During the 1950s, malaria, a rural disease extended in Mexico and Latin America, became the quintessential international health intervention for agencies working in developing countries (as yellow fever and hookworm were for tropical health during the early 20th century). The Pan American Sanitary Bureau, the World Health Organization, UNICEF and the U.S. Department of State supported malaria eradication by indoor spraying of DDT and use of antimalarial drugs. This presentation will examine the Cold War motivations of the campaign and examine the responses in Mexico (the first developing country to embrace eradication). Malaria eradication was portrayed as an instrument for improving agricultural productivity, tourism, and rural progress. There was also an official belief that the campaign would advance Western medicine and overcome the "apathy" and "fatalism" of peasants. Eradication was carried out through a military-style campaign with overconfidence on technological solutions.