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13 countries to study cellphones and cancer - ISIS: Non-Thermal Effects
- RE Dr. Munzert (13/12/02)
Tramès per Klaus Rudolph (Citizens'
Initiative Omega)
13 countries to study
cellphones and cancer
Canadian Press
TORONTO - Can cellphones cause cancer? To date, most research says no.
But with the growing use of cellphones, particularly among children, concerns
persist.
The World Health Organization wants to get to the bottom of the issue.
"Because of the level of public concern and because of the high use
of cellphones and the increasing use of cellphones worldwide... the World
Health Organization -- I think rightly -- feels that we need to do a larger,
more definitive study," said Mary McBride, one of the key Canadian
researchers involved in the 13-country international study announced Tuesday.
McBride, an epidemiologist at the B.C. Cancer Agency, is one of three
principal investigators for the Canadian arm of the study, which is expected
to recruit 700 adults with brain, head or neck tumours. About 1,800 randomly
selected Canadians who haven't been diagnosed with cancer will also be
recruited.
The other Canadian researchers are located at the University of Ottawa,
the Institut Armand-Frappier of the University of Quebec, and the University
of Montreal.
Internationally, it's hoped a total of 9,300 people with the selected
cancers and 12,000 people without cancer will participate in the study.
Those kinds of large numbers are crucial when any increased risk may be
slight, explained Dr. Remi Quirion, who heads the Canadian Institutes
of Health Research's Institute of Neurosciences, Mental Health and Addiction.
"I think if it increases the risk, it's probably a small increase,"
said Quirion, who is not involved in the cellphone study. "So to
be able really to say 'Yes, if you use that you have a likelihood of an
increase of brain tumours of 15 per cent,' we need a very, very large
sample size, in different kinds of populations."
The researchers will interview all subjects about their cellphone use.
As well, the Canadians are planning to piggyback additional research onto
the WHO study and interview subjects with brain cancer about their exposure
to things like solvents, petrochemical substances and X-rays.
The international study was designed by the International Agency for Research
on Cancer, a division of the World Health Organization. Britain, Australia,
New Zealand and Japan are among the other countries involved.
The idea is to look at enough people for a long enough period to see if
there is even a slight increase in risk associated with cellphone use.
Findings of the study aren't expected to be available for five years.
Most previous studies have suggested that health-related fears associated
with cellphone use are unfounded. But the authors of those studies have
acknowledged that the data they looked at covered too short a period of
time to be considered conclusive.
That's because most cancers initially develop very slowly. And the cellphone
- at least as a device used by the masses -- is still a relatively new
technology.
"That's the problem," McBride said. "The average years
of use for those earlier studies have been 1.5 to two years, certainly
for the U.S. studies." As well, most of the earlier studies looked
only at analogue cellphones.
The WHO study will look at both analogue and digital phones.
The researchers will not be studying children. McBride admitted that might
draw criticism, since many people concerned about a possible link have
been questioning why the scientific community hasn't addressed the question.
But she said to study the impact of cellphone use on children just wouldn't
make sense.
"We know cancer takes many years to develop and tends not to manifest
itself until middle age," she said. "So we would be having to
follow children for a long time, and we can get the same answer faster
this way. "We expect that what we learn from the adults will also
apply to children."
The Canadian portion of the research is being funded by the Canadian Institutes
of Health Research with support from the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications
Association.
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1039563361544_16///?hub=Health
Informant: Robert Riedlinger
The Institute of Science in Society Science Society Sustainability
http://www.i-sis.org.uk
General Enquiries sam@i-sis.org.uk
Website/Mailing List press-release@i-sis.org.uk
ISIS Director m.w.ho@i-sis.org.uk
ISIS miniseries "Fields
of Influence"
Electromagnetic radiations are increasingly flooding our environment,
as evidence of health risks is mounting, suggesting that organisms are
sensitive to very weak electromagnetic fields.
This requires a new biology that understands organisms that has been systematically
ignored and excluded from mainstream discourse, to our peril. This miniseries
is in four parts:
Electromagnetic Fields Double Leukemia Risks http://www.i-sis.org.uk/FOI1.php
Mobile Phones & Cancer http://www.i-sis.org.uk/FOI2.php
Non-Thermal Effects http://www.i-sis.org.uk/FOI3.php
The Excluded Biology http://www.i-sis.org.uk/FOI4.php
Non-Thermal Effects
Electromagnetic fields too weak to heat up the body had been linked to
cancer and other illnesses since the 1960s. The current 'safety' limits
are still inadequate to protect workers and the public from these effects.
Dr. Mae-Wan Ho (m.w.ho@i-sis.org.uk)
exposes the bad science at the centre of the controversy.
The complete document with references http://www.i-sis.org.uk/full/FOI3Full.php,
is available in the ISIS members site. Full details here http://www.i-sis.org.uk/membership.php
The current debate over the health hazards of mobile phones is a continuation
of the debate over the health hazards of weak electromagnetic fields in
the entire frequency spectrum that began in the 1950s.
The first experiment on the biological effects of electromagnetic fields
dates from the end of the nineteenth century when Russian scientist Danilevsky
observed effects of radio-frequency fields on a muscle preparation that
included the nerve supplying the muscle. Investigations peaked simultaneously
with the development of radar between 1930 and 1940, but ended abruptly
with World War II.
Interest in the subject was rekindled by the discovery that animals and
plants failed to thrive and even died in areas exposed to radio waves
beyond a certain minimum power density; and also by complaints of workers
at radar stations. Research resumed in the 1950s in the former Soviet
Union and the United States, as well as in Poland, Italy, and later, Britain.
Public debate over the health hazards of electromagnetic fields began
in the United States. In 1973, biologist Robert Becker was approached
by the US Navy Commander Paul Tyler to serve on a panel of experts to
evaluate some experiments that the Navy had funded. These were in connection
with an antenna system the Navy was planning to build in northern Wisconsin
that involved grids of buried wires that would extend over thousands of
square miles of land. It was to be used for communication with submerged
submarines.
Because of the large size of the antenna system, and fears that the non-ionising
electromagnetic radiation (NIEMR) it would emit might have impacts on
health and the environment, Congress had ordered the Navy to carry out
the studies.
The New York Academy of Sciences had sponsored a conference on "Electrically
Mediated Growth Mechanisms in Living Systems", and Becker had delivered
a brilliant keynote paper that summarised his work up to then, which revealed
how electrical fields and currents produced by the body are controlling
growth and regeneration. By the 1960s, Becker had already proposed a theory
that an electrical communication system exists within all living things,
and also showed that externally applied fields could influence the processes
of growth and regeneration.
But Becker was also worried about the undesirable, harmful effects that
could come from exposures to external electromagnetic fields that were
often orders of magnitude stronger than the fields within the living body.
He had taken on a graduate student, Andrew Marino to conduct some studies
on mice and rats.
Marino had indeed found that animals exposed to NIEMR suffered adverse
effects, when Becker was asked to review the studies that the Navy had
funded.
There were seven scientists on the panel reviewing more than 30 studies.
Nearly two-thirds of the studies had found biological effects from exposure
to NIEMR; and these were in a variety of species, including slime-mould,
rats, birds and humans. The upshot was that all the panel members thought
the proposed antenna was a potential hazard to human health, and they
drew up a long list of recommendations and further studies.
In the middle of deliberations, someone pointed out that the Navy's proposed
antenna produced NIEMR similar to that produced by high-voltage powerlines,
and that in the largest lines carrying 765 000 volts, the strength of
the NIEMR might be as much as a million times stronger. That threw the
panel into disarray. The discussions became heated, but eventually, the
scientists agreed they had to recommend some action: that the Navy should
inform a special committee advisory to the President that many Americans
might be "at risk" from NIEMR from power lines.
Marino, who told his story in a book published years later had no idea
that he and his supervisor were about to be drawn into one of the most
acrimonious and lonely battle against the industrial-military complex,
and prominent figures in the scientific establishment were to play the
key role in victimising him and his supervisor. When it was all over,
Becker would lose all grant support, and would have to close his laboratory
in Syracuse, New York, after 20 years of pioneering research on the electromagnetic
basis of living organisms.
Marino had found that animals exposed to NIEMR of 60Hz from the wall outlet
gained less weight and drank less water. The exposed animals also had
altered levels of blood proteins and enzymes. That was precisely the same
NIEMR that would come from power lines. He had repeated the experiment
twice, with the same results.
By then, at least two 765 000 volt lines were being planned, and Marino
and Becker were called to give evidence at a powerline hearing which arose
from Becker's warnings. Their experiments had confirmed what the Navy's
own studies had found. Becker had no doubt that the power line was a potential
health risk.
Unfortunately, they were up against Herman Schwan and other scientists
who would be defending the industry and their own prestige in the scientific
establishment.
Schwan had come to United States from Germany in 1947 under Project Paperclip,
a controversial government programme to import German scientists after
WWII. He worked for the US Navy until 1950 when he became a professor
at the University of Pennsylvania. Schwan had done some research on NIEMR
in Germany during the war. After arriving in the US, he began to publish
papers saying that 'the laws of physics' showed that the only effects
of NIEMR on living things would be through heating or electric shock.
Schwan's writings were bound up with the federal government's concern,
which surfaced in the 1950s, over military employees who were reporting
various injuries from working around radar - eye injuries, temporary and
permanent sterility, internal bleeding and other problems. In response
to these complaints, an Air Force surgeon, Colonel George Knauf was asked
to determine how much NIEMR was safe. Knauf and Schwan began to work together,
with Schwan being the expert on biological effects.
Schwan regarded the stories of non-thermal injuries anecdotal and unreliable.
Accordingly, he regarded NIEMR safe if it did not cause heating. What
was the maximum level? Schwan 's answer was that the body could handle
a certain amount of heat, for example, by sweating, but if the heat reached
the point at which the body's regulatory mechanisms broke down, temperature
would rise and injury would result. According to his calculations, the
'safe' level would be 10 milliwatts per square centimetre (mW/cm2).
This level was adopted provisionally by the Department of Defence in 1955,
and Knauf got the go-ahead to fund a series of animal experiments to verify
Schwan's calculations.
One of the researchers funded was Solomon Michaelson at the University
of Rochester, who used beagle dogs as a test animal, and, "in a revolting
series of experiments, he literally cooked dogs alive with NIEMR at levels
of 50 to 100mW/cm2". He recorded burns, fluid oozing from the brain
and eyes and body temperatures rising to 106-108F.
Other investigators confirmed Michaelson's work. Gross acute effects had
been observed at NIEMR levels only slightly above the safety limit set
by Schwan. There was not one instance of an experiment funded by the programme
that was conducted at power densities below the limit. In other words,
non-thermal effects were never investigated.
Schwan was subsequently appointed chair of a committee of the American
National Standards Institute (ANSI), whose goal was to set a NIEMR limit
or industry. It came as no surprise that ANSI accepted Schwan's position
and 10mW/cm2 became the "safe" level for such industries as
radar and radio and others whose employees would be exposed to electrical
equipment.
Over the next twenty years, Schwan published dozens of papers and gave
hundreds of lectures, which culminated in his election to the National
Academy of Engineering.
What Schwan said in most of his papers was that there were no known biological
effects of NIEMR below 10mW/cm2. There were in fact such reports, particularly
from the former Soviet Union, that were never acknowledged by Schwan.
Schwan's limit came solely from calculations based on non-biological models,
or dead tissues; and all subsequent experiments were simply rationalisations
of it, as Marino pointed out.
Michaelson, too, declared that so long as NIEMR levels were below Schwan's
limit, they were completely safe. He was especially critical of Soviet
scientists who found non-thermal effects below that threshold, and had
set safety limits far more stringent that that in the US. He said that
the harm done to industry and the military from such stringent limits
would outweigh any proposed public-health benefit.
In 1965, the safe exposure limit set for the general public in Czechoslovakia
was in the range of microwatts/cm2, ie, a thousand times smaller than
that in the United States.
Michaelson's public declarations brought him many important appointments
to committees of the National Academy of Sciences, the World Health Organization,
the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, President's Office of Telecommunication
Policy, Electric Power Research Institute, etc.
Both Schwan and Michaelson were to be major witnesses on behalf of industry
against Marino and Becker.
It turns out that in the mid-1960s, the power industry in the US had already
obtained copies of Soviet studies on the biological effects of NIEMR from
powerlines. The American Electric Power Company (AEP), one of the largest
in the US, commissioned a study by scientists in Johns Hopkins University,
the results of which were released in 1967. In a survey involving 11 linemen,
two were found with reduced sperm count. In a second study, mice exposed
to NIEMR were not harmed, but their offspring, which were not exposed,
were stunted. No more follow-up studies were carried out, and request
by the John Hopkins team for further funding was turned down.
At an international conference on high-voltage powerlines in Paris in
1972, Soviet engineers announced for the first time to the West that they
had performed investigations on the effects of NIEMR on workers and concluded
they needed protective clothing. They reported reduced sexual potency
and adverse effects on the central nervous system, the heart and circulatory
system.
The power industry released translations of the Soviet reports, which
were prefaced by Howard Barnes, an engineer for AEP involved in the John
Hopkins studies. The Soviet scientists had studied hundreds of linemen,
compared to the 11 in the American study. And while the American study
involved only physical examinations, the Soviets had performed psychological
and neurological tests as well.
But Barnes, in his introduction, invoked an argument that's all too familiar
in the current GM debate. He pointed out that there were then 500 000
miles of high-voltage lines in the US, and there wasn't a single report,
not one confirmed case, of anyone being killed or made ill by the NIEMR
from such lines, so they must be safe.
As in the case of GM food, that statement was based on there having been
no studies on the effects of living near the power lines.
The story that unfolded makes riveting reading. Research findings were
suppressed and falsified. Important scientific witnesses failed to turn
up or were not contactable. Committees were stacked with industry-friendly
scientists.
Marino, Becker and citizens won in the end, at tremendous personal costs
to themselves. They prevented one of the two big power lines from being
built, and the company that built the first announced it would not build
another 765 000 volt line.
Most revealing in the entire episode was the way Schwan defended the indefensible
orthodoxy. He denied all scientific evidence that went against his a priori
calculation based on the 'known laws of physics' and the utterly false
assumption that the living organism was to be regarded as no different
from dead or inanimate matter.
As Marino wrote, "..Schwan seemed to view the studies [reporting
non-thermal NIEMR effects] as weeds in the garden of known physical laws.
Because the know laws did not predict the results of the studies, Schwan's
reaction was to denigrate them, rather than assume that there existed
unknown laws, or unknown interpretation of known laws.."
Schwan was not alone, the scientific establishment had thrown its weight
behind his position until it became untenable. But there has been little
change in scientific outlook since.
To this day, the 'safe' exposure limits recommended by the international
authority, International Committee for Non-Ionising Radiation (ICNIRP)
take no account of non-thermal effects, despite the mounting evidence
of health hazards from such effects.
By the 1980s, Marino could already point to the studies reporting NIEMR
links to depression and suicides in England, to cancers in both children
and adults in Colorado in the United States. Housewives in Oregon who
lived in houses with radiant electric heating were subject to increased
cancer risk. In Sweden, a correlation was reported between cancer in juveniles
and proximity to high-voltage power lines in the Stockholm area. A cluster
of rare and lethal ovarian tumours was found in five young girls living
near a 69 000 volt line in Florida.
Similar association between NIEMR and cancer was reported in Wichita,
Kansas. Men and women living in counties containing cities near Air Force
bases were more likely to get cancer than people in similar counties not
located near Air Force bases.
Finally, a correlation between electric blankets and miscarriages was
also reported.
Successive reports since then, including the latest from the UK National
Radiological Protection Board that accepts the links to childhood leukaemia,
stops short of drawing any firm conclusions because of the absence of
"any proven biological mechanisms".
The complete document with references http://www.i-sis.org.uk/full/FOI3Full.php,
is available in the ISIS members site. Full details here http://www.i-sis.org.uk/membership.php
This article can be found on the I-SIS website at http://www.i-sis.org.uk/FOI3.php
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Dear Dr. Munzert: Since you last
corresponded with me, I talked again to the local police, and they said
they knew the person doing this to me was the person I said it was and
that they might talk with him, but they didn't want to "rile him
up any further". That is ridiculous...he is a medical doctor
who is a criminal and they don't want to "rile up" a criminal
to whom no one did anything, and even if they did, this is totally illegal.
I am going to persue until something is done.
Cindy
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