I'm just trying to fortify the writeup above:

DDT was first introduced massively in World War II. It helped stop disease-carrying insects and protect crops. It was especially effective in protecting against malaria, typhus, yellow fever, river blindness, and encephalitis. Malaria was nearly eliminated by the late 1960s. India, which before the introduction of DDT had over 75 million cases of malaria, had less the a million by 1962, and by 1970 had only 200,000. The World Health Organization estimates that 100 million lives were saved by DDT.

"Silent Spring" went so far as to predict the extinction of the robin and other birds of prey if the use of DDT was not halted. It was argued that DDT would find its way into fields and rivers, accumulate in fish, and from the fish, reach humans.

Environmentalists speculated that high levels of DDT in birds caused their eggshells to thin, but where as there was hard proof that DDT was saving millions of lives, there was no proof that their was any danger to the bird population. Of course, they showed us examples of damaged bird colonies as proof that DDT cause damage to them, but every single example they showed were of birds that were exposed to DDT and PCB (which has been proven to cause damage to eggshells). Even three decades after the ban on DDT, there is still no proof that DDT is harmful. Not only has there been no proof that it causes any damage to birds, but also the bird population increased in the period that DDT was in mass production.

The Audubon field census found that bird populations from 1941 to 1960, the period which saw the introduction of DDT, the peak of its use, and the beginning of its decline, increased. Swallow, robin, heron, and eagle populations all grew over 20 years of the use of DDT. Other reports showed increasing raptor populations during that same period of time. The bald eagle population increased 25% over the years of 1942 to 1960.

DDT also destroyed blood-sucking insects that pestered and killed blackbirds in Kentucky. The birds also saw an abundance of fruits and berries where the insects had formerly ravaged the land. It created an ideal habitat for birds in that area.

Many also claim that DDT causes disease in humans such as cancer, mutations and hepatitis as typical results of ingestion. Studies were executed after the ban on adult volunteers, After 18 months there were no ill effects reported on the test subjects. In 1981 in Tirana, Albania there was a massive DDT spill which exposed villagers to the highest level of ingestion of DDT ever recorded. No health effect was reported. Other post-ban research has concluded that DDT does not build up in animal tissue. We now know that DDT does not cause any harm to humans or animals and yet we still have not lifted the ban. We have the ability to create a "miracle chemical" yet we still haven't reexamined the ban. This ban was the first in a series of campaigns against non-existent threats to mother earth.

Sources: World Health Organization http://www.who.org ; Global Warming in a Politically Correct Climate, M. Mihkel Mathiesen ; National Audobon Society http://www.audobon.org