Mobile Phones and Cancer. (May 17, 2010)

The mass media report today on the World Health Organisation's International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) study on the link between mobile(cell) phone use and cancer.

The largest study to date of the safety of mobile phones has found no clear link to brain cancer, although it said further study is merited given their increasingly intensive use.

Nevertheless the Sydney Morning Herald's headline reads "Study can't rule out brain cancer link to mobiles", and the ABC's reads "Mobile phone-cancer link study inconclusive" and follows with the quote from IARC director Christopher Wild: "The results really don't allow us to conclude there is any risk associated with mobile phone use, but... it is also premature to say there is no risk associated with it."

Below are several excerpts from Bob Park's "What's New" blog. Park is Emeritus professor of physics at the University of Maryland, College Park rather than a biomedical cancer researcher. His is a clarion plea that the laws of physics be considered.

http://bobpark.physics.umd.edu/    -- search on "cell phone" for a full set of his views.

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Friday, April 23, 2010
1. CELL PHONES: FIVE BILLION ARE IN USE AROUND THE WORLD.
In spite of unsubstantiated reports that cell phone radiation increases the risk of brain cancer, sales soared in the first decade
of the 3rd Millennium. Cell phones became a $1 trillion business. There was no corresponding increase in brain cancer, but perhaps
there is a long latency period. Cancer victims have no way of knowing what caused their cancer, but the media had made their cell
phones the suspect. The clear scientific conclusion that cell phone radiation could not be the cause,
http://jnci.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/93/3/166, went largely unreported. In short, microwave photons do not have enough
energy to create a mutant strand of DNA. That cant happen until you get to the blue limit of the visible spectrum. In the interest
of full disclosure, let me state that although I own a cell phone I don't normally carry it, and cant even remember my number. I
find cell phones to be rude and intrusive. My wife insists I carry it when I travel so I can dial 911 in an emergency. That's OK.

2. COSMOS: THE COHORT STUDY ON MOBILE COMMUNICATIONS.
Yesterday, the cell-phone controversy was taken to a new and substantially lower level. The Cohort Study on Mobile Communications
(COSMOS) was launched in the UK to determine whether microwave radiation from wireless devices can induce cancer. It will track
250,000 users for 30 years to catch any slow growing cancers. Note the built-in job protection. The study will look for neurological
diseases such as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's as well. Participants aged 18-69 are being recruited in Britain, Finland, the
Netherlands, Sweden and Denmark. In Britain, COSMOS is inviting 2.4 million cell phone users to take part, and hoping 100,000 or so
will accept. If they do the study really well, it will confirm Albert Einstein's 1905 explanation of the photoelectric effect, for
which he was awarded the 1921 Nobel Prize. Of course, the photoelectric effect is confirmed thousands of times annually by students
in elementary physics lab courses. If it is done badly, this tedious and expensive study could perpetuate the publics unfounded fear
of radiation below the ultraviolet threshold. This must be stopped.

Friday March 12, 2010
3. CELL PHONES: THE MAINE PROBLEM IS SCIENTIFIC IGNORANCE.
The use of cell phones has become ubiquitous in modern society. There is also a lot of brain cancer. This has led to a lot of people
to suggest that the two are connected, and the state of Maine is considering legislation that would require cell phone manufacturers
to print a warning on the product. But has the incidence of brain cancer increased at anything like the numbers of cell phones. It
is a troubling issue for most physicists who recognize that cell phones almost certainly cant cause cancer. All known cancer agents
act by breaking chemical bonds in DNA, creating mutant strands that may multiply to become cancers. Microwave photons are orders of
magnitude short of being able to break chemical bonds. The Federal Communications Commission, the Food and Drug Administration and
the American Cancer Society recognize this, but for most Americans the words quantum mechanics are simply an announcement that you
won't understand what follows. Even a very bright high school student probably won't have any idea what you're talking about.

Friday, January 8, 2010
1. CELL PHONES: KEEP YOUR HEAD OUT OF THE MICROWAVE OVEN.
Several readers admonished me for my unqualified assertion in last week's WN that "cell phone radiation does not cause cancer." They
point out that microwave photons may not eject photoelectrons but they do excite molecular vibrations (heat). That's why your
microwave oven has a safety interlock on the door. So does the miniscule energy deposited by the cell phone cook your brain? No!
Rapid blood circulation keeps the brain temperature at that of the blood, which is regulated by the hypothalamus at the base of the
brain. Thermoregulation is a high priority for the brain. That why marathoners run hard for more than two hours, often hatless
beneath a midday summer sun, yet their rise in blood temperature is about that of a mild fever.