Electro Magnetic Fields (EMFs) – Non-Industry Funded Science – What Does it Say?

This post offers two ways to digest the recent science conducted on the safety of wireless technology:

1. Video Presentation, fully cited
2. Transcription, also fully cited

The information presented here is incredibly important information in regards to the health of our children, elderly, as well as everyone, but particularly pregnant mothers…

The science shows: fetuses of pregnant mothers are dangerously affected – and we will not see the full effects until these fetuses, who are developing in our pregnant mothers today, grow up and attempt to have children of their own.  This is a major fertility issue.

Eggs, which develop in a female fetus’s body while she is growing in her mother’s womb, must not be radiated.

Quick resources before we continue:

• Wireless Education course (short and informative) developed for families, schools, school staff, public officials, legislators and families. $7.95 – link
• Baby Safe Project – protect yourself and your fetus during pregnancy – link.
• Find ALL resources here.

In the video, Cece Doucette shares the latest science with the Ashland, MA Health Board. Cece has been working with MA legislators for a few years now.

As a result of her efforts, the MA legislators have introduced NINE bills, which are in session as we speak in MA.  Eight of these bills are about electromagnetic fields (EMFs) and the ninth bill is about high voltage power lines.

Previously, as the President of the Ashland, MA Education Foundation, Cece Doucette ran seven campaigns, and facilitated over 100 grants to purchase ipads, chromebooks, smart TVs, etc, — hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of wireless technology into the Ashland MA public schools.  Now that she has become aware of the science and biological harm of wireless radiation, she is working to undo/remove that technology, and replace it with safe technology.

This is the most concise and most up to date presentation you will find anywhere, regarding the science and research.  There are other excellent presentations on the internet, but this is the presentation that explains and lists the non-industry funded science.

***Please note, for ease of reading, I’ve made minor changes, such as switching pronouns.  For example, “Cece” (third person) is used instead of “I” in most cases throughout.***

*START TRANSCRIPT*

Regarding wireless technology and the biological harm it brings.

*CECE BEGINS BACKGROUND*

When Cece first became aware that there may be biological harm from wireless technology, she asked the school’s IT district director if he knew anything about biological harm from WiFi. The director checked with the FCC, and told Cece that the FCC says that WiFi is fine – safe.

Cece is a technical and professional writer by trade and part of her skill set is doing research. She began to investigate. If one does a cursory search on ‘is WiFi safe?’ you will find studies that show ‘we did the studies and no harm was found.’ But when you get beyond and look at the scientific studies themselves, you will find there are many, many, biological effects from wireless radiation.

There is a compendium report called ‘The BioInitiative Report’ (A) and it was updated in December 2017 by Dr. Henry Lai, with the current studies that were done through 2017. A quick run-through of the key scientific evidence of harm:

• damage to sperm and reproduction
• children are more vulnerable
• fetal and neonatal effects
• effects on autism
• electrohypersensitivity
• effects on the blood-brain barrier, which is being linked to a lot of neurological issues that children are having today
• effects on brain tumours
• genotoxicity
• neurotoxicity
• cancer
• melatonin
• alzheimer’s disease
• and a few other technical things

When Ashland public schools began their investigation into this, they saw the industry-funded studies which showed no evidence of harm, and they also saw the non-industry funded studies, and they didn’t know what to do. They’re not scientists; they’re not doctors. We looked to the Department of Public Health for advice – they were not aware of this issue. We looked to the Board of Education for advice – they weren’t aware of this issue either.

Then, the Ashland public schools read the fine print that comes with all of our devices (B).

For example, if you have an iPhone, go into

Settings >> scroll down to General >> About >> Legal

At the bottom of legal, is “RF Exposure” – which stands for Radio Frequency radiation, also known as two-way microwave radiation, which the industry politely calls “energy.” The fine print tells us two very important things:

1. Keep this device “x” amount of distance from your body (In the second or third paragraph, you will find a distance). In most iPhones used, that distance is 5mm.
2. It also says to use a hands-free device, because by simply holding the device in active mode, in your hand, you are exceeding the FCC guidelines for public radiation exposure.

Note, these are just GUIDELINES, no STANDARDS, because standards were never developed.

Those FCC guidelines were established in the 1990s, very very high, based on a thermal theory, saying “ok, how much heat from one device would it take to raise the biological temperature of our cells.” We have no safety testing – that was never safety tested, for anybody.

Worse, the science today is showing there are great biological effects, which are not related to thermal.  In other words, you don’t have to have HEAT, to have harm.

The IEEE (The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) published a report in 2016 called “Some Effects of Weak Magnetic Fields on Biological Systems” (C). Radio-frequency fields can change radical concentration in cancer cell growth rates.

Even the IEEE, who helped inform those FCC guidelines in the 1990s (referenced above), is acknowledging that there is biological harm.

When Ashland public schools read the fine print on the devices, they became the first in the nation to even require a sign to be hanging in the classroom with precautionary measures that should be taken regarding wireless devices, which include:

1. turn off the wireless routers when they aren’t being used, otherwise, they continuously pulse microwave radiation at our staff and our children.
2. turn off devices like cell phones, or at least put them in airplane mode. When a cell phone is in airplane mode, it shuts off most of the antennas in the cell phone. The wireless antennas in just one device include: cell antenna, data antenna, blue tooth antenna, wif antenna, a locator antenna, and likely an antenna to take advantage of your phone to use as a public hotspot as well.

All six of those antennas are continually pulsing, to handshake with the nearest cell tower or router. We don’t need that, but most of us don’t know about it, so we could keep the cell in airplane mode when we keep it on our body, because even the manufacture says: “keep it off your body.” This would reduce our exposure.

Cece is very proud of Ashland public schools for requiring this cautionary signage in their classrooms, but right now it’s just a sign. The schools aren’t actually following the precautions — they’re waiting for higher authorities to teach them what to do.

*END BACKGROUND PORTION*

Cece met with Senator Karen Spilka, and explained to Karen what this technology is bringing us regarding risk, and we measured her cell phone and her district director’s laptop with a Radio Frequency measurement device (meter). The meter allows us to detect the microwave radiation in our spaces.

[Cece turns on the meters, which has visual as well as audio indicators to display measurements].

Cece: “as you can see, just from the ambient wiFi we have here, in addition to the wireless devices we are carrying, we are in the red zone. This meter is set to biological limits for where the science is showing that there is harm.”

Ashland is the first library in the nation to now offer one of these meters for loan, from the library. Anyone can now take this meter home for a week, and measure your exposures, and then learn what to do.

[the board member asks Cece to measure his cell phone’s radiation, and brings his phone next to the meter. During the measurement, they can see ‘jumps’ or variations in the power density measurement of the radiation being emitted by the cell phone.]

Cece: “as you can see, the measurement value jumps. Many radio and TV – they roll off using a continuous rolling sine wave, and unless your underneath or near the broadcast radio tower where you get an extreme dose, there is less harm, and the body can more easily acclimate to it (although it does still affect our biology). But with digital technology, in addition to that sine wave, there is a square wave that rides on the sine wave, and the the waves are carrying data packets of information, via the microwave radiation, in pulsed, spiked, erratic shots that continually hits our cells, and that is what the science is showing is part of where the biological harm is.”

In the last year, we have had some major breakthroughs.

The California Department of Public Health released a long-held fact sheet (D) that they wrote in 2009, and it was suppressed by industry. It took a lawsuit from a professor at UC Berkley to get this fact sheet released and out to the public. So, it’s been almost 10 years, and so many people have already died from the glioblastomas, the acoustic neuromas, the salivary gland tumors, the thyroid tumors, and so on. So it’s urgent that we get this information out the public.

In the Mediterranean country of Cypress, in December, their entire medical community made an EMF (electromagnetic field) declaration, and they have published a 16-point bulletin to the public to teach them to use today’s technology safely until the industry brings safe mobile technology to market, and has removed WiFi from schools. (E)

The United States National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), houses the National Toxicology Program (NTP). They’ve been working on a 25 million dollars study (the largest they’ve ever done), and in Spring 2016, they expected to find that cell phones are safe. In 2016, when they did their first analysis, they found DNA damage, heart tumors, and brain tumors (F) — statistically enough, that they tried to tell the FCC, and they tried to tell the FDA which commissioned the study, and they tried to tell the public, but it never made it to us.

The NTP did their peer review of the full study this spring, and they took a vote to declare that this is a clear carcinogen.

Others will say “oh, well, you need to have multiple studies showing the same thing…”

Well, right on the heels of the NTP study, the Ramazzini Institute in Italy found the same findings in another very large study. (G)

In this year 2018 as well, Dr. Martin Pall, put together a report (H) on the studies that were done on WiFi, to help dispel the confusion as people say that cell phones may cause cancer, but that WiFi is different. WiFi is not different. They both send data in the same microwave radiation range (300MHz – 300GHz), sending data through digital pulse. Dr. Pall’s report is very well sourced.

Right after these studies came out, The Nation, which is the country’s oldest magazine, put out an investigative report called “How Big Wireless Made Us Think That Cell Phones Are Safe”. (I)

What they uncovered is that back in the 1990s, the industry itself conducted their own studies, found the radiation to be carcinogenic, AND that children are more vulnerable to it. And they didn’t invoke the precautionary principle; instead they suppressed it and got the Telecom Act passed.

Harvard published a similar, but more extensive report in 2015, called “Captured Agency: How the Federal Communications Commission is Dominated by the Industries it Presumably Regulates,” (J)

So, we have a lot of new information that should propel us forward to protect our citizens — especially our children, our fetuses, our elderly, because the science is clear — we are at risk. Senator Spilka introduced a bill this session under her own name. Senator Julian Cyr of Cape and the Islands (Cape Cod, Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket) introduced two bills to raise the fine print so we all know, and can have a right to choose how to use our technology.

When Senator Cyr’s bills came before the Joint Committee on Consumer Protection and Professional Licensure, there were testimonies sent in from all over the world — from scientists, from doctors, from public health experts, and from people in Massachusetts who’ve become electrically sensitive. And the Committee did something very unique. They assigned one of the research analysts to this issue, and they did the deep dive, and then they wrote their own bill.

So, we now have two bills advancing through the Senate right now, that would form a commission to get the right bright minds together at the State level to examine the non-industry funded science, and decide how we’re going to protect the public.

Since you are the board of health, I should mention that our state level Department of Public Health, has written four fact sheets on this.

1. WiFi
2. cell phones
3. cell towers
4. high voltage power lines (because in Natick, there is a cancer cluster around those high voltage power lines).

We are very well poised to bring this information to the public, but as we know, public policy takes time to catch up with the science, and in the meantime, we should think long and hard about how we can protect ourselves in our homes, in public spaces, and most especially our children – we should not start another school year with radiation with Ashland public schools. And especially our pregnant mothers with fetuses.

The town of Wayland has pushed off a cell tower, and they’ve also decided at town meeting NOT to install wireless water meters, because these meters continually pulse microwave radiation 24/7. With cell phones or tablets you have a choice, meaning, you can turn it off. But when the industry puts a device on your home that is pulsing radiation 24/7, you don’t have a choice in that.

If we don’t get ahead of this issue quickly, the industry’s next step is for 5G and the internet of things. 5G has the crummy end of the spectrum (millimeter waves) — we’ve already used up the rest of the microwave spectrum with 3G and 4G. With 5G they are promising great speeds (everything will be connected wirelessly), but it can’t travel very far, so what they want to do is put in ADDITIONAL infrastructure. The existing cell towers won’t go away….they want to add cell towers inside our neighborhoods, every 2 to 12 houses, on street level poles, in the public access right of way. They are working feverishly at the federal and state level to take away local municipal rights that we use to say if or where we want any of this technology in our towns.

So we need to learn about this, and quickly, because there are deep pockets with a lot of influence, and if we don’t, we’re going to find ourselves with a cell tower right outside our bedrooms.

Question from the board:

“Did the articles or science give you relative rate of increase in whatever diseases…cancer, or whatever, compared to baseline?”

Cece replies:

“The American Cancer Society is reporting now that our young adults are seeing a double and triple-fold increase in colon cancers, rectal cancer, breast cancers on the rise, and rise in brain tumors in children as well. What the industry will do to spin that is to say that ‘oh, cancers are not rising’ (they will do an AVERAGE). But when you look at SPECIFIC cancers form where we carry these devices, you will see significant increases.”

board member:

“i agree with you to where the industry would use their pockets to hid information, as we’ve seen in every other industry. I can google it and find a million things that tells me how bad it is and how good it is.”

Cece replies:

“Yes, and it is the big tobacco playbook all over again..and that is what they’re banking on. If they can create doubt and seduce the public with their sexy products, then we will sit there as say ‘”oh! it must be alright” so we keep using it…but at GREAT PERIL. We already see escalations in autism, ADD, ADHD. We have never had children hospitalized for social and emotional issues like we have today, and the science is very clear that wireless radiation hits the central nervous system especially hard. Balance is important, but don’t be lulled into a false sense of security. Don’t take my word for this, go out and do your independent research and then decide what you might like to do to reduce your exposure.”

*END TRANSCRIPT*

–

LINKS TO THE SCIENCE

(A) The BioInitiative Report

The BioInitiative Report: 2007

In 2007, world experts convened to assess data available to date and published a report of findings and recommendations for public health. Here’s the Purpose of the 2007 BioInitiative Report:

This report has been written by 14 (fourteen) scientists, public health and public policy
experts to document the scientific evidence on electromagnetic fields. Another dozen
outside reviewers have looked at and refined the Report.

The purpose of this report is to assess scientific evidence on health impacts from
electromagnetic radiation below current public exposure limits and evaluate what changes in these limits are warranted now to reduce possible public health risks in the future. Not everything is known yet about this subject; but what is clear is that the existing public safety standards limiting these radiation levels in nearly every country of the world look to be thousands of times too lenient. Changes are needed.

New approaches are needed to educate decision-makers and the public about sources of exposure and to find alternatives that do not pose the same level of possible health risks, while there is still time to make changes.

Their findings back then included:

The effects of long-term exposure to wireless technologies including emissions from cell phones and other personal devices, and from whole-body exposure to RF transmissions from cell towers and antennas is simply not known yet with certainty. However, the body of evidence at hand suggests that bioeffects and health impacts can and do occur at exquisitely low exposure levels: levels that can be thousands of times below public safety limits.

The report goes on to implicate wi-fi radiation in brain tumors, childhood leukemia, and possibly other cancers and neurological diseases. Children were noted to be particularly vulnerable:

These effects can reasonably be presumed to result in adverse health effects and disease with chronic and uncontrolled exposures, and children may be particularly vulnerable. The young are also largely unable to remove themselves from such environments. Second-hand radiation, like second-hand smoke is an issue of public health concern based on the evidence at hand.

This was enough for some governments to revise their public safety standards, but not the U.S. We took a wait-and-see approach and kept our 1996 standards. See the World Response page to understand how other countries have responded. The BioInitiative Report was published in 2009 in a special issue of Pathophysiology.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/09284680/16/2-3

The BioInitiative Report: 2012

Much more research was then done to clear up the suspicions reported in 2007, and a new world-wide 2012 BioInitiative Report was issued concluding:

Overall, these 1800 or so new studies report abnormal gene transcription (Section 5); genotoxicity and single-and double-strand DNA damage (Section 6); stress proteins because of the fractal RF-antenna like nature of DNA (Section 7); chromatin condensation and loss of DNA repair capacity in human stem cells (Sections 6 and 15); reduction in free-radical scavengers – particularly melatonin (Sections 5, 9, 13, 14, 15, 16 and 17); neurotoxicity in humans and animals (Section 9), carcinogenicity in humans (Sections 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16 and 17); serious impacts on human and animal sperm morphology and function (Section 18); effects on offspring behavior (Section 18, 19 and 20); and effects on brain and cranial bone development in the offspring of animals that are exposed to cell phone radiation during pregnancy (Sections 5 and 18).

Additionally, Bioeffects are clearly established and occur at very low levels of exposure to electromagnetic fields and radiofrequency radiation. Bioeffects can occur in the first few minutes at levels associated with cell and cordless phone use. Bioeffects can also occur from just minutes of exposure to mobile phone masts (cell towers), WI-FI, and wireless utility ‘smart’ meters that produce whole-body exposure. Chronic base station level exposures can result in illness.

The full 2012 BioInitiative Report was published in January 2013 and research continues to identify additional harmful effects of EMFs and RFs. The 2007 report is contained within the 2012 full report.

In 2014, the BioInitiative Report authors published a much smaller Summary for the Public to cull out the major points: http://www.bioinitiative.org/report/wp-content/uploads/pdfs/sec01_2012_summary_for_public.pdf

To access searchable summaries of the research done through 2017, see Dr. Henry Lai’s work at: http://www.bioinitiative.org/research-summaries/

(B) Fine print in wireless devices 
scroll down halfway down the page: https://sites.google.com/site/understandingemfs/manufacturers)

(C) IEEE’s “Some Effects of Weak Magnetic Fields on Biological Systems”: https://tinyurl.com/y9mnkce7

(D) California Cell Phone Safety Fact Sheet, originally written 2009 – released to the public in 2017: https://www.cdph.ca.gov/Programs/CCDPHP/DEODC/EHIB/CDPH%20Document%20Library/Cell-Phone-Guidance.pdf

More information about draft vs. published document: https://www.saferemr.com/2018/01/CDPHsidebyside.html

(E) Cyprus has removed Wi-Fi from elementary schools and supported a strong educational initiative to educate children and families about cell phones and wireless radiation. They have developed comprehensive brochures for public health and video public service announcements regarding the issue: (https://ehtrust.org/cyprus-policy-recommendations-cell-phones-wireless-radiation-health/)

(F) U.S. National Toxicology Program Confirms Cell Phones Cause Cancer – 2018:

• Please see the Cancers page as the U.S. National Toxicology Program has announced results from a $25 million tightly controlled rodent study that radiation from cell phones caused brain and heart tumors, and what happens to these rodents happens to humans. Since all of our wireless devices use the same radiation, all of our devices are carcinogenic, and cancer is just the tip of the iceberg with biological harm to our bodies and planet.

(G) Ramazzini Institute in Italty ALSO confirms Cell Phones Cause Cancer – 2018: See study findings: (https://reader.elsevier.com/reader/sd/29C7A9A3E802F9F3382D46DC62A5D00DF6203D7E093F04397B9DBDAA3681C5B3F25AE8E278ED4891D2543D86DF4B8B58)

(H) Dr. Martin Pall’s 2018 paper, “Wi-Fi is an important threat to human health,” summarizes studies showing the biological harm from wi-fi:
(https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0013935118300355)

(I) The Nation magazine published a 2018 investigative report on how big wireless has kept cancer information from the public for decades: (https://www.thenation.com/article/how-big-wireless-made-us-think-that-cell-phones-are-safe-a-special-investigation/)

(J): Harvard University’s 2015 Norm Alster published “Captured Agency: How the Federal Communications Commission is Dominated by the Industries it Presumably Regulates”: (https://ethics.harvard.edu/news/new-e-books-edmond-j-safra-research-lab).
This further details what has happened with the FCC since telecom industry leaders like Tom Wheeler took the helm, and how they have been able to establish laws that protect industry profits over public health.

————————— ADDITIONAL SCIENCE

The Science: https://ethics.harvard.edu/news/new-e-books-edmond-j-safra-research-lab

Cancers: https://sites.google.com/site/understandingemfs/cancers

Infertility: https://sites.google.com/site/understandingemfs/infertility

Military Experts: https://sites.google.com/site/understandingemfs/military-experts

Additional Research: https://sites.google.com/site/understandingemfs/