BY PETER REID
The presence of mobile phone facilities in built-up areas, particularly near houses, schools and hospitals, often triggers fierce resistance from local residents and community groups, mirroring public disquiet nationwide over the vexed question of whether electromagnetic emissions pose health risks, especially for children.
The radiation safety issue has generated such controversy here and abroad it's now the key focus of a Senate committee of inquiry into electromagnetic radiation. The inquiry has held public hearings in Canberra, Melbourne and Sydney, and is reviewing a vast range of international research on health risks of radiation, especially from mobile phones and their transmitter towers.
"The wide response we've had underlines the extent of public unease about potential risks of mobile phone radiation", says Democrats Senator Lyn Allison, chairperson of the inquiry, which is also considering whether more consumer involvement is needed in setting radiation exposure standards.
Australia's fastest-growing slice of the lucrative mobile phone market is now young people, aged between 14 and 25, with children among frequent users. Youngsters may be more vulnerable than grown-ups to any as yet unrecognised health hazards because their developing brain tissues and immune systems are more susceptible to radiation, according to a recent study (June 2000) by a British expert task force.
Moreover, young people have longer time in which to accumulate exposure during their lives and more time for any delayed effects to develop. The study urged the mobile phone industry to stop promoting the use of mobiles by children.
All schools in Britain last year were sent guidelines aimed at discouraging non-essential use of mobile handsets by children under 15, in line with the UK government's precautionary stance on radiation exposure. Mobile phone makers in the UK are now legally required to include a health warning pamphlet in retail packaging of new phones.
As sales of mobile phones — and toy handsets for pre-school children — soared in Australia last Christmas, the Disney company announced a surprise halt to all commercial links with the mobile phone industry because of concern about children's susceptibility to handset emissions. The use of Disney cartoon characters face-plates on the phones — including Micky Mouse and Donald Duck — would no longer be licensed until more became known about health risks.
"Because the well-being of customers is our priority, we've decided to discontinue licensing our characters for use on mobile phones until there's reliable scientific evidence establishing the absence of any risk", said a spokesperson for the company's European division.
The Disney move coincided with British research (December 2000) suggesting mobile phone radiation could cause epilepsy, sleeping disorders and hearing loss in young users. The study, published in the prestigious Lancet medical journal, found radiation from mobile handsets altered the structure of human cells and affected brain rhythms, rendering children and teenagers especially vulnerable.
"If mobile phones were a type of food they wouldn't be licensed because there's so much uncertainty surrounding their safety", said Dr Gerald Hylands, who headed the study by scientists at England's Warwick University.
Many Australian parents who bought their children mobile phones as gifts last Christmas were apparently unaware of the British study which got scant coverage in our media. As well, no warnings of potential health risks for children are given on handsets or their retail packaging in Australia, though that could change later this year if the Senate inquiry recommends such action in its report due to be tabled in federal parliament at the end of this month.
Just before Christmas — as if to counter the UK study — US scientific researchers released results of a four-year project which found no link between short-time use of mobile phones and the development of brain cancer. "I think it provides some assurance with regard to short-term mobile phone use", said Dr Joshua Muscat of the American Health Foundation.
Timing of the study could hardly have been more fortuitous for the industry, coming at the peak of Yuletide shopping, with millions of mobile phones being sold worldwide. But the researchers stressed that more studies over a longer period were needed before long-term use of mobile phones could be deemed safe. The long-term use factor is crucial in considering such studies because incubation periods can take up to 20 to 30 years or more for some cancers to develop and be detected. It's a key aspect often overlooked when the mainstream media — especially some newspapers that benefit from mobile phone advertising — report on research outcomes misleadingly implying that mobile phones have been given a clean bill of health.
Failure to disclose a study's financial backing is another media oversight, for whoever holds the funding purse strings can significantly sway both the direction and outcome of research. Increasingly, international telco corporations have financed mobile phone studies here and overseas, giving rise to allegations of exerting possible influence on research. But all too often media coverage ignores funding sources — which is what happened earlier last month in reports of a major Danish study that also found no link between cancer and short-term use of mobile phones.
Most Australian media reports omitted to mention the study was partly funded by Danish phone companies — not that there was evidence to suggest industry sponsorship influenced the research in any way. But public disclosure in the media of funding sources is essential to ascertain the independence or otherwise of a study's findings.
Silent, unseen, and unfelt, electromagnetic radiation, known technically as EMR, has been an integral part of our increasingly high-tech society for decades — yet not many of us realise how pervasive it has become or what long-term effects repeated or prolonged exposure may have on our health and well-being.
Virtually all mains-powered products, especially those with electric motors, emit forms of radiation in the electromagnetic spectrum. Household appliances like microwave ovens, vacuum cleaners, washing and sewing machines, electric ranges and power tools all give off low-level emissions known as non-ionising radiation. Hair dryers expose users to more intensity because they're often held close to the head. Similarly, plug-in shavers and electric blankets come into direct skin or body contact.
More Australians than ever have jobs routinely exposing them to visual display units and other computerised devices.
Exposure may be prolonged or only intermittent yet repetitive, like electronic scanners at checkouts in supermarkets and libraries, operated usually by women of child-bearing age.
Woman have long been more often at risk than men to potential EMR risks in daily use of domestic appliances in the home. And nowadays while both genders are widely employed operating most types of computerised apparatus, women are more prevalent in many sectors of the telco industry, especially in electronic data processing and call centres. Children, too, are frequently exposed to EMR from video games and classroom computers as well as mobile phones.
EMR dissipates with distance from the source, and though everyday exposures for most people are usually within national safety guidelines, some medical studies suggest that since our bodies could absorb emissions cumulatively it's unlikely there's any such thing as a safe dose of radiation.
Despite decades of costly scientific research here and overseas, experts still differ sharply about possible health risks of EMR from everyday electrical devices in the home and workplace. Some studies have suggested causal but unproven links between EMR exposure and ailments ranging from headaches, vision and hearing impairment, memory lapses and chronic fatigue to more serious disorders like childhood leukemia, miscarriages and birth defects.
But doubts have been cast on much EMR research in recent years, especially by international studies funded by electrical power and telecommunications corporations, which have found no conclusive evidence to prove non-ionising radiation under current limits causes or promotes cancer. But it's generally agreed there's a pressing need for further study.
More recently, controversy over the EMR health issue has been rekindled by the explosive growth of information technology spearheaded by mobile, or cellular, phones. Nearly one in every two Australians, particularly among 18 to 35 year olds, now own or use a mobile handset, one of the world's highest uptake rates. Near-total penetration is predicted as third generation mobile telephony expands — offering handsets with a host of new add-on services, like colour video images and high-speed internet access.
This will add another 3000 installations to 4500 communications transmitters and ancilliary facilities already dotting landscapes across Australia, markedly increasing public exposure to radiation emissions.
Some scientific studies associate mobile phone radiation with a rise in life-threatening cancers such as brain tumours, breast, liver and testicular cancer. And with forecasts of a billion mobile phone subscribers globally within two years, the World Health Organisation warns that "even small adverse health effects could have major public health implications".
Stakes in the EMR health issue are high, especially for the multibillion dollar telecommunications industry, the world's most-rapidly expanding business. But paradoxically, its crown jewel — the mobile phone handset — could also become its Achilles heel. Basically a mini refinement of the conventional radio telephone or walkie-talkie transceiver, the handset remains the most contentious factor in the radiation safety debate. This is chiefly because it's virtually the only widely used electrical device that emits radiation close to the user's brain. Never before in human existence have millions of people held a radiating device in such proximity to their bodies.
The recently phased-in digital mobile phone gives off pulsed radio-frequency (RP) radiation which has been found to impact worse on health than the analogue system it replaced. And the crucial question many mobile phone users want answered is what levels of radiation they're exposed to from different makes of handsets, which can vary widely. But that remains a trade secret.
Why? Because the Australian Mobile Telecommunications Association (AMTA) won't tell — not so far, anyway, though last year in response to public concern about health effects from mobile phones, it undertook to disclose radiation levels at some future date. But the information won't be provided on handsets — only "in the box when purchasing a new phone", says an AMTA representative.
Though different mobile phones sold in Australia "may vary slightly" in levels of radiation, they are "equally safe because they all meet strict science-based safety standards", he says.
But Australia's foremost scientific organisation, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), takes a decidedly different view about radiation levels: "It's not possible to conclude that exposure to low-level RF radiation (from handsets), even at levels below national safety exposure standards, is without potential adverse health effects."
Public disquiet over health risks from mobile phones is substantial, with 40% of users voicing concern about health hazards, according to an AGB McNair survey. Up to 50% of the general community expressed concern, especially about emissions from transmitter towers. The chief worry: cancer.
There was overwhelming concern (78%) that the government should make more information available to the public about the potential health impact of mobile phones and transmitter towers. The figure was higher (81%) among residents near transmitters. Scientific information provided to the public was regarded with suspicion and scepticism, the survey found, the perception being that some experts who advised the government were "not independent ... that is, they considered industry interests before community interests".
Advances in mobile telephony have been so swift they've outpaced scientific research into radio-frequency radiation, with the result that conflicting and often-inadequate studies fuel public unease about safety guidelines. In a forthright submission to the Senate inquiry, senior CSIRO scientists condemned research projects commissioned by the telco companies as having "either failed to achieve a useful outcome or have produced results that are criticised as being 'tainted' by industry involvement".
The EMR safety issue has also given rise, say industry sources, to corporate concern about risks of consumer litigation, akin to legal action taken against tobacco companies. For if RF radiation levels under present exposure limits are ultimately proved to induce serious ill health, like cancer, not only the industry but also governments and local councils could face costly lawsuits from employees whose health may have suffered from workplace radiation. There could also be financial burdens on families and communities in caring for sufferers of radiation effects.
Some independent scientists suspect the industry of downplaying possible adverse health effects of mobile phone emissions in order to limit potential litigation. Alex Doull, a former CSIRO health and safety adviser, says in a submission to the Senate inquiry that processes of setting safety standards limiting human exposure to RP radiation "have come under sustained industry pressure to delete any references to fundamental principles of radiation safety [and] minimise any explicit references to harmful effects".
"Industry advisory panels", he said, "are numerically dominated by sectional interests that treat expressions of concern about increasing exposures to radiation with almost complete contempt... Changes in the official [exposure] standard the industry has wanted would probably have the effect of protecting the industry from mounting and future litigation."
Several international mobile phone corporations, including Vodafone, are facing a billion-dollar legal action in the United States over claims that mobile phones cause brain cancer. A number of cases, reportedly due to be filed by a lawyer who headed claims against the tobacco industry, are expected to give rise in court evidence to one of the most searching examinations so far of the health implications of mobile phones.
Some community action groups claim sectors of the industry are also lobbying the government to adopt a more lenient Australian exposure limit to achieve compatability with higher international safety levels. This would also substantially benefit the industry as new IT services, including the next generation of mobile phones, expand their push into global markets.
But the CSIRO, which has a long history of involvement in setting Australian standards for RP exposure, urges that until more is known about the health effects "prudence demands that exposure levels be kept as low as technically, socially and economically feasible". In its Senate inquiry submission, the CSIRO also draws attention to what it claims is public "mistrust of government because of its connection with industry and lack of action".
Other industry critics question Canberra's commitment to radiation safeguards, pointing out that while government regulatory agencies grapple with public and occupational health issues posed by mobile phones, the federal government will be a major beneficiary from the sale of licences for the third-generation telco spectrum, expected to yield about $2.6 billion in revenue from the airwaves auction this year.
[Peter Reid is a Sydney journalist and TV producer.]