Clean water is essential for the existence of all living species and the effective functioning of habitats, populations, and ecosystems. However, as human populations rise, industrial and farming practices increase, and changing climate continues to disrupt the global hydrological processes, the sustainability of the world’s water is increasingly challenged. Most of the water pollution is brought by channeling untreated water bodies. Dichlorodiphenyl trichloroethane, DDT, has emerged to be a significant pollutant to our environment, as it is a persistent organic pollutant that is easily absorbed by soils and sediments and may serve as both sinks and lengthy sources of exposure to organisms. DDT is an odorless compound with crystalline properties, colorless and tasteless. It was the first of the new synthetic insecticides to be produced and was first used successfully in both military and urban communities to fight measles, typhus, and other insect-borne illnesses. It thus gained popularity when many food crop farmers started using it worldwide.
However, DDT proved to be dangerous to the environment after lengthy research, and afterward, people started avoiding using it. I found that many countries banned the use of this compound. DDT was phased out due to its chronic shipping, biomagnification, and toxic impact, and the lack of benefits provided by DDT that fewer environmentally hazardous compounds could not obtain. A revival was triggered by increased mosquito resistance to DDT and parasite tolerance. Partly or entirely overturned in certain places, and transmission rates grew in some situations. DDT also caused effects to human health, and research found that it caused harm to the growing brain, which causes oversensitivity, behavioral disturbances, and decreased neuronal signal processing, as well as immune response repression. It results in a sluggish reaction to pathogens, are some of the more recent research discoveries.
DDT also has a strong bias for biomagnification, which has a significant effect on sea life. DDT accumulates in fish, plankton, algae, and other marine species until it reaches the water body. It collects in visceral fat and pyloric appendages, while toxic chemicals are retained in the gills and tissue. Poisonous substances infiltrate the more susceptible organs and cause toxicity due to increased fat intake, such as during relocation and hibernate mode. DDT and its compounds collect in biological filth at the base of rivers, waterways, streams, estuaries, and shallow regions, where they can not only survive for decades but also serve as a potential source of accumulation in the marine environment since several species, like fish, eat the filth.
DDT is a neurotoxin that kills fish. The following are some of the potential fish issues that occur and are linked explicitly or indirectly to the existence of DDT in aquatic environments: The presence of DDT in fish eggs raises the young’s mortality rate. DDT continues to accumulate in fish’s fat tissue. Such issues are found in the reproductive organs, and high DDT levels in these organs can contribute to high levels of DDT in eggs. Large predators, such as sea lions and dolphins, accumulate elevated amounts of chronic fat-soluble toxins, which may cause physical problems as they are at the top of the food chain.
DDT will bioaccumulate or build-up, in the tissues or fat of living organisms due to its chemical makeup. The act of biomagnification then causes these toxins to migrate across the food chain at exponentially higher amounts after being ingested. As a result, players at the top of the food chain are the most impacted ones as most of these compounds accumulate in seafloor sediments. Aquatic invertebrates will eat the polluted sediments and more giant animals will then ingest them before reaching the peak of the food chain, where they will be absorbed by dolphins and sea mammals, like sea lions. Since each stage of the food supply chain eats more than one individual from the level below, pollution levels would still be higher. DDT may also trigger cancers, alterations, and behavioral problems in these marine lives.
About 27,000 artifacts were discovered discarded off the coast of California, perhaps barrels holding the illegal chemical DDT. The place, that is 12 miles from Los Angeles and near Main Beach has long been suspected of being a hazardous waste site dating back to World War Two. A submerged drone piloted by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the California State University, Los Angeles, detected the videos. If indeed the containers have not yet spilled, they should relocate them to a better place. If they do, tests of dirt, groundwater, and sea life could be used to determine the impact. Any potential waste options, such as eliminating the barrels or enclosing them in cement frames, will be prohibitively costly and unlikely to be implemented. Future damage mitigating could be one of the only solutions open. It is necessary to restrict industrial activities in that region, avoid more disturbing the site and causing additional destruction or breaking open containers, and stop processing hazardous materials that aren’t going anywhere anytime shortly.
