Are mobile phones a health hazard?

[agellner]

There’s been a lot of talk lately (at least in Europe) about the potential threat of mobile phone technology to our health. Farmers with cows grazing underneath mobile base stations claim to observe a strong increase of dead or somehow disabled calves and a decrease of milk production. People working or living near such antennas complain more and more about headaches, and houses with mobile antennas on their roofs are becoming increasingly hard to sell.
Obviously, the mobile vendors can cite hundreds of studies “proving” the harmlessness of mobile technology. On the other side, research showing the exact opposite abounds as well.

Time for the Straight Dope, I’d say. What’s up with cell phones? Are they up there with gene technology in the list of both useful and potentially dangerous inventions?

Al

[Earl_Snake-Hips_Tucker]

Use the “SEARCH” option on this one. It’s been beaten around many, many times here. I’m sure there’s nothing new to add.

Long story short, though: There’s NO credible evidence to show a statistically significant increase in any health problems arising from the invisible rays emitted by cell phones.

Cell phones are just the latest: Various health concerns were raised bout the invisible rays emitted by color TV’s when they started becoming popular, and by invisible rays from computer monitors, when monitors (first, dumb terminals) started populating desktops.

[KarlGauss]

Only if you use them while driving. Look here.

[KarlGauss]

Here’s the text:

**The New England Journal of Medicine – February 13, 1997 – Vol. 336, No. 7
Association between Cellular-Telephone Calls and Motor Vehicle Collisions

Donald A. Redelmeier, Robert J. Tibshirani
ABSTRACT

Background: Because of a belief that the use of cellular telephones while driving may cause collisions, several countries have restricted their use in motor vehicles, and others are considering such regulations. We used an epidemiologic method, the case-crossover design, to study whether using a cellular telephone while driving increases the risk of a motor vehicle collision.

Methods: We studied 699 drivers who had cellular telephones and who were involved in motor vehicle collisions resulting in substantial property damage but no personal injury. Each person’s cellular-telephone calls on the day of the collision and during the previous week were analyzed through the use of detailed billing records.

Results: A total of 26,798 cellular-telephone calls were made during the 14-month study period. The risk of a collision when using a cellular telephone was four times higher than the risk when a cellular telephone was not being used (relative risk, 4.3; 95 percent confidence interval, 3.0 to 6.5). The relative risk was similar for drivers who differed in personal characteristics such as age and driving experience; calls close to the time of the collision were particularly hazardous (relative risk, 4.8 for calls placed within 5 minutes of the collision, as compared with 1.3 for calls placed more than 15 minutes before the collision; P<0.001); and units that allowed the hands to be free (relative risk, 5.9) offered no safety advantage over hand-held units (relative risk, 3.9; P not significant). Thirty-nine percent of the drivers called emergency services after the collision, suggesting that having a cellular telephone may have had advantages in the aftermath of an event.

Conclusions: The use of cellular telephones in motor vehicles is associated with a quadrupling of the risk of a
collision during the brief period of a call. Decisions about regulation of such telephones, however, need to take into account the benefits of the technology and the role of individual responsibility. (N Engl J Med 1997;336:453-8.) **

In the text, the authors use words to the effect of: “The risk of driving while using a cell phone is equal to the risk of driving while drunk”.