"My speciality is the epidemiology of mosquito-borne diseases"

Also from the Bolter: Paul Reiter, one of the world’s greatest experts on mosquitos, nails Al Gore on yet another deceit: I am a scientist, not a climatologist, so I don’t dabble in climatology. My speciality is the epidemiology of mosquito-borne diseases. As the film [An Inconvenient Truth] began, I knew Mr Gore would get to mosquitoes: they’re a favourite with climate-change activists. When he got to them, it was all I feared. In his serious voice, Mr Gore presented a nifty animation, a band of little mosquitoes fluttering their way up the slopes of a snow-capped mountain, and he repeated the old line: Nairobi used to be ‘above the mosquito line, the limit at which mosquitoes can survive, but now…’ Those little mosquitoes kept climbing. The truth? Nairobi means ‘the place of cool waters’ in the Masai language. The town grew up around a camp, set up in 1899 during the construction of a railway, the famous ‘Lunatic Express’. There certainly was water there — and mosquitoes. From the start, the place was plagued with malaria, so much so that a few years later doctors tried to have the whole town moved to a healthier place. By 1927, the disease had become such a plague in the ‘White Highlands’ that £40,000 (equivalent to about £350,000 today) was earmarked for malaria control. The authorities understood the root of the problem: forest clearance had created the perfect breeding places for mosquitoes. The disease was present as high as 2,500m above sea level; the mosquitoes were observed at 3,000m. And Nairobi? 1,680m. Reiter also gives yet more evidence at the corruption of the scientific process that is at the heart of the IPCC. UPDATE Yet another Gore whoopsie, this time on extra “tree motality” thanks to global warming. At what stage can we call this fraud a bare-faced liar? It’s odd that not one of his many, many mistakes errs on the side of calm.

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