W.E.E.P. News
Wireless Electrical and Electromagnetic Pollution News
16 November 2010
Magnetic fields have undeniable effect on the brain
http://blogs.itbusiness.ca/2010/07/magnetic-fields-have-undeniable-effect-on-the-brain/
Imagine this scenario in a doctor's office of the future.
You walk in to visit your family doctor and complain that you're suffering from depression. Your doctor agrees, but instead of prescribing you Prozac, she instead hands you an electronic gadget in the shape of a wand – much like a metal detector used by airport security – she tells you to point it at a specific area of your head and turn it on for 10 minutes, twice a day. The magnetic field will zap away your depression and leave you feeling relaxed instead.
It sounds like sci-fi techno-wizardry, but this sort of treatment may very well be a viable future treatment for sufferers of depression in 10 or 20 years if the research of Dr. Alex Thomas and other scientists like him takes off. Personal devices might be a possible future, but repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) treatment is a reality in Canada today.
Thomas is a scientist with London, Ont.-based Lawson Health Research Institute. He's also the founder of Fralex Therapeutics Inc., which was bought last year by Baylis Medical Company Inc.
Health Canada gave the thumbs up years ago to a not-so-mobile device that exposes a patient's brain to a large magnetic field. It's used to treat those suffering depression who aren't responding well to drug therapy.
It's no quack science – there are 1390 medial research papers available on rTMS on PubMed, a collection of international research hosted by the U.S. National Institutes of Health.
Now Thomas is working on a different approach to rTMS. Instead of exposing the entire brain to a large magnetic field, he wants to target specific areas of the brain with weaker and more focused magnetic fields. The research has implications for therapeutic practices, but I think it also raises questions about the safety of cell phones.
"We're trying to create a gradient field that will create a virtual lesion, to numb a specific area of the brain or to hyperstimulate it," Thomas says.
In essence, the weak magnetic pulses act like a maestro to the brain's neurons. When it is turned on, the neurons fire synchronously and when it turns off, the neurons stop firing. Repeated pulses can turn a brain that is in chaos back into a brain that is ordered and coordinated.
"I would expect to see regulatory approval and marketing occur in the European Union in the foreseeable future," Thomas says. Fralex is also seeking approval in Canada, and Baylis is producing a therapeutic unit based on the weaker pulse method.
The side effects of this therapy should be tame when compared to pharmacology, which affects the entire body, Thomas argues. But there are some known side effects. Since the pulse aims to reduce emotional pain, people receiving the pulse therapy tend to feel an effect of relaxation.
Anecdotally, the side effects go further than that, Thomas says. Some volunteers after receiving five to 10 minutes of exposure are unable to think of any one single thing that bothers them.
Now that sounds fine when you're talking about a clinical therapy method. But it becomes creepy when you realize our cell phones generate the same sort of electromagnetic fields that these rTMS devices do. You have to wonder if we're unknowingly numbing ourselves into a relaxed state of apathy.
It's not an easy question to answer, Thomas says. Because adequate research hasn't been done to fully understand the effect of long term exposure on the brain.
"We still can't say what the level of exposure that produces objective or subjective effects in humans actually is, and we're one of the major centres in the world actually testing this," he says. "I'm in a position to fear monger if I wanted too. You can't prove a negative, all we can do is examine and come up with a scientific best guess at what the effects might be."
If Thomas has demonstrated that weak magnetic fields can have a measurable and predictable effect on the human brain, then serious questions must be raised about cell phones that produce similar fields. Some initial research into cell phone safety indicates there is a potential human health risk, especially for children.
Electromagnetic fields from cell phones penetrate living tissue and seep into the brain. We just haven't been using cell phones long enough to know exactly what this might be doing to us.
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Dr. Devra Davis will be speaking at Brock University, Academic South 203, St Catharines, Ontario on Monday November 22 between 1:00 and 2:00pm.
Community members are welcome.
For more information contact brockuhealth@gmail.com or info@niagarabreastcancer.org
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Pharmaceutical Microchipping
http://www.naturalnews.com/030341_microchips_drugs.html
Big Pharma to begin microchipping drugs
Tuesday, November 09, 2010
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
Editor of NaturalNews.com
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Wi-Fi challenged
By NATHAN TAYLOR, THE PACKET & TIMES
http://www.packetandtimes.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=2822562
A local parent has created a petition to keep wireless Internet (Wi-Fi) out of the new Orillia Public Library.
Colleen Genno's petition comes shortly after she removed her four-year-old son from Monsignor Lee Catholic School, which, like most Simcoe County schools, has Wi-Fi.
She is concerned about the health effects of Wi-Fi, especially as it relates to children.
"As citizens, we should have a say," Genno said of the decision to put Wi-Fi in the new library when it is built.
That decision has already been made. While it will still include wired computers, Orillia's new library will have four main transmitters for laptop users.
"It's a service that's in high demand," said Suzanne Campbell, interim CEO of the library.
At least 135 people use the library's Wi-Fi each month.
"The public, as we can see by our statistics, does want it and is making a lot of use of it," Campbell said.
And the new library, still under construction, is "already wired for it."
There are two transmitters at the temporary library on Gill Street, and the library conforms to the safety guidelines from Health Canada, Campbell said.
Some parents -- many of them in Simcoe County -- have said Health Canada's guidelines relating to radiofrequency exposure are inadequate and that the nation's top authority on health needs to update the safety code.
Genno thinks so, too.
"I'm not just a paranoid mother. There is a lot of proof," she said of research showing Wi-Fi can harm children and adults. "It's dangerous. Lots of children are sick. How are our children supposed to learn with radiation like this?"
Shannon Genno, Colleen's sister, has also taken her child out of school. Her six-year-old daughter was coming home with fevers, and she was having trouble focusing at school. The adverse conditions were absent outside of school, Shannon said.
"I suspect it's Wi-Fi."
While she felt it was in the best interest of her daughter, the decision to remove her from school was "tough," she said, adding her daughter misses her friends and her teacher.
Both Colleen and Shannon Genno had nothing but praise for the school and its teachers. The decision to equip the school with Wi-Fi was made by the Simcoe Muskoka Catholic District School Board.
"I really like the school. I want my child to go there. I just don't want him to be around Wi-Fi," Colleen Genno said.
Diane Legg, the board's communications director, said this is "the only group of folks -- and it's a small group -- that has written the board" on the issue.
"Parents need to make their own decisions," she said.
Wi-Fi will be in the new St. Bernard's and Monsignor Lee Catholic schools when they are built, Legg said, because "technology is a key component of our learning agenda."
Colleen Genno said she knows there are more local parents with similar concerns.
"I don't know if they just don't want to rock the boat. They're willing to sign a petition to keep it out of the schools, but they're not ready to keep their kids home. I don't understand it."
Her feeling is that "our kids aren't sick enough yet for our schools to take notice."
Her goal now is to stay a step ahead by urging that the wireless technology not be included in the new library.
"Wi-Fi is just the 'in' thing with technology. People are just trying to keep up with technology."
If Health Canada were to change its guidelines, Campbell said the library would adjust accordingly.
Colleen Genno has raised the issue with some incoming council members, too, including mayor-elect Angelo Orsi and Ward 4 councillor-elect Tony Madden. She plans to make a deputation to council.
It would be helpful for council to be educated on the matter, and then "we, as a body, would make a decision," said Orsi, who has a chip in his cellphone to reduce the electromagnetic fields.
Madden questioned the need for wireless technology in areas dedicated to children, but said it's "a tough issue because it really boils down to Health Canada."
But, like Orsi, Madden would welcome the opportunity to learn more.
"I'm all ears on it, as an incoming councillor," he said.
The petitions are at Gaudaur Natural Foods and Ecocentric. Before the petitions hit both stores, Genno said there were about 50 signatures.
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