Chapter 2

Why Take Precautions?

When you bought the wireless devices in your home, you probably thought they were safe. They’d have to be safe to be sold on the market, wouldn’t they? It’s a reasonable assumption — but, unfortunately, it’s not necessarily true.

Across the world, more and more concerns are emerging about the risks of wireless radiation, particularly for long-term exposure. Here are just some of the concerns raised so far.

Cancer risks

In 2011, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classified radiofrequency radiation as a Class 2B (‘possible’) carcinogen, in the same category as lead. IARC made this decision on the basis of two groups of studies (one by the Interphone team and one by Swedish oncologist Professor Lennart Hardell) both of which found higher risks of some brain tumours among heavy and long-term mobile-phone users, even though the phones they used complied with relevant standards.

Since then, several more studies have found evidence for brain-tumour risks from mobile-phone use.

One of these was the French study known as CERENAT. Its authors found that making one call a week for at least six months (which they called ‘regular’ mobile-phone use) didn’t increase the tumour risk, but there was an increased risk of gliomas and meningiomas for people who had used a mobile phone for 896 hours altogether — equivalent to just 30 minutes’ phone use a day over five years.

Professor Lennart Hardell and his team from Örebro University have found additional evidence that questions the safety of wireless radiation. They conducted a number of studies that found increased risk of gliomas, acoustic neuromas, and, to a lesser extent, meningiomas among people who had used mobile phones for more than ten years. In 2014, the team showed that long-term use of mobile phones decreased the survival rate for people with brain tumours.

In 2016, the US National Toxicology Program released the results of a study it considered too important to keep until the final results of its $25-million research program were published. It found that rats exposed to mobile-phone radiation had more malignant brain tumours, schwannomas, and DNA damage than unexposed animals.

Of course, not all studies have found increased brain-tumour risks — but some of these have been accused of serious design flaws.

A number of scientists believe that there is now enough evidence linking mobile-phone use with brain-tumour risks to categorise mobile-phone radiation as a Class 2A (‘probable’) carcinogen.

Scientists have recognised risks

There are now thousands of peer-reviewed scientific studies in which scientists have found harmful effects from exposure to radiation levels that are well within international safety standards. These effects include:

For almost two decades, scientists and medical practitioners have expressed concerns about the risks of wireless technology in the papers they’ve published or in group statements and resolutions.

These concerns culminated in an Appeal to the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations (UN), signed by 191 scientists from 39 nations on 11 May 2015. The text of the Appeal said: ‘Effects include increased cancer risk, cellular stress, increase in harmful free radicals, genetic damages, structural and functional changes of the reproductive system, learning and memory deficits, neurological disorders, and negative impacts on general well-being in humans.’ The Appeal called on the UN and WHO to take action to protect children and pregnant women, strengthen standards, encourage the development of safer technologies, and educate the public and medical professionals about the effects of wireless-radiation exposure. Since its launch, even more scientists have endorsed the Appeal.

Courts have recognised risks

In several countries, courts have made determinations recognising that exposure to wireless radiation could be a health risk, even though those exposures complied with relevant standards.

ITALY

In 2012, Italy’s Supreme Court accepted that the brain tumour suffered by 60-year-old businessman Innocente Marcolini was caused by the radiation from his mobile phone. Marcolini had used his mobile phone for an average of five or six hours a day for about 12 years. He claimed that his phone use led to the development of a tumour on his trigeminal cranial nerve (responsible for sensations in the face), which was located close to the position of his phone — and the court agreed. Although the tumour was not cancerous, it was life-threatening and required removal by surgery, which left him with partial paralysis of the face, and ongoing pain.

In 2017, two Italian courts found a link between mobile-phone radiation and acoustic neuromas. A court in the city of Ivrea ordered the state’s social-security agency to pay Roberto Romeo an annual pension of 6,000 to 7,000 euros for the injuries he sustained using a company phone for three hours a day for 15 years. At almost the same time, a court in Florence ordered the Italian Workers’ Compensation Authority to compensate a worker who developed an acoustic neuroma after using his mobile phone for two to three hours a day for ten years.

AUSTRALIA

In 2013, an Australian court recognised a link between the symptoms experienced by an Australian scientist and his exposure at work. The Administrative Appeals Tribunal of Australia ordered the federal government to pay compensation to Dr David McDonald for injuries he developed at work when exposed to electric and electronic equipment. Dr McDonald, a principal research scientist at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), had advised his employer that he suffered from the condition of electromagnetic hypersensitivity (symptoms experienced when exposed to electromagnetic fields, including wireless radiation). When the CSIRO required him to undertake a trial of electric and electronic equipment, he developed severe symptoms within minutes — nausea and migraines that lasted for days.

FRANCE

In 2015, a Toulouse court recognised that electromagnetic fields, including wireless radiation, were responsible for the symptoms of a 39-year-old woman who suffered from the condition of electromagnetic hypersensitivity. The court awarded a monthly disability payment of 800 euros to Marine Richard, who lived in a remote area, away from electromagnetic signals.

ISRAEL

In 2014, the Tel Aviv-Yafo District Court accepted a settlement in which mobile-phone operators are required to provide consumers with information about safer mobile-phone use — including keeping phones at a distance from the body — and must provide an inexpensively priced hands-free kit with every mobile phone sold.

SPAIN

The Spanish High Court awarded compensation to a university professor who suffered from electromagnetic hypersensitivity, among other problems. Meanwhile, a court in Castellón awarded a disability payment and carer’s pension to a man who suffered from electromagnetic hypersensitivity.

USA

On 12 August 2015, a 12-year-old boy, unnamed for privacy reasons, and his parents filed an injunction against the Fay School in the Massachusetts District Court. The boy developed symptoms of headaches, itchy skin, and rashes soon after an industrial-strength wi-fi system was introduced at the school. The parents alleged that the school refused to accommodate the boy’s symptoms and disregarded his rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act.

How the court will decide in this case remains to be seen. However, already the local school district is taking action.

INDIA

In 2017, the Supreme Court of India ordered that telecommunications company BSNL deactivate a mobile-phone base station because the radiation it emitted caused a plaintiff’s cancer. Harish Chand Tiwari told the court that he’d developed Hodgkin’s lymphoma as a result of 24-hour exposure from the tower for 14 years.

Governments have recognised risks

Because of the many concerns about the safety of wireless radiation, many countries have introduced precautions to protect users. So have the governments of some regions and cities. These precautions include warnings for reducing exposure to mobile-phone radiation — especially for children — and introducing stricter standards. Some notable precautionary regulations have been introduced by the governments of France, Belgium, and Israel. You’ll see more about these precautions later.

Authorities have recognised risks

A steadily increasing number of international authorities have suggested precautions for reducing exposure to wireless radiation. These include the Council of Europe, the Japan Federation of Bar Associations, peak paediatric bodies, medical associations, cancer institutes, associations of teachers, and various schools.

Insurers have recognised risks

Some insurance companies have undertaken not to provide cover for injuries developed as a result of exposure to wireless radiation. For example, A&E Insurance has excluded cover for any problems caused by electromagnetic radiation.

Swiss Re recognised the risk of ‘electrosmog’ for insurers as early as 1997 and said, ‘On the basis of present knowledge alone, it must be expected that plaintiffs will win suits dealing with this issue.’ In 2013, it rated the unforeseen consequences of electromagnetic fields (including wireless radiation) as potentially having a high impact and said, ‘If a direct link between EMF and human health problems were established, it would open doors for new claims and could ultimately lead to large losses under product liability covers. Liability rates would likely rise.’

Australian telecommunications giant Telstra admitted in its 2004 annual report that the company had been able to obtain only limited insurance cover against the risks of exposure and even that was diminishing. The company now self-insures.

Mobile-phone companies have recognised risks

Mobile-phone companies are recognising potential risks of holding mobile phones directly against the body for calls and are including information in their user manuals for safer phone use (see Chapter 3).

In Australia, Telstra has been texting its customers with a link to information on its website about how to reduce mobile-phone exposure. In one 12-month period, it reported sending 15 million of these messages.

The multinational telecommunications company Orange has published ‘best practice’ recommendations for reducing exposure to radiation on its website. These include recommendations to use a hands-free kit, to text rather than call, to keep phones away from the body of pregnant women, and to use phones in good reception areas.

Problems with standards

The radiation from all wireless devices on the market must comply with relevant radiation standards. However, international guidelines and standards may not be adequately protecting the public. They have been designed to prevent a very limited number of short-term, acute heating effects of radiation, with an assumed safety factor added. As mentioned before, thousands of studies have found non-beneficial effects at levels below the ones they mandate.

Certainly some studies have failed to find harmful effects from radiation — and that’s especially true of studies that have been conducted on animals and cells. However, there’s evidence that these studies might not have been conducted properly in the first place. In 2015, Gernot Schmid and Niels Kuster, scientists from Austria and Switzerland respectively, published the results of a groundbreaking study in which they calculated that a mobile phone can expose tissues to over 40 Watts of radiation per kilogram (40 W/kg). However, when they looked at studies that had been published from 2002 onwards, they found that many of them had exposed cells to an average of approximately 2 W/kg. In other words, the results of these studies were not reliable for estimating risk.

So standards that have taken these studies into account are also highly questionable.

Anyone who tells you that wireless radiation is safe is telling you, not a fact, but an assumption. They are assuming that it should be safe if it complies with relevant standards, assuming the assumptions that underlie those standards are correct, and assuming the way products are being tested for compliance with those standards is correct.

That’s a lot of assumptions.

The fact is that not only do we not know wireless devices are safe, but also there’s evidence they’re not.

It’s simply not possible to state that wireless radiation is safe. Radiation-emitting devices are not tested for safety (only compliance) before being released on the market. All research on the effects of exposure is done afterwards — on the people using the technologies. It stands to reason that health effects from using wireless devices may not be immediately obvious. It takes around 40 years for brain tumours to show up, for example, so it may be decades before we know the full impact of exposure.

In short, no one knows what levels of long-term exposure is safe for any individual — and it may be decades before we do.

In the meantime, it’s up to each of us to decide just how much exposure we are willing to accept as individuals and for our families. In the following pages, you’ll find some tips about how to reduce your exposure if you choose — but ultimately, the decision about whether or not or how far to do so is up to you.

[For more information see Appendix A]