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The Question of Cellphone Radiation and Human Health Remains to be Answered

Two studies, carried out over a period of 10 years and costing $25 million, attempted to find out the answer to this long debated question.
The Question of Cellphone Radiation and Human Health Remains to be Answered

Does cellphone radiation cause cancer or other unwanted health effects? Two studies, carried out over a period of 10 years and costing $25 million, attempted to find out the answer to this long debated question. But their results do not give a definite explanation.

Researchers at the National Toxicology Program (NTP) in US studied how exposure to cellphone radiation impacted the health of rats and mice. Rodents of both sexes were put in chambers for 2 years, 9 hours a day, and their entire bodies were exposed to radiation. While male rats developed tumours in the nerves around their hearts, female rats or female or male mice did not. However, even with high cellphone usage, humans do not face such high amounts of radiation.

John Bucher, senior scientist at NTP and co-director of the study, said, “The results cannot be applied directly to humans.” He did add, “We note, however, that the tumours we saw in these studies are similar to tumours previously reported in some studies of frequent cell phone users.”

Bucher also said that the conditions in which the tumours developed suggest that cellphone radiation could be a weak carcinogen.

Certain noncancerous health effects were also observed in rats, such as lower weight of newborns, damage to DNA, and heart conditions. But it could not be established that radiation exposure was the definite cause behind these.

Another baffling finding was that male rats and mice who had been exposed to radiation were seen to live longer lives. Bucher said that one possible explanation for this is that radiation may have eased inflammation, thereby reducing the severity of a common, fatal kidney disorder that occurs in ageing rats.

Bucher and other scientists believe that the studies show there is no cause for alarm and no need for a radical change in cellphone usage habits. Jeffrey Shuren from US Food and Drug Administration said the studies have “given us the confidence that the current safety limits for cellphone radiation remain acceptable for protecting the public health.”

Bucher also said that the amount of radiation emitted increases in areas where signal is poor, advising worried citizens to avoid using cellphones in such places. In the Indian context, this is noteworthy as our telecom industry is plagued with poor connectivity and signal strength. For a population of 1.3 billion people, we have 1.1 billion mobile phones.

Since the findings of this study remain ambiguous, further research is still required to determine the link between cellphone radiation and human health.

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