For the past several years, there has been growing concern about the health impact of radiation from mobile towers. In 2008, Government of India adopted the Guidelines developed by the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) for Electromagnetic radiation from mobile towers.The values chosen for the permissible Power Density are 4.5 W/Sqm for 900 MHz and 9 W/Sqm. for 1800 MHz.
Based on media reports and public concerns, the Government set up an Inter-Ministerial Committee (IMC) of specialists on August 24, 2010. The Committee examined the environmental and health related concerns and indicated that most of the laboratory studies were unable to find a direct link between exposure to radio frequency radiation and health;and the scientific studies as yet have not been able to confirm a cause and effect relationship between radio frequency radiation and health. The effect of emission from cell phone towers is not known yet with certainty.
However, the IMC recommended lowering the mobile towers’ EMF exposure limits to 1/10th of the existing prescribed limit as a matter of abundant precaution. The Government accepted the recommendation and issued directions making the new norms applicable from September 1, 2012.
Among the inputs submitted to the Department of Telecom was a document "Report on Cell Tower Radiation" authored by Prof. Girish Kumar of the Department of Electrical Engineering, IIT Bombay.
The report listed symptoms and diseases allegedly caused by electromagnetic radiation. The only items not included in it were jealousy and baldness! The author mined part of the scary data from "papers" of Arthur Firstenberg, the founder director of the "Cellular phone task force" which is “dedicated to halting the expansion of wireless technology because it cannot be made safe". Firstenberg filed and lost many suits against the spread of wireless technology.
Wikipedia, noted his claim that electromagnetic fields from his neighbour's cell phone are destroying his health and that he sued his neighbour seeking damages $ 530,000 for refusing to turn off her cell phone and other electronic devices!Firstenberg is a symbol of the collective schizophrenia against RF radiation.
Prof. Kumar uncritically accepted the Bio-initiative Report 2007 (BIR), a booklet well known for its lack of balance.
Advocacy document
The Committee on Man and Radiation (COMAR), a technical committee of the Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBS) of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) noted that BIR is an advocacy document. BIR itself conceded that it was written “to document the reasons why current public exposure standards for non-ionizing electromagnetic radiation are no longer good enough to protect public health.”
Fourteen individuals under the direction of a 4-person organizing committee wrote BIR. “Most of its 21 sections are authored by single individuals or (in a few cases) pairs or trios of authors; the section ‘Key Scientific Evidence and Public Health Policy Recommendations’ was written by a pair of individuals and appears to reflect their views only,” COMAR clarified in a paper in Health Physics Journal. “There is no indication of how the members of the committee were chosen or how balance was provided in the group of contributors, a majority of whom have public records of criticism of existing exposure standards and guidelines.”
COMAR added that since appearing on the Internet in 2007, the BIR has received much media attention but, more recently, has been severely criticized by health organizations and scientific groups such as EMF-NET, a coordinating committee of the European Commission 6th Frame Work Programme, The Netherlands’ Health Council and Australian Centre for Radiofrequency Bioeffects Research
BIR report was slammed by these agencies thus: “written in an alarmist and emotive language and the arguments have no scientific support from well-conducted EMF research;” “There is a lack of balance in the report; no mention is made in fact of reports that do not concur with authors’ statements and conclusions. It is “not an objective and balanced reflection of the current state of scientific knowledge;” and “As it stands it merely provides a set of views that are not consistent with the consensus of science.”
In May 2010, The INTERPHONE Study concluded that overall, no increase in risk of brain tumours was observed with the use of mobile phones. “There were suggestions of an increased risk of glioma at the highest exposure levels, but biases and error prevent a causal interpretation. The possible effects of long-term heavy use of mobile phones require further investigation", the authors added
The INTERPHONE study supported by WHO is the largest case–control study of mobile phones and brain tumours conducted to date, including the largest numbers of users with at least 10 years of exposure and the greatest cumulative hours of use of any study. Thirteen countries including UK, Sweden, France and Germany collaborated.
"Interphone study in 2010 mentions that excessive use of mobile phones has doubled to quadrupled brain tumor risk. However, they claim that for an average user, increase in cancer cases is not significant," the Prof. Kumar’s report says. By this assertion, the report is misinterpreting the lucid conclusion provided by the study
Prof. Kumar argued that the allowable power level must be brought down in India. "A number of adverse health effects have been documented at levels below the FCC guidelines, which include altered white blood cells in children; childhood leukemia; impaired motor function, reaction time, and memory; headaches, dizziness, fatigue, weakness, and insomnia etc", the report said, possibly based on the much criticized Bio-initiative Report 2007.
Prof. Kumar had cherry-picked many references to substantiate such claims. International agencies such as the WHO and national agencies have not accepted such preposterous claims.
A newspaper reported that in a building in Mumbai four cases of cancer were linked to radiation from a mobile phone tower. Based on this, Prof. Kumar estimated the power level at the building to be about 0.1 W/ m2 and claimed that the tower was the cause of cancer in “several” people in 2-3 years’ time!
He also measured a power level of 7,068 microwatt/m2 in the home of a cancer patient who allegedly developed cancer within an year of installation of a mobile phone tower, and links the cancer to radiation from the tower!
Arriving at a conclusion based on studying one or two individuals is not how epidemiological studies are conducted.
K.S. PARTHASARATHY
Former Secretary, Atomic Energy Regulatory Board
ksparth@yahoo.co.uk
The article has been corrected for a factual error.
Keywords: mobile tower radiation
If there was no scientific proof behind the earlier limit, then why is
there any need for scientific proof for the new move to change the limit
by a factor of 10.
Effect of mobile phone radiation has to be studied systematically. Govt
of India (S&T ministry)should take an urgent intervention in this
context. Studies should be carried out at molecular level. Please note
that it took about 150 years for Cigerratte to be realized to have link
with smoking ( cigerratte was invented in 1820s ). Such delay will be
fatal in the case of mobile radiation.)
Rather than discrediting other reports K.S. PARTHASARATHY should write about how to approach the whole issue. If norms of scientific research have been violated he should inform us what in his opinion should be done.
Mr Raman, Thank you for the correction.My text was correct. I have
used W/ sq.m or W/ m2 or microwatt/m2 in the text . I found that
the superscript was missing in the internet version. They were
misprints. They are corrected now.
Thank you very much for your comments. There has been too much
unfounded phobia on the health impact of cell tower radiation.
Erection of towers in a haphazard way also caused avoidable
concerns. It seems that there is an effort by those selling "shields"
etc to exaggerate the apprehensions. The UK Health Protection Agency
has published a very informative booklet titled "Health Effects from
Radiofrequency Electro magnetic Fields- Report of the independent
Advisory Group on Non-ionizing Radiation (April 2012).
i personally suffered severe headaches and memory loss due to proximity of my home to the towers. Moreover International agency of research on Cancer (WHO) document has placed cell phone radiations in group 2B, which says it is possibly carcinogenic. Then again there were two committees set up by ministry of environment and forests, both of them came to the conclusion that these radiations should be handled with some caution. Look the question is installation of towers very close to residential houses. there is no problem if towers are installed at a distance of 100m between any tower transmitter and house. why is the tower installed at a very low height in our country (Just to save a few lakhs). Such low towers will surely increase the radiation intensity at the nearby houses. which could have been easily avoided, if we had strong guidelines in favour of public health. I am advocating only Precautionary approach in dealing with tower radiation.
I cannot find appropriate words to express my immense gratitude to The Hindu and to Dr Parthasarathy. Girish Kumar has produced graphical presentations of his contentions, which can be seen on the Internet. In these presentations, Girish Kumar repeats his false and baseless attribution of various ailments to "mobile tower / mobile phone radiation". During the recent Fiftieth Convocation of IIT, Bombay, (Chief Guest, Dr Manmohan Singh, PM) the Director found it fit to make a mention of a film titled "Radiation Effects due to the Use of Mobile Phones", presumably produced by Prof. Girish Kumar and his team. I urge Dr Parthasarathy to take up the matter with the Director, IIT Bombay, for getting the score set right. This perverse attack on mobile phone industry must stop.
Finally, an apparently needed correction: "power levels" should all be " /sq. m", not "/m". Are the figures Prof. Kumar's, or are they misprints? I can't believe Dr Parthasarathy could make such a mistake.
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