H/T to Chris at AmericaBlog, who posted on this yesterday here. Full article here.
... a study by an award-winning cancer expert has concluded... on growing evidence... that using handsets for 10 years or more can double the risk of brain cancer. Cancers take at least a decade to develop, invalidating official safety assurances based on earlier studies which included few, if any, people who had used the phones for that long.
I do not own a cell phone, and have purposefully avoided buying one so long as the jury was still out.I also turned vegetarian during the first MadCow scare (not that the FDA has made the rest of our food supply any safer, geez).I've had issues for a long time regarding industry's willingness to sacrifice the public health for a quick buck, and am constantly amazed at society's immature and myopic pursuit of any technology without any truly comprehensive analysis.
Remember, while this technology may have been tested in the short term, it is still essentially untested in the long term, if only because the technology has not been around that long. In my opinion, that is no excuse for submitting a supposedly safe product into the consumersphere, the same way "they" never bothered to test if pesticides like DDT were safe before polluting the world with them. Of course the phone companies will try to create reasonable doubt, just as the global warming naysayers paid by the oil corporations do. They will equivocate and ask us, "What's a little more radiation to the brain?", just as the Bush administration asked, "What's a little more mercury in your fish?". Perhaps they are aware of dangers, but sweep them under the rug like industry did with asbestos and cigarettes. Why are cell phones getting a free ride, and what makes us so sure it won't be any different? Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence; just because cellies haven't been proven dangerous does not mean that they have been proven safe.
Even the WHO recommends the minimization of cellular phone usage, based on the precautionary principle: "a risk management policy applied in circumstances with a high degree of scientific uncertainty, reflecting the need to take action for a potentially serious risk without awaiting the results of scientific research." How many cell phone users believe they are taking a "potentially serious risk", with a "high degree of ... uncertainty" whether it will kill them or not? I doubt such sober warnings are part of the sales pitch down at my local Verizon store. Not to sound too knee-jerk radical--but if you believe these companies won't put profit before conscience, I've got some beachfront property in Oklahoma to sell you.
Professor Khurana – a top neurosurgeon who has received 14 awards over the past 16 years, ... concludes that "there is a significant and increasing body of evidence for a link between mobile phone usage and certain brain tumours". He believes this will be "definitively proven" in the next decade.
Noting that malignant brain tumours represent "a life-ending diagnosis", he adds: "We are currently experiencing a reactively unchecked and dangerous situation." He fears that "unless the industry and governments take immediate and decisive steps", the incidence of malignant brain tumours and associated death rate will be observed to rise globally within a decade from now, by which time it may be far too late to intervene medically.
Can you even fathom the mayhem if the majority of heavy cell phone users (out of the cited 3 billion worldwide) developed inoperable brain tumors in the next 10-15 years? The elite and wealthiest of society, the movers and shakers, ordinary families. Do you think the rest of us Luddites are going to be able to keep the world economy balanced on stilts for you? We're already ostracized in our Kaczynski shacks hoping the world doesn't go to hell in a handbasket, and should not be relied on to sustain the status quo. And if some think lack of FISA immunity will bankrupt the communications industry, wait until the largest class-action health lawsuit in history hits them. This is all sheer speculation of course, but no less grounded in reality then any absolute claim of safety on the part of cell phone manufacturers. I strongly pray my sacrifice of convenience will have been in utter vain.
Give me a cell phone lined with those lead covers they use for chest x-rays, and I'll consider it. Yes, it would be as big as those cell phones in the early 90's, and I'll look ridiculous, but less so than my tinfoil hat. ;) (Conspiracy disclosures: 911: like Maher said, if Bush was behind it, it wouldn't have worked. Katrina: never underestimate the power of incompetence. Man on the moon: if we landed, where's the green cheese?).
And while I'm on a rant here... WTF is the deal with these new compact fluorescent light bulbs? There's a thousand ways to save energy that won't increase the mercury released into our environment. Robbing Peter Environment to pay Paul Energy just doesn't feel right to this progressive. While these are getting pushed at us like some panacea to our energy woes, are they spending anywhere near the same amount of money on education as marketing? Warnings and disposal information printed on packaging is not mandatory. Do consumers know how or where to properly dispose of these—or perhaps more importantly, do they care? A theoretically beneficial product like this becomes a liability if the companies selling them relies on the consumer to both be aware and do the right thing. I can't even get my next door neighbor to recycle the basics-—I'll bet at least 95% of these bulbs are going right into the regular trash. And of course, what better container for highly toxic substances than highly brittle glass? No way any of these will make it to the dump intact. And if it breaks in my curbside container, then I may get a nice whiff of aerosolized the next time I open the lid. Ah, you gotta love the odorless smell of heavy metals in the morning...
According to Wikipedia, the amount of mercury released by one bulb can exceed U.S. federal guidelines for chronic exposure, and that's too much for my tastes. If a bulb breaks in your home, the EPA recommends you use a broom to sweep up the glass particles, likely because the wind generated by a vacuum could spread the debris—and we all know how well brooms work on carpet. As for the mercury, you're stuck with it--keep your fingers crossed, and take short breaths. Yes, I've seen stats to the effect that the amount is negligible, only enough to cover the tip of a pen--which is indeed much much less than what is currently spewing out of our power plants. I just don't buy that we can split the atom but can't make a non-toxic light source. Big Auto won't increase mileage unless the public demands it, I fear there isn't enough public will to challenge "Big Light Bulb" to not sit on their laurels. (I've heard some very positive things about new-gen LEDs, I need to read more on that)
I'm aware some companies are now producing low-mercury bulbs, but that takes us back to my original question: how much of a potential danger, whether radiation or mercury, is acceptable, how certain are we of that standards' absolute safety (versus a less assured "risk assessment"), and is it ever acceptable for industry to make that decision for us?
If I may share a related song lyric of mine:
"Welcome to the cancer factory, full of hapless inhabitants
and prolific producers of manufactured contaminants
Your safety's imagined—what you can't see will kill you
While you're twiddling your fingers, they'll poison and bill you..."
My first diary, please be kind, if not concerned (not the trollish kind, tho)