strip mall parking lot. Customers wander through the forest searching for the perfect
tree.
Duke Wagatha runs the tree lot. He appears each year from north Michigan to sell his trees:
“We get here the weekend before Thanksgiving. Takes us probably about a week, or
five days to get set up, with the idea of opening the day after Thanksgiving. We like to let folks get one
holiday out of the way and then we start on the next.”
“Hello folks, how may I help you?…” (fade tree lot sound under)
He calls his business ‘Flat-Snoots Trees.’ You couldn’t tell from looking at his face now – but he
calls it ‘Flat-Snoots’ to make light of a broken nose he suffered in high school.
Duke seems to be a hard working free-spirit. His coveralls are all tarnished with pine needles and sap.
And when he moves, you hear ringing from the bells on his hat. He moves between the trees in his
parking lot forest telling his customers jokes and filling their heads with visions of Scotch pine, Fraser
firs, and Blue Spruce.
Margaret Jahnke has been buying trees from Duke for more than six years:
“He just makes it really personable – and there was one year it was really kind of warm and he had his
Hawaiian shirt on and his straw hat, and he was out here partyin’ away! And I’m like, ‘Whoa!’ It’s fun
to come, you know, just to run in, you know, to talk to him. And they’re really helpful!”
While they’re in Ann Arbor, Duke and his crew live in a 1950’s vintage trailer. The trailer’s paint is
faded, but Duke spruces it up for the holidays with wreaths and pine bows. And when you step inside, the
old lamps and rustic furniture make it seem as if you’ve stepped back in time.
(sound of trailer door opening)
“Whooo! It feels better in here doesn’t it?”
(sound of trailer door closing)
The trailer also doubles as his office. Customers pay for their trees in here and on occasion they’ll have a
complimentary nip of what Duke calls his “bad schnapps.” And the kids might be offered coupons for
free hot chocolate.
Duke is from Mesick, a small rural town in northern Michigan. Christmas tree farming is big business
in Michigan. The state is second only to Oregon in the number of acres that are in Christmas tree
production.
Duke, however, calls himself a small-time grower. He’s a carpenter by trade, but his work tends to dry up in the
long winter months:
“It’s not enough to make a living for me and my family year-round, uh, but it’s a good extra source of
income and uh, winters are tough up there, so if you make a little bit of extra money – winters are tough
and expensive – uh, living in the country, you know, like anybody, you got propane bills and all that, and
it’s a little colder up there, so to make a little bit of money going into winter is pretty nice.”
A lot of work went into growing the trees that have now arrived on his lot. Each summer workers plod
through the rows and rows of trees swinging razor sharp machetes. They trim each tree to give them that
classic, symmetrical, Christmas tree shape.
After about ten years, the trees are ready for harvest. They’re cut, they’re run through a baling machine,
and they’re loaded onto trucks and shipped down to the lots.
(sound of tree lot with sound of Duke)
Even though there’s a jovial atmosphere on the lot, there’s also a sense of urgency. After all, Duke only
has a few weeks to sell trees that in many cases have taken more than ten years to grow.
And while selling the trees is an important part of Duke’s income – he gets something else out of it. He
really likes people. And he enjoys making connections with them – whether it’s getting them to laugh, or
just simply helping them buy a tree:
“Sometimes you get some grumpy folks coming in, and it’s usually just because they’re overwhelmed
with shopping, it’s cold out, they didn’t wear their long underwear, or whatever, but we can usually get
them turned around, you know, we have a little fun with them. Like I say, if we have to bring them to the
trailer and have a shot of bad schnapps with ’em – hey, that’s just fine too.”
It’s closing time at the tree lot. The workers are headed for a warmer space. Right now, Duke’s trailer is
filled with his relatives and friends.
(sound of door opening)
“Come on in! This is Duke’s family. It’s warm in here, huh?”
(more rowdy banter)
Duke will continue to sell his trees right up until Christmas Eve. Then he’ll drive home to spend a few
days with his family before he comes back to tear the lot down:
“It’s kind of like the circus coming to town. You build up your tree lot, you almost build like, well I
wouldn’t say a village, but a little spot where there was nothing – just an asphault parking lot. And when you leave – there’s nothing
left – we sweep up and go – so it’s almost like a mirage. Were those guys really here?” (laughter)
And so, they spring to their trucks and drive out of sight, knowing they helped make the season
merry night after night.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Mark Brush.
A commission that monitors the environmental health of the Great Lakes says current trends fall short of protecting the Great Lakes from pollution. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush reports:
Transcript
A commission that monitors the environmental health of the Great Lakes says current trends fall
short of protecting the Great Lakes from pollution. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark
Brush has more:
Under the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement, the U.S. and Canada decided to reduce and
clean up pollution in the Great Lakes.
Thirty years have gone by… and now the commission that monitors the progress says that the
countries have yet to make a strong commitment to clean up the lakes.
Dennis Schornack is the U.S. Chair of the International Joint Commission.
“The public cannot always safely swim at Great Lakes beaches, nor safely eat
many of the fish from the Great Lakes.”
Schornack made the statement while presenting the Commission’s latest two-year report on the
lakes. This report echoes much of the criticisms of the Commission’s last report.
Schornack says despite the current focus on national security issues in Congress – it shouldn’t
overlook spending to clean up the Great Lakes. He says it’s a pressing public health issue.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Mark Brush..
The Culex pipiens quinquefasciatus
mosquito - one of the mosquitoes responsible for the transmission of West Nile virus. Photo courtesy of the USGS.
The West Nile virus has claimed 28 lives and at least 550 people have been infected in the nation so far this summer. And evidence of the virus has already been found in 41 states. The carriers of the virus, mosquitoes, have been a concern and a nuisance for public health officials. Many citizens are demanding more visible action on the officials’ part to get rid of the bad bugs…like spraying chemicals to kill adult mosquitoes. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Annie MacDowell reports:
Transcript
The West Nile virus has claimed 28 lives and at least 550 people have been infected in the nation so far this summer. And evidence of the virus has already been found in 41 states. The carriers of the virus, mosquitoes, have been a concern and a nuisance for public health officials. Many citizens are demanding more visible action on the officials’ part to get rid of the bad bugs…like spraying chemicals to kill adult mosquitoes. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Annie MacDowell reports:
You might not expect to find a breeding ground of controversy in the suburbs, but
then again, you wouldn’t expect to find an exotic disease breeding there, either.
With the West Nile virus threatening any place that has mosquitoes…which is almost
anywhere…people are fighting over whether to spray or not to spray.
Spraying means releasing pesticides into the air to kill adult mosquitoes.
Pro-sprayers say the threat of West Nile virus necessitates this chemical
treatment. But some people who live in spraying districts are worried about the
possible dangers of the pesticides. Dr. Kim Stone is the Executive Director of the
Safer Pest Control Project in Chicago. As we walk around a nature preserve, she
tells me they’ve started spraying in her neighborhood and she’s worried about her
kids. Passing the pond and a grove of trees, she says the pesticides could kill fish
that eat mosquito larvae and birds that eat the adults. But she’s more concerned
about their possible threat to humans.
“I believe that the health impacts of the pesticides are a greater danger than the health impacts of West Nile virus. A local hospital had seen many people who thought that they had West Nile virus, came in with headache, nausea, and the hospital said that they did not have West Nile virus, but suspected that it might be related to the pesticides, because it was the morning after pesticides were sprayed in those neighborhoods.”
Stone recommends a different form of mosquito abatement…larvaecide.
Larvaecide is a preventative form a treatment that kills mosquito larvae before they
hatch. Pellets of larvaecide are dropped into lagoons, or a blower is used to spread
granules over the water. The chemicals are less toxic, she says, and they’re
species-specific. That means they won’t kill other animals. Dr. William Paul is with
the Chicago Department of Public Health. He says the city of Chicago hasn’t started
spraying because larvaecide is much more effective.
“We would really, in terms of mosquito control, want to focus on the long run,
breeding sites, and larval breeding sites, because that’s in the long run what’s going to be more effective. Using sprays for adults to kill the northern house mosquito… it’s challenging, you need tightly spaced applications of the product. And it’s not just a going up and down the streets kind of thing.
But spraying is a more visible treatment than larvaecide. Paul says people like to
see their government doing something to combat the mosquitoes. It makes them
feel better, he says. Other government officials can relate. Dr. Kiahn Liem has
been the head of the South Cook County Mosquito Abatement District in the Chicago area for 28 years. He’s has been working with mosquitoes since he was a little boy. He says watching many of his fathers’ patients die of malaria in his native country led him to his current profession of killing mosquitoes.
“I grew up in Indonesia, and malaria is a big killer of people there. Almost six to ten million people every year get killed by malaria. And there’s probably ten times more mosquitoes there than here.”
Liem uses larvaecide in his district. He hasn’t sprayed since 1977, after the
outbreak of St. Louis encephalitis, another virus carried by mosquitoes. He says
spraying was not effective then, and it still isn’t now, as most mosquitoes hide out in
people’s back yards, in the bushes or under leaves. He says the spray released from
trucks in the street just doesn’t reach them. But many of his citizens demand a
visible fight against the mosquitoes.
“They want to see you working. But if you work and you don’t do anything for them, you’re just fooling them. We have many of them that call us, and say, I want you here, I want you to show me that you’re doing something for my money. And we do that just to appease them.”
If people really want peace of mind, personal protection is what most experts
recommend. They say to wear long sleeves and pants between dusk and dawn
when mosquitoes are out in force. If you’re going outside, use mosquito repellent.
And routinely change standing water on your property, such as kiddie pools and bird
baths, to cut down on available mosquito breeding sites.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium…I’m Annie MacDowell.
