Government Secretly Imports Banned Insecticide DDT

The Zambian government has been secretly importing the internationally banned insecticide DDT for its malaria control programme, despite warnings from scientists that the chemical causes breast cancer and reduces the quality of mens’ sperm.

State-owned Indian chemicals manufacturer HIL Ltd. has confirmed that the Zambian ministry of health recently received a consignment of 114.2 tonnes of DDT. 

HIL’s Managing Director SP Monhaty said this was the last part of a 307 tonne order by the government. 

Environmental campaigner Robert Chimambo has strongly criticised the Ministry of Health’s decision to import the banned substance, questioning whether Zambia had become a dumping ground for dangers, carcinogenic chemicals.

“Agro -Chemicals, Glyphoset, Atrizine, etc. Now, are we again adding DDT to this Chemical brew? What’s happening to our Country?” Asked Chimambo. 

Zambia officially agreed to ban the use of DDT under the Stockholm Convention of 2001, and usage was eventually phased out in 2010 when evidence of mosquitos’ resistance to the chemical emerged.

Dr Brenda Eskenzai of the University of California Berkeley School of Public Health called the effects of DDT on communities in southern Africa “profound”. 

“The studies that have come out have suggested that there are associations with breast cancer, there are associations with effects on the neurobehavioral development of children, there are associations with spontaneous abortion. And there are quite a number of studies that have looked at DDT and diabetes and found an association,” she explained. 

A consignment of DDT shipped from India to Zambia