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Article: DR. ROBERT MOBBS, PIONEER ACTIVIST AGAINST USE OF DDT
- Article from:
- The Boston Globe (Boston, MA)
- Article date:
- November 16, 2003
- Author:
CopyrightCopyright 2003 The Boston Globe. Provided by ProQuest LLC. (Hide copyright information)
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Dr. Robert F. Mobbs of Andover, a physician who warned of the
toxic effects of DDT 24 years before the pesticide was outlawed, died
Oct. 29 at Melrose-Wakefield Hospital. He was 85.
Dr. Mobbs was a general physician and surgeon in Aberdeen, N.C.,
in 1948, when his 3-year-old niece died after suffering inexplicable
convulsions.
Puzzled by her death, Dr. Mobbs grew suspicious of the chemical
exhaust from a local chemical plant where crop-dusting compounds were
manufactured. He used rabbits to investigate the effect of repeated
exposure to the chemicals found in the factory's exhaust. The
rabbits died; Dr. Mobbs published his research in the Journal of the
American Medical Association.
"For ...