W.E.E.P. News
Wireless Electrical and Electromagnetic Pollution News
19 March 2011
Cell Tower Refugees
Thursday, March 17, 2011
By Jack Coraggio
http://www.countytimes.com/articles/2011/03/17/news/doc4d822147e1a48208005874.txt
KENT–The darkened office window still has the name Progressive Medicine etched into it.
For five years, in a small but otherwise bustling business complex near Kent's charming town center, the comprehensive natural treatment center stood as an active and viable part of the economic community.
A Dream and Static
Until this past October, this was where Brad Harding, M.D., and his wife, Meg McMorrow, a licensed acupuncturist, practiced their professions, promoting health and wellness through Eastern and Western philosophical and medical traditions and techniques.
Over the course of a half-a-decade, it was their dream realized. It wasn't an effortless one however. Before opening their doors, it took them just as much time to develop the business.
Then, about a year-and-a-half ago, the telecommunications giant Verizon Wireless constructed a 150-foot monopole cell tower nearby, just across Maple Street.
Slowly, various adverse health symptoms—such as insomnia, cognitive complications, heart irregularities and memory lapse—affected the husband-and-wife team. It became so overwhelming, they say, that it affected their ability to practice markedly.
As a result, this past fall they moved the operation to Litchfield. And now, particularly for Ms. McMorrow, they have trouble just being in the Kent parking lot for any extended duration without feeling overcome by a certain malaise.
"I'm about 80 percent better," said Ms. McMorrow, while outside her old office. "But just standing here, I can feel this."
She described dizziness, a "torque" in her chest, and mild nausea not unlike altitude sickness. Her sensitivity to electromagnetic radiation has become so acute that she takes the back roads to her mother's home in White Plains, N.Y., just to avoid the frequencies wafting all over highway 684.
The problem is that on the record there is little official information concerning the health risks associated with telecommunication towers.
Off the record, Dr. Harding and Ms. McMorrow can cite endless information on the potential dangers of living near a cell tower.
"We went from 0 to 100 percent exposure, and we went through it together," said Dr. Harding. "When we started noticing it, we were able to talk and share."
The Connecticut Siting Council, the agency that oversees and ultimately approves cell towers, in December 2007 issued a report describing the best management practices concerning electric and magnetic fields (EMF.)
The report focuses on "electric transmission facilities or other sources," and says that the state Department of Public Health produced an EMF Health Concerns Fact Sheet in May 2007 that incorporates the conclusions of national and international health panels. The fact sheet states that while "the current scientific evidence provides no definitive answers as to whether EMF exposure can increase health risks, there is enough uncertainty that some people may want to reduce their exposure to EMF."
So that's what Dr. Harding and Ms. McMorrow did. Still, they're unsatisfied with the lack of information, and are ready to make this matter public. In their Litchfield practice they treat people with symptoms similar to the ones they overcame, as such, are naturally better prepared to handle the problems.
At night, turn off the home's wireless router, and be careful of those newfangled tablets now so big on the gadget scene. They are like portable cell towers, perhaps worse, and they emit electromagnetic radiation.
Dr. Harding and Ms. McMorrow wonder aloud about the spike in prescription sleep aids and mood stabilizing medications; perhaps it has something to do with the spike in EMF, they say. And as they explained to the Washington Board of Selectmen recently, living within a half-mile of a cell tower is living in a red zone.
Like many Litchfield County towns, Washington is in the midst of a couple cell tower brouhahas. The town of Washington wants Verizon Wireless to place one at the old town garage in Washington Depot, and a private landowner may have AT&T install one on Warren Road.
Washington First Selectman Mark Lyon later told the Litchfield County Times that the selectmen are aware of health concerns associated with cell towers. However, the potential Washington Depot tower placement comes at the advice of a hired consultant, and to limit the frequency coming off the tower the town, which would hold the lease, will limit the number of providers to co-locate.
Plus, by using a half-mile radius would severely limit the number of cell towers anywhere.
"If we start using a half-mile setback, there will be no cell service. If you start drawing circles with a mile circumference in the Northwest corner, there would be no cell towers," said Mr. Lyon. "Drive on any road for a mile in Litchfield County, tell me if you don't go by a residence."
Dr. Harding and Ms. McMorrow found the Washington selectmen thoughtful and receptive. And of course the medical practitioners admit not being opposed to technology, just opposed to unfettered "electromagnetic smog," to use a burgeoning term from Europe.
"It's going to be done, these towers will blanket the country, it's how it is done that's most important," said Dr. Harding. "It has to be done sensibly."
Still, watching Ms. McMorrow outside her old workplace struggling to make it safely down a staircase makes one reconsider the cost of better service. One morning, about three months after making their great egress from Kent, they awoke feeling markedly better. On the exact same day, they said, their health significantly improved.
Then, coming back to the office for but a brief period, her rebound so rapidly diminished. At a point, she had to position herself between a building and the cell tower just to somewhat blunt the frequency. But her cell signal was excellent.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Okanagan man questions Health Canada's standards
Cort Smith, CHBC News: Friday, March 18, 2011
http://www.globalregina.com/Okanagan+questions+Health+Canada+standards/4466192/story.html
A Kelowna electrician has brought up the question of whether there is a frequency conflict between people and their cell phones.
It started with a phone call to Industry Canada.
Curtis Bennett, a Kelowna electrician, brought up the question of whether there is a frequency conflict between people and their cell phones.
The next thing he knew, Bennett was testifying before the Canadian Parliament's Standing Committee on Health.
Bennett believes that Health Canada's guidelines regarding electromagnetic devices, known as safety code 6, do not account for the fact humans have their own electric frequency.
He says humans were left out of Health Canada's equation for safety standards, which puts the general population at risk.
An extreme example of this problem is Enderby's Barb Makota, who says her cell phone caused significant burns to her face and hands.
However, Bennett says this also happens on a smaller scale.
He says students face this problem everyday at school when they encounter WiFi signals.
Despite his testimony and testimony from other experts saying safety code 6 is obsolete, Health Canada has not reported any of this to the public.
In an email to CHBC News, Health Canada says safety code 6 was established after scientists reviewed decades of data on the effects of radiofrequency energy.
Health Canada says that as long as exposures are within their guidelines, there is no scientific reason they could be dangerous to the public.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FCC Flip Flop on SAR Levels
http://www.aolnews.com/2011/03/14/is-your-cell-phones-radiation-level-safe-dont-call-the-fcc/
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SmartMeters: What's next?
By Howard Glasser
03/17/2011
http://www.record-bee.com/ci_17639548
SmartMeters: What's next?
It's a sad state of affairs when your peaceful, serene county begins to feel like a war zone and you have to stay home, stand guard and keep watch for the SmartMeter installation trucks rolling down your street to protect your home because PG&E doesn't understand the meaning of the word "no."
What part of "no" don't they understand? We've posted signs saying do not install. We tell them no at the door. Kelseyville's District Supervisor Rob Brown has followed Wellington trucks to people's homes advising residents that they can say no when PG&E's SmartMeter messenger and facilitator tells us we don't have a choice. Like other cities and counties around the state, our county supervisors passed a moratorium putting a ban on installation until AB 37 has its chance in Sacramento to provide customers with an opt-out position. People have formed citizen blockades to stop SmartMeter installations. We've written our legislators. We've contacted PG&E and the CPUC.
What more do we have to do? It seems that with all this and an ongoing, ever-growing movement of health professionals and scientists, community groups and regional organizations all essentially saying "stop!" we're nonetheless being besieged by an industry with deadlines they are bent on meeting come hell or high water and the public be damned in the process.
What's the rush? Can't we afford the time to responsibly review the findings since the first installations went in and see if maybe some of the problems reported by thousands of people and businesses from San Diego northward have validity? Why would so many people with no connection to each other report the same symptoms and illnesses and ridiculous and inexplicable rate hikes since SmartMeters were installed? Are these people all suffering from the same mass hysteria? Why do the cynics so quickly label all of these people as if they were lunatics wearing tin hats?
Haven't we experienced in our lifetime, the assurances of one industry or another telling us that everything is fine with their glossy brochures and P.R. campaigns and media ads, only to find out later that they either weren't telling us the truth or didn't have the facts or were covering up something that would be inconvenient for us to know because it would impact their bottom line? Haven't we learned anything from the industry's rush to profit, from the lobbying money that pollutes our political process, from "bought" science, from regulatory corruption, from payoffs to political collusion and coercion?
I think it's high time we stood up with one, large voice and said "no" in no uncertain terms and if that means marching on Sacramento in numbers that simply can't be ignored and making news to get the attention of those we put in office, then so be it. I think it's time to move from blogging to marching. This country was founded on the rights of its people to protest in the face of tyranny and if this isn't tyranny, I don't know what is. I think it's time we woke up and sounded the alarm and took the kind of action it takes to get government to respond when our more passive resistance goes unacknowledged. It's either that or we all lay down and go to sleep and say, that's the end of it, it is what it is and there's nothing we can do about it. That's not America to me.
America is a place I grew up in where the individual mattered. Are we to just step aside while corporations and industry take over our democracy and wield their will on a powerless people or are we going to take back our place as citizens of a country that stands for freedom and make our will known to those who have assumed a position of arrogant and immovable power over us?
Know this. If we as a people united in ways that our legislators haven't seen in years and stop falling prey to those who would have us splintered in to little groups all pitted against each other while they passed laws and adopted rules and regulations that oppressed us and diminished our rights and freedoms, we'd regain the power we all have and never lost no matter what anyone tells you. The power is in the people. The problem is we have to start acting like one people and get out of our skins and political affiliations and speak to government as a nation that rises up and says "I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take this anymore!" as Peter Finch told his broadcast viewers in the 1976 strikingly prophetic movie, "Network." If you haven't seen that film, it's worth renting if only to rekindle a spirit that empowers and makes you realize once again that your voice matters, that you have the right to be heard and that you will accept nothing less than your rightful place in the decisions that are made that affect your everyday lives.
Wake up, be heard and don't be beaten down by those who would criticize or mock your beliefs and have you conform, get in line, go along with the program and just take whatever hand you're dealt even if you are being dealt from a stacked deck.
Howard Glasser
Kelseyville
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Study Shows Greater Security Concerns for Smart Meters
A new report by Pike Research suggests that smart meters may be the weak security link in the electrical grid because they have regularly been rolled out to customers with little consideration for the potential security risks. ...
"It would be naïve to think that smart meters will not be successfully attacked
http://www.smartmeters.com/the-news/2047-study-shows-greater-security-concerns-for-smart-meters.html
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Feds Tell Big Tobacco to Run Ad Campaigns Saying They Lied
How long before the cell phone industry has to do the same?
Catherine
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NEW Studies Reveal Alarming Hidden Cause of Breast Cancer
Could electro magnetic radiation be reacting with free iron and aluminium to cause cancer?
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2011/03/18/vaccines-increase-cancer-risk.aspx
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
BC School Protects Children's Health and Saves Money!
These differences all impact how WiFi affects health. Source. Children are more susceptible to radiation from cellphones and wireless networks in general ...
http://www.helladelicious.com/blog/2011/03/bc-school-protects-childrens-health-and-saves-money/
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Nuclear Radiation and Health
As we are well enough away from the source of radiation being released in Japan, there is no need to take doses of potassium iodide. However, ensuring adequate levels of circulating iodine in the body will help protect the thyroid gland. This article outlines other dietary factors that will help your body detoxify appropriately.
http://www.naturalnews.com/031727_radiation_contamination.html
Potassium iodide is emergency medicine, not a nutritional supplement! I would personally NEVER take this stuff unless I was about to be hit with radiation. Do not acquire these pills and start popping them like candy. That's insane. These are for emergency use ONLY.
NOTE: Potassium Iodide is NOT to be taken like vitamins! This is for emergency use only, preceding an imminent radiation exposure event. Do NOT take this in North America if a meltdown event has not occurred (you'd be wasting it). HOLD ON to these pills for emergencies only. Save 'em until you need 'em, folks!
Potassium Iodide has possible side effects. If you just start slamming these pills (especially when you don't need them), that is not a proper use of this emergency medicine. People who are allergic to shellfish should not take these pills.
Those on thyroid medications or who suffer from thyroid problems should check with their physicians. Don't be foolish! Potassium iodide is a concentrated, isolated nutrient combination that should only be used in serious emergencies and never for casual use.
Read more about possible side effects at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potass...
I would never take potassium iodide unless radiation exposure were imminent. I own some potassium iodide but have never taken it personally, and I hope I never have to.
The above quote is taken from the following article:
http://www.NaturalNews.com/z031746_potassium_iodide_radiation_pills.html
Further information:
http://thedispensaryonline.com/about-your-health?view=sski-potassium-iodide-radiation
http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/dhp-mps/prodnatur/applications/licen-prod/monograph/mono_iodine-iode-eng.php
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This is a very good opportunity to encourage NIEHS to conduct research on electrosmog. They request input from the public and the scientific community. I hope that many of you will submit your ideas. We could use this funding to support research as no funding exists in North America.
-magda
SUBMIT YOUR VISIONARY IDEAS ABOUT ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH RESEARCH
Strategic planning process begins at NIEHS
The National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) is seeking input from the public as well as researchers for its new strategic plan. To get involved, submit an idea for research or nominate a workshop participant.
"We are looking for visionary ideas to help define the institute's future directions, research goals, and resource priorities," said NIEHS Deputy Director Richard Woychik, Ph.D., who is leading the strategic planning effort.
The NIEHS is the nation's leading federal biomedical agency supporting research to discover how the environment influences health. It's part of the National Institutes of Health.
Visionary ideas can be submitted through the Internet at
http://strategicplan.niehs.nih.gov/
All submitted ideas will be posted to the Internet site, and anyone can comment on the ideas or give a thumbs-up or thumbs-down rating. The site also integrates with Facebook and Twitter. Submissions will be accepted through April 30, 2011.
Additionally, NIEHS is seeking nominations for a stakeholder community workshop in mid-July in Research Triangle Park, N. C.
You can nominate yourself, a colleague or anyone who is passionate about research on our environment, and improving public health and preventing disease. Nominations can be made at
http://www.niehs.nih.gov/about/od/strategicplan/nomination/index.cfm.
"This is an opportunity for everyone who cares about environmental health to have a voice in shaping the direction of our research," said Linda Birnbaum, Ph.D., NIEHS and National Toxicology Program director.
The public will have many opportunities to provide input and review throughout the 15-month strategic planning process. Visit
http://www.niehs.nih.gov/strategicplan/
for more information about the process and timeline for establishing the new NIEHS strategic plan, or to review the existing 2005-2011 strategic plan.
The NIEHS supports research to understand the effects of the environment on human health.
For more information on environmental health topics, visit
Subscribe to one or more of the NIEHS news lists
(www.niehs.nih.gov/news/releases/newslist/index.cfm)
to stay current on NIEHS news, press releases, grant opportunities, training, events, and publications.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) -- The Nation's Medical Research Agency -- includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. It is the primary federal agency for conducting and supporting basic, clinical and translational medical research, and it investigates the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit
This NIH News Release is available online at:
http://www.nih.gov/news/health/mar2011/niehs-17.htm.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wireless in smart meters a health concern
By A. Richards, The Citizen March 18, 2011
http://www.canada.com/Wireless+smart+meters+health+concern/4461181/story.html
Did you know that BC Hydro will install a smart meter in homes by 2012?
A smart meter is a piece of wireless technology that will replace your existing hydro meter.
BC Hydro is claiming these will help in hydro theft, report electricity more accurately, and modernize our system.
This all sounds good except for the fact that the safety of wireless technology is very controversial.
Smart meters employ radio frequency radiation and send signals wirelessly 24/7. The negative heath impacts from this constant frequency can include headaches, dizziness, sleep problems, tinnitus, and many more serious problems as our exposure to electromagnetic radiation continues to grow.
Many people choose to have wireless internet, cell phones, cordless phones etc. and that is each person's choice, but unfortunately, as all of us know who have detected someone else's wireless on our computer know, most of us really don't have a choice.
I urge you all to look at the sage report
(http://sagereports.com/smart-meter-rf/?page_id=404)
to view all the scientific data on the effects of low intensity radio frequency, everything from emotional behavioral changes to a two fold increase in leukemia in children.
My meter is right on the side wall of my playroom, and my house is so small I have no choice but to have that room as the children's play room and my office. I am scared, and worried about not being given a choice.
I choose to have wired internet, have my children speak on a wired phone, but I feel helpless at being told that regardless of how I feel I will not have a choice. I do not find this kind of attitude of a company partially funded by us to be acceptable.
Yesterday, in California, the City of Capitola, became the seventh local government in California to criminalize the installation of "smart" meters in their jurisdiction. One Councilman Sam Storey said, "It sends a message to both the legislature and PG&E that we feel people should be able to make choice.
In our society people should be able to choose. Frankly I think [PG&E] has done a terrible job of rolling this out and communicating with the public on Smart Meters."
I hope our council stands up like theirs did, and I hope we as a people can say that "yes, we DO have a choice!"
Please see
(http://www.citizensforsafetechnology.org)
to download a paper for your meter, and find out more.
A. Richards
North Cowichan
Web site www.weepinitiative.org e-mail contactweep@weepinitiative.org
To sign up for WEEP News: newssignup@weepinitiative.org (provide name and e-mail address)
W.E.E.P. – The Canadian initiative to stop Wireless Electrical and Electromagnetic Pollution
