WHO on Cell phones: your brain in a microwave oven

[Guest guest]

WHO: Cell phone use can increase possible cancer risk

By le Dellorto, CNN May 31, 2011 1:49 p.m. EDT

(CNN) -- Radiation from cell phones can possibly cause cancer, according to the

World Health Organization. The agency now lists mobile phone use in the same

" carcinogenic hazard " category as lead, engine exhaust and chloroform.

Before its announcement Tuesday, WHO had assured consumers that no adverse

health effects had been established.

A team of 31 scientists from 14 countries, including the United States, made the

decision after reviewing peer-reviewed studies on cell phone safety. The team

found enough evidence to categorize personal exposure as " possibly carcinogenic

to humans. "

What that means is they found some evidence of increase in glioma and acoustic

neuroma brain cancer for mobile phone users, but have not been able to draw

conclusions for other types of cancers

" The biggest problem we have is that we know most environmental factors take

several decades of exposure before we really see the consequences, " said Dr.

Black, chairman of neurology at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los

Angeles.

The type of radiation coming out of a cell phone is called non-ionizing. It is

not like an X-ray, but more like a very low-powered microwave oven.

" What microwave radiation does in most simplistic terms is similar to what

happens to food in microwaves, essentially cooking the brain, " Black said. " So

in addition to leading to a development of cancer and tumors, there could be a

whole host of other effects like cognitive memory function, since the memory

temporal lobes are where we hold our cell phones. " ...

http://www.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/05/31/who.cell.phones/index.html?eref=rss_topstor\

ies & utm_source=feedburner & utm_medium=feed & utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_topstor\

ies+%28RSS%3A+Top+Stories%29 & utm_content=My+

[Guest guest]

What I wonder is if the effect is the same if you don't hold the phone to your

head. And what if you don't use your phone to make and receive phone calls? I

use my phone constantly to look things up but only rarely to make or receive

calls. When used for Googling I would think that there would be minimal

transmission of data - maybe only a few milliseconds per search, which would

mean very little radiation being emitted from the phone. But I am not an expert

on phones so I am not sure how much transmission happens when you are not making

a phone call. I know that there is some regular automatic updating going on but

I don't know how much transmission actually takes place. And since I, like a

lot of people, keep my phone in my front pants pocket, it isn't brain cancer

that concerns me. It would be interesting to get more information on what the

phone is doing in the background.

>

> WHO: Cell phone use can increase possible cancer risk

> By le Dellorto, CNN May 31, 2011 1:49 p.m. EDT

> (CNN) -- Radiation from cell phones can possibly cause cancer, according to

the World Health Organization. The agency now lists mobile phone use in the same

" carcinogenic hazard " category as lead, engine exhaust and chloroform.

>

> Before its announcement Tuesday, WHO had assured consumers that no adverse

health effects had been established.

>

> A team of 31 scientists from 14 countries, including the United States, made

the decision after reviewing peer-reviewed studies on cell phone safety. The

team found enough evidence to categorize personal exposure as " possibly

carcinogenic to humans. "

>

> What that means is they found some evidence of increase in glioma and acoustic

neuroma brain cancer for mobile phone users, but have not been able to draw

conclusions for other types of cancers

>

> " The biggest problem we have is that we know most environmental factors take

several decades of exposure before we really see the consequences, " said Dr.

Black, chairman of neurology at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los

Angeles.

>

> The type of radiation coming out of a cell phone is called non-ionizing. It is

not like an X-ray, but more like a very low-powered microwave oven.

>

> " What microwave radiation does in most simplistic terms is similar to what

happens to food in microwaves, essentially cooking the brain, " Black said. " So

in addition to leading to a development of cancer and tumors, there could be a

whole host of other effects like cognitive memory function, since the memory

temporal lobes are where we hold our cell phones. " ...

>

http://www.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/05/31/who.cell.phones/index.html?eref=rss_topstor\

ies & utm_source=feedburner & utm_medium=feed & utm_campaign=Feed%3A+rss%2Fcnn_topstor\

ies+%28RSS%3A+Top+Stories%29 & utm_content=My+

>

[Guest guest]

Hi Don, Happy Summer Solstice!

I regret to say that it sounds like cell phone users might possibly be in the

same position today as the atomic veterans of the post-WW2 era, some of whom saw

atomic bombs explode with their own naked eyes and only learned years later that

this sort of thing led to health problems. At the time, nobody knew or

suspected a problem.

>

> What I wonder is if the effect is the same if you don't hold the phone to your

head. And what if you don't use your phone to make and receive phone calls? I

use my phone constantly to look things up but only rarely to make or receive

calls. When used for Googling I would think that there would be minimal

transmission of data - maybe only a few milliseconds per search, which would

mean very little radiation being emitted from the phone. But I am not an expert

on phones so I am not sure how much transmission happens when you are not making

a phone call. I know that there is some regular automatic updating going on but

I don't know how much transmission actually takes place. And since I, like a

lot of people, keep my phone in my front pants pocket, it isn't brain cancer

that concerns me. It would be interesting to get more information on what the

phone is doing in the background.

[Guest guest]

It could also be true that the entire population of the developed world is in

the same position because of another technology that was introduced about a

hundred years ago. Maybe all radio and television transmissions have increased

the rate of cancer in the world. It is curious at least that the rapid and

dramatic increase in cancer deaths in the world closely parallels the rapid and

dramatic increase in electromagnetic radiation in the environment thanks to TV

and radio.

> >

> > What I wonder is if the effect is the same if you don't hold the phone to

your head. And what if you don't use your phone to make and receive phone

calls? I use my phone constantly to look things up but only rarely to make or

receive calls. When used for Googling I would think that there would be minimal

transmission of data - maybe only a few milliseconds per search, which would

mean very little radiation being emitted from the phone. But I am not an expert

on phones so I am not sure how much transmission happens when you are not making

a phone call. I know that there is some regular automatic updating going on but

I don't know how much transmission actually takes place. And since I, like a

lot of people, keep my phone in my front pants pocket, it isn't brain cancer

that concerns me. It would be interesting to get more information on what the

phone is doing in the background.

>