Cellphones: Cancerous or not?
Two U.S. government agencies are giving conflicting interpretations of a safety study on cellphone radiation: One says it causes cancer in rats. The other says there’s no reason for people to worry.
No new research was issued Thursday. Instead, the National Toxicology Program dialed up its concerns about a link to heart and brain cancer from a study of male rats that was made public last winter.
The Food and Drug Administration, which oversees cellphone safety, disagreed with the upgraded warning. And “these findings should not be applied to human cellphone usage,” said Dr. Jeffrey Shuren, FDA’s chief of radiological health.
In a $30 million study, scientists put rats and mice into special chambers and bombarded them with radiofrequency waves, like those emitted by older 2G and 3G phones, for nine hours a day for up to two years, most of their natural lives. The levels the rodents experienced were far higher than people are typically exposed to.
Last February, the National Toxicology Program said there was a small increase in an unusual type of heart tumor in male rats, but not in mice or female rats. The agency concluded there was “some evidence” of a link.
Thursday, the agency upgraded its description of those findings. The heart tumor increase marked “clear evidence” of cancer in male rats, it announced. “We believe that the link between radiofrequency radiation and tumors in male rats is real, and the external experts agreed,” said John Bucher, the toxicology agency’s senior scientist.
The FDA immediately disagreed, firing off a press release assuring Americans that
“decades of research and hundreds of studies” has made the health agency confident that the current safety limits for cellphone radiation protect the public health.
There’s a reason two different government agencies are clashing—they’re asking different questions, said George Washington University public health professor George Gray.
A former science chief for the Environmental Protection Agency, Gray said the toxicology program examined how cellphone radiation affected animals. By looking at what it means for humans, the FDA “brings in more sources of information and data than just these recent tests in rats and mice,” he said in an email. So are cellphones safe?
In a 2014 article posted on Philippine Council for Health Research and Development, “The number of mobile phone subscribers in the Philippines has reportedly soared from over 22.5 million in 2003 to over 57.3 million in 2007 and continues to rise daily at a very fast clip.”
So while the debate for cellphones is ongoing, experts present tips on what one can do: Minimize usage. As long as your mobile phone is turned on, it emits radiation that enables it to communicate with base stations. The radiation emitted, however is strong and more frequent when you’re talking or messaging. Keep it out of your pocket. The farther you are from a base station, the more radiation your phone must emit to get a signal, which causes your phone to heat up when you have low reception. Make calls only when you have strong reception, hang up before your phone heats up, and store your phone away from your body when it’s not in use. Always use a headset. The electromagnetic waves emitted by handsets may affect your inner ear mechanics over time. Send a text instead. It’s actually a safer way to communicate. This exposes you to less radiation than when you have the mobile to your ear. Switch to Bluetooth. Use a Bluetooth headset; it emits only a minuscule amount of electromagnetic energy. /