Susan C. Olmstead
Apr 7, 2022
Pesticides, Habitat Loss Killing Off Insects, Entomologist Tells RFK, Jr.
In an appearance on “RFK Jr. The Defender Podcast,” entomologist Brian Brown, Ph.D., spoke with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. about insects, biodiversity and the threat of the “zombie fly.”
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In an appearance on “RFK Jr. The Defender Podcast,” entomologist Brian Brown, Ph.D., spoke with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., chairman and chief legal counsel of Children’s Health Defense, about insects and the ecosystem.
Brown is head of the entomology department and curator of entomology at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County.
He also is author of a study on “insect abundance and richness” in the canopy of an Amazonian tropical forest in Brazil, in a project that discovered hundreds of new species.
The study recommended action to protect tropical ecosystems “against pervasive stressors, such as climate change, deforestation, fragmentation of the landscape, and use of pesticides.”
“Why should people like me — who are concerned with children’s health and the future of our children … be concerned about the disappearance of insects?” Kennedy asked Brown.
Brown said:
“Insects are responsible for pollinating our food crops. That’s just about as important as you can get in terms of ecosystem services and ecosystem processes. So they help provide us with clean air, water, food — all those sorts of things that we take for granted every day.
“They do all kinds of things we can’t do without.”.....
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The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of Children's Health Defense.
Susan C. Olmstead is the assistant editor of The Defender.
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