If human skin also blocks 5G signals, Dr. Carpenter acknowledged, “maybe it’s not that big a deal.” The most important word in this sentence is "If". As a scientist, I find the article to be vapid. You ignore the argument of duration, like one of 24 hour a day close exposure to 5G cell towers, in proximity day and night when you work and sleep in the same location. Journalists like you make truly thorough science look far easier than it is.
65
@Michelle -- you are a scientist in what discipline? Do you know what ionizing radiation is? Do you know what the skin effect is? Are you aware that a wifi antenna puts out 100mW of power while the noonday sun radiates up to 1000W per square meter? And that 5G cell towers will subject you to fractions of a milliwatt in toto? Are you aware the your spouse exposes you to more radiation as you sleep next to them than a cell tower?
136
Wow, obvious propaganda is obvious. Every time NYT writes an article about 5G I lose a lot of respect for them. There are hundreds of credible studies and experts warning about the dangers of wireless radiation particularly 5G. Why does this article focus on one obviously flawed study performed by one researcher and submitted to a school board....?
https://www.5gspaceappeal.org/the-appeal
http://www.5gappeal.eu/the-5g-appeal/
https://5gawarenessnow.com/take-action/
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanplh/article/PIIS2542-5196(18)30221-3/fulltext
https://www.blumenthal.senate.gov/newsroom/press/release/at-senate-commerce-hearing-blumenthal-raises-concerns-on-5g-wireless-technologys-potential-health-risks
65
Wireless networks use photons orders of magnitude less powerful (energetic) than sunlight. Are you all afraid that sunlight is destroying your brain? God what a load of conspiracy theory this is.
64
"The 5G Health Hazard That Isn't" and the NY Times article "Your 5G Phone Won't Hurt You. But Russia Wants You to Think Otherwise" are trite journalism. Or worse. Negligence. Or propaganda? Do not attempt to have this conversation until you have a few hours of research under your holstered iphone belt. You do not have to be an engineer or a physicist to participate in this conversation. Before you repeat claim that there is no research that shows this technology causes biological harm whip out your wireless device and start here: https://mdsafetech.org/5g-telecommunications-science/
If you are reactive to your mobile phone or other wireless/wired technology (EHS) or experience multiple chemical sensitivities (MCS) start cleaning up your electromagnetic environment and get thee to an informed practitioner for tox screening. I am acutely electro-hypersensitive. Came part and parcel with chemical sensitivities. Presently working with a functional medicine MD to address heavy burden from mold, heavy metal and petrochemical toxicities. Do not wait for it to get "better." The damage is cumulative. Be advised that detox cleanses, protocols must be done with toxin specific binders. (My uninformed primary MD may have caused additional harm.)
https://www.sophianutrition.com/blogs/sophia-life-blog/are-you-detoxing-with-the-correct-binders
15
@Brenda So, I have a rash on my hand from where I use to hold my cell phone. Won't go away even though I no longer have one. Healthy as could be beforehand. Used a cellphone(S4) for 4 years. It started appearing shortly after getting it. Tried just about everything and getting rid of everything else that could have lead to this. What do you recommend?
15
Listen to this and judge.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Qt5B39LB7c&feature=share
9
Here is a meta analysis which finds an increase in morbidity/mortality from several types of cancer following exposure to microwave and/or RF radiation. Contains 87 references.
https://clinmedjournals.org/articles/ijccr/international-journal-of-cancer-and-clinical-research-ijccr-3-040.pdf
17
The big problem with this article is the conflict of interest that underlies it. Large telecoms have a huge influence, and NYT has a collaboration with Verizon. I’m a huge fan of the NYT but I am quite concerned about biased writing in some specific fields.
It may be the 5G is safe, or maybe it isn’t. Comments to the effect that we “know” it is or isn’t safe is nibbling at the feet of the problem.
The way the term is used here and elsewhere, “5G” doesn’t even have a consistent meaning (millimeter wave frequencies? all cell phone frequencies? cell phones? base stations? backbone networking equipment? etc.) so the answer is inherently irrelevant until we rectify the ambiguities.
As with so many exposures, diseases and environmental issues that are controversial, such ambiguities serve the purposes of those whose product is to sow doubt.
28
Doesn't all this hysteria about 5G rads sound an awful like the Hubba MMR shots? One bad report by a 3rd rate scientist or doctor and a lot of people go nuts. "Much ado about nothing."
22
An analogous danger-that-isn't hinders nuclear energy from wider adoption: the Linear No-Threshold (LNT) model, which theorizes exposure to a given amount of radiation results in the same cancer risk whether spread out over 10 years or 10 seconds. Some cling to the LNT model despite the lack of any conclusive evidence to support it.
There is conclusive evidence the psychological danger from exposure to small doses of radiation far outweighs any physiological danger. After the 1986 Chernobyl accident hundreds of excess induced abortions were performed in Denmark out of fear fetuses had been damaged by radiation. Though an estimated 1,500 deaths resulted from the panicked evacuation of Fukushima Prefecture following the 2011 Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear accident, rates of cancer and other radiological effects in the area show no discernible increase.
15
Why aren't the telecom industry, and in this article Mr. Broad himself, more skeptical about 5G? There is now an enormous body of excellent peer-reviewed literature that supports the conclusion that 5G may be or is actually dangerous to human health. Many of the comments below point toward the solid research. It's obvious that the telecom industry has a vested interest in rapid implementation of 5G, just as petro has with fracking and arctic drilling, pharma with new drugs, agribusiness with new pesticides, and so on. Society generally also has good reason to be interested in the success of those technologies --e.g. natural gas without carbon emissions, drugs without side effects, pesticides that don't harm people or the environment, and telecom that is 100% safe. So, people and their government at all levels must continually engage in dealing with the tough and critical issue of balancing the costs and benefits of new technologies. But just as alarmism is harmful and sometimes immoral, so too is it immoral and harmful to disparage, dismiss or ignore the good science on 5G by discussing only the bad science, as you appear to have done.
26
@GH
Please list the good science disparaging 5G. Thanks
44
What we really need is evidence-based research on 1) why use of cell phones is so addictive; and 2) what causes so many users to divest themselves of common sense.
14
If the author’s thesis (and, so we’re told, the scientific community’s) is that these high-frequency waves are blocked by skin and other human tissue, surely it would be simple to devise an experiment to test this hypothesis.
Take a human cadaver and implant sensors under the cadaver’s skin at various depths. Then bombard the cadaver with 5G radiation at various strengths. If nothing gets through to the brain and other vital organs, great. If the waves get through, a potential problem.
Surely, some testing along these lines must have been done. Yet no such mention in the article, just a bare assertion that skin blocks these waves.
19
An essential part of good science is to devise experiments to confirm or dismiss theories. This comment goes into an important and good direction that most of all the discussion ignores.
This experiment is about 1 important aspect: When the claim is that human skin „blocks“ radio frequencies, it makes a huge difference whether „blocking“ means „reflection“ or „absorption“.
Reflection would mean: little to no interaction of the energetic photons with the tissue. (It‘s like a mirror that reflects light - but the mirror doesn‘t heat up or shine bright)
Absorption means: the energetic photons will lose their energy and the energy will be transformed into other forms. The most relevant forms: thermal or kinetic.
Thermal = the tissue would warm up; depending on dose, this may or may not be of any relevance
Kinetic = the photon‘s energy interact with the tissue „mechanically“. Depending on dose, frequency, time and other factors, the effects can be from temporary to a persistent change (alteration or destruction) of molecular structures (including DNA).
The subject matter is complex, it‘s so complex that any theories must be validated by experiments.
Otherwise it‘s just theories...
17
I have been exposing myself to high frequency r.f. for years.
And I feel fine.
https://youtu.be/tXtiFw8NK_Y
@gonzo
Well, it's impossible to prove cause and effect, but based on your posts here: 1) you don't read or listen, 2) you don't understand how science operates, and 3) you're not interested in the truth.
Try reducing your exposure and see if there's any improvement.
5
@jrd
I must admit. I don't read much. Just a few obscure journals.
https://www.sciencemag.org
https://www.nature.com
https://jamanetwork.com
https://www.nejm.org
And I don't know much about science. Just have a few measly degrees in electrical engineering.
And truth?
I am interested in observable facts.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PT90dAA49Q
What do you read?
15
Just to throw some science into the mix, there was a recent article looking at brain cancer incidence for all of Australia over the years preceding and then including modern cell phone use. They found no increase in any brain cancer types when compared to the era before they were widely used. It doesn’t address the 5G issue but it should be reassuring as the the risks with older technology.
https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/8/12/e024489
20
Well except here's an abstract of a Swedish study that did correlate cell phone use with brain cancer:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25466607
Additionally, this article ignores that it is only really in 2018/19 that people have been regularly exposed to cellphone microwaves (from cellphones not so much from towers) for 20 years. In other words a couple of years of regular use probably won't give you brain cancer.
6
How can these articles continue to promote the idea that there are no studies on the possible dangers of 5G. There are many studies which are being completely overshadowed by the huge industry push for 5G.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29459303
https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/8016593
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-22271-3
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30247338
https://arxiv.org/abs/1711.03683
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29402696
And many, many more. The fact that humans have evolved over milleniums without this exposure should surely mean that we should at least study the effects more (with studies not funded by the telecom industry) and then make an informed decision.
20
Times readers might be interested in this petition
https://www.emfscientist.org/index.php/emf-scientist-appeal
signed by 236 scientists worldwide, from fringe institutions like John Hopkins, USC and WHO, concerned about the health hazards of non-ioniziing radiation.
Then again, the Times says it harmless...
11
The article, and a lot of the comments, conflate 5G with millimeter wave radios. The 5G "New Radio" standards are designed to work over any usable portion of the radio frequency spectrum. T-Mobile, for example, is using the 600 Megahertz (MHz) band, which was previously used by broadcast television. Sprint has extensive spectrum at around 2.5 Gigahertz, slightly higher than the frequencies used by most WiFi and microwave ovens. The biggest proponents of millimeter wave are Verizon and AT&T, along with carriers in Korea and Japan. Since a mm-wave antenna array can cover only a small area, it will be used mainly to add capacity in urban areas and venues like stadiums and malls. Elsewhere, they will use the same spectrum as they're presently using for 4G, or will buy sub-6 GHz spectrum from the FCC.
So the questions are: first, are existing handheld devices in 6 Hz and below bands, transmitting at the maximum authorized power in fact causing us harm? There is little evidence of that. Second, would mm-wave wave handheld devices operating at maximum power be harmful? There are fewer extensive studies, but again no evidence. As noted, physics strongly suggests otherwise.
Note that I stipulated maximum authorized power. It's like the saccharine scare in the '70s: rats that were fed absurd amounts of saccharine had high rates of bladder cancer, which was extrapolated to any amount causes cancer.
The burden on skeptics is to demonstrate that the FCC power limits are too lax.
19
Tryptophan, one of the amino acids that comprise proteins absorbs microwave radiation at least in the range of about 2GHz to 10GHz. This absorption has been detected by a spectroscopic method called "Optical Detection of Magnetic Resonance" or "ODMR". Microwave absorption causes transitions between three electronic states ("triplet states") that produce phosphorescent emission (which is experimentally induced via ultraviolet absorption).
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/7efb/aa1fe69561c613af95355843baba0cf7e90b.pdf
Tryptophan functionality includes protein folding (shape), stacking interactions with other aromatic (benzene-like) molecules, and as a precursor to serotinin in the brain.
So I don't reject out of hand that there may be some biological effects resulting from exposure to microwave radiation at least in that range of frequencies. I think that caution is warranted.
8
@Ken
You better not be on wifi...or near wifi...or on planet earth.
Caution in this case is a nothing burger.
4
The wireless debate is much like the anti-vaccine debate. Both anti-vaxers and anti-wireless proponents support their arguments by believing in corporate conspiracy theories. And they are correct. Remember the pro-cigarette campaign that had medical doctors smoking on camera telling us everything was okay. Even with well-researched data, I’m not sure there is ever a way to convince these proponents to change their minds because their counter is always that corporations lie in order to make a profit. Unfortunately, they have too much evidence of the truth of that.
9
"In 1978, Paul Brodeur, an investigative journalist, published “The Zapping of America,” which drew on suggestive but often ambiguous evidence to argue that the growing use of high frequencies could endanger human health.'
How about a better statement, Paul Brodeur, an "investigative journalist", published “The Zapping of America,” and became rich because it was a bestseller.
6
As someone who can't put a cell phone to my ear without getting a headache or tachycardia, I have followed the science on this issue closely, and I agree with those who point out that this article is biased in the extreme and omits the excellent and extensive research indicating that cell-phone EMFs, and 5G in particular, may in fact be far more harmful than we're willing to admit. But as a journalist, I'm appalled that the Times would publish an article that purports to be news, not opinion, with the title The 5G Health Hazard That Isn't--accompanied by a graphic that mocks the concern. Whatever your point of view, this is clearly not reporting, this is advocacy!
20
While the data is inconclusive as to the immediate effects of 5G, the effects are more apparent at high frequency high power gamma and other frequency waves as happened at Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Fukushima and Chernobyl. Jokesters who make fun of skin and other cancers that have been documented from long term exposure to low power hi frequency waves, remind me of the head in the sand people, who deny global extreme weather. Everyone wants to make money with new technology before doing extensive scientific testing to determine the risks and side effects. The side effects of not doing due diligence is now apparent to all with the new MCAS on the 737 MAX.
5
@Max
Please provide link to peer reviewed studies.
"skin and other cancers that have been documented from long term exposure to low power hi frequency waves"
6
“Dr. Curry, now 82, was less forthcoming. In an interview, he said he no longer follows the wireless industry and disavowed any knowledge of having made a scientific error.
“They can say whatever they want,” Dr. Curry said of his detractors. “I’ll leave it to the young in the business and let them figure it out.””
Sounds like this guy should apply for a science advisory position with the current government administration. He’d fit right in...
13
The same process of misinformation has infested other areas of biomedicine and spawned the same sort of crackpot conspiracy theories. Autism being caused by vaccines was based on a small study by a British physician who falsified much of the data while the growing community know as anti-vaxers continue to believe the falsehood. This has led to the recent outbreaks of measles, a viral infection that was thought to have been eliminated in the US in 2000. The other area where misinformation portrayed as "scientific" is in the anti-abortion movement, with numerous falsehoods propounded as established fact, typically based on spurious research or even just the opinion of a contrarian scientist. An incomplete list includes: life begins at conception, the discredited notion that abortion causes depression and breast cancer and the neurologically impossible idea that a 20 week old (or even younger) fetus can feel pain. The true but deluded believers in all this claptrap cause great harm to the rest of us in the form of unnecessary panic and/or the diversion of limited resources of money and time that would be better devoted to research that would actually help people's health and lives.
11
Granny, here, doesn't have 4 G, much less need 5 G. I have better things to do than stare at a phone all day. And, I have many more skills than those who do.
4
I wish this article delved deeper into credibility of the main actors. Most importantly Bill Curry. He is not a physicist. He has an undergraduate degree in physics from a reputable institution, and a masters from a brach of University of Tennessee that existed for 1 year at the time (so not track record at the time, but in principle legitimate).
His "Ph.D" comes 25 years later, from a NON-ACCREDITED, distance learning (the "on-line" of the 80's) "university". Don't call him Dr. and boost his credentials well beyond what he deserves.
Proper debunking of this myth should come entirely from the epidemiological and public health data. Rising cancer incidence would be the proof, and it needs to be visible in most cell phone using populations. There is no such data. That should be the end of the discussion.
The notion that courts can use (near-)crack pots as expert witnesses is really troublesome.
45
A similar story came out a couple months from the NYT stating that, if anything, 5G will be good for our health. They came to this conclusion because China and Russia use certain UHF frequencies for novel health therapies such as, skin and hair treatments. Well, if it can be used for health therapies, couldn't it potentially do harm if not used or taken right? Also, I can find health studies from the gov't and military going clear back to the advent of radar. Another thing with 5G is that whatever privacy you had will be gone. The Internet of Things. Whatever can be connected to the internet, will be. This will eventually include the water you drink and the food you eat. You know, nano-tech. It is already in some of our food. So, if you are eating and drinking it, that would mean it is in you. And if you know anything about nano, you know that it can cross the blood-brain barrier. "The Trillion Sensor Summit ". Yay for no privacy and transhumanism! I don't think people fully understand the full scope of 5G. It's about more than faster downloading etc.. You could say Orwellian.
7
I'm a retired radio frequency engineer. I've worked on transmitters as powerful as 1,500 KW. Once, long before today's vehicle tech, I decided to develop a car radar for use in thick fog. To this end, I used a simple doppler radar horn operating at X Band (10GHz -- twice the frequency of 5G) with an output of only 10 milliwatts. much less than a cellphone puts out.
At first I mounted it on the dash, 'looking' through the windscreen. My early tests resulted in severe headaches. It seemed that the windshield reflected enough microwave energy back at me to cause this. I moved the horn to the front of the car and my headaches stopped.
The thing is this:
MICROWAVE OVENS operate at 2.5GHz - HALF of the 5G frequency - yet are safety limited to just 5 millwatts detectable radiation, and that's close to the oven. So may I ask the cell industry this:
IF it is necessary to restrict microwave ovens to 5 milliwatts for safety, how come the cellphone industry claims that phones that emit 250 milliwatts (50 times as much) at TWICE the frequency are safe? Please explain that -- if you can.
17
@Laughingdog
It is quite easy to explain.
A microwave oven operates with limit on the "leakage" of microwaves of 5 milliwatts. The actual power of the oven inside is about 1000 watts.
A microwave oven has a specific purpose of varying the microwave to make polarized water molecules "wiggle" back and forth. That wiggling or vibration of the water molecules causes friction heating of whatever is in the oven. (put anything in a microwave without water molecules and it won't heat up.) Since one's body is made of a lot of water, the leakage limits are set a very low power.
Cell phones and associated towers don't operate by trying to increase molecular friction the way a microwave does. And the 5G frequency would be wrong anyhow.
18
Once again the NYT marches out the same science writer on the same topic promoting the same industry stance that 5G is safe and the telecoms are the victims of bad science and Russian trolls. And, uh, forgot to mention the NYT joint venture with Verizon, that makes this article seem an awful lot like a biased marketing piece. You can do better.
15
Agree. Same author used a single source in his last article (on Russians using RF debate to mislead people) to downplay any potential Effects of RF. Neither story mentioned recent NTP results. NYT needs informed and balanced reporting on this
9
I'm sticking with The Nation https://www.thenation.com/article/how-big-wireless-made-us-think-that-cell-phones-are-safe-a-special-investigation/
7
@Margaret Yang
Here's how far I got in that Nation article:
"This article does not argue that cell phones and other wireless technologies are necessarily dangerous; that is a matter for scientists to decide."
9
@Norman:
So you didn't see this in the Nation piece:
"The scientific evidence that cell phones and wireless technologies in general can cause cancer and genetic damage is not definitive, but it is abundant and has been increasing over time."
Note the over time point, we've only just passed 20 years of many using a cellphone daily.
There's actually quite solid research that microwaves cause cancer.
That you and the NY Times are unaware of it is partly a failing of the NY Times.
5
On the other hand...5G can reduce the accuracy of weather forecasting by as much as 30%.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/global-5g-wireless-networks-threaten-weather-forecasts/
5
I wear my tin foil pyramid hat to protect me from both these radio waves as well as alien invaders.
Please let's get some real science and avoid the needless conspiracy theories we are awash in every day. If it's a problem so be it, if not let's proceed with the benefits of the technology.
I believe we would have seen significant increases in brain tumors and other cancers if this was the case. Literally, we have billions of data points.
16
Mike: lol re the tin foil hat. I once spoke with someone who claimed she covered her entire house exterior in aluminum to protect herself against "radiation."
1
@Mike
We have seen significant increase in brain tumors --glioblastoma multiforme in fact, in the frontotemporal regions of the brain, proximal to where people hold their phone.
Evidence: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6035820/pdf/JEPH2018-7910754.pdf
6
Microwave frequencies used by cell phones is non ionizing (won't mess up your DNA) and very low power.
People should be more concerned about exposure to sunlight.
I have been exposed to low power r.f. radiation routinely for years.
And I feel fine.
https://youtu.be/tXtiFw8NK_Y
4
This all reminds one of the terrible scare some years ago concerning high-tension power lines and cancer. There were reports of 50% increases in cancer in some locations. The actual numbers were an increase in cancer diagnoses from two one year to three the year after the power line s went up. The fact that the cancers were completely unrelated didn't seem to matter. People making claims like this really need to take an elementary statistics course.
12
Say what you will, I take little consolation in having my skin and bone absorb the radiation. Beams of mm-wave radiation are used in "active denial" directed-energy weapons that have been tested for crowd control: No-one can stand in the beam for more than a brief period while their eyes and skin feel like they are burning. Very frequent fliers are well-advised to join TSA-Pre to avoid mm-wave body scanners. Their radiation passes through the body or they would not work.
7
@Harvey Liszt
I expect you get more exposure to ionizing radiation by exposure to sunlight that to a cellphone.
12
Interesting article on an important subject! I have two questions: If the radiowaves, especially those of higher frequency like 5G are, don't make it into the body because they are absorbed by the skin, what happens to the skin cells that are much more exposed? Should we see an increase in skin cancers specifically where cell phones are closest to the body for long periods of time?
Lastly, why aren't there good, well-designed animal studies on this? We demand safety testing in animals for all kind of things, largely for good reason, wouldn't this be a study that government agencies such as the EPA and DHS (NIH) should do just to clarify the subject?
16
@Pete in Downtown These well-designed studies have been done by NIH, but the author didn't bother to cite them, possibly because they contradict the thesis of their article.
https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/results/areas/cellphones/index.html
7
@Anonymous
Probably because if you follow that link, you get to this fact sheet:
https://www.niehs.nih.gov/health/materials/cell_phone_radiofrequency_radiation_studies_508.pdf
"NTP studies of RFR used in 2G and 3G cell phones do not apply to 4G or 5G technologies."
3
@Anonymous. As also pointed out in the NIEHS summary itself, linked to by Norman in his comment below, those studies were not done with the higher frequency ranges and greater signal intensities required for true 5G (they used 2G and 3G frequencies and wave modulations only). Given the significant level of uncertainty and even fear over potential health risks of 5G everywhere, wouldn't it be worthwhile for NIEHS to redo such a study with the 5G parameters? Let's replace a lot of assumptions on all sides with strong data from a well-designed and conducted study!
5
As a physician with no direct knowledge or axe to grind in this debate, let ask: if we are counting on skin to block it all, what about exposure through our eyes? mucous membranes such as lips? seriously asking.. ?
11
@Steve -Think of electromagnetism similar as how you think of medicine. It's the dose that counts. Visual light is a much higher frequency than radio or microwaves. Per Curry: “The higher the frequency, the more dangerous.” If that were the case, then our constant 15+ hours a day exposed to light radiation would be cause for concern. The amount of visible light radiation we encounter every day is not only received in higher doses than radio waves from wireless networks like cell phones or wifi, but it is also a higher frequency. Yet your eyes remain fine... so long as you don't look at too much visible light at once.
The dose is what matters. If instead of a light bulb, you stand under a laser, then you risk blindness in the eye or burning of your skin.
Microwaves and radiowaves are the same. Stand next to a household wireless broadcaster, and you have something akin to a flashlight on you. Put your head in a microwave oven, or hug the antennae of a radio broadcast tower, and serious burns or skin irritation will happen.
Where higher frequency is more dangerous is above visible light. UV radiation, xrays, and gamma rays are ionizing radiation. Their energy levels are high enough to strip electrons. A side effect of which can be cancer because it damages cells.
Companies and cities abide by regulations for non-ionizing radiation. Meaning your cell phone and wifi receiver are like another light bulb, and radio towers are tall enough that they are like street lamps outside.
27
@Crim
Your folk account of non-ionizing radiation, which sounds like it came from the 1950s, is wrong on virtually every aspect of the science.
If you're really interested in the matter, repair to PubMed and look at actual studies.
3
@Crim But note on the chart the 5G at upper end is at same frequency as Xrays. Why is that not concerning. And why isn't this being studies before unleashing on the public. As previous poster noted this NIH study suggests real issues: https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/results/areas/cellphones/index.html
1
I have no idea if 5G is safe or not. However i do know that our country and the FDA has a long history of making mistakes. Consider;
The 200,000 killed from Opioids
The full page on Wikipedia on errors of the FDA.
The total destruction of wheat and the removal of all its nourishment.
The fact it is illegal to sell whole milk to school children.
Our ability to ignore the obesity epidemic.
The fact that 33 countries are healthier than we are.
The approval of aspartame by firing the head of the FDA.
Sorry but your argument has to be taken with a sense of history. Over and over again we have made health decisions in favor of profits regardless of the effects on people. It is a sad country.
20
@Allan
Those are very bad analogies. We make informed decisions based on the best available evidence. The fact that some things once thought to be benign later turn out to have ill effects has no bearing whatsoever on any other specific question involving something unrelated. The fact that knowledge about environmental hazards is continually bring revised is good, it shows science works. Proving something is completely safe is open ended, and not possible.
10
It's so easy to slap the "big" label on companies, ag, pharma, tobacco, sugar, telecom, etc. and assume ALL of it is destined to destroy. No doubt some of that is true, but sweeping generalization is almost always plainly incorrect. Worse yet, many are suffering from an unwillingness or inability to distinguish fact from fiction, as well as a complete lack of self-discipline, e.g. I didn't know that regularly eating double cheeseburgers, fries and drinking sugar would cause me to gain 50 pounds!
4
Shockingly analogous to the anti-vax wave of misinformation. How do we educate people, particularly our children, how to distinguish reality from “fake news”?
17
@Jane Welsh
Four years of college courses in liberal arts and science.
It works about half the time.
5
If this reporter is really interested in the views of "mainstream scientists", it's puzzling why he didn't reference dozens of studies demonstrating mutagenic and other biological effects of non-ionizing radiation.
Is there something which prevents proponents of 5G and related technologies from actually studying the matter, and citing current science -- instead of quoting skeptics, who don't conduct actual research?
The reporter does that realize that business (and science!) pretended to be blithely ignorant about the dangers of any number of serious environmental threats, including ionizing radiation and lead?
This is not a call for hysteria: but what's wrong with actually looking at current science, meaning studies, instead of turning the issue into what amounts to a political dispute, with people on either side?
20
@jrd
Please provide links to dozens of studies demonstrating mutagenic and other biological effects of non-ionizing radiation.
From a peer reviewed journal maybe?
As opposed to this:
http://www.stopsmartmetersbc.com/martin-pall-predicts-end-of-humanity-in-5-7-years/
4
@gonzo
You need only repair to PubMed, a database of peer-reviewed journals maintained by the National Institutes of Health, and conduct appropriate searches. You'll find no shortage of material of adverse effects of lower power fields common to human exposure.
You'll also find links among these comments, if that's too much trouble.
This is NOT settled science. But there's a sound basis for skepticism of the claims of William J. Broad.
In the meantime, this petition warning of the dangers of EMI, from scientists worldwide in health and physical science fields, may be of interest to you. The American signatories hail from quack institutions like John Hopkins and USC:
https://www.emfscientist.org/index.php/emf-scientist-appeal
7
@jrd
I have clicked on the links. And I read the studies.
In one NIH study, they exposed rats with microwaves having a power of 9 W/Kg for 18 hours a day, 7 days a week for 28 days.
This is the equivalent of a 50 kg person walking around with 450 cell phones 18 hours day for a month.
So, yeah. That person might get sick.
10
The electromagnetic spectrum below infrared on the graphic, in the location expanded for explication of 5G, is described as radio wave spectrum. In fact, it is part of the microwave spectrum. The smaller the wave, the more energy it imparts. Humans have evolved with the presence of light waves, and yes, light can harm us under certain conditions and with persistent exposure. However, life on earth has not evolved with the presence of microwaves --microwaves from space are largely screened out by our magnetosphere and our atmosphere.
There are thousands of academic studies demonstrating the biological effects of microwaves on living tissue, and hundreds demonstrating the harmful effects of microwaves on people. For a just portion of citations to peruse, see Martin Pall's work.
https://peaceinspace.blogs.com/files/5g-emf-hazards--dr-martin-l.-pall--eu-emf2018-6-11us3.pdf
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@Barbara Lock
Dr. Pall also predicts the end of humanity in 5 to 7 years.
With all due respect, in terms of credibility, Martin Hall is right up there with Deepack Chopra, Dr. Oz and Marianne Williamson.
3
@gonzo
I refer you to the primary studies listed in the bibliography. People who ask for evidence should review the actual evidence.
People freak out over sending masts that are hundreds of meters if not kilometers away from their brains. But on the other side, they are perfectly fine with such things as Wifi routers and microwave ovens in their homes, and sleep the whole night with an alarm clock just next to their head.
2
A classic piece by this reporter, conflating different types of electromagnetic emissions; and portraying vocal scientists as marginal, profit-seeking outliers while ignoring legitimate sources covering radiofrequency health effects like Dr. Louis Slesin of Microwave News.
Perhaps Mr. Broad could expose his face to terahertz (THz) radiation for extended periods, because 'high frequencies are safe,' and write about how he endured the ordeal just fine, without any surviving eyeballs.
6
@Pep Streebeck
People are subjected to EM waves all the time. You are bombarded with AM, FM, and phone waves all the time, not just when you’re listening. But no increase in illness.
5
Dr. Curry was wrong and lacks the integrity to admit it.
4
Many in this space are condemning science and technology. These are abstract things, however, and the real culprits are humans. Moreover, the villains are not the scientists and engineers. They are the PR men, the lawyers, the economists, the fancy language twisters, and the truly parasitic, the businessmen, whose only skills are the math of adding dollars and cents. Follow the money. The scientists are well off at best, but it is these other players who are making millions.
Science has given us terrible knowledge -- the atomic bomb above all, but the misapplication of this knowledge is all due to human beings.
7
1. The article fails to mention the most important study regarding health effects from radiofrequency radiation.
2. The National Toxicology Program released a report regarding health effects of radiofrequency radiation.
Here is a link to the study: https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/results/areas/cellphones
3. What did the studies find?
The NTP studies found that high exposure to RFR used by cell phones was associated with:
a. Clear evidence of tumors in the hearts of male rats. The tumors were malignant schwannomas.
b. Some evidence of tumors in the brains of male rats. The tumors were malignant gliomas.
c. Some evidence of tumors in the adrenal glands of male rats. The tumors were benign, malignant, or complex combined pheochromocytoma.
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@Bear with me
Yes, this study is bad news for male rats trapped in a microwave set at very low power (that's how the rats were "exposed" to the microwaves) for most of their lives.
Also, critically, rats are small. The penetration depth of the microwaves in rats essentially includes their whole mass. Nothing close to that happens to humans.
Lastly, why focus on males? The female rats and the mice (even smaller!) of either gender were just fine.
What do you conclude from that?
This study simply means we need to understand what went wrong with the male rat subjects.
5
This study, while difficult for a layperson to understand, is pretty specific about dosage and thermal effects. In fact, it even looks as if survival is better for their higher levels of exposure. Sure, once you get to cooking human or rat flesh, some things can happen, but this can be related to human cellphone levels and duration of exposure only with more than a few assumptions, which the study does not make.
2
@Norbert
Another problem with that rat study was that it didn't have a control group.
But so what? Their disclaimer said that it only applied to 2G and 3G radiation, not 4G and 5G.
2
Well we know that this type of radiation can penetrate concrete and steel walls so logically it must pass through our bodies. The question becomes whether it is causing molecular damage as it passes through. Additionally, our space is continually saturated with this radiation from multiple sources. What about potential damage to the fetus? The source of autism?
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@Mike
The big difference between concrete and people is water. Water is a terrific absorbent for high frequency electromagnetic energy. NASA is looking to use it as a radiation shield for spacecraft. So just because EMR will penetrate concrete it does not mean it will penetrate skin.
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@Larry Land
Sorry Larry, you mistake 'one fits all' for radiation. Radiation happens in many forms, and the skin can block one type, and be totally 'invisible' to others. I won't go into the science of it here and now, I suggest you do some Googling, but what is so incredibly alarming is the ease with which so many will read an article unquestionably believing what they're told.
Personally I'm furious with this article, and how the Times didn't have a neutral scholar check before publishing.
It's one thing to defile the claims of some scientists, which may or may not be justified, with due process and reference, but to then do that swinging to the opposite extreme with the purpose of dismissing justified concerns begs the credibility of the author, and the Times for publishing this.
I suggest the Times present the opportunity for other researchers to present their case....both pro and con, but in a neutral and unbiased way without an obvious agenda.
5
@Mike. Logically? This logic might say an antenna can’t work because radio waves pass through, your coaxial cables wouldn’t be shielded, submarines would have radio contact (except ULF) when submerged, your microwave oven would heat dry food easily and so forth. The physics is actually pretty simple, and water is what ‘shields’ us from having visible light, UV and some of these frequencies from blithely either passing through or being absorbed by our innards.
1
One of the greatest inventions in Communications is Spread-Spectrum. It enables us to transmit signals at extremely low power, without having to boost power to overcome noise. It is like having a whispered conversation with someone sitting across a large room in which a noisy cocktail party is in full swing - if you only could whisper the proper way. The scientist Claude E. Shannon showed that you could transmit signals through a noise infested channel without having to boost power by controlling the range of frequencies you transmit the symbols on. Rather than transmit the signal as it originally exists, the energy is spread across a wide spectrum and then constituted upon reception. This approach allows cell phones to work below 1 watt of power, and base stations (cell towers) to operate at extremely low power to reach long ranges. In SS, the loss of coverage is compensated with more of these safe low powered towers - unlike old AM radio stations that used higher power to cover wider range. The low power/high frequency combination makes it much much safer than say, your fuse panel, or your microwave oven. It is probably the safest communication technology ever built. It is probably safer than the taut string that connects two resonating cups that children play with.
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@Krish Pillai
[It is probably the safest communication technology ever built. ] There's also the digital re-integration aspect you haven't included, but beyond that *any* electromagnetic radiation has risks. The issue is at what point that becomes irrelevant in the background spectrum?
As for "safest"? You're not thinking. Even though light spectrum (arguably still emr or not) other than damage to photon receptors, it's vastly superior to magnetic forms, and offers an extremely wide bandwith that can still be subdivided in terms of directional polarity.
This article has actually done the debate more harm than good. I trust the Times will address that by hosting a wider discussion.
1
@ssaines
Light and EMR are one and the same. James Clark Maxwell showed in his equations that a varying electric field is always associated with a correspondingly varying magnetic field, and vice versa. All forms of telecommunication communications today involve electro-magnetic radiations of some sort, transmitted over some medium - fibre as light, or copper as electric signals. I am not sure what you really mean when you say "light spectrum is vastly superior to magnetic forms". Light is composed of varying electric and magnetic fields. If you crank down the frequency of the oscillations you get communication channels, and if you crank up the frequency you start seeing it once it goes over infra red into the visible range.
5
@ssaines
There is no evidence that “any” EM radiation has risks.
1
I’m an electrical engineer. “Skin effect” is the techical term for the penetration of an Electromagnetic field into a conductor, and decreases inversely with higher frequency. Skin tissue is not a conductor and will not block electromagnetic waves. If it did, x-rays wouldn’t work and neither would your microwave oven. The latter being my personal reason not to stand too close when I warm my coffee. Also, police radars have caused a documented number of cases of testicular cancer because the unknowing officer would lay the radar gun in his lap.
I believe electromagnetic radiation (at all frequencies) is a potential health hazard. That and plastic have become too pervasive to address head on, so we live (and die) with both.
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@Gary Way
I also have a degree in electrical engineering. It's unfortunate that you appear to misunderstand the issue so gravely.
Human skin is not a conductor, but all the blood vessels in human skin are. Indeed, human brains are completely surrounded by many blood vessels.
Second, the relationship between frequency and absorption is probably not so neat as a perfect inverse relationship in reality. For example, the absorption spectrum of water is not monotonic at all.
Third, electromagnetic waves only start to increase the risk of cancer once they carry nearly enough energy to ionize DNA molecules. That is, only light at or above ultraviolet frequencies will noticeably increase risk of cancer. It does not really matter how much you absorb below these frequencies unless you afraid of literally cooking yourself to death.
It should be noted that the intensity of visible light during the day is far greater, and at a higher frequency, than what would be produced by any 5G technology. That means that people should be just as worried about walking around during the day as they are about cellphone use.
23
@Steve S The argument that RF damage to living tissues is limited to ionizing radiation or thermal effects is not settled science by any means. The notion that daylight is more hazardous is akin to Ronald Reagan's claim that trees emit most of the pollution.
6
@Pep Streebeck
Daylight, which contains UV radiation known to cause skin cancer, is almost certainly more hazardous than wireless radio emissions.
8
I am trying to understand the 'skin' argument;
if I cover my smartphone in skin, will it stop working?
Did I miss the explanation of how skin protects us, or does it?
Or would water protect us, if I put the smart phone at the bottom of a swimming pool would it not receive signals? We do get cell phone service in our homes through walls.
7
This is a twisting of the real facts out there. William Curry was far from the only scientific voice raising the alarm about a technology which the industry itself admits is dangerous in fine print and which government agencies refuse to test ahead of time. I am appalled at the hard sell by the New York Times. (see their previous attempt a few months ago). The fact is, 5G will be many times more harmful than its predecessor. Educate yourselves, readers, before you wake up to find "mini" towers installed every 500 feet across this country -- on lamp posts, rooftops, buildings -- and find yourself dealing the harm it will cause, especially to children. All for what? For addiction to the "convenience" of speedier downloads on your smartphone? Or is this being pushed on us WITHOUT TESTING for the usual reason in ravenous, late-stage capitalism -- enormous profits before all else.
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@free range actually I am not much into the topic, but it's strange hearing about "one" doctor. I have run into a similar article in Zeit in March or something where two physicians were arguing about that. One was saying that a health hazard is not great enough to put economic development behind other countries and the other one told the economic development is not worth health hazards. I didn't read the article to the end, but i definitely remember there was a debate.
6
Yes, also vaccines cause autism and aliens are living among us.
10
@Stacy Cool Story, thanks for posting
3
As expected of the Times, a well-researched, coherently-presented article. Thank you for maintaining jouralistic standards in a "post-fact" world where people tend to only hear or listen to things which support what they already believe - no matter HOW shaky or insubstantial their chosen sources may be!! The current hysteria regarding the impending role-out of the 5G cell phone update, is an excellent case in point - people who have are constantly seeking something new to be frightened of, have latched firmly onto a few extremely flawed studies which sound loud, strident warnings.... while ignoring the large volume of far more solid and substantiated science that indicates there is most probably nothing much to worry about. If every news outlet followed the same strict guidelines as the NY Times, such dubiously-based fears and conspiracy theories would not gain nearly as much credence as they now do.
22
@JR Mayhew. Yes, a good piece of reportage. Some fraction of the public is strongly attracted to invisible danger, and a few entrepreneurs can make careers out of feeding that attraction. Worse, the actual scientific community has to divert too much scarce research budget to keep countering public hysterias, money that should be used for more defensible purpose. I never would have believed that the science behind climate change, for example, could be manipulated into a political weapon by a handful of people with their own economic gain at heart.
4
@Joseph Ross Mayhew--The author of this article appears to have a strong opinion on this issue and cites a handful of sources to support that view. Considering the widespread use of radio frequency signals, much more needs to be known about their effect on human health.
I am an engineer and worked in telecommunications for many years. We hired tower climbers to do antenna maintenance. They spoke of being forced by some customers to work near broadcast antennas while they were transmitting. The climbers reported feeling very perceptible heating in parts of their bodies during this exposure. The frequencies and power levels were different from cell phones, but it does demonstrate that radio frequency energy can affect body tissue. To make a blanket statement to the contrary, absent better evidence, seems very ill advised.
17
@Bill 765. There is a big difference between heating flesh and causing cancer. Even 5 GHz radiation is about 100 thousand times to week to cause cancer. It can heat flesh, but only if the intensity is high enough, which in cell phone and wifi use it is definitely not. And if it were, you would feel it long before any damage could be done.
3
What do we need 5G for? To hasten climate change by using energy for things we can do ourselves, like navigate, or to buy more stuff, or to look at facile facebook? Stop with the techno push. It not only may not improve life, but appears to be making it worse for the sake of minor convenience. And the jury should be out on this. It has not been long enough to know.
49
@scientella
So how far backwards in technology should we go to "improve" life? Pre-cellphones/smart phones? Pre-internet? Pre-computer? How about pre-electrification or even pre-indoor plumbing?
Which of these, and other technical advances in common living, were significant improvements or just minor conveniences?
11
@scientella Are you trading in your car for a horse drawn carriage? Amish people choose to largely live without modern technology and that is there right. But the rest of us don’t need luddites deciding where to stop advancements.
10
@Bob Krantz
Pre- industrial revolution, or at least pre- internal combustion engine.
A lot of the arguments for the modern age point to advances in medicine, which have lead to dramatic overpopulation.
Scientific advances have lead to fracturing of populations. As an immigrant, I am not so sure that breaking up cultures is good.
The care of aging parents is now shunted onto strangers working for corporations who do it for profit.
Our foods and our bodies contain plastic.
Our food sources are running out.
Is this progress?
15
No one should take from this article that 5G phones and especially sender transmissions are safe. There is lots of reports in Europe of dead birds and toasted vegetation. Way to early to solidify your conclusions.
27
@Larry Oswald
Please provide links to your sources.
21
Bruxelles (city) banned this technology. Switzerland (country) put it on hold. Please, google. Thank you!
7
Laboratory experiments are one thing, but what about when an entire population is stewing in high frequency radio waves over time? How do you test for that in a lab?
Science doesn’t know everything, and in some cases, it doesn’t know what it doesn’t yet know, particularly regarding how things affect our brains (see the warnings on new medications). We’ve been lucky so far.
37
@D. Wagner The deployment of millions of millimeter-wave transmitters, which will be necessary for 5G, is an unprecedented science experiment on a massive scale.
And technically speaking, these are not "high-frequency" (HF or shortwave, 3-30 MHz) emissions as asserted, they are in the Super-High (SHF, 3-30 gigahertz) and Extremely High (EHF, 30-300 GHz) range, another fact these popular articles tend to softball.
12
These sorts of ideas have actually been around since Heinlein’s “Waldo,” from the 1940s.
4
I had to laugh at the graphic chosen to accompany this article. People running in fear from cell towers (ergo tech in general)? Just ponder how many tech gadgets Amazon sold in the last two days.
7
Dr. Curry,
It is very human to make a mistake.
It is very unlike a scientist not to admit one.
You made a career by spreading an untrue claim that has worried millions and encouraged groundless lawsuits. Now you want to ride off into the sunset and forget about the trouble you have caused.
39
Unless these guys are proposing an alternate mechanism other than ionization for damage, the absorption is irrelevant (short of noticeable heating as in a microwave oven).
This article likewise does a public disservice by only hinting at ionization as the only accepted mechanism for damage, when it mentions X-Rays. Please do more than vaguely imply why these guys are crackpots. Surely some of your readership is scientifically literate enough to understand an explanation, even while not being versed on this specific issue.
26
He presented a data plot using Excel. Sad!
4
I recall reading that holding a cell phone to your ear was not safe. This article appears to be an attempt by the industry to counter that concern. I also recall the tobacco industry following a similar strategy.
28
@ron Only cancer markedly increased after tobacco exposure among the entire using (and second hand using) population. Mobile phones have come under far, far more scrutiny than tobacco products from their inception, and using far more sophisticated methodologies, and yet, so far, nothing. In fact if they were a public health risk it would have already created a public health crisis due to their almost universal adoption. So we can deduce that currently mobile phones do not cause cancer or pose any direct health risk through the technologies they use. So your comparison between the mobile phone industry and tobacco industry is in large part faulty.
36
@Martin
The mass use of cell phones has only been about 20 years. It's an ongoing test and we are guinea pigs.
Would you care to also explain the marked rise in dementia.
6
@Martin -- Go over to microwavernews.com and read about the 4 European country epidemiological studies that find brain cancer to have doubled in recent years in older people.
I'd be interested in what you think is wrong with these studies.
3
This article, strangely, doesn't mention Louis Slesin and his Microwave News website. Slesin is a much more nuanced critic of the health risks of electromagnetic radiation, including from cellphones.
He currently has articles discussing the increase in glioblastoma brain cancer in older people. For example, he comments on a recent set of Danish "government data, released in May by a member of the Danish Parliament, show a near doubling of this fatal brain tumor, glioblastoma multiforme, since the year 2000."
Another article discusses the 4x increase in colorectal cancer among younger people, who tend to carry phones in their back pocket, while it countinues to decrease in older people.
Slesin is a careful phyicist who has been involved in this issue for over 35 years and doesn't use a megaphone. I'm amazed he isn't mentioned in this article about leading proponents of concern about high frequency radiation.
64
@Dave Anderson. Does the article about colorectal cancer factor out increasing obesity rates among young people which have actually been correlated to increase the risks.
12
@Todd
Took me about 30 seconds to find the link below:
https://microwavenews.com/news-center/de-kun-li-crc
2
@Dave Anderson
Wow. None of that jives with the very most basic thing pointed out in this article, that skin does not allow the propagation EM waves at these frequencies through it. Now, if you were talking skin cancer or some such, that would be more believable.
Next we'll be hearing about how the lights in our houses are causing liver cancer. Oooops, probably just started another "theory".
At any rate, as one trained in physics myself, it is a well known phenomenon that many physicists assume they need little training in other fields in order to authoritatively spout on things they actually know far too little about.
16
Mr. Broad argues for trusting industry. Any fears of technology which are not supported by a wealth of solid evidence amount to mass hysteria. Don't believe those wild-eyed renegades who suggest the dangerousness of technology. This same trust has given us global warming, and epidemic of tobacco-related illness, brain-tumors from cell phones, and a diet endorsed by the government which has led to an epidemic of obesity. Lost in the debate is that it is the responsibility of industry to conduct research demonstrating the safety of their products. This notion, widely held elsewhere in the western world, and known as the precautionary principle, has not been conducted on 5G technology, as even the industry will admit. Attempts to manipulate popular opinion towards trusting technology, and the media and government who are their mouthpieces are likely to backfire, as people observe more closely. The tendentious pieces that support big industry will become increasingly obvious in their overt salesmanship, and the lack of solid scientific foundation, echoing the many deceptions of the past will become gradually clearer. Or not, and we will have to live with the consequences to our health, forecast years ago by all too many science fiction writers who foresaw the potentially devastating effects of poorly regulated technologic innovation.
48
@Samantha Perhaps, but that is a very general claim. Here we're talking about specific radiation, which we know can't penetrate the skin. Just saying "technology is poorly regulated" (sometimes) and "poorly regulated technology is devastating" is a tautology. The fact of the matter is that human monkeys have been implementing technology since the days of fire and the wheel and it's always been a double edged sword. Sometimes (over) regulation of technologies can be harmful (or lack of its benefits not available to everyone).
Is sunlight dangerous? Sure, depending on the context but we also need it to survive.
21
@Samantha
“Where is the evidence” is the scientific question. And there is no evidence that high frequencies have negative health effects. Global warming is real, with lots of evidence. That’s how the atmosphere of Venus is explained scientifically.
25
@D. Smith You miss the point. "Where is the evidence?" is the question that must be directed towards industry, as regards safety of new technology. It is their responsibility to prove safety with science, not the public's responsibility to prove lack of safety.
19