Once again: Do cell phones cause brain tumors?
A widely endorsed report calls into question the methodologies of studies that show no link between cell phone use and brain tumors.
(Credit: L. Lloyd Morgan, et al)A collaborative of international electromagnetic radiation (EMR) watchdogs, including Powerwatch and the EMR Policy Institute, sent a paper to government leaders and media Tuesday detailing several design flaws in a major but oft-delayed telecom-funded Interphone study.
Now consumers get to wonder yet again whether the message behind the paper, "Cellphones and Brain Tumors: 15 Reasons for Concern, Science, Spin and the Truth Behind Interphone," is legitimate or the result of overzealous conspiracy theorists.
The paper's main conclusions are: There is a "significant" risk of brain tumors from cell phone use; EMR exposure limits that have been used by governments and supported by industry are based on the false premise that EMR has no biological effects except for heating; and design flaws of the Interphone study include selection bias, insufficient latency time to expect a tumor diagnosis, unrealistic definition of what makes a "regular" cell phone user, exclusion of children and young adults from the study, exclusion of many types of brain tumors, and exclusion of people who had died or were too ill to be interviewed as the result of brain tumors.
Read the full report here (PDF), as well as CNET's cell phone radiation level chart (a few Motorola models top the list, with several Samsungs coming in lowest).
The paper's primary author, L. Lloyd Morgan (a retired electronics engineer and member of the Bioelectromagnetics Society), is backed by endorsers (mostly scientists) from 14 countries when he cautions that cell phone use might lead to an increased risk of more than just brain tumors:
Exposure to cell phone radiation is the largest human health experiment ever undertaken, without informed consent, and has some four billion participants enrolled. Science has shown increased risk of brain tumors from use of cell phones, as well as increased risk of eye cancer, salivary gland tumors, testicular cancer, non-Hodgkin's lymphoma and leukemia. The public must be informed.
The World Health Organization does not seem terribly worried about the effects of cell phone use on health: "None of the recent reviews have concluded that exposure to the RF fields from mobile phones or their base stations causes any adverse health consequence." But this statement--last updated nine years ago--relies on precisely the kind of data these watchdogs suggest is flawed.
Several other studies, many of which are referenced in the book "Cancer Biology," including one of 195,775 workers manufacturing and testing cell phones, indicate no association between EMR exposure and brain or other nervous system cancers. But again, this book was published in 1995; time for an update?
Yesterday's announcement also calls into question the wide use of wireless technologies beyond cell phones. If GSM cell phones are dangerous in the 1.8GHz band, does that render Wi-Fi, at 2.4GHz and 5GHz frequency bands, even worse? These are questions that need to be addressed, preferably by researchers who do not receive their funding from the telecommunications industry.
Elizabeth Armstrong Moore is a freelance journalist based in Portland, Ore. She has contributed to Wired magazine, The Christian Science Monitor, and public radio. Her semi-obscure hobbies include unicycling, slacklining, hula-hooping, scuba diving, billiards, Sudoku, Magic the Gathering, and classical piano. She is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. 
When I get behind the wheel these days, I'm very, very scared (California has a totally ineffective "hands-free" law).
Cel phones are turning people into addicts. It's most noticeable in the movie theaters where these soon-to-be-retards just have to check their phones every few minutes.
Waiting to cross the street I saw a guy "driving"... one hand was dangling out the window, the other strapped to his ear, phone in hand... I don't know about brain tumors, but I fervently believe the phones are turning these people into brain-dead addicts.
In the elevator, a girl's signal gets cut off. Instead of hanging up (a quaint, 19th-century term, I know) she starts yelling into the infernal device "I'm in an elevator!" Were I not a kind and gentle soul I would have taken the phone out of her hand and smashed it on the floor.
Worse? The guy answered it and started talking.
Completely brain-damaged moment? The guy actually said, "I'm at the movie theater and I can't talk right now." Several audience members actually got into an altercation with the guy and the guy was finally chased out of the theater.
Whatever happened to silent/vibrate mode? Going to voicemail? Walking outside to the lobby? Calling back later?
Unbelievable... And yet, I see more of this happening. Getting on the freeway is getting really frightening. Heck, crossing the street at a crosswalk as a pedestrian is a gamble. Cellphones are driving people insane.
[CNET editor's note: Offensive language deleted.]
And we know that Wi-Fi operates at the 5 GHz range which is a much higher frequency than the radio waves/microwaves our cell phones put out. So it makes some sense to be concerned about Wi-Fi.
But it makes MUCH more sense to target those appliances that put out EM in the 400 - 800 THz range (a hundred times higher than mere Wi-Fi. Keep in mind that ultra-violet starts just above this range, and we KNOW UV is dangerous. It's why we wear sunscreen and discourage tanning bed use.
So let's get our priorities straight and first ban all devices that produce EM the THz range. Seriously, wouldn't that make much more sense?
And once we ban the visible light spectrum, THEN we can go after Wi-Fi, microwaves, and radio waves.
@ Elizabeth Armstrong Moore: No, no, no. There is no need for any "updates". The physics hasn't changed. These people are indeed "overzealous conspiracy theorists".
It'll be kind of like the movie Thank You For Smoking.
The firefighter guy is only listed as having endorsed it; he did not work on the paper. His opinion on this matter doesn't carry much weight with me, but it has no bearing on whether the objections raised to Interphone are credible. All the MDs and PhDs are "nut jobs"? Based on what?
If cells phones cause cancer, then so do all of the other waves pounding the earth all day everyday.
OMG does that mean tv is also bad? And my car stereo with high power subs ... all those EM waves filling my car??? oh my!
LOL.
Check this out
http://brain101.info/EMF.php
http://www.peterdolph.com/2009/08/will-microwave-radiation-give-you_19.html
Dariusz
YES, They DO, specially Acoustic Neuromas:
http://brain101.info/EMF.php
- by ashbar25 October 29, 2009 5:19 AM PDT
- It's compelling to me that this paper was funded by telecom. Generally papers that have a negative finding for the funder are never published, much less publicized. Seems to lend some credibility to the results, IMO.
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