Posted on 06/03/2008 7:48:27 PM PDT by neverdem
What do brain surgeons know about cellphone safety that the rest of us don’t?
Last week, three prominent neurosurgeons told the CNN interviewer Larry King that they did not hold cellphones next to their ears. “I think the safe practice,” said Dr. Keith Black, a surgeon at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, “is to use an earpiece so you keep the microwave antenna away from your brain.”
Dr. Vini Khurana, an associate professor of neurosurgery at the Australian National University who is an outspoken critic of cellphones, said: “I use it on the speaker-phone mode. I do not hold it to my ear.” And CNN’s chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, a neurosurgeon at Emory University Hospital, said that like Dr. Black he used an earpiece.
Along with Senator Edward M. Kennedy’s recent diagnosis of a glioma, a type of tumor that critics have long associated with cellphone use, the doctors’ remarks have helped reignite a long-simmering debate about cellphones and cancer.
That supposed link has been largely dismissed by many experts, including the American Cancer Society...
--snip--
Cellphones emit non-ionizing radiation, waves of energy that are too weak to break chemical bonds or to set off the DNA damage known to cause cancer. There is no known biological mechanism to explain how non-ionizing radiation might lead to cancer.
But researchers who have raised concerns say that just because science can’t explain the mechanism doesn’t mean one doesn’t exist. Concerns have focused on the heat generated by cellphones and the fact that the radio frequencies are absorbed mostly by the head and neck. In recent studies that suggest a risk, the tumors tend to occur on the same side of the head where the patient typically holds the phone...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Look. When your cold, your fingers don’t work.
Interesting but my cell doesn’t have bluetooth and hence I use a wired headpiece. But then someone said they act like antennas too...not sure what to think.
Well if this is the case then it’s gonna involve much more than cell phones. Police radio’s in the 800MHZ range, cordless home phones 800-2400MHZ, commerical business radio 800-950 MHZ, just for starters. I don’t hold them up to my ear for the simple reason most phones are too blasted small now that your hand covers the built in antenna. I use a wired headset with boom mike. I also have a mount for the phone in my vehicles. I can use the wired headset to talk to someone on the phone almost anywhere and talk so low on it that it bothers no one else. I think the scare is an over-reaction though.
The wired ones don't. They are perfectly safe from RF dangers. IF cell phones are such a great risk many persons now would have hand cancer as well as actually most people hold their hand over the built in antenna.
The emitted radiation from a wired headset would be a small fraction of the radiation from a Bluetooth headset, which is a small fraction of the radiation from a cell phone. If you’re worried about the wired headset, you probably need to get worried about the radiation from broadcast TV antennas in your city.
From the University of Utah,”How big a role do telomeres play in aging?
“Some long-lived species like humans have telomeres that are much shorter than species like mice, which live only a few years. Nobody yet knows why. But it’s evidence that telomeres alone do not dictate lifespan.
Cawthon’s study found that when people are divided into two groups based on telomere lengths, the half with longer telomeres lives five years longer than those with shorter telomeres. That suggests lifespan could be increased five years by increasing the length of telomeres in people with shorter ones.”
In the case of cell phones vs. microwave ovens, it’s like two watts vs. 500 watts. Think being hit by a bullet at 1 ft./ min. vs. 250 ft./min.
You got that right.
It has been established by years of science and experience that those who lack brains are unlikely to suffer from brain cancer. However some nerve centers may at times surf those micro waves that crash on the shores of ME ME! ISLAND.
So most of the time, you would be exposed to very little of that power. That's why people spend big bucks for the big antennae, to get the power sent where it is needed.
Just don't spend too much time in the direct line between them and whatever they are aimed at.
If you are old enough, you might remember the advert from circa 1964:
“Doctors smoke Camels more than any other brand!”
MRSA From Farm Animals Found In Humans In UK For First Time
The Science of Sarcasm (Not That You Care) regular webpage with video
FReepmail me if you want on or off my health and science ping list.Anyone can post any unposted link as they see fit.
Hey, where’s the sarcasm thread?
If it looks like the admin mods will downgrade it to chat, I just link it. You can post it.
I used to do that. I trained at Little Black Mtn. in Ranco Penesquitas west of San Diego. Had a massive comm tower. The idea was to take a thermal over the top of the towers which I did on a number of occassions.
I think there is a headset that has no wires in the tube from the phone to the head.
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