Mobile phones are now an essential part of our everyday lives - helping us keep in touch - acting as a safety precaution - performing as business aids and so on - many of us would find it difficult to manage without them. However, there is a great deal of evidence suggesting that they could be very bad for our health in the long term.
SO as a mobile, or even a cordless phone, user, what do you know about the link between Electro Magnetic Radiation and brain tumours?
How much are you at risk?
Here is some information compiled from a range of reliable sources that illustrates the size of the issue and the implications for many of us:
It is an accepted fact that one of the fastest growing communication industries is Mobile Phone production: In 2006 Nokia, a major manufacturer, predicted that by 2009 there will be over 3 Billion mobile phone users worldwide. That may sound astonishing, but we are already well on the way to reaching that demographic in most of the developed world.
Worldwide, the percentage of households with mobile phones are:
Japan - 95%
South Korea - 94%
China 93%
France - 85%
Germany - 83%
UK - 79%
Mobile Internet Usage
With the additional technological advancement of being able to surf the net and email from our mobiles our overall usage has increased. In April 2006, it was estimated that 28% of mobile users had accessed the Internet from their mobile phones, which is an increase from an estimated 25% in late 2004.
Whilst this number signals the increasing popularity, there is one fact that makes it more interesting. The area of chief growth came from the sector comprising 35-54 year old males. This demographic is not known to invest in technology fads, and their adoption of this technology indicates viable growth potential.
Mobile Internet usage has grown worldwide, with Japan in the lead. The percentages of mobile users accessing the Internet per country are estimated at:
Japan - 40%
UK - 29%
USA - 26%
South Korea - 26%
Canada 19%
Germany 18%
France - 18%
Mexico - 16%
China - 10%
According to the Oftel Residential Survey, 75 per cent of all adults in the United Kingdom owned or used a mobile phone in May 2003. Twenty one per cent used their mobile as their main method of telephone communication, with 8 per cent of homes relying totally on a mobile, with no fixed line phone.
Increase in the demand for mobile phones has led to an increase in the number of base stations constructed all over the UK. Whether living close to a base station provides a health risk is also under scrutiny at the present time:
The balance of evidence indicates that there is no general risk to the health of people living near base stations, on the basis that exposures are expected to be small fractions of guidelines. However, gaps in scientific knowledge led the Stewart Group to recommend a precautionary approach to the use of mobile phones and base stations until more research findings become available. They added that in some cases people’s well-being may be adversely affected by insensitive siting of base stations.
So should we assume that if someone says it is safe, that we can ignore those who are saying it is not? Who can we trust?
Mobile-phone antennae produce non-ionizing radio-frequency energy, the same kind of radiation used in microwave ovens.
RF energy of sufficient levels can harm living tissue by heating it to the point of causing damage. However, cell phones produce only six-tenths of a watt of RF energy, several orders of magnitude below that of a microwave oven.
The lawsuits contend that even this much radiation so close to a cell-phone user's head is potentially dangerous, charging that the manufacturers and service providers chose not to mitigate the risk by providing headsets with every phone.
Some more statistics on mobile phone usage
- over one trillion text messages were sent via mobile phones worldwide in 2005.
- One billion mobile phones will be sold in 2006 (812 million sold in 2005)
- The mobile phone is the most common electronics device in the world and considered the fourth window of content after television, the big screen and the personal computer.
- Asia Pacific is the world’s largest mobile phone market
- There are 409 million mobile phone users in China as of the end March 2006.
- There are more mobile users than landline customers in China.
- During the recent Chinese New Year season, 2.7 billion SMS-es were sent.
- About 50% of all handsets shipped around the world are cameraphones
- The two billionth mobile phone user worldwide was connected this past weekend and new users are signing up at the rate of 1000 per minute, says the GSM Association (GSMA). More than 72 million of these users are 3GSM customers.
Craig Ehrlich, chairman of the GSMA, says 'While it took just 12 years for the industry to reach the first billion connections. The second billion has been achieved in just two and a half years boosted by the phenomenal take up of mobile in emerging markets such as China, India, Africa and Latin America, which accounted for 82 per cent of the second billion subscribers.'
Results from present studies on use of mobile phones for 10 years give a consistent pattern of increased risk for acoustic neuroma and glioma. The risk is highest for ipsilateral exposure.
The latest study on brain tumours and phone use shows the biggest increase of any study so far, and is statistically significant in all areas. The new study on 905 malignant brain tumour cases shows a 1.7 to 5.9-fold increase in risk for long-term mobile phone and cordless phone users.
Increased risk was obtained for both cellular and cordless phones, highest in the group with more than 10 years use of mobile or cordless phones.
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