As society's dependence on wireless technologies grows, the
concern that there are health risks attached to the
saturation of the air with high-frequency radio waves (RF)
is not going away, despite official claims those fears are
groundless.
Dr. Riina Bray, an environmental health specialist at
Women's College Hospital in Toronto, told the National Post
she's treating two or three patients a week from ailments
she links to wi-fi routers, cellphone towers and other
radio-frequency sources.
Symptoms include stabbing headaches, "brain fog," tinnitus
(a ringing in the ears) and extreme fatigue.
The Post says Bray's clinic may be the only mainstream
health facility routinely treating patients for what's being
called electromagnetic hypersensitivity.
"Every year we are getting more and more people coming in,"
Bray told the Post. "I'm very concerned, because the stories
are very, very compelling … These are not crazy people.
There is a huge, huge problem."
Bray is urging a rethink of our use of telecommunication and
computer technologies, including moving back toward
hard-wired devices.
Studies have found no link between the symptoms Bray sees
with RF exposure. In its web page on wi-fi equipment, Health
Canada acknowledges some people have raised health concerns
but "there is no convincing scientific evidence" low-level
RF exposure causes adverse health effects in people.
"You have to be very careful as a scientific, medical
authority figure that you don't provide an outside
reinforcement of beliefs that might be quite sincere, but
lack scientific evidence," Dr. Ray Copes, environmental
health director with the Ontario Agency for Health
Protection and Promotion, told the Post, referring to Bray's
diagnoses.
"You don't want to reinforce disability, and you don't want
people to put themselves in tighter and tighter boxes with
regards to their daily activities."
But there's been enough conflicting data to nurture people's
doubts.
The Post noted that last year the World Health
Organization's cancer-research arm listed cellphones as
possible carcinogens because some large studies found a
possible link.
Bray said that five years ago she saw no hypersensitivity
patients but now treats dozens a year. Typically her
patients tell her the symptoms lessen or disappear when they
get away from RF sources.
"Everybody in the person's family thinks the person is going
crazy," she told the Post. "Then they'll start putting one
and one together and they look around and [during an illness
episode] somebody is doing this in close proximity; somebody
is texting or talking on the cellphone."
Some of her patients suffer from other medical problems such
as heart disease, Lyme disease or an ear injury, which she
believes may make them more susceptible to hypersensitivity.
In British Columbia, opponents have fought B.C. Hydro's
installation of smart electric meters because they use wi-fi
connections to transmit data periodically.
"Health Canada and health organizations globally say the
radio frequencies at this level are safe," Gary Murphy,
Hydro's chief project officer, told the Vernon Morning Star.
The wi-fi transmitter on Hydro's smart meters will operate
for less than a minute a day, he added.
"Is that worth getting wrapped around the axle on?"
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