Are Mobile Phones a Hazard to our Health?
Well, are Mobile Phones a hazard to our health?
I spent the day at Portland College in Nottinghamshire yesterday, talking about magnotherapy and magnetic pain relief. Towards the end of the day I had a long conversation with a couple of people about another concern of mine – the negative effects on human health of electromagnetic radiation from mobile phones and phone masts, and from wireless computer systems.
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Are we in love with our mobiles?
It is estimated that around three billion of us worldwide use a mobile phone, and some of us have more than one. One in five of us even sleeps next to their mobile phone. We are strangely attached to them. The stress of being parted from a mobile phone has even been compared to moving house or breaking up with your partner! We just do not seem to think of it as a health hazard at all. And yet there is an increasing body of evidence emerging from research which links the electromagnetic radiation emitted from mobile phones and phone masts to a range of serious health problems including tumours and cancers.
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The increasing opposition
Press coverage on this issue is increasing and is becoming increasingly negative. Like the article in the Daily Mail last July telling of the 14 people who died from cancer over a seven year period, who had lived within a mile of the phone mast described as emitting one of the highest levels of radiation in the country. Four of these people lived in a cul-de-sac yards from the site. Apparently a further 20 residents developed tumours in the last seven years, although fortunately they have survived.
Pressure groups have formed to put the case for a re-think on mobile phone use (for the latest information on this issue, together with details of the latest research, go to the EM Radiation Research Trust website at www.radiationresearch.org.) And mobile phone companies are coming under increased pressure from Euro MPs to stop building masts near schools and houses until the potential hazards to health are clearer.
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The Industry line
Not surprisingly, the mobile phone industry denies any link between mobile phone usage and ill health. They refute research linking mobiles and phone masts to cancer and other illnesses, and point to their own research which fails to show any causal link. Now I’m old enough to remember the way the tobacco companies continuously denied any link between cigarettes and cancer over the last thirty or forty years, despite considerable evidence to the contrary. It seems to me that history is repeating itself.
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The expert
What I find interesting is that the mobile phone industry recruited a respected expert, Dr George Carlo, to manage their research programme to prove the safety of mobile phones. But after some six years of research, Dr Carlo came to the view that they were not safe and broke ranks with the industry.
I’ve found a couple of short videos which you might find interesting. Watch them and decide for yourself.
If this topic interests you, check back over the next couple of days for more information.
If you want to do something positive to reduce the harm caused by electromagnetic radiation from mobile phones, click here and take a look at Bioguards and Biophones on my website.
