For persons who suffer from electrical hypersensitivity and disability, this Italian news is very important!
- IL SECOLO "Disability: the court blames use"
- Communiqué from Prof. Angelo G. Levis Judgment of the Appeal Court regarding the recognition of occupational illness due to the use of a mobile and cordless phone
- All Next-up News:
www.next-up.org/Newsoftheworld/2009.php
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Magnetic field issue draws controversy
Sharp differences expressed about safety of power-line placement
By Leslie Brooks Suzukamo
lsuzukamo@pioneerpress.com
Updated: 12/16/2009 09:56:39 PM CST
http://www.twincities.com/business/ci_14013902
It points north on a compass. It turns the motors in hair dryers and refrigerators. And it emanates from high-voltage power lines.
But is a magnetic field harmful to human health?
That question was at the center of testimony by dueling experts Wednesday at the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission, which is trying to decide the route of a new 345kilovolt transmission line between Brookings, S.D., and the town of Hampton in Dakota County.
The line is one of three high-voltage lines planned for the state by Xcel Energy and Great River Energy in the Twin Cities. Jointly called CapX 2020, the three lines carry a price tag of $1.7 billion, the price of shoring up the state's electrical grid to meet growing energy needs in the next decade, the utilities say.
Permits for the other lines between Fargo, N.D., and the St. Cloud-Monticello area and from Hampton to La Crosse, Wis., await PUC approval, but the commission OK'd the 230-mile Brookings-to-Hampton line in mid-April.
Now comes the hard part — drawing the exact route for the high-voltage line within a wide corridor of farmland and small towns.
State rules on rights-of-way say the power lines can be placed as close as 75 feet from their center to residential property lines.
But Dr. David Carpenter, director of the Institute for Health and the Environment at the State University of New York at Albany and a public health expert, argued on behalf of opponents that the lines should be kept more than 300 feet from residences and day care centers because studies show the electromagnetic fields have a relationship to elevated levels of childhood and adult leukemia, Alzheimer's disease and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, better known as Lou Gehrig's Disease.
Carpenter's recommendations are controversial because the studies do not show electromagnetic fields directly cause cancer or neurodegenerative diseases like ALS.
Peter Valberg, a public health expert with Gradient Consulting in Cambridge, Mass., who testified for the utilities, said a statistical link may be present but there is no way of knowing whether electromagnetic fields actually caused the disease, and there are no good animal studies to show that.
"We've got to look at this closely, but at the present time, it doesn't all hang together," he said.
"I think that's a pile of nonsense," Carpenter said. The studies may not have explained how high-voltage electromagnetic fields harm people, but they still show it's not good to live next to them, he said.
Standing directly under 345 KV line exposes a person to an electromagnetic field of about 100 milligauss.
A gauss is a measurement of magnetic strength and it fades the farther it gets from its source.
Carpenter sets the limit for exposure at a mere two to four milligauss.
The World Health Organization and the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection guidelines say people should not be exposed to power lines giving off more than 833 milligauss.
Leslie Brooks Suzukamo can be reached at 651-228-5475.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
New scientific research now shows that cigarette smoke can cause genetic mutations and that that a person may develop one mutation for every 15 cigarettes smoked (story below). They found more than 23,000 mutations that tumor cells had acquired and also discovered a new gene.
We already know that Electro magnetic radiation causes damage to DNA. This raises several questions:
1.Will we receive one mutation for each one minute on a cell phone or one mutation for each five minute call cell phone?
2. How many mutations does a baby receive from having a DECT baby monitor?
3. How many mutations an hour from children using WiFi?
4. How many mutations a day from living near to a cell phone mast?
Martin Weatherall
www.weepinitiative.org
DNA Sequencing Used to Attack Lung Cancer
ScienceDaily (Dec. 17, 2009) — Aided by next-generation DNA sequencing technology, an international team of researchers has gained insights into how more than 60 carcinogens associated with cigarette smoke bind to and chemically modify human DNA, ultimately leading to cancer-causing genetic mutations.
In a new study available online and in a future issue of the journal Nature, lung-cancer experts in the Harold C. Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center at UT Southwestern Medical Center worked with scientists from the Cancer Genome Project in the United Kingdom to determine the entire genetic sequence of cancer cells from a patient with small-cell lung cancer (SCLC). They then compared those results with normal DNA isolated from the same patient.
Using new DNA sequencing technology called "massively parallel sequencing," the researchers searched the DNA sequences for differences between tumor and normal cells. They found more than 23,000 mutations that the tumor cells had acquired and also discovered a new gene involved in lung cancer named CHD7.
The number of mutations from the study suggests that a person may develop one mutation for every 15 cigarettes smoked, said Dr. John Minna, director of the Nancy B. and Jake L. Hamon Center for Therapeutic Oncology Research at UT Southwestern and one of the authors of the new study.
The researchers said the findings illustrate the power of advanced technology to provide important new information about human cancer, including the effect of cancer-causing chemicals on the body and the identification of potential new therapeutic targets.
"Cancer is driven by acquired mutations in genes, and we are at a point where it soon will be possible to actually know every mutation in the tumors of each of our patients," Dr. Minna said.
"The key will be to use this information to find new ways to help prevent cancers, diagnose them earlier and to select treatments that might be specific for each patient's tumor. While these findings are the first step, they have lighted our path to clearly point us in the right direction. In addition, they provide the first detailed analysis of a human cancer -- lung cancer -- that is closely linked to smoking."
Dr. Minna and Dr. Adi Gazdar, professor of pathology in the Hamon Center at UT Southwestern, provided the SCLC cells and normal cells for the research. Dr. Minna, who also directs the W.A. "Tex" and Deborah Moncrief Jr. Center for Cancer Genetics, and Dr. Gazdar have developed one of the most extensive collections of lung-cancer cell lines, which are used by researchers worldwide in studies of the disease. The SCLC and normal cells used in the study are designated NCI-H209 and NCI-BL209, respectively, and were established from a patient Drs. Minna and Gazdar treated 30 years ago.
When the researchers analyzed the 23,000 mutations, they found distinctive patterns associated with the cocktail of carcinogens present in cigarette smoke. The DNA sequence of the cancer cells also revealed that the cells had attempted to repair their smoke-damaged DNA using two mechanisms, but the cells were only partially successful.
Cigarette smoke deposits hundreds of chemicals into the airways and lungs. The longer one smokes and the more cigarettes smoked each day, the higher the risk of developing lung cancer and mutations.
"By applying the same approach to other cancers not associated with cigarette smoking, including the very large group of people who develop lung cancer but have never smoked, it may be possible to discern which carcinogens play a role in those other cancers as well," Dr. Gazdar said.
Dr. Minna added that the research methods used to analyze the cancer cells represented a technological tour de force.
"The data demonstrate the power of whole-genome sequencing to untangle the complex mutational signatures found in cancers induced by cigarette smoke," Dr. Minna said. "In addition, the protein product of the CHD7 gene now becomes a new marker for early diagnosis and also for potentially targeted therapy."
The study was supported by grants from the Wellcome Trust, the Human Frontiers Science Program and the National Cancer Institute.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Call for free internet for whole county
http://www.lep.co.uk/news/Call-for-free-internet-for.5908540.jp
Published Date: 14 December 2009
A Parliamentary campaign has been launched to make Lancashire Britain's first wifi county by rolling out free internet access to the entire population.
MPs say free wifi access would have "countless benefits" for businesses, residents and students and provide a huge economic boost.
The suggestion has been made in an Early Day Motion tabled by Chorley MP Lindsay Hoyle and signed by South Ribble MP David Borrow and Ribble Valley MP Nigel Evans.
The MPs want Lancashire County Council and the district councils to follow the example of Swindon borough council, which plans to offer free internet access to its residents.
No one within the borough boundary will be out of range of a wireless connection after April next year, when 1,400 access points will be placed on street lamps.
Mr Hoyle believes Swindon has drawn up a model which should be repeated. His EDM asks the government to back "forward thinking" projects elsewhere.
Response:
Lancashire is a great county. My family are from Lancashire. Lancastrians face a choice now, and it is a big one. It is passing most people by, but it will determine whether Lancashire is a successful county by the middle of this century or whether it is a sick one. The Council have a choice to install a fibre optic network to provide fast broadband, digital TV and radio to everyone, or to go wireless. The first will be harder to install and may cost more but will set the infrastructure for fast internet for decades to come.
It is also safe. The latter is cheaper, but is likely to lead to seriously compromised health for the population, wildlife and future generations.
I have spent my career understanding how the brain works and what goes wrong in disease. There are now many scientific studies published that demonstrate that exposure to low powers of pulsed microwave electromagnetic fields (such as in wifi wireless internet) alters the way brains develop.
Rats exposed during pregnancy have babies with damaged parts of the brain involved in learning and memory. The brains have abnormal dead cells and fewer of them. Other studies show that learning abilities and memory are compromised following exposure to wireless technologies. Behavioural problems and short attention spans in children have also been found to be associated to exposures to wireless devices. Then there is male fertility. The evidence for decreased fertility in men who use mobile phones or for exposure to mobile phone masts is now very strong. Cancer clusters are reported near to phone masts. The potential damage to nerve cells in the brain and increased risk of cancer is a concern for the elderly and increases in the numbers of people with dementia or cancer might be expected. Lancashire has a choice.
Don't do nothing, as now is the time to choose wisely. If you value the health of your young people, want bright healthy children, a fit elderly population, then choose a fibre optic infrastructure. Choose to lead the world with fast communication technologies without the risk of increased infertility, poor cognitive abilities and disease. I suspect that the communities that are leading the world in the 22nd century will not be the wireless ones. They will be the ones who listened to the science and developed safe technologies that allowed future generations to flourish. Have a safe and happy 2010.
Dr. S. Starkey
