Kelly,

  I'm no expert on the biological effects of electromagnetic fields, but
I've long been aware that the manufacturers of walkie-talkies, cordless
microphones, and all their successors, such as cellular telephones, have
been reluctant to consider the health effects of their products.  Others
have carried out some investigations in this field, but the results seem to
be rather anecdotal instead of conclusive.

  One clear fact is that microwave ovens operate on the resonant frequency
of the water molecule.  So we should not expose ourselves to radiation of
that frequency, about 2450 megahertz.  If there are similar resonances in
other biological molecules on other frequencies, we should avoid exposure to
those frequencies, too.

  While high-voltage power lines certainly radiate strong electromagnetic
fields, their frequency is 0.000060 megahertz, which is probably not close
to any biological molecule's resonant frequency.  Much worse must be the
electromagnetic fields produced by the coils wrapped around the necks of TV
picture tubes, which produce strong magnetic fields for deflecting the
electron beams from left to right and then quickly back again as well as
slowly down the screen and then rapidly back to the top.  The left-to-right
deflection takes place nearly 16,000 times a second, and the most
significant effect of this magnetic field on TV viewers probably comes from
the very rapid return from the right edge to the left edge of the screen
16,000 times a second because it's changes in magnetic fields that induce
electric currents to flow in conductive media such as bodily organs, nerves,
and blood vessels.  These currents can perhaps cause physical damage.
Certainly TV watching often causes mental damage.

  There used to be a fear of the x-rays produced by the picture tube's
electron beams' striking the screen at the front of the tube.  But, now that
the front face of the tube is usually made of lead glass, the x-rays are
presumably adequately attenuated before they hit the viewers.

Nelson Blachman
Oakland, Calif.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Kelly Pierce" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, January 17, 2005 5:21 PM
Subject: Hang Up and Listen


> Utne Reader
>
> January/February 2005
>
>
> Hang Up and Listen
>
> by Anne Geske
>
>     While government watchdogs snooze, mobile phones and cell towers cause
> grave harm
>
>     IF THERE'S A SINGLE symbol of the revolution in modern communication,
> it's the cell phone-that evertinier, ever-more-multifunctional ear
> appendage that keeps us in touch with the whole world, wherever we may be.
> Thanks in large part to the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (TCA), the
> empire of wireless communication is spreading unchecked across our
> landscape. There are antennas on apartment buildings, church steeples,
> water towers, and anywhere else a signal made of electromagnetic radiation
> can be transmitted and received. It's hard to resist the convenience. But
> a growing body of evidence shows that the microwave radiation from
> proliferating cell towers-and cell phones themselves-poses a significant
> health risk. And the industry-friendly regulatory system in the United
> States is failing to address the problem.
>
>     Scientists, local governments, and grassroots organizations around the
> world have long been warning about the health hazards of electromagnetic
> radiation (EMR). While all electrical devices, from hair dryers to
> computers, produce EMR, the most hazardous waves are those on the radio
> frequency (RF) section of the electromagnetic spectrum, including radio,
> television, and microwave signals. Microwave radiation is considered
> particularly worrisome.
>
>     Certain individuals, like Arthur Firstenberg, are highly sensitive to
> almost any amount of EMR. As Firstenberg reports in The Ecologist (June
> 2004), his medical career was derailed by his body's intolerance for
> electronics in the operating room, as well as computers and other everyday
> devices. His dilemma spurred him to research the effects on humans of EMR
> in general and microwaves in particular. In 1996, the first year of
> massive cell phone expansion, what he found prompted him to create the
> Cellular Phone Task Force. According to Firstenberg, "each of dozens of
> cities recorded a 10 to 25 percent increase in mortality, lasting two to
> three months, beginning on the , day in 1996 or 1997 on which that city's
> first digital cell phone network began commercial service." Around the
> same time, he says, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) set public
> exposure limits for microwave radiation at "levels at least ten thousand
> times higher than levels which, according to the Environmental Protection
> Agency, were causing reports of illness from all over the world."
>
>     Firstenberg also details a number of reports and research projects,
> including a German study that discovered a host of infirmities in cows
> raised near cell towers, as well as French, Spanish, and Dutch studies
> that documented dizziness, nausea, chest pains, and other symptoms in
> human beings similarly exposed.
>
>     While the FCC regulates wireless service providers and sets standards
> for safe levels of RF radiation, it's the Food and Drug Administration
> (FDA) that has authority to monitor the health effects of cell phones.
> Information posted on the PDA's Web site (www.fda.gov) sends a mixed
> signal, saying, "The available scientific evidence does not show that any
> health problems are associated with using wireless phones. There is no
> proof, however, that wireless phones are absolutely safe."
>
>     As for the FCC, its safety standards for wireless phones are based
> exclusively on the so-called thermal model, which says that at dangerously
> high levels, microwave radiation will heat human tissue, just like it
> heats food in microwave ovens. While acknowledging that scientists have
> noticed biological effects at lower levels of radiation, the FCC Web site
> (www.fcc.gov) claims that "further research is needed to determine the
> generality of such effects and their possible relevance, if any, to human
> health."
>
>     Meanwhile, study results continue to come in, indicating that
> microwaves are quite dangerous even at low, nonthermal levels. Bo
> Sernelius, a Swedish physicist, has theorized that radiation from mobile
> phones "may cause a massive increase in the forces that living cells exert
> on each other," as Duncan Graham-Rowe reports in NewScientist (April
> 2004). Such an action may cause cells to clump together or blood vessels
> to contract. Sernelius' theory still needs to be confirmed experimentally,
> however.
>
>     As the evidence accumulates, a number of organizations are encouraging
> action. The EMR Network (www .emrnetwork.org) was established to, as the
> site puts it, "challenge the thermal model of harm from radiofrequency
> radiation upon which the U.S. exposure guidelines are based." It also
> works against a provision of the Telecommunications Act that it claims
> poses serious political problems as well as health hazards.
>
>     Before 1996, any group of citizens could stop base stations and
> antennas from 'being erected in their neighborhoods by citing concerns
> over the health hazards posed by radiation. Under the TCA, local and state
> governments still have a say on the siting of antennas, but can't base
> siting decisions on health or environmental effects. It's an example of
> how, despite disturbing (if not fully conclusive) evidence of risks,
> Congress and our regulators are more willing to risk public health than
> the health of a profitable industry.
>
>     -Anne Geske
>
>     [Sidebar]
>
>     BRIGHT LIGHTS, BIG TROUBLE: In an effort to raise public awareness
> about the potential dangers of electromagnetic fields (EMFs), artists
> Larry and Debby Kline placed a series of freestanding fluorescent light
> bulbs along the power grid in Southern California. According to Orion
> (Sept./Oct. 2004), "the bulbs, whose plasma is excited by the ambient EMFs
> emanating from high-voltage lines, light up without a direct electrical
> connection." Disturbing stuff, considering that children living in homes
> with high magnetic fields have a greater risk of developing leukemia. The
> installation pictured above, located at the entrance to the Chevron Pipe
> Line Company in Kettleman City, California, is titled Cathedral Gate.
> Other examples of the Klines' politically charged conceptual artwork can
> be seen at www.jugglingklines.com.
>
>
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