W.E.E.P. News
Wireless Electrical and Electromagnetic Pollution News
22 May 2010
1,500 in campaign against mobile towers after 4 fall ill
Smita Nair Posted: Thu May 20 2010, 02:35 hrs Mumbai:
Carmichael road: Residents blame radiation, resolve towers have to go
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/1-500-in-campaign-against-mobile-towers-after-4-fall-ill/621262
Over 1,500 residents of South Mumbai's Carmichael Road, home to some of India's richest families, have taken a collective decision to seek a "radiation-free environment" by asking for the removal of cellphone towers from their roofs.
The effort was initiated by residents of Usha Kiran Building, who cite three cases of brain tumour and an alleged case of bone cancer as "strong evidence" of dangerous radiation from towers atop the adjacent building, Vijay Apartments. Residents of that building have joined the campaign.
The residents say they struggled for two years to gather the evidence before coming together and agreeing to deny permission to operators who want to set up cellphone towers. Some societies have also written to Vijay Apartments requesting that their towers be removed.
There is no conclusive evidence on health hazards, if any, caused by electromagnetic radiation, and India does not have an authorised, independent agency to inspect radiation levels. There are no legal guidelines either on the installation of cell towers on residential buildings. WHO has said cancer is unlikely to be caused by mobile phones or their base stations, based on expert consensus, and that reviews have not found convincing evidence about other health hazards either.
But the Usha Kiran residents claim doctors treating their four patients suspect the problems were caused by the radiation. Last year they went to Navi Mumbai-based Sameer-CEM, a research and development institution affiliated to the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, asking them to survey the "radiated power density". Two tests were conducted, one in 2009 funded by the residents, and the next this January, funded by one of the telecom service providers themselves.
The 2009 tests projected high density levels. The January tests were done in two environments, once with the towers switched on and then with these off. The Sameer-CEM team checked the radiation power density on the three floors where those with tumours lived, and in a flat just below the towers in Vijay Apartments. When the towers were on, the density on the ninth floor was 0.4637 watts per sq cm; when off, it fell to 0.0008 watts per sq cm.
Vijay Apartments passed a resolution in its annual general body meeting that the cell phone towers should be removed. A spokesperson said, "We are not looking at it as a decision on health; there is no conclusive research yet on this subject." But the results showed there was a huge drop in radiation density when the towers were switched off. "We feel there is no need to live in such dense radiation levels. The resolution is a choice we made towards a radiation-free environment."
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ElectroSensitivity UK website
Welcome to the ElectroSensitivity UK website. Our aim is to provide unbiased and balanced information to help those who have become sensitive to mobile and cordless phones, their masts, wifi, and a multitude of common everyday electrical appliances.
http://www.es-uk.info/index.asp
You may care to feature extracts from Michael Bevington's book on ES & EHS as per attached in your trial preparation.
Our regular newsletters also available online are useful: www.es-uk.info.
kind regards
Sarah Dacre
UK
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Transcript of the Standing Committee's Meetings
Transcript of the Standing Committee's Meetings 12 & 13 ( also with: Dr. Magda Havas, Dr. Dimitris Panagopoulos, Dr. Andrew Goldsworthy , Dr. Olle Johansson, etc…) are here:
click on Evidences
Thanks, cheers,
Hans.
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Do Cell Phones Cause Cancer? Part 1
http://howtogetwellfaster.com/do-cell-phones-cause-cancer-part-1-1382.html
Are you concerned about your cell phone use? As if we didn't already have plenty of health related environmental topics to be concerned about. For several years, I've wondered about the impact cell phone use and the effect it has on my brain and body. After talking to someone formerly associated with the cell phone industry, who informed me her colleagues did not allow them near their bodies, I began to seriously reduce my use.
We'll take a look in this article at several studies and their critical findings. There are other reports that have found no link between cell phone use and brain tumors, but many researchers believe the length of the studies, two or three years, were not long enough to adequately determine the true risk of long term, excessive exposure to the microwaves emitted by cell phones. Tumors can take at least 10 years to grow. This fact questions the validity of official assurances of safety, based on preceding studies, that lasted for only a few years.
In 2003, scientists found the first evidence linking brain cancer with mobile phone use. A study determined that users who spend more than an hour a day talking on a mobile phone have a close to one-third higher risk of developing a rare form of brain tumor. Most frequently, the cancers were found on the side of the head that the user held the phone up to.
The association was found with digital mobile phones, old-style analogue mobile phones and digital enhanced cordless phones.
The medical records of 1600 brain tumor patients who'd used cell phones for up to 10 years prior to their diagnosis were reviewed. The researchers determined that the risk of brain tumors increased with the frequency and length of time the cell phones were used.
Also, using the phone for more than an hour per day caused a thirty per cent increase in the risk of developing an acoustic neuroma, a tumor that can cause deafness and occurs in an auditory nerve in the brain.
The incidence of this type of cancer, though rare, have increased from one tumor per 100,000 people in 1980 to one per 80,000 today.
Another study, conducted in Sweden found talking on your cell phone for an hour a day increases your risk of developing a brain tumor is 240% higher than a person who never uses one. The study was published in the International Archives of Occupational and Environmental Health. The results of this study go against another recent one carried out in the UK and published in January, 2006, which indicated that cell phone use is safe for humans.
The scientists evaluated the cell phone use among 905 people who had a malignant brain tumor and compared them to a control group of 905 healthy people. All the volunteers were between the ages of 20 and 80.
85 of the 905 people who had a malignant tumor were high users of cell phones (mobile phones) – they started using mobile phones a long time ago, and have used them a great deal, on average for about an hour a day.
The researchers' definition of extensive cell phone use means is 2,000 hours of talking on a mobile unit, over the course of many years.
Source:
http://jco.ascopubs.org/cgi/content/abstract/27/33/5565
International Journal of Oncology February 2003;22(2):399-407
Cell Phones and Cancer Part 2
http://howtogetwellfaster.com/cell-phones-and-cancer-part-2-1459.html
Dr. Vini Khurana conducted a review of 465 studies, 23 case-control studies, which involved 37,916 participants (12,344 patient cases and 25,572 controls), were included in the report, published in 2009. His analysis found compared with never or rarely having used a mobile phone, the odds ratio for overall use was significantly greater for malignant and benign tumors in a meta-analysis of all 23 studies.
Mobile phone use of 10 years or longer was associated with a risk of tumors in 13 studies reporting this association. Also, additional analysis revealed the same findings in smaller groups.
The current study found that there is possible evidence linking mobile phone use to an increased risk of tumors from a meta-analysis of low-biased case-control studies. Prospective cohort studies providing a higher level of evidence are needed.
Mobile phones could kill far more people than smoking or asbestos, a study by an award-winning cancer expert has concluded. He says people should avoid using them wherever possible and that governments and the mobile phone industry must take "immediate steps" to reduce exposure to their radiation.
Dr. Khurana's study is the most devastating indictment yet published of the health risks. The debate regarding the health effects of low-intensity electromagnetic radiation from sources such as power lines, base stations, and cell phones has recently been reignited.
The results indicate that using a cell phone for more than ten years approximately doubles the risk of being diagnosed with a brain tumor on the same side of the head as that preferred for cell phone use. The data achieve statistical significance for glioma and acoustic neuroma but not for meningioma.
It draws on growing evidence that using handsets for 10 years or more can double the risk of brain cancer. Cancers take at least a decade to develop, invalidating official safety assurances based on earlier studies which included few, if any, people who had used the phones for that long.
Dr. Khurana concluded that mobile phones could kill far more people than smoking or asbestos. He says people should avoid using them wherever possible and that governments and the mobile phone industry must take "immediate steps" to reduce exposure to their radiation.
He admits that mobiles can save lives in emergencies, but concludes that "there is a significant and increasing body of evidence for a link between mobile phone usage and certain brain tumors". He believes this will be "definitively proven" in the next decade.
Noting that malignant brain tumors represent "a life-ending diagnosis", he adds: "We are currently experiencing an unchecked and dangerous situation." He fears that "unless the industry and governments take immediate and decisive steps", the incidence of malignant brain tumors and associated death rate will be observed to rise globally within a decade from now, by which time it may be far too late to intervene medically.
"It is anticipated that this danger has far broader public health ramifications than asbestos and smoking," says Professor Khurana, says his assessment is partly based on the fact that three billion people now use the phones worldwide, three times as many as smoke. Smoking kills some five million worldwide each year, and exposure to asbestos is responsible for as many deaths in Britain as road accidents.
In 2008, the French government warned against the use of cell phones, especially by children. Germany also advises its people to minimize handset use, and the European Environment Agency has called for exposures to be reduced.
Source: http://www.brain-surgery.us/mobilephone.html
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