A $25 million National Toxicology Program study on rats and mice, the results of which were published earlier this month, was designed to test the widely held assumption that non-ionizing radiofrequency radiation (from mobile/cell phones) could not cause health effects at low “non-thermal” levels. Thermal levels (radiation that actually causes temperature to rise) are well-known to cause harm.
However, although the results from the mice studies are ‘inconclusive’, the rat studies show an increases in tumours in animals that had been exposed at the non-thermal exposure levels that have been assumed to be safe for humans – the same types of tumours that occur in humans who have been using cell phones regularly for more than a decade.
The National Institutes for Health press release covering the studies played down the direct correlation between the rats in the study and humans but did note ‘that the tumors we saw in these studies are similar to tumors previously reported in some studies of frequent cell phone users.’
However, in a statement on the report, Devra Davies, a long time researcher and campaigner on the possible risks of mobile phone and wifi usage, made the following points:
- The National Toxicology Program results indicate increased rates of a number of forms of cancer and heart and thyroid disease in animals when exposed for most of their lifetimes to the same types of radiation that people get today from their cell phones and other wireless transmitting devices that are held close to the body.
Recent test data from the French national radiation testing agency revealed that when phones are tested directly next to the body they can expose people to up to 9 times more radiation than current US test guidelines allow. (Current guidelines test phones held at a distance form the body.)
Phones are not tested in these positions:
- Resting the phone on your chest as you lay in bed listening to streaming music.
- Carrying the phone in your bra, pants, or shirt pocket.
- Playing with a phone resting against the body as many toddlers are doing when handed phones.
- Watching a streaming video with the cell phone placed on your thigh.
- Watching virtual reality with a transmitting smartphone in front of your eyes.
When phones are tested in these positions of close body contact, radiation levels in the body tissue near the phone can exceed current regulatory limits up to 9 times the US levels, as documented by the French government agency tests.
2. …..In addition, current regulatory mandated cell phone radiation tests are set only to avoid heating the body and do not consider the vulnerability of a child’s developing brain, a pregnant abdomen, or the sperm of a man wishing to father a healthy child……
3. The NIH Press release states that:
“The incidence of tumors, called malignant schwannomas, that were observed in the heart increased in male rats as they were exposed to increasing levels of RFR beyond the allowable cell phone emissions. Researchers also noted increases in an unusual pattern of cardiomyopathy, or damage to heart tissue, in exposed male and female rats.”
Based on these and other published peer-reviewed findings, if radiofrequency radiation were a drug, it would have been pulled off the market.
4. …..Cell phones are not toys but they are two-way microwave transmitting and receiving radios. Governments of high-tech countries such as France, Israel, India, and Switzerland, and over a dozen others recommend reducing exposure to cell phone radiation. Local, state and federal governments are also issuing policies to limit cell phones in the classroom.’
Anyone who wishes to follow the debate into 5G and what that may entail should read this article by Paul Héroux, Ph.D., Professor of Electromagnetic Toxicology, Faculty of Medicine, McGill University – 5G and IoT: a Trojan horse