Radar Exposure Not Linked to Adverse Outcomes in War Veterans
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) May 09 - Korean War Navy veterans exposed to high levels of microwave radiation emitted from radar equipment were no more likely than other men to develop most forms of cancer, according to a recent report. In fact, men with the highest exposure to radar waves--those who repaired and tested the radar equipment--were 35% less likely to die during the follow-up than men in the general US population.
"We found little, if any, evidence of adverse health effects resulting from microwave frequencies," study author Dr. Robert E. Tarone, of the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Maryland, told Reuters Health.
One exception, however, was aviation electronics technicians. This highly exposed group of veterans was more than twice as likely as other veteran groups to develop non-lymphocytic leukemia.
However, the authors note that if radiation from radar was to blame, other highly exposed veterans would demonstrate the same increased risk. They suggest the increased risk is related to occupational exposures other than radar, lifestyle factors that are specific to this group, or simply chance.
The results, published in the May issue of the American Journal of Epidemiology, stem from a 40-year follow-up of 40,581 Korean War Navy veterans designed to study the long-term impact of high levels of microwave radiation on health.
Studies of the association between radiation and brain cancer, leukemia and testicular cancer have yielded conflicting results. During the Korean War some soldiers were exposed to high levels of radiation from search radar and fire control radar.
Dr. Tarone emphasized that radiation emitted by radar detectors, cell phones and microwaves is different from extremely high-energy radiation like x-rays, which, as numerous studies have shown, can cause harm.
"The average person would never be exposed to the high levels of radar waves that the Navy technicians were exposed to," he said.
Dr. Tarone explained that the finding that highly exposed veterans lived longer than men in the general population likely results from the "healthy soldier" effect. People have to pass physical exams to enter the Navy, he said, and must maintain their fitness while in service. Therefore, veterans are likely healthier to begin with than the general population, and may tend to exercise more.
Am J Epidemiol 2002;155:810-818.
Radiation Oncology, Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee 53226, USA.
There have been allegations in the media and in the courts that cell phones and other types of hand-held transceivers are a cause of cancer. There have also been numerous public objections to the siting of TV, radio and cell phone transmission facilities because of a fear of cancer induction. A recent publication in Radiation Research by Repacholi et al. (147, 631-640, 1997) which suggests that exposure to radiofrequency (RF) radiation may increase lymphoma incidence in mice has contributed to this controversy. The goal of this review is to provide biomedical researchers a brief overview of the existing RF radiation-cancer studies. This article begins with a brief review of the physics and technology of cell phones. It then reviews the existing epidemiological studies of RF radiation, identifying gaps in our knowledge. Finally, the review discusses the cytogenetics literature on RF radiation and the whole-animal RF-radiation carcinogenesis studies. The epidemiological evidence for an association between RF radiation and cancer is found to be weak and inconsistent, the laboratory studies generally do not suggest that cell phone RF radiation has genotoxic or epigenetic activity, and a cell phone RF radiation-cancer connection is found to be physically implausible. Overall, the existing evidence for a causal relationship between RF radiation from cell phones and cancer is found to be weak to nonexistent.