To Bee or not to Bee ….

More and more evidence now leads to the conclusion that Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), the mysterious disease that is killing so many honeybees is in fact not a disease at all but exposure to a certain class of insecticide over the past six years. The culprit appears to be neonicotinoids which cause their greatest affect as winter comes on, at which time the bees become more susceptible to mites and other parasites that then kill off the bees. The obvious reason we all should be concerned is that honeybees pollinate roughly one third of all crops globally and 80% of US crops.

While the studies are not yet definitive, they point to the hand of mankind not unlike the same type situation where the insecticide DDT, first synthesized in 1874 caused the degeneration of birds shells often best remembered by the1962 bestselling book “Silent Spring” by American biologist Rachel Carlson. Her book demonstrated that DDT and other pesticides had been shown to cause cancer and that their agricultural use of a threat to wildlife, particularly birds; all of which eventually led to the 1972 banning of DDT in the US and most of the world. It remains controversial because of its effectiveness in reducing deaths due to malaria.

It appears that once again, our captains of industry in the fields of chemistry have allowed their need for greater profits to cause a rush to market of something that ultimately is not in the best interest of mankind, but is this a fair analogy?

There is a balancing point where cost and profit must coexist. There will most certainly be a great deal of speculation on both sides of the subject and hopefully corrective actions will take place sooner rather than later. The loss of the honeybee species would have a lot more drastic effect than the loss of honey. Losing the ability to naturally cross pollinate crops would most certainly have costly, perhaps devastating effects on the US and world food supplies.

We continue to have this see-saw battle between governmental regulation and the ability of agriculture / industry to conduct business. So many well-meaning people just trying to do the right thing, but far too often various outside influences on both sides of the argument cause havoc and what appears to be plain old “good common sense”. The end result causes us to painfully explore the options under great scrutiny and the influence of change appears to come more from who is screaming the loudest rather than which makes the most sense and thus, is the best overall solution. We have seen this in so many industries for so many years that it causes me to wonder why we have so passionately ignored the wisdom of our elders. The simplest wisdom has been tossed aside for catchy sayings. Hearing my father tell me “haste makes waste” took a while to sink in, but it was golden and absolutely correct. Listening to comments like “it is what it is” might sound good, but it frequently is used to misdirect responsibility or hold responsible no one at all.

Technology is a good thing but we must command technology, not the other way around. To paraphrase a more recent quote “just because we can doesn’t mean we should” is advice our government would be wise to follow, not only in the security and defense of this country, but also in allowing so many seemingly technological breakthrough’s to be implemented well ahead of a reasonable degree of verification; just because there is a buck to be made.