Comparative Response of Insects and Mammals to Certain Halogenated Hydrocarbons Used as Insecticides

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Abstract
For methyl bromide, ethylene dibromide, ethylene dichloride, o- and p- dichlorobenzene, DDT and its analogues, hexachlorocyclohexane isomers, aldrin, dieldrin, and chlordane, absorption, signs of poisoning, structural changes, physiological disturbances, biochemical disturbances, metabolism, fate of the drug, and mode of toxic action are reviewed, so far as data are available, in both mammals and insects. "Despite their diversity of structure, size and behavior, insects and mammals respond in a very similar way at comparable tissue concentrations to any one of the compounds discussed...Data, accumulated incidental to the studies of insecticide action, indicate that the basic cellular metabolic processes are essentially the same. Many of the enzymes and intermediate metabolites appear to be very similar if not identical...The fact that the compounds considered in this review show a general similarity in their action upon mammals and insects suggests that they must all depend for their action as toxic substances upon an interference with these basic metabolic processes common to both phyla. Such action might be mainly a chemical one exerted on enzymes, their cofactors or their substrates. Where a chemical reaction seems less probable, as in the case of DDT for example, a physicochemical action on cell membranes and their permeability may be responsible for the toxic effects observed. Differences in the sensitivity of insects and mammals, which in some cases make a compound a safe one to use under conditions where man, mammals and insects may be exposed together, must depend upon the ease and speed with which effective concentration of the insecticide can reach its site of action.