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MOBILE PHONES TIME TO TAKE PRECAUTIONS — Recent medical findings and recommendations from UK government reports suggest that radiation emission guidelines should be made more stringent and that mobile phone use should be minimised. [Editor's Note: This article refers to a number of research studies involving animals. We wish to advise that we at NEXUS do not condone or support the validity, efficacy or morality of animal experimentation or vivisection.] y the end of November, a leaflet on mobile phone health hazards will have been made available at point of sale and to the general public in Britain. This significant development puts the UK government in the lead in reacting to the growing public and scientific concern over the possible hazards from mobile phone radiation. However, since the leaflet is being put together by the Department of Health (DoH), the National Radiological Protection Board (NRPB) and the mobile phone industry, one will have to wait to see whether it does proper justice to the evidence or tries to downplay it. Whatever the case, such developments are keeping the issue continually in front of the public and the media in Britain. The leaflet is just one of the major outcomes of the Stewart Report—the Report of the Independent Expert Group on Mobile Phones, chaired by Sir William Stewart, FRS, Chairman of Tayside University Hospitals NHS Trust, Dundee, entitled "Mobile Phones and Health" and published in May.' Another is that in August the Department of Education wrote to every school in the country, requesting them to make children aware of possible hazards from excessive use of mobile phones and to encourage them to reduce their use. No such warning has yet been issued by any other Western country. Most significant among the Stewart Report's many recommendations was its adoption of a "precautionary approach" regarding the use of mobile phones, especially among chil- dren, with the advice that the industry cease promoting them to children. It recommended that a leaflet be sent to every household explaining the health issues, and that this should also be made available at the point of sale. It also recommended that a major, well-funded research program be set up, and the gov- ernment has since announced that it will launch a new program by the end of November. Specific Absorption Rate (SAR) information on every phone at the point of sale, full plan- ning permission for all new masts and a review of the evidence in three years' time (or before, if warranted) were among other recommendations of the Report, which also included criticisms of the NRPB. How many of these recommendations will be adopted will have become clear by the end of the year, although the Department of Health has now accepted most of them. One of the chief criticisms of the Report itself is that it left out certain major pieces of research in drawing its conclusions about the evidence for radiofrequency (RF) hazards. This has been assessed in detailed elsewhere,’ but certainly many would disagree with its conclusion that "The balance of evidence suggests that exposures to RF radiation below NRPB...guidelines do not cause adverse health effects to the general population"(1.17). Besides the symptoms reported by users, ranging from heating sensation and skin irrita- tion, headache, eye and sleep problems to short-term memory loss, disorientation and brain tumour, there is a growing body of research that cannot be dismissed. The industry, however, continues to insist that there is insufficient evidence, and that the phones are "safe" and the radiation they emit falls well within the guidance laid down by the UK's regulatory authority, the NRPB—which currently refuses to acknowledge any need to change its guidelines and has stuck rigidly to its position of only taking account of heating effects, despite growing evidence and criticism. by Simon Best, MA © 2000 Editor Electromagnetic Hazard & Therapy PO Box 2039 Shoreham, W. Sussex BN43 5JD, UK E-mail: simonbest@em-hazard- therapy.com Website: www.em-hazard-therapy.com NEXUS © 17 by Simon Best, MA © 2000 DECEMBER 2000 — JANUARY 2001