Dangers of Electromagnetic Frequency – Quotes by Experts
Michael Persinger, PhD, Neuroscientist
Laurentian University who has studied the effects of EMFs on cancer cells.
"For the first time
in our evolutionary history, we have generated an entire secondary,
virtual, densely complex environment — an electromagnetic soup — that
essentially overlaps the human nervous system.”
Olle Johansson, Ph.D.
Associate Professor,
The Experimental Dermatology Unit, Department of Neuroscience, Karolinska
Institute, Stockholm, Sweden; Author of the BioInitiative Report’s section on the Immune System.
"…the inauguration of smart meters with gruding and involuntary exposure of millions to billions of human beings to pulsed microwave radiotion should immediately be prohibited…"
William
Rea, MD
Founder & Director of the Environmental Health Center, Dallas Past
President, American Academy of Environmental Medicine
President, American Academy of Environmental Medicine
“Sensitivity
to electromagnetic radiation is the emerging health problem of the
21st century. It is imperative health practitioners, governments,
schools and parents learn more about it. The human health stakes are
significant”.
Henry Lai, Ph.D.
Professor, Bioelectromagnetics Research Laboratory Dept. of Bioengineering,
University of Washington (Seattle)
"It's one thing to be on a cell phone for one hour per day, but if you are exposed to a smart meter or a cell tower, you are exposed 24/7 so the effect is cumulative."
Martin
Blank, PhD
Associate
Professor, Department of Physiology and Cellular Biophysics,
Columbia University,
College of Physicians and Surgeons; Researcher in Bioelectromagnetics; Author
of the BioInitiative
Report’s section on Stress Proteins.
“Cells in the body react to EMFs as
potentially harmful, just like to other environmental toxins, including heavy
metals and toxic chemicals. The DNA in living cells recognizes
electromagnetic fields at very low levels of exposure; and produces a
biochemical stress esponse. The scientific evidence tells us that
our safety standards are inadequate, and that we must protect ourselves from
exposure to EMF due to power lines, cell phones and the like, or risk the known
consequences. The science is very strong and we should sit up and pay
attention.”
Olle
Johansson, Ph.D.
Associate Professor,
The Experimental Dermatology Unit, Department of Neuroscience, Karolinska
Institute, Stockholm, Sweden; Author of the BioInitiative Report’s section on the Immune System.
“It is evident that various biological
alterations, including immune system modulation, are present in
electrohypersensitive persons. There must be an end to the pervasive
nonchalance, indifference and lack of heartfelt respect for the plight of these
persons. It is clear something serious has happened and is happening. Every
aspect of electrohypersensitive peoples’ lives, including the ability to work
productively in society, have healthy relations and find safe, permanent housing,
is at stake. The basics of life are becoming increasingly inaccessible to a
growing percentage of the world’s population. I strongly advise all governments
to take the issue of electromagnetic health hazards seriously and to take
action while there is still time. There is too great a risk that the ever
increasing RF-based communications technologies represent a real danger to
humans, especially because of their exponential, ongoing and unchecked growth.
Governments should act decisively to protect public health by changing the
exposure standards to be biologically-based, communicating the results of the
independent science on this topic and aggressively researching links with a
multitude of associated medical conditions.”
David
Carpenter, MD
Professor,
Environmental Health Sciences, and Director, Institute for Health and the
Environment, School of Public Health, University of Albany, SUNY
Co-Editor, The
BioInitiative Report (www.BioInitiative.org)
Electromagnetic fields are packets of energy
that does not have any mass, and visible light is what we know best. X-rays are
also electromagnetic fields, but they are more energetic than visible light.
Our concern is for those electromagnetic fields that are less energetic than
visible light, including those that are associated with electricity and those
used for communications and in microwave ovens. The fields associated
with electricity are commonly called “extremely low frequency” fields (ELF),
while those used in communication and microwave ovens are called
“radiofrequency” (RF) fields. Studies of people have shown that both ELF
and RF exposures result in an increased risk of cancer, and that this occurs at
intensities that are too low to cause tissue heating. Unfortunately, all
of our exposure standards are based on the false assumption that there are no
hazardous effects at intensities that do not cause tissue heating. Based on the
existing science, many public health experts believe it is possible we will
face an epidemic of cancers in the future resulting from uncontrolled use of
cell phones and increased population exposure to WiFi and other wireless
devices. Thus it is important that all of us, and especially children,
restrict our use of cell phones, limit exposure to background levels of Wi-Fi,
and that government and industry discover ways in which to allow use of
wireless devices without such elevated risk of serious disease. We need to
educate decision-makers that ‘business as usual’ is unacceptable. The
importance of this public health issue cannot be underestimated.”
Magda
Havas, PhD
Associate
Professor, Environment & Resource Studies, Trent University, Canada.
Expert in radiofrequency
radiation, electromagnetic fields, dirty electricity and ground current.
“Radio frequency radiation and other forms of
electromagnetic pollution are harmful at orders of magnitude well below
existing guidelines. Science is one of the tools society uses to decide health
policy. In the case of telecommunications equipment, such as cell phones,
wireless networks, cell phone antennas, PDAs, and portable phones, the
science is being ignored. Current guidelines urgently need to be
re-examined by government and reduced to reflect the state of the science.
There is an emerging public health crisis at hand and time is of the essence.”
Whitney
North Seymour, Jr., Esq.
Retired
Attorney; Former New York State Senator & United States Attorney, Southern
District of NY Co-Founder, Natural Resources Defense Council
“Electromagnetic radiation is a very serious
human and environmental health issue that needs immediate attention by
Congress. The BioInitiative Report is a major milestone in understanding
the health risks from wireless technology. Every responsible elected official
owes it to his or her constituents to learn and act on its finding and policy
recommendations.”
B.
Blake Levitt
Former
New York Times journalist and author of Electromagnetic Fields, A
Consumer’s Guide to the Issues and How to Protect Ourselves, and Editor of Cell
Towers, Wireless Convenience? Or Environmental Hazard?
Ambient man-made electromagnetic fields
(EMFs), across a range of frequencies, are a serious environmental issue. Yet
most environmentalists know little about it, perhaps because the subject has
been the purview of physicists and engineers for so long that biologists have
lost touch with electromagnetism’s fundamental inclusion in the biological
paradigm. All living cells and indeed whole living beings, no matter what genus
or species, are dynamic coherent electrical systems utterly reliant on
bioelectricity for life’s most basic metabolic processes. It turns out that
most living things are fantastically sensitive to vanishingly small EMF
exposures. Living cells interpret such exposures as part of our normal cellular
activities (think heartbeats, brainwaves, cell division itself, etc.) The
problem is, man-made electromagnetic exposures aren’t “normal.” They are
artificial artifacts, with unusual intensities, signaling characteristics, pulsing
patterns, and wave forms, that don’t exist in nature. And they can misdirect
cells in myriad ways. Every aspect of the ecosystem may be affected, including
all living species from animals, humans, plants and even microorganisms in
water and soil. We are already seeing problems in sentinel species like birds,
bats, and bees. Wildlife is known to abandon areas when cell towers are placed.
Radiofrequency radiation (RF)—the part of the electromagnetic spectrum used in
all-things-wireless today—is a known immune system suppressor, among other
things. RF is a form of energetic air pollution and we need to understand it as
such. Humans are not the only species being affected. The health of our planet
may be in jeopardy from this newest environmental concern—added to all the
others. Citizens need to call upon government to fund appropriate research and
to get industry influence out of the dialogue. We ignore this at our own peril
now.”
Eric
Braverman, MD
Brain
researcher, Author of The Edge Effect, and Director of Path Medical in
New York City and The PATH Foundation. Expert in the brain’s global impact on
illness and health.
“There is no question EMFs have a major
effect on neurological functioning. They slow our brain waves and affect our
long-term mental clarity. We should minimize exposures as much as possible to
optimize neurotransmitter levels and prevent deterioration of health”.
Abraham
R. Liboff, PhD
Research
Professor – Center for Molecular Biology and Biotechnology – Florida Atlantic
University, Boca Raton, Florida. Co-Editor, Electromagnetic Biology and
Medicine
“The key point about electromagnetic
pollution that the public has to realize is that it is not necessary that the
intensity be large for a biological interaction to occur. There is now
considerable evidence that extremely weak signals can have physiological
consequences. These interactive intensities are about 1000 times smaller than
the threshold values formerly estimated by otherwise knowledgeable theoreticians,
who, in their vainglorious approach to science, rejected all evidence to the
contrary as inconsistent with their magnificent calculations. These faulty
estimated thresholds are yet to be corrected by both regulators and the media.
The overall problem with environmental
electromagnetism is much deeper, not only of concern at power line frequencies,
but also in the radiofrequency range encompassing mobile phones. Here the
public’s continuing exposure to electromagnetic radiation is largely connected
to money. Indeed the tens of billions of dollars in sales one finds in the cell
phone industry makes it mandatory to corporate leaders that they deny, in
knee-jerk fashion, any indication of hazard.
There may be hope for the future in knowing
that weakly intense electromagnetic interactions can be used for good as well
as harm. The fact that such fields are biologically effective also implies the
likelihood of medical applications, something that is now taking place. As this
happens, I think it will make us more aware about how our bodies react to
electromagnetism, and it should become even clearer to everyone concerned that
there is reason to be very, very careful about ambient electromagnetic fields.”
Lennart
Hardell, MD, PhD
Professor
at University Hospital, Orebro, Sweden. World-renowned expert on cell phones,
cordless phones, brain tumors, and the safety of wireless radiofrequency and
microwave radiation. Co-authored the BioInitiative Report’s section on Brain Tumors
by Dr. Hardell
“The evidence for risks from prolonged cell
phone and cordless phone use is quite strong when you look at people who have
used these devices for 10 years or longer, and when they are used mainly on one
side of the head. Recent studies that do not report increased risk of brain
tumors and acoustic neuromas have not looked at heavy users, use over ten years
or longer, and do not look at the part of the brain which would reasonably have
exposure to produce a tumor.”
Samuel
Milham MD, MPH
Medical
epidemiologist in occupational epidemiology. First scientist to report
increased leukemia and other cancers in electrical workers and to demonstrate
that the childhood age peak in leukemia emerged in conjunction with the spread
of residential electrification.
“Very recently, new research is suggesting
that nearly all the human plagues which emerged in the twentieth century,
like common acute lymphoblastic leukemia in children, female breast
cancer, malignant melanoma and asthma, can be tied to some facet of our
use of electricity. There is an urgent need for governments and
individuals to take steps to minimize community and personal EMF exposures.”
Libby
Kelley, MA
Managing
Secretariat International Commission For Electromagnetic Safety; Founder,
Council on Wireless Technology Impacts; Co-Producer of documentary,
“Public Exposure: DNA, Democracy and the Wireless Revolution”; EMF
environmental consultant and leading appellant in challenging the FCC Radio Frequency
Radiation human exposure guidelines, 1997-2000. (www.icems.eu)
“Radiofrequency radiation human exposure
standards for personal wireless communications devices and for
environmental exposure to wireless transmitters are set by national governments to
guide the use of wireless communications devices and for wireless
transmitters. In the U.S., the Food and Drug Administration and
the Federal Communications Commission set these standards. The
Council on Wireless Technology Impacts considers these exposure
standards to be inadequate as they are based on heating effects and
do not accommodate the low level, cumulative exposure conditions in which
the public now lives. These standards are also
designed for acute, short term exposure conditions and do not
acknowledge the medical evidence pointing to increased risks and actual
harm that results from chronic, intermittent exposure. Federal
and State public health agencies are not officially addressing what many
concerned scientists and medical doctors now see as an emerging
public health problem. There are no health surveillance or
remedial response systems in place to advise citizens about
electromagnetic radiation exposure (EMR). As wireless technology
evolves, ambient background levels increase, creating electrical
pollution conditions which are becoming ubiquitous and more
invasive. We strongly encourage consumers, manufacturers, utility
providers and policymakers to reduce, eliminate and mitigate EMR exposure
conditions and to support biologically based standards.”
James
S. Turner, Esq.
Chairman
of the Board, Citizens for Health. Co-author, Voice of the People:
The Transpartisan Imperative in American Life. Attorney,
Swankin-Turner, Washington, DC
“According
to the BioInitiative Report: A Rationale for a Biologically-Based Public
Exposure Standard for Electromagnetic Fields—from
electrical and electronic appliances, power lines and wireless devices such as
cell phones, cordless phones, cellular antennas, towers, and broadcast
transmission towers—we live in an invisible fog of EMF which thirty years of
science, including over 2,000 peer reviewed studies, shows exposes us to
serious health risks such as increased Alzheimer’s disease, breast cancer, Lou
Gehrig disease, EMF immune system hypersensitivity and disruption of brain
function and DNA. The public needs to wake up politicians and public
officials to the need for updating the decades old EMF public health
standards. This report tells how.”
Camilla
Rees, MBA
CEO,
Wide Angle Health, LLC. Patient education and advocacy
“The U.S. spends over $2 trillion dollars on
health care each year, of which about 78% is from people with chronic
illnesses, without adequately exploring and understanding what
factors—including EMF/RF—contribute to imbalances in peoples’ bodies’ in the
first place. After reading The BioInitiative Report, it should come as no
surprise to policymakers, given the continually increasing levels of EMF/RF
exposures in our environment, that close to 50% of Americans now live with a
chronic illness. I grieve for people who needlessly suffer these illnesses and
hold out the hope that our government leaders will become more cognizant of the
role electromagnetic factors are playing in disease, health care costs and the
erosion of quality of life and productivity in America.”
L.
Lloyd Morgan, BS Electronic Engineering
Director
Central Brain Tumor Registry of the United States, Member Bioelectromagnetics
Society, Member Brain Tumor Epidemiological Consortium *
“There is every indication that cell phones
cause brain tumors, salivary gland tumors and eye cancer. Yet, because
the cell phone industry provides a substantial proportion of research funding,
this reality is hidden from the general public. The Interphone Study, a
13-country research project, substantially funded by the cell phone industry
has consistently shown that use of a cell phone protects the user from risk of
a brain tumor! Does anything more need to be said? It is time that
fully independent studies be funded by those governmental agencies whose
charter is to protect its citizens so that the truth about the very damaging
health hazards of microwave radiation becomes clear and well known.”
*For
identification purposes only: All statements are mine and mine alone and do not
represent positions or opinions of the Central Brain Tumor Registry of the
United States, the Bioelectromagnetics Society or the Brain Tumor
Epidemiological Consortia.
Janet
Newton
President,
The EMR Policy Institute
www.EMRPolicy.org
“The radiofrequency radiation safety policy
in force in the United States fails to protect the public. Currently in the US
there are more than 260 million wireless subscribers, the demand that drives
the continuing build-out of antenna sites in residential and commercial
neighborhoods, including near schools, daycare centers, and senior living
centers and in the workplace. The January 2008 report issued by the
National Academy of Sciences committee whose task was to examine the needs and
gaps in the research on the biological effects of exposure to these antennas
points out that the research studies to date do not adequately represent
exposure realities. Specifically, the studies 1) assume a single antenna rather
than the typical arrangements of a minimum of four to six antennas per site,
thereby underestimating exposure intensities, 2) do not pertain to the commonly
used multiple-element base station antennas, thereby not taking into account
exposures to multiple frequencies, 3) lack models of several heights for men,
women, and children of various ages for use in the characterization of Specific
Absorption Rate (SAR) distributions for exposures from cell phones, wireless
PCs, and base stations and 4) do not take into consideration absorption effects
of exposures from the many different radio frequency emitting devices to which
the public is often simultaneously exposed. A federal research strategy to
address these very serious inadequacies in the science on which our government
is basing health policy is sorely needed now.”
Prof.
Livio Giuliani, PhD
Spokesperson,
International Commission for Electromagnetic Safety (www.icems.eu)
Deputy Director, Italian
National Institute for Worker Protection and Safety, East Venice and South
Tyrol; Professor, School of Biochemistry of Camerino University, Italy
The Venice Resolution, initiated by the International
Commission for Electromagnetic Safety (ICEMS) on June 6, 2008, and now signed
by nearly 50 peer reviewed scientists worldwide, states in part, “We are
compelled to confirm the existence of non-thermal effects of electromagnetic
fields on living matter, which seem to occur at every level of investigation
from molecular to epidemiological. Recent epidemiological evidence is stronger
than before. We recognize the growing public health problem known as
electrohypersensitivity. We strongly advise limited use of cell phones, and
other similar devices, by young children and teenagers, and we call upon
governments to apply the Precautionary Principle as an interim measure while
more biologically relevant exposure standards are developed.”
Professor
Jacqueline McGlade
Executive
Director, European Environmental Agency. Advisor to European Union countries
under the European Commission
“There are many examples of the failure to
use the precautionary principle in the past, which have resulted in serious and
often irreversible damage to health and environments. Appropriate,
precautionary and proportionate actions taken now to avoid plausible and
potentially serious threats to health from EMF are likely to be seen as prudent
and wise from future perspectives.”
Paul
J. Rosch, MD
Clinical
Professor of Medicine and Psychiatry, New York Medical College; Honorary Vice
President International Stress Management Association; Diplomate, National
Board of Medical Examiners; Full Member, Russian Academy of Medical Sciences; Fellow,
The Royal Society of Medicine; Emeritus Member, The Bioelectromagnetics Society
Claims that cell phones pose no health
hazards are supported solely by Specific Absorption Rate (SAR) limits safety
standards written by the telecommunications industry decades ago based on
studies they funded. These have made the erroneous assumption that the only
harm that could come from cell phone radiofrequency emissions would be from a
thermal or heating action, since such non thermal fields can have no biological
effects. The late Dr. Ross Adey disproved this three decades ago by
demonstrating that very similar radiofrequency fields with certain carrier and
modulation frequencies that had insufficient energy to produce any heating
could cause the release of calcium ions from cells. Since then, numerous
research reports have confirmed that non thermal fields from cell phones, tower
transmitters, power lines, and other man made sources can significantly affect
various tissues and physiologic functions.
We are constantly being bathed in an
increasing sea of radiation from exposure to the above, as well as electrical
appliances, computers, Bluetooth devices, Wi-Fi installations and over 2,000
communications satellites in outer space that shower us with signals to GPS receivers.
New WiMax transmitters on cell phone towers that have a range of up to two
square miles compared to Wi-Fi’s 300 feet will soon turn the core of North
America into one huge electromagnetic hot spot. Children are more severely
affected because their brains are developing and their skulls are thinner. A
two-minute call can alter brain function in a child for an hour, which is why
other countries ban their sale or discourage their use under the age of 18. In
contrast, this is the segment of the population now being targeted here in a $2
billion U.S. advertising campaign that views “tweens” (children between 8 and
12 years old) as the next big cell phone market. Firefly and Barbie cell phones
are also being promoted for 6 to 8-year-olds.
It is not generally appreciated that there is
a cumulative effect and that talking on a cell phone for just an hour a day for
ten years can add up to 10,000 watts of radiation. That’s ten times more than
from putting your head in a microwave oven. Pregnant women may also be at
increased risk based on a study showing that children born to mothers who used
a cell phone just two or three times a day during pregnancy showed a dramatic
increase in hyperactivity and other behavioral and emotional problems. And for
the 30% of children who had also used a cell phone by age 7, the incidence of
behavioral problems was 80% higher! Whether ontogeny (embryonic development)
recapitulates phylogeny is debatable, but it is clear that lower forms of life
are also much more sensitive. If you put the positive electrode of a 1.5 volt
battery in the Pacific Ocean at San Francisco and the negative one off San
Diego, sharks in the in between these cities can detect the few billionths of a
volt electrical field. EMF fields have also been implicated in the recent
massive but mysterious disappearance of honeybee colonies essential for
pollinating over 90 commercial crops. As Albert Einstein warned, “If the bee
disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would only have four years
of life left.”
Finally, all life on earth evolved under the
influence of solar radiation and geomagnetic forces that we have learned to
adapt to and in some instances even utilize. The health of all living systems
(ranging upward from a cell, tissue, organ or person, to a family, organization
or nation) depends on good communication – good communication within, as well
as with the external environment. All communication in the body eventually
takes place via very subtle electromagnetic signaling between cells that is now
being disrupted by artificial electropollution we have not had time to adapt
to. As Alvin Toffler emphasized in Future Shock, too much change in too short a
time produces severe stress due to adaptational failure. The adverse effects of
electrosmog may take decades to be appreciated, although some, like
carcinogenicity, are already starting to surface. This gigantic experiment on
our children and grandchildren could result in massive damage to mind and body
with the potential to produce a disaster of unprecedented proportions, unless
proper precautions are immediately implemented. At the same time, we must
acknowledge that novel electromagnetic therapies have been shown to benefit
stress related disorders ranging from anxiety, depression and insomnia, to
arthritis, migraine and tension headaches. As demonstrated in
Bioelectromagnetic Medicine, they may also be much safer and more effective
than drugs, so we need to avoid throwing the baby out with the bathwater.”
