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Cell Towers Not Responsible For Illness
Posted by
kdawson
on Thu Jul 26, 2007 07:38 AM
from the tinfoil-underwear dept.
from the tinfoil-underwear dept.
drewmoney notes a BBC article on a major UK study of whether cell towers (or "mobile phone masts" as they are called in the UK) cause illness. The study concluded strongly that symptoms of illness caused by mobile phone masts are all in the mind. People claiming sensitivity to radio emissions showed more symptoms in trials, according to the article, whether signals were being emitted or not. Quoting: "Dozens of people who believed the masts triggered symptoms such as anxiety, nausea and tiredness could not detect if signals were on or off in trials. However, the Environmental Health Perspectives study stressed people were nonetheless suffering 'real symptoms.' Campaign group Mast Sanity said the results were skewed as 12 people in the trials dropped out because of illness."
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Bad science or bad science reporting? (Score:5, Insightful)
The obvious way to conduct such a study would be to correlate the incidence of illness with the proximity to radio sources.
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Re:Bad science or bad science reporting? (Score:5, Funny)
Science ftw.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I've had a toothache for the last week (seeing the dentist tomorrow alright?) and I've been reading Slashdot every day. Must be Slashdot causing my toothache because my friend, he doesn't read Slashdot and he doesn't have a toothache.
Science ftw.
Wow, what a horrible lack of understanding of what a clinical trial is all about.
First off the OP misunderstood the article. The "detection" that the test was seeking was people becoming ill, not people saying, "OK, I think it's on now."
Second, when you have a single anecdote, there's no value in that. There are just too many variables.
In a clinical trial, you attempt to limit the variables and compare multiple people's results in order to determine the causal relationship for a given problem. For example,
Re:Bad science or bad science reporting? (Score:5, Funny)
This Earth, not some other Earth.
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Re:Bad science or bad science reporting? (Score:4, Insightful)
FWIW, there are LOTS of kinds of radiation. Not all of it is bad for us. I love it when people ask me if their monitors (LCDs, mind you) are blasting them with radiation. "Of course," I say, as their eyes widen with fear, "that's the whole point!"
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Re:Bad science or bad science reporting? (Score:4, Insightful)
Or getting back to the article, could the people that are claiming sensitivity to EMF, also be sensitive to sun spots, food additives, black cats, nuclear fallout from 1950's atmospheric testing, and any number of other horrors?
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Code Monkey like Tab and Mountain Dew
It cuts both ways (Score:4, Insightful)
It is the same as when you do a dug trial with 1/2 the people getting sugar pills, and in a huge majority of *both* groups the people get better. You use statistics to find out the *true* efficacy of your medicine.
Basically - the point is the illness could be being caused by any number of other local-specific factors, but cell towers is not the cause.
Parent
Re:It cuts both ways (Score:5, Insightful)
For what it's worth, I think it's all a lot of BS, but let's not overstate the evidence of any one experiment.
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Re:It cuts both ways (Score:4, Informative)
They did a non-blinded and a blinded run. When the subjects knew the field was on or off, their symptoms correlated with it (not surprising). When they didn't know, their symptoms DIDN'T correlate with the field. That suggests the symptoms aren't caused by the field, but by their knowledge of it.
You can find a link to the study on this page:
http://www.badscience.net/?p=470 [badscience.net]
Parent
Re:Bad science or bad science reporting? (Score:5, Insightful)
They tested on both people's perception and symptoms such as sweaty skin and high blood pressure.
They found that people with these symptoms felt unwell regardless of whether the mast was off or not and that they generally had no idea whether the mast was on or off. If they were truly ill from signal sensitivity they should be able to tell whether the mast was on or off depending on their general feeling of well-being.
The effects were, however, real. Thus it seems like a classic case of placebo, but the "Mast sanity" campaign group obviously refuses to acknowledge that this may be psychological effects.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Bad science or bad science reporting? (Score:5, Informative)
They tested a short-term effect claimed by people who call themself 'sensitive' to RF transmitters.
Those people claim that those transmitters have an almost immediate effect on them.
When a short term effect is claimed, you test for that short term effect.
And in this case when they properly blinded those people they found no short term effect.
Simple summary: The short term effect claimed by these people is bullshit, there might or might not be a long term effect but this test doesn't cover it in any way.
Parent
Re:Bad science or bad science reporting? (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, the best way would be to use subjects which have no subjective bias: rabbits, monkeys, etc. After all, they are trying to test whether or not the masts are causing the symptoms. Mind you, they cannot control for other possible environmental influences, i.e. other sources of radiation, because they are so prevalent and widely varied. The drawback to using animals is that how do you know if they are nauseous or dizzy?
I'm going to save them a lot of trouble and expense and posit that the masts are not causing the symptoms, from the standpoint of radiation exposure, because radiation is all around, in various intensities and wavelengths all the time. While I don't have my old astrophysics textbooks handy and I don't have statistics on cell tower emission strengths, I'm willing to bet the extra amount of radiation from the masts is insignificant compared to the general background radiation and would only pose a threat if it were highly concentrated and you were living in extremely close proximity.
Parent
Re:Bad science or bad science reporting? (Score:5, Insightful)
And the irony is: using a mobile phone (as most of the people complaining against masts do) exposes your brain to far more radiation than a mast. And the even bigger irony: if your campaign against a mast succeeds, your mobile phone will be transmitting much more powerfully to reach an unnecessarily distant mast.
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Re:Bad science or bad science reporting? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Bad science or bad science reporting? (Score:4, Informative)
To address the question in the subject line - bad reporting. There was a much better radio interview on BBC Radio 4 with one of the researchers, and a representative from one of the mast pressure groups.
IIRC, it was acknowledged all round that the test was well conducted and that the methodology was sound. The primary criticism raised was that the test didn't account for long term exposure effects. The researcher conceded that proper controls were problematic in a case like this; that more research was needed into long term effects, and that a double blind test would also be useful. The possibility of confirmation bias among those complaining of ill-health due to EM radiation was also discussed.
The problem here seems to be the Beeb web page punching up the headlines, and then Slashdot exacerbating the effect by further sensationalising things. At the end of the day, the result didn't prove anything other than the fact that people don't seem to be able to consciously detect when a phone mast is on or off, and the researchers seem quite happy with that result.
That said, I was listening with half an ear whilst driving home down the A19, so I may have some of the details wrong. Take it for what it's worth....
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
There are a shitload more cell towers than most people realize.. each tower doesn't have that much range, and each provider has their own. They're also pretty well hidden.. chances are if you're in a built up area you can probably see one out of your window, but you haven't realized yet.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
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cooties (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
This post was intended to make no sense what so ever, if you do see the slightest spark of logic in it I pity you...
I thought it was insightful, but I didn't have mod points today; I also haven't had my first cup of coffee yet. I never use mod points until I have my first cup of coffee as lack of caffeine hinders my reasoning capabilities. I'm off to find coffee before I post something else like this and find my karma so low I have to dig for it. Be back in an hour to join you fine gents' in todays series of flame wars.
Psychological? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
My wife use to work at an insect ID lab...she's an entomologist, and at least once a week someone
would send in a piece of fuzz or lint with a letter claiming that these bugs were making them sick.
Wether it's cell phone towers, power lines, non-existent bugs, or viruses you cant see, there are some people who are convinced the world is out to get them, and it's not their fault.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
There is no such thing as symptoms that are "entirely psychological". The cause may not be triggered by the physical interaction of the radio waves with the body, but so-called "psychosomatic" symptoms are still very real. Blood pressure changes, headaches, nausea, nervous system abnormalities, heart palpitations, muscle weakness, dizziness, "cloudy" thinking, sinus pressure, rashes, abdominal pain, diarrhea, insomnia, and many other physical issues can be triggered by stress and non
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I think it just depends on the person.
Re:Psychological? (Score:4, Insightful)
It might. for instance a lot of these symptoms are generic "illness" symptoms. You may have:
1. A person who is just a garden-variety neurotic. Purely pyschosomatic. Or they suffer from a mild form of mental illness but do not know it (manageable bipolar 2, low grade depression, low grade GAD, etc)
2. A person with an undiagnosed thyroid or blood sugar problem. Unfortunately, they have been led to believe that their problems stem from technology, not biology.
3. A person who very sensitive skin. Some people may be able to feel *something* if they are near a transsmitter, but never enough to cause anything like the symptoms described. This something feeling may make them politically sympathetic to people in 1 and 2.
4. Nutters. The typical tin-foil brigade. They may have started as a 1 but have degenerated into this.
5. People who suffer from work or person life related stress. They have real symptoms but its not the cell tower, its their crappy marriage.
I can also imagine that people in groups 1 and 5 may also have their symptoms made worse by actually carrying a cellphone. They know that *anyone* can call them on it, including the people in their lives who stress them out or are at the source of the negative relationships. They also may feel resentment to the "24/7" society and just holding a phone or being near one causes anxiety and a little depression. Seeing the tower only reminds them of this tenfold.
So I think its fair to say its a mixed bag out there. A lot of these people certainly have my sympathy, but they should not be attacking the cell phone companies. They should be angry at themselves for not attending to their personal problems. They should be seeking recourse with a therapist or a doctor. Hopefully, these people will realize that aliens, liberals, taxes, jet contrails, vaccinations, err cell phone towers arent the problem.
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
If this were even remotely true (Score:5, Funny)
Oh wait...
The effect does exist! (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:The effect does exist! (Score:5, Insightful)
hmmmm.... I often have those same symptoms and I don't work around transmitters.
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Re:The effect does exist! (Score:5, Funny)
then vodafone revealed that the tower wasn't switched on yet.
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They cause crop circles, too.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Feng shui or no feng shui, maybe they just need to be more clever about integrating them into the environment. If a big, ugly tower causes stress for a significant portion of the nearby population, then it's worth exp
Re:The effect does exist! (Score:5, Informative)
Parent
Someone should have told this guy (Score:5, Funny)
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2007/07/14/11838 33843064.html?from=top5 [theage.com.au]
and a video
http://video.aol.com/video-detail/id/1439921521 [aol.com]
OR it was because his mobile phone bills were too high, and I know I can relate to that.
Fence sittin ho' (Score:4, Interesting)
For example, when placed under a heat lamp, it could easily take 5 seconds before "pain" was registered, it doesn't mean that the heat wasn't hurting you 5 seconds ago, it means it takes a while for the sub-dermal layers to heat up. So it's entirely possible that prolonged exposure to the radiation is causing them problems.
However, if they claimed they feel instant pain the minute the transmitter kicks on, they're probably lying.
Tom
Not likely (Score:3, Interesting)
The power lines are the ones I remember the best, since the house I lived in as a little kid was very near some
Little village meeting... (Score:5, Interesting)
They had handouts that they have printed from websites that were expressing the dangers of living near the masts although, clearly, these were taken from a highly bias source. The guy who called the meetings was not shy about admitting that this biggest concern was the potential drop in value of his grade 2 listed cottage which was positioned quite close to the mast.
The highlight of the evening though, was a little old man they dragged out to talk about the science. Apparently he had worked on some of the early nuclear power stations in the UK and had also spent time as a science teacher, although long since retired. He gave us a speech about the effects of radiation (not really going into detail about the difference between a phone mast and a nuclear power station in terms of radiation intensity), he talked about the electric systems in the body etc. It was all pretty interesting in a 'high-school physics' kind of way.
Then, completely out of the blue, this guy starts going into a really passionate tirade about how the government are using mobile phone masts to plant instructions directly into our brains. The look of horror on the organisers face was a picture! I think he saw this old guy as his trump card until this very moment. The guy was ushered off staging mid-sentance. Containing my laughter was quite difficult. I had never actually seen a members of the tin-foil hat brigade in the flesh before!
The mast got built.
Now I come to think about it, my voting habits changed around the same kind of time too.... hmmmm
Re:Little village meeting... (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Who, exactly, funded the study? (Score:4, Insightful)
"The study was funded by the Mobile Telecommunications and Health Research programme, a body which is itself funded by industry and government."
So, who exactly is the Mobile Telecommunication and Health Research programme? If this were the United States and the study had to do with health effects of nuclear power plants, and if "business and government" meant, say, the EPRI and the "government" agency were the NRC, I'd be very skeptical. On the other hand, if the government agency were the National Institutes of Health, I'd give it a lot of credence.
The Mobile Telecommunications and Health Research programme has a website, [mthr.org.uk], but I can't judge from it whether this is real science or not.
Place to look for radiation damage (Score:3, Insightful)
Both GSM and CDMA harm? (Score:3, Interesting)
In Europe where it's primarily (or only?) GSM and in North America where it's primarily CDMA people are convinced it's harming them. It's seems odd that people are harmed by a broad spectrum of the radio spectrum specifically from 900MHz to 1800MHz and not by microwave ovens, wifi or other common sources.
It always seems that a 300 foot tall tower a couple of miles away gets more attention than a cell phone transceiver mounted to the top of an office building. You'd think the latter would cause more of an outrage but it's always the tower in the middle of nowhere that gets people riled up. If they can't see it they won't complain, ignorance really is bliss.
What about the TVs? (Score:3, Insightful)
The programming section of the library was right next to the UFO section of the library, so I got quite a bit of exposure to the cook section, as well. I remember seeing one book, "The Irradiation of America," or something like that. I opened it up, saw all the predictions about how we'd all be dead by now, due to the TV and radio signals flying around.
I asked myself, "What educational value could the library possibly see, in getting this book for us kids to read?"
Now I know.
To the ignorants here: Microwaves are unhealthy (Score:3, Insightful)
I've got news for you: Microwaves damage health. Period.
The debate is only about at which intensity do they start doing that.
I generally turn my Wifi of if I'm not using it and have stopped carrying my cellphone close to my body, since it's on all day. I turn it off at night. I also hold it away from my head when I make a call until the cell handshake is over and the remote connect is there. My old Siemens M35 even had a beep to indicate when the connect is there. Smart people the Siemens engineers, aren't they?
Handshake you ask? That's the high-power meep-meep-meep you hear in nearby active FM radios just before you make or recieve a call. It's what establishes the conection to the cell network for communication.
I know a woman who can sense the cellphone handshake (she has e-magnetic field sensetivity) from meters away and has the habbit of anouncing cellphone calls seconds before a phone rings. Fun to watch with unsuspecting others near by
On it goes:
My father was a high profile radar electronics engineer - with Military (Nato, Cruise Missile), Airbus, Nasa/Grumman Aircraft (Lunar Module, Skylab & early Space Shuttle) and some others. He forbid us to have a Microwave oven (they ALL leak Microwaves) and steared clear and went the other way whenever we got to close to a radar bubble when going hiking.
There are people who've had terminal brain tumors due to intense cellphone usage and I work with doctors (medical IT) who keep all equipment far away and well cased according to TCO.
Don't think it's not unhealthy just because most people don't care or some Telco funded (sic!) study from the UK says the health issues are all bogus and the people claiming health issues are hysteric. It is scientifically proven that even lower wattrange microwaves predictably lower the threshold for internal blood clot (mw induced heat + blood protein == hardboiled) and influence plant groth. Switzerland (iirc, it was some european country) official acknowledges e-magnetic sensetivity and authorities even funds radio shielding paint and other countermeasures for people who are affected. Whatever you make of that, I, for one, would *not* want to live right in smack of the middle of a directional radio beam or the raycone of a cell transciever. Not with proper shielding anyway.
Bottom line:
It's not about being hysteric or overly paranoid. But a little common sense and forsight is needed when handling technology. You don't get universal flawless wireless connectivity and mobile coverage without a tradeoff. Anyone who believes that is a crackpot himself.
Stop Immediately! (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Well, not amongst Humans anyway... (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:Flexible Bullet (Score:5, Funny)
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