Media hype
OVER the past six months, a series of reports have appeared in the media on the 'devastation and misery' caused in Padre village in northern Kerala by 'spraying of endosulfan'. All the reports carried photographs of the same set of unfortunate children born with physical deformities or 'congenital anomalies'.
Congenital anomalies are "birth defects which may be inherited or produced by external factors however, for most anomalies it is not possible to identify the causative mechanism." Not so in Padre village. All the media reports unequivocally blame endosulfan as the causative agent. First sentence it. Evidence and proof of guilt can be found out later