Smartphones do not cause brain cancer. Word of the WHO
From the most complete review to date of the most relevant studies on the subject, it emerged that there is no correlation between smartphones and brain tumors. All the details
Despite popular belief, smartphones are not linked to brain tumors. This is confirmed by the largest study conducted so far. Some researchers from the Australian Agency for Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety (Arpansa), on behalf of the World Health Organization (WHO), have in fact examined more than 5,000 studies from which the most rigorous ones from the point of view of scientific and the weak ones were excluded. Approximately 63 conducted on humans from 1994 to 2022 were therefore selected.
WHY THE CORRELATION BETWEEN SMARTPHONES AND BRAIN CANCER IS INVESTIGATED
The fear of a potential link between cell phone use and brain tumors is partly due to the fact that in 2011 the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classified exposure to radio waves as a 'possible carcinogen' for man. In fact, cell phones – like everything that uses wireless technology, including laptops, radio and television broadcasts and mobile phone towers – emit radio frequency electromagnetic radiation, also known as radio waves.
However, Professor Ken Karipidis , lead author of the recent review and vice-president of the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection, said that the IARC judgment had been based "largely on limited evidence from human observational studies." . This latest revision, however, “is based on a much larger data set, which also includes more recent and more complete studies, so we can be more confident that exposure to radio waves from wireless technology does not pose a danger to human health,” he assured.
The professor also recalled that the IARC has different levels to indicate the risk of cancer, which are divided into 'certain', 'probable', 'possible' and 'not yet classifiable'. “By designating radiofrequency electromagnetic fields as 'possible carcinogens,' WHO has equated them with hundreds of other agents for which evidence of harm is uncertain, such as aloe vera, pickled vegetables and working in a dry cleaning,” notes the Guardian . And which more recently has also involved aspartame .
THE LARGEST REVIEW OF EXISTING STUDIES
The review focused on tumors of the central nervous system (including brain, meninges, pituitary gland and ear), tumors of the salivary glands and brain tumors. In the end, the researchers found no overall association between cell phone use and cancer, nor an association with prolonged use (if people use cell phones for 10 years or more), nor an association with the amount of mobile phone use (the number of calls made or time spent on the phone).
“We concluded that the evidence does not show a link between cell phones and brain cancer or other head and neck cancers,” Karipidis said , adding: “I am quite confident in our conclusions. And what makes us quite confident is that… even as cell phone use has skyrocketed, brain tumor rates have remained stable.”
The results, the scholars point out, are in line with previous research conducted by Arpansa which demonstrates that, although the use of wireless technology has increased massively in the last 20 years, there has not been an increase in the incidence of brain tumors.
RADIO WAVES AND FERTILITY
Fertility, in relation to radio waves, has also been the subject of study. Karipidis reported that another systematic review also commissioned by the WHO showed that even in the case of male fertility there is no evidence of an association between telephones and a decrease in the number of sperm. While for women an association was detected in some scenarios , such as the influence on birth weight, "however, this association occurred when exposure to radio waves was far above the safe limit" , Karipidis specified.
Now the professor and his colleagues are working on the second part of the study, which will look at cancers less commonly associated with mobile phones, including leukemia and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/sanita/lo-smartphone-non-causa-tumore-al-cervello-parola-delloms/ on Wed, 04 Sep 2024 13:35:17 +0000.