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- 06-22-2007, 03:08 PM #1Guest
When Bad News Is No News
European papers are reporting some troubling research about cell
phones that American papers aren't.
.."
....... when major papers in Britain, Germany, Canada, Israel, and
other countries "recently rang, sometimes on page one, with the
findings of a five-country study that showed a statistically
significant increase in a certain type of brain tumor among people who
had used cell phones for ten years or more, one might have expected
the American press to at least record the message." But it didn't,
said CJR, even though "the telecom industry here keeps hoping that the
FCC and the federal health agencies will raise the levels of cell-
phone radiation currently allowed.
"Memo to journalists: call waiting."
Cell-phone radiation is non-ionizing, which means it produces heat
but, at least in theory, doesn't threaten biological organisms at the
atomic level. The idea that noniodizing radiation is a menace
regardless goes back at least as far as the 1977 book The Zapping of
America: Microwaves, Their Deadly Risk, and the Coverup, by New Yorker
writer Paul Brodeur.
"There is a vast conspiracy among the press, especially newspapers,
not to write about the biological studies, especially the
epidemiological studies done in Europe," Brodeur told me this week.
Like other vast conspiracies, this one shows every sign of being able
to live on indefinitely, never confirmed beyond doubt or discredited
to everyone's satisfaction. That a long period of latency precedes
whatever damage cell phones might do only hardens both sides'
convictions.
CJR singled out two publications for praise: the Florida Sun-Sentinel,
for reporting the study, which was published in January by the
International Journal of Cancer, and Microwave News, a newsletter that
provided a "comprehensive, comprehensible account of the controversial
findings." Brodeur tells me its editor, Louis Slesin, got his start by
studying the Zapping files and is now "the authority on microwave
radiation."
When I looked online for the story CJR told me wasn't there -- well,
it wasn't there. On the ABC News site I found an AP story with the
headline "Study Disputes Cell Phone-Cancer Link: Large Study From
Denmark Offers the Latest Reassurance That Cell Phones Don't Trigger
Cancer." Medpagetoday.com carried a staff-written story citing the
same Danish study and headlined "Once Again, No Cell Phone-Cancer Link
Found." The PC Magazine Web site carried a Reuters story based on a
British survey under the headline "Study Minimizes Cancer Risk From
Cell Phones."
And the very day I conducted my search, May 29, MSN.com touted a story
by MSNBC science editor Alan Boyle on the possible link between cell-
phone radiation and low sperm count and played it for laughs: "There's
no known connection between cell phone radiation and health risks, but
thankfully there's silver-threaded underwear for those who are
concerned."
Ho ho. Slesin was so concerned that the American press wasn't telling
the public something it needed to know that he wrote and shopped
around an op-ed sounding the alarm. It began, "Two billion people now
use cell phones, many for hours on end. But are they safe? Could
putting a small microwave transmitter next to your brain lead to
cancer or a neurological disease?"
He couldn't be sure, "but some of the early returns are disquieting."
Citing studies that other reporters took comfort in, Slesin said they
"point to a problem over the long term. These studies show that using
a cell phone for more than ten years leads to higher rates of two
different kinds of tumors: gliomas, a type of brain tumor, and
acoustic neuromas, a tumor of the nerve that connects the ear to the
brain. In each case, the tumors were more likely to be on the side of
the head closest to the phone."
"To be sure, these are still preliminary findings," Slesin
acknowledged, but he didn't think it made sense to ignore them. In his
view skeptics who assert that "the worst microwaves can do is heat you
up, and even then only at power levels much higher than you could ever
get from a cell phone" not only "abound" but dominate the debate in
this country. "The heating-only advocates, many of whom have links to
industry, are in control even though laboratory research has shown
that microwave radiation can damage DNA, upset sleep patterns, alter
cognitive function, increase the flow of chemicals through the blood-
brain barrier and bring on headaches."
Here in the U.S., Slesin wrote, no epidemiological studies are being
made of cell-phone radiation, the American Cancer Society has called
the idea of cancer risk a "myth," and Consumer Reports published a
long recent report on cell phones that didn't even take up the
question of radiation. But "it's a completely different story in
Europe."
The op-ed wasn't published. Slesin says the New York Times and Boston
Globe both turned it down.
When I asked Brodeur to explain what he meant by a "vast conspiracy,"
he took a verbal step back, as if to distance himself from the lunatic
fringe. "What there is is self-censorship," he replied. "The reason
is, as always, money. You follow the money trail and the newspapers
have a vested interest in the big telecommunications companies. It's
an enormously powerful industry and it has managed to convince a lot
of people there is absolutely no harm." Slesin said something similar
in his op-ed: he claimed the "wireless industry has a stranglehold on
the health debate" and "Motorola and Nokia, the two largest phone
manufacturers, dismiss all claims of a possible hazard."
› See More: Tumor-row, Tumor-row...gliomas and acoustic neuromas, are only 10 years away!!
- 06-25-2007, 07:20 AM #2Harlan MessingerGuest
Re: Tumor-row, Tumor-row...gliomas and acoustic neuromas, are only10 years away!!
When you "looked online for the story CJR told me wasn't there -- well,
it wasn't there." Your premise is that while the story is being reported
in Europe, it's being hushed in the United States.
Yet--if the story being reported would lead you to expect to find it
online, then that would be as true of being reported in Europe is it
would be of being reported in the US.
So, following your logic, because you aren't finding anything online,
the story is being hushed in Europe as well--OR there isn't a story at
all and you or someone else is just making it up.
- 06-25-2007, 06:56 PM #3Guest
Re: Tumor-row, Tumor-row...gliomas and acoustic neuromas, are only 10 years away!!
On Jun 25, 8:20 am, Harlan Messinger
<[email protected]> wrote:
> When you "looked online for the story CJR told me wasn't there -- well,
> it wasn't there." Your premise is that while the story is being reported
> in Europe, it's being hushed in the United States.
>
> Yet--if the story being reported would lead you to expect to find it
> online, then that would be as true of being reported in Europe is it
> would be of being reported in the US.
>
> So, following your logic, because you aren't finding anything online,
> the story is being hushed in Europe as well--OR there isn't a story at
> all and you or someone else is just making it up.
Interesting that someone or something canceled my attempt to post
this, the day before it got posted..JG
Aws gpu
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