New York City-based comedian Tyler Fischer posted a video late Tuesday night asking if others in the Big Apple had their house sprayed with pesticides.
“Does anybody live in New York City and did you just have your house sprayed with pesticides?” he asked.
“I was in my living room. My windows are open. These trucks come by. They’re making these dystopian announcements. ‘Run inside. Get inside,'” he explained.
Fischer showed footage of the trucks making dystopian announcements about pesticide application and spraying the neighborhood.
“Go indoors immediately until the trucks have passed. The city is applying pesticide to reduce the threat of the West Nile Virus,” the trucks announced.
“It’s going right in my windows,” Fischer said.
“NYC just sprayed chemicals into my house at 10:30pm with NO warning!” Fischer wrote.
“As a mom, I’d want to know exactly what was sprayed. How careful were they to make sure there WEREN’T kids, pets, etc. in the area PRIOR to spraying? This just seems wrong on multiple levels!” one X user wrote.
WATCH:
What the hell, New York City! 😳
As a mom, I'd want to know exactly what was sprayed. How careful were they to make sure there WEREN'T kids, pets, etc. in the area PRIOR to spraying?
This just seems wrong on multiple levels!#NewYork #NewYorkCity #NYC #Pesticides… https://t.co/3klRIcQtAE
— Jenn Cheng (@THATJennCheng) September 20, 2023
Some Brooklyn residents said they’ve felt “off” this week. When comparing symptoms, they seemed similar to one another.
The symptoms include: sluggish, dazed, and feeling weak.
Upon discovering Fischer’s video, it has residents wondering if the pesticide spray is the culprit.
Watch on Cafecito Break via Instagram.
The New York City Health Department sprayed Anvil 10+10, Duet or MERUS 3.0 in sections of Brooklyn starting Thursday, August 31.
Safe & Effective 💫
“The Health Department will be using very low concentrations of Anvil 10+10, Duet or MERUS 3.0. The risks of pesticides applied by the Health Department for mosquito control are low to both people and pets. Some people who are sensitive to spray ingredients…
— Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) September 20, 2023
From BK Reader:
The New York City Health Department will be conducting an adulticide mosquito treatment in Brooklyn. To reduce mosquito activity and the risk of West Nile virus, trucks will spray pesticides in sections of Brooklyn beginning on Thursday, August 31, 2023 between the hours of 8:30 p.m. and 6:00 a.m. the following morning.
The Health Department will be using very low concentrations of Anvil 10+10, Duet or MERUS 3.0. The risks of pesticides applied by the Health Department for mosquito control are low to both people and pets. Some people who are sensitive to spray ingredients may experience short-term eye or throat irritation, or a rash. People with respiratory conditions may also be temporarily affected.
Spraying pesticides in residential areas for the ‘threat of mosquito-borne diseases’ isn’t a new program and has actively taken place around the United States.
“I cannot believe that we allow health authorities to do this. Have we not learned our lesson from DDT spraying in the 40s/50s? This is absurd and will do absolutely nothing to prevent disease, and will likely cause more illness from the pesticide exposure, which I’m sure they’ll blame on COVID,” Inversionism explained.
“This is also why everyone should invest in a high quality air purifier in their home. It’s insane governments can just spray this s*** on your street a few feet from your home without consent.”
NYC (and other major cities, like Sacramento) have an active and repetitive west nile mosquito control program where they drive through boroughs like Brooklyn and Queens, and they indiscriminately spray pesticides into the air from trucks on the street. You barely get a warning… pic.twitter.com/r754OEDhqw
— Inversionism (@Inversionism) September 21, 2023
One notorious example of pesticide spraying in the United States is the use of DDT by the ‘Office of Malaria Control in War Areas,’ the CDC’s predecessor.
From the CDC:
CDC’s predecessor, the Office of Malaria Control in War Areas, had been established in 1942 to limit the impact of malaria and other vector-borne diseases (such as murine typhus) during World War II around military training bases in the southern United States and its territories, where malaria was still problematic. The center was located in Atlanta (rather than Washington, DC) because the South was the area of the country with the most malaria transmission.
These efforts were so successful that at the end of the war and at the founding of CDC, one of the initial tasks was to oversee the completion of the elimination of malaria as a major public health problem.
The National Malaria Eradication Program was a cooperative undertaking by state and local health agencies of 13 southeastern states and the Communicable Disease Center of the U. S. Public Health Service, originally proposed by Dr. L. L. Williams. The program commenced operations on July 1, 1947. It consisted primarily of DDT application to the interior surfaces of rural homes or entire premises in counties where malaria was reported to have been prevalent in recent years. By the end of 1949, more than 4,650,000 house spray applications had been made. It also included drainage, removal of mosquito breeding sites, and spraying (occasionally from aircrafts) of insecticides. Total elimination of transmission was slowly achieved. In 1949, the country was declared free of malaria as a significant public health problem. By 1951, CDC gradually withdrew from active participation in the operational phases of the program and shifted its interest to surveillance, and in 1952, CDC participation in operations ceased altogether.
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