At issue is the health of electricians, plumbers, and other workers who might be working near hidden cell towers without knowing it.
One way to mitigate that problem, according to IBEW Safety and Health Director
"If you're close enough to them, you can be getting burned and not even know it. You don't feel it. You don't see it," said Tomaseski.
"The problem is that these things are everywhere now. There's over a half a million of these cellular sites...They may be on the roof of your building," Tomaseski said.
IBEW also wants a third party to monitor the new company's nationwide plan as a condition of the merger.
IBEW is one of several entities filing comments in opposition to the deal. The merger would make Verizon Wireless, jointly owned by
The EMR Policy Institute, a
EMR has long argued that cell towers in close proximity to humans are dangerous. Calling FCC's guidelines on radio frequencies "superficial and arbitrary," EMR said the FCC should "initiate or request thorough and comprehensive research" on the towers' health effects.
Meanwhile, a group of competitor wireless companies is protesting the merger because it says the deal will harm its members roaming agreements with
One of the signatories to that comment is
Other signatories include the Rural Telecommunications Group, the Organization for the Promotion and Advancement of Small Telecommunications Companies, and several competitor companies.
Filing separately,
Consumer advocates also oppose the merger, arguing the deal is bad for competition.
Consumers Union Senior Counsel
Several organizations have sent comments to the FCC supporting the pending merger, including Women Impacting Public Policy, which said women and minority business owners would benefit from increased access to wireless Internet.
The Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy echoed those comments, saying the merger would speed the roll-out of new wireless Internet technologies that allow for increased download speeds.
-By
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Not new information, but very interesting!
Dear Mr Rudolph;
In the recent Omega newsletter, which I received just today (5 February), I have found with interest the following brief note signed by Don Maisch:
..."Occupational exposure to RF/MW and "Microwave sickness" (excerpt) Some months ago I was contacted by the Trade Union responsible for Australian crane operaters. They are receiving many concerns about health problems from crane operaters who were working at elevations close to active microwave antennas, such as mobile phone antennas on top of buildings.
From our discussions it was apparent that there seemed to be a connection with health complaints and working in close proximity to antennas. The symptoms were the same as those listed under the condition of "microwave sickness" in the Russian medical literature."...
I would be obliged to you for receiving more details about the symptoms and complaints which occured in the Australian crane operators and were related by them to radiation from mobile phone antennas. Perhaps an e-mail contact with Don Maisch would be helpful. We work for years on occupational exposure to microwave radiation and the above informations would be of great interest for us.
Best wishes. Sincerely yours,
Prof. Dr med. Stanislaw Szmigielski,
Department of Microwave Safety, Military Institute of Hygiene and Epidemiology, Warsaw, Poland.
