Exposure to insecticide DDT linked to having a child with autism

A plane spraying crops

Spraying with DDT was widespread until many rich countries banned it because of health fears

Bettmann/Getty

Although banned for decades in most rich countries, the insecticide DDT may be influencing whether babies born today and in the future develop autism. A study in Finland has found that mothers that show signs of high DDT exposure in their blood may be more likely to have children with autism.

DDT was sprayed in large amounts from the 1940s onwards, to kill disease-carrying mosquitoes. But it was widely banned in Western nations in the 1970s and 1980s, after evidence mounted …