Mobile phones and health
Posted: Thu Oct 16, 2008 11:07 amMobile phone studies find no short-term health problemsAlok Jha, science correspondent guardian.co.uk, Wednesday September 12 2007 16.30 BST Article history
The impact of mobile phone use after more than a decade is not clear.
Mobile phones do not pose health problems to adults in the short term, according to the results of a major six-year research programme published today. However the research also points to a "slight hint" of a cancer risk for long-term users.
Experts warned they were unable, at this stage, to rule out the risks of brain or ear cancers for people who have used mobiles for more than 10 years. They said that further investigation of this result would be a priority for the next phase of their work, which would also study the effects of mobile phones on children's health.
"We found no association between incidence and exposure for people who have used their phones for less than 10 years," said Lawrie Challis, the chairman of the Mobile Telecommunications and Health Research (MTHR) programme and emeritus professor of physics at the University of Nottingham.
"That's an important result but we cannot rule out the possibility that there's an association for exposures for more than 10 years - the numbers appeared to show some slight hint. Although that is, in no way convincing, it's a faint suggestion that needs to be followed up."
The £8.8m MTHR programme was joint-funded by the government and the mobile phone industry in response to Sir William Stewart's independent inquiry into the safety of mobile phones in 2000. He concluded that the phones seemed to pose no problems but recommended further study.
Today, the group published its final report (pdf), pulling together work from 28 studies it has supported, as well as similar research from around the world looking at the effects of mobile phones on health factors such as blood pressure, brain function and cancer.
The report concluded that there was no evidence for short-term effects from either GSM or 3G handsets or base stations. There was also no evidence that they caused the symptoms described as electrical hypersensitivity, which up to 4% of people in the UK describe as a tingling or dizziness in the presence of electrical signals.
For long-term users, however, there was less certainty. Paul Elliott, an epidemiologist at Imperial College, London, said: "In some of the studies, there was an excess of malignant brain tumours and of acoustic neuromas [ear cancers]. But the excess is quite small and is at the borderline of statistical significance. There's a hint in the data that needs to be further explored."
Professor Challis said the evidence was not strong enough to rule out a health effect in future. In addition, "most cancers cannot be detected until 10 years after whatever caused them - if you look at the link between smoking and lung cancer, smoking increased enormously 1940s on; no hint in the increase in lung cancer for 10 years."
Another question mark was raised over the effects of mobiles on children. "At this stage we have no evidence at all that mobile phones or masts hurt children," said Prof Challis.
"But we do know that a number of other environmental agents - lead, tobacco smoke, ultraviolet radiation, ionising radiation - children react differently to them, and often more severely to them, than do adults. "So you can extrapolate that it's possible therefore that maybe children are more sensitive to mobile phone radiation. We really feel we need to work on children, very little has been done around the world on children. We wish to contribute to that work."
In 2005, Sir William urged parents to limit their children's use of mobile phones as a precautionary measure and said under-eights should not use them at all. Prof Challis said that his group's research had not found anything to contradict that advice.
The next phase of the MTHR programme will focus on children and the long-term effects of mobiles on health. Starting next year, the researchers will begin a £6m study on more than 200,000 mobile phone users from across Europe, whose health will be recorded for several years to find if there are links to a range of diseases.
The impact of mobile phone use after more than a decade is not clear.
Mobile phones do not pose health problems to adults in the short term, according to the results of a major six-year research programme published today. However the research also points to a "slight hint" of a cancer risk for long-term users.
Experts warned they were unable, at this stage, to rule out the risks of brain or ear cancers for people who have used mobiles for more than 10 years. They said that further investigation of this result would be a priority for the next phase of their work, which would also study the effects of mobile phones on children's health.
"We found no association between incidence and exposure for people who have used their phones for less than 10 years," said Lawrie Challis, the chairman of the Mobile Telecommunications and Health Research (MTHR) programme and emeritus professor of physics at the University of Nottingham.
"That's an important result but we cannot rule out the possibility that there's an association for exposures for more than 10 years - the numbers appeared to show some slight hint. Although that is, in no way convincing, it's a faint suggestion that needs to be followed up."
The £8.8m MTHR programme was joint-funded by the government and the mobile phone industry in response to Sir William Stewart's independent inquiry into the safety of mobile phones in 2000. He concluded that the phones seemed to pose no problems but recommended further study.
Today, the group published its final report (pdf), pulling together work from 28 studies it has supported, as well as similar research from around the world looking at the effects of mobile phones on health factors such as blood pressure, brain function and cancer.
The report concluded that there was no evidence for short-term effects from either GSM or 3G handsets or base stations. There was also no evidence that they caused the symptoms described as electrical hypersensitivity, which up to 4% of people in the UK describe as a tingling or dizziness in the presence of electrical signals.
For long-term users, however, there was less certainty. Paul Elliott, an epidemiologist at Imperial College, London, said: "In some of the studies, there was an excess of malignant brain tumours and of acoustic neuromas [ear cancers]. But the excess is quite small and is at the borderline of statistical significance. There's a hint in the data that needs to be further explored."
Professor Challis said the evidence was not strong enough to rule out a health effect in future. In addition, "most cancers cannot be detected until 10 years after whatever caused them - if you look at the link between smoking and lung cancer, smoking increased enormously 1940s on; no hint in the increase in lung cancer for 10 years."
Another question mark was raised over the effects of mobiles on children. "At this stage we have no evidence at all that mobile phones or masts hurt children," said Prof Challis.
"But we do know that a number of other environmental agents - lead, tobacco smoke, ultraviolet radiation, ionising radiation - children react differently to them, and often more severely to them, than do adults. "So you can extrapolate that it's possible therefore that maybe children are more sensitive to mobile phone radiation. We really feel we need to work on children, very little has been done around the world on children. We wish to contribute to that work."
In 2005, Sir William urged parents to limit their children's use of mobile phones as a precautionary measure and said under-eights should not use them at all. Prof Challis said that his group's research had not found anything to contradict that advice.
The next phase of the MTHR programme will focus on children and the long-term effects of mobiles on health. Starting next year, the researchers will begin a £6m study on more than 200,000 mobile phone users from across Europe, whose health will be recorded for several years to find if there are links to a range of diseases.