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Can Wireless Devices Affect Your Health?
by Dr. Priyanka (Pri) Bandara
Researcher/consultant/educator - environmental health, linkedin.com,
by Dr. Priyanka (Pri) Bandara
Researcher/consultant/educator - environmental health, linkedin.com,
19 August 2017
There is an intense scientific debate about the health risks of currently permitted wireless radiation. Technically speaking, we are talking about low-intensity microwave/radiofrequency electromagnetic radiation (MW/RF-EMR). Your mobile/cordless phone, WiFi-enabled computers and a range of personal wireless devices, including baby monitors and gaming consoles emit microwave RF-EMR exposing you and others around to this invisible environmental pollutant. It is the same man-made microwave EMR that is used in microwave ovens at high intensity to cook food. It has been long claimed by the industry and regulatory bodies (without any safety testing for health effects) that at low intensities, RF-EMR exposure is unlikely to cause any harm if that does not cause tissue heating. However, we now have irrefutable scientific evidence showing a range of biological effects and health effects to be associated with everyday typical exposures.
Health authorities have so far responded very poorly to this scientific evidence of biological/health effects. Scientists around the globe are frustrated about this inaction.
Do you know that some 225 scientists and clinicians from 41 countries have petitioned the World Health Organization (WHO) and the UN urging immediate action to protect public health from wireless radiation?
Please take just 3 min of your time to watch the introductory video message to the International EMF Scientist Appeal (https://emfscientist.org/). I recommend that you read the appeal in full and check out the signatories. Although my name is right on top at the second spot, that’s purely due to my country and surname start with A and B respectively. I am relatively new to this research space on EMR health effects compared to many eminent scientists who have researched on this topic for decades. For example, another Australian signatory, Dr. Bruce Hocking, former long-serving Chief Medical Officer of Telstra has been researching on health effects of wireless radiation for over two decades. Famous neurosurgeon Prof. Charlie Teo is all too familiar with the scientific evidence linking mobile/cordless phone use and brain cancer and what he sees in his patients on a daily basis.
It appears that concerns about a massive economic impact and serious legal liabilities that come with admitting to health risks are making the health authorities reluctant to pursue this issue. The influence of the global trillion-dollar wireless industry is a major factor and it is present all the way to the World Health Organization (WHO) where a small department (International EMF Project) handles this issue in a controversial manner*. This lack of action is unfortunately at the expense of public health.
Recently, Prof. Joel Joel Moskowitz, long-term Director of University of California Berkeley Center for Family and Community Health went to court and won rights to access a document prepared by the Californian Department of Public Health (CDPH) that was never released despite going through multiple edits. This lawsuit made the CDPH to release all the 27 versions of a cell phone safety "fact sheet" originally prepared in 2009 and revised till 2014 to advice the public of mobile phone health risks. It turns out that this document was abandoned without public release due to various influences. http://www.saferemr.com/2017/03/cell-phone-safety-guidance-from.html
Here in Australia, the same game goes on and the concerning scientific evidence gets ignored or even distorted, often by “experts” with funding trails to the wireless industry. In 1994, the government commissioned a CSIRO report on biological effects of RF-EMR, but this was quickly swept under the carpet. Last year, the flagship science program of the ABC, Catalyst, raised concerns of scientists about health effects of wireless and faced suicide: not only did the ABC retracted the program under pressure (though it had initially passed all the quality control for accuracy etc.), the involved journalists got sacked!
This is clearly an area where the scientists alone cannot help protect public health. The rest of the society needs to get involved in the discussion and take the best possible action to ensure health and wellbeing of the public, particularly the more vulnerable children.
*This recent paper by an eminent Swedish researcher, oncologist/epidemiologist Prof. Lennart Hardell in the International Journal of Oncology sheds light on the controversial approach at the WHO to this issue:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28656257
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/can-wireless-devices-affect-your-health-dr-priyanka-pri-bandara
There is an intense scientific debate about the health risks of currently permitted wireless radiation. Technically speaking, we are talking about low-intensity microwave/radiofrequency electromagnetic radiation (MW/RF-EMR). Your mobile/cordless phone, WiFi-enabled computers and a range of personal wireless devices, including baby monitors and gaming consoles emit microwave RF-EMR exposing you and others around to this invisible environmental pollutant. It is the same man-made microwave EMR that is used in microwave ovens at high intensity to cook food. It has been long claimed by the industry and regulatory bodies (without any safety testing for health effects) that at low intensities, RF-EMR exposure is unlikely to cause any harm if that does not cause tissue heating. However, we now have irrefutable scientific evidence showing a range of biological effects and health effects to be associated with everyday typical exposures.
Health authorities have so far responded very poorly to this scientific evidence of biological/health effects. Scientists around the globe are frustrated about this inaction.
Do you know that some 225 scientists and clinicians from 41 countries have petitioned the World Health Organization (WHO) and the UN urging immediate action to protect public health from wireless radiation?
Please take just 3 min of your time to watch the introductory video message to the International EMF Scientist Appeal (https://emfscientist.org/). I recommend that you read the appeal in full and check out the signatories. Although my name is right on top at the second spot, that’s purely due to my country and surname start with A and B respectively. I am relatively new to this research space on EMR health effects compared to many eminent scientists who have researched on this topic for decades. For example, another Australian signatory, Dr. Bruce Hocking, former long-serving Chief Medical Officer of Telstra has been researching on health effects of wireless radiation for over two decades. Famous neurosurgeon Prof. Charlie Teo is all too familiar with the scientific evidence linking mobile/cordless phone use and brain cancer and what he sees in his patients on a daily basis.
It appears that concerns about a massive economic impact and serious legal liabilities that come with admitting to health risks are making the health authorities reluctant to pursue this issue. The influence of the global trillion-dollar wireless industry is a major factor and it is present all the way to the World Health Organization (WHO) where a small department (International EMF Project) handles this issue in a controversial manner*. This lack of action is unfortunately at the expense of public health.
Recently, Prof. Joel Joel Moskowitz, long-term Director of University of California Berkeley Center for Family and Community Health went to court and won rights to access a document prepared by the Californian Department of Public Health (CDPH) that was never released despite going through multiple edits. This lawsuit made the CDPH to release all the 27 versions of a cell phone safety "fact sheet" originally prepared in 2009 and revised till 2014 to advice the public of mobile phone health risks. It turns out that this document was abandoned without public release due to various influences. http://www.saferemr.com/2017/03/cell-phone-safety-guidance-from.html
Here in Australia, the same game goes on and the concerning scientific evidence gets ignored or even distorted, often by “experts” with funding trails to the wireless industry. In 1994, the government commissioned a CSIRO report on biological effects of RF-EMR, but this was quickly swept under the carpet. Last year, the flagship science program of the ABC, Catalyst, raised concerns of scientists about health effects of wireless and faced suicide: not only did the ABC retracted the program under pressure (though it had initially passed all the quality control for accuracy etc.), the involved journalists got sacked!
This is clearly an area where the scientists alone cannot help protect public health. The rest of the society needs to get involved in the discussion and take the best possible action to ensure health and wellbeing of the public, particularly the more vulnerable children.
*This recent paper by an eminent Swedish researcher, oncologist/epidemiologist Prof. Lennart Hardell in the International Journal of Oncology sheds light on the controversial approach at the WHO to this issue:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/28656257
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/can-wireless-devices-affect-your-health-dr-priyanka-pri-bandara
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