Cell Phones Shown to Negatively Influence Fetal Brains

[superpatriotman]

[link:http://naturalsociety.com/cell-phones-shown-to-negatively-influence-fetal-brains/|

Cell phones – the incredibly convenient device that make our lives infinitely easier. While these phones have created great steps forward in communication, talking on them comes at a price. The massive increase in cellular phone use in our current society has resulted in a large degree of research examining the potential negative health effects they have on human health. Very recent research has shown that microwave radiation emitted by cellular devices negatively influence fetal brains.

Read more: http://naturalsociety.com/cell-phones-shown-to-negatively-influence-fetal-brains/#ixzz1lolX63V4

snip

This research comes just before Greek scientists demonstrated how frequency electromagnetic fields, namely cell phones, portable phones, WiFi, and wireless computer equipment alter important protein changes in the brains of animals.

Link to the study:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22268709

[Yo_Mama]

1. But how does that compare to human exposures?

Rats are much smaller than humans, and surely net exposure would be lower?

[DCKit]

2. I'm always put-off by people who spoil their kids, but a cell phone for a fetus?

That's really going too damn far.

What kind of adapter do you use to charge the thing? How's the reception?

Sorry, but I couldn't help it. The title was begging for a riff.

[ZombieHorde]

3. Funny! nt

[MADem]

5. Ha!

[stevenleser]

17. That is exactly what I thought when I saw this. Tell your fetus not to use a cell phone

[MADem]

4. Purely anecdotal commentary, here....

But I know two people who have been heavy cellphone users since they first came out, and they both are suffering gioblastomas in the right side of their brains, where they held the phones. It will be a miracle if either one of them lasts another year.

Ted Kennedy lived on his frigging cellphone, and he got one of those, too--it killed him.

Cause and effect? I don't know. What I do know is I only use the speaker phone feature when I talk on the cell phone. Everyone knows that's how I roll, so most conversations are mercifully short.

[jeff47]

10. Well, if that were the case, the rate of disease would be skyrocketing.

And it isn't.

[TheWraith]

12. Not to mention, it's classic confusion of correlation with causation.

There are millions of people who have been constant cell phone users, but we automatically notice the ones who suffer from brain tumors. It's perceptual self-selection.

[MADem]

14. Like I said, purely anecdotal.

I'm simply working from a position of an abundance of caution.

[HuckleB]

22. That position leads one to hide in a closet 24 hours a day.

[MADem]

24. Speak for yourself. nt

[HuckleB]

25. I don't hold that position.

[uppityperson]

16. Cousin died a few yrs ago of gioblastoma but never used any phone but one with a cord.

[Yo_Mama]

20. Same in my family

Both heavy cell phone users. Both now dead, and they didn't last long.

However when looking at the data, it seems to me that people with certain genomes might be susceptible to this, while others are not. Additionally the older cell phones emitted more radiation, so the incidence with just the newer models might be lower.

I do think there is a link to glioblastomas in some people, but I don't see that the data yet supports the idea that the risks are the same for everyone.

"Incredibly rare," we were told on the first diagnosis. The next year the second diagnosis. Something's up. A lot more people are getting these, and yes, many are very heavy cell phone users.

I now twitch when I see young people with them glued to their ears.

[MADem]

21. One guy lived on his phone.

He was in real estate--constantly on the go, constantly on the phone. He had one of the first cellphones I ever saw, too!

You might be right, that it's a "some people" - genomes thing. I don't know. I just think it's a bit odd, particularly given all the articles that have been written down the years making this very same suggestion.

[HuckleB]

23. Considering how many people there are in the world, it's not odd at all.

[Yo_Mama]

28. Yes it is.

The common belief that glioblastomas are not increasing is probably false. Here's a pretty recent study that the Aussies did:
http://www.surgicalneurologyint.com/article.asp?issn=2152-7806;year=2011;volume=2;issue=1;spage=176;epage=176;aulast=Dobes

Other studies are referenced in that article. Those other studies have tended to contain the suggestion that glioblastomas kind of took a step rise in causation somewhere, which is how I came up with the theory that the old cell phones were really most of the cause.

On the other hand, the Australian data here tends to debunk that theory.

The only way to know is to wait and see. The Australian studies will be very useful, because if they come up with a Nordic-type rise shifted years later, it is one of the few things that would tend to point very strongly toward cell phones as the cause. The only other causative link is the same-side incidence, which was first reported in Japan.

That link has not been debunked:
http://www.cancermonthly.com/blog/2007/12/braincancer-cellphones.html

The studies now done have produced a change in the phone equipment sold to commercial centers to reduce brain exposure, and many of the people in the industry believe it is real.

Because many of these cancers are age-related, you have to adjust for age and than sort through the datasets carefully to get a better clue. Those datasets do not now exist, so it will take some effort. What is lacking is high quality data on quantity and timing of cell phone use (real exposure).

I wondered at one point if the rising incidence of some of these types of brain tumors was really a function of lengthened life spans due to reduction in cardiac risk. That did not bear out in the very small surveys I was able to do. The cell-phone risk did show up, though.

I have reviewed enough of these studies to be sure that the link is not going to be simple. Either some populations have a genetic susceptibility, so that this type of intimate prolonged exposure will cause more cancers for those with these genes, or the actual harmful exposures occurred years ago, or some third cause is in there.

The statement by the AN foundation is probably the best summary of where we really are regarding this:
http://ucbraintumorcenter.com/pressrelease/statement-regarding-cell-phones-acoustic-neuroma-association

The reason I do not like to see young people talking on their cells a lot is that it is an unknown risk.

[HuckleB]

29. A few selections of data do not support a world wide claim.

Sorry, but that's not how science works.

Sheesh.

[ZombieHorde]

6. Those things are entertaining, so who cares about the human cost?

Expecting a family to make do with only a wired-internet connection and a land-line phone for nine months is simply barbaric.

One's offspring is cool, but not as cool as the new iPhone.

[TheWraith]

7. "Naturalsociety.com"? Yeah, that's an unbiased source!

The reality is that many, many, many studies have shown no substantive effect on humans from low power radio equipment like cell phones and WiFi. More to the point, if radio DID harm people, you'd think that that fact would be noticed by people living near 250,000 watt TV stations, rather than by people using 1 watt cell phones.

[superpatriotman]

8. Check the link to the NIH

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22268709

[jeff47]

9. That's a link to a journal.

The NIH hosts a service that lists journal publications. The presence in that database doesn't mean the NIH backs the study. It just means they got published somewhere. In this case the journal's name is "Electromagnetic Biology and Medicine". And again, presence in the NIH database means nothing about the quality of the journal.

You can find the home for that journal here: http://informahealthcare.com/loi/ebm

You'll find this paper in the "Early Online" section. You will also find a paper titled, "Is there any exposure from a mobile phone in stand-by mode?"

This question is so mind-boggingly stupid that I really don't have any further questions about the quality of this journal.

As for this study, I'm not willing to pay to see the full paper, and their abstract doesn't bother saying anything about the frequencies or power levels involved. Which is really important information to judge the importance of this paper.

So I'll fall back to our ongoing 30-year study in billions of humans. It hasn't shown any disease that can be traced to cell phone usage.

Edit: Typo

[TheWraith]

11. +1,000.

"Oh, there was a STUDY" is way too easy of an excuse for ignoring the dozens of other studies saying the opposite.

[JHB]

13. Yes. A link to a study, out of context, to a general audience...

...that doesn't have the general background nor is "up to speed" on the particular material to knowledgeably evaluate it, is at best sloppiness and the logical fallacy of argument from authority.

At worst, it's the sort of lawyerly cherry-picking people like creationists do.

[MineralMan]

19. Uh, dude, that was research done on fetal RATS...

It has no relevance to fetal humans, which are much better protected from RF radiation. That study has nothing to do with humans in any way.

It is irrelevant to the piece in your other source, which is an advocacy site for alternative medical woo, complete with bogus diabetes treatment advertisers, etc.

Again, this sounds awfully familiar to me, somehow.

[HuckleB]

26. Rats!

[madrchsod]

15. dam those chinese workers can make anything!

how in the hell can they assemble something that small?

i guess we`ll have to walk around with some very,very,very long phone cords.

[MineralMan]

18. Sounds like woo to me. Given the source, I'd say it's about

an 85% probability that it's nonsense. I cannot see any way that RF at cell phone frequencies could penetrate through to a fetus.

Nope.

This post sounds awfully familiar somehow, stylistically and otherwise. Perhaps it belongs in the Health Forum. Or perhaps not.

[HuckleB]

27. RATS!