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Health Consequences of CRT Monitors?
DigiMan asks: "I was wondering, what are the effects of working on a CRT are on your health - long term. It has recently bothered me that EVERYONE seems to be switching to LCD's - I noticed that Bill Gates was one of the 1st people to do this, even when the cost was super high, and many, many government offices switched to the much more expensive LCD's - despite budget cuts and having to go with the lowest bidder strategy they operate under. Was this ONLY for style and space savings? Is there some health consequence that no one talks about publically. I know that they do emit very low amounts of X-Rays and have a 60Hz magnetic field as well as a 12.5 kHz electro magnetic field (for the raster scan). I work in front of typically 3, 19" CRT's for 12 - 16 hours per day at an average distance of 18". Can these magnetic fields cause Leukemia, or anything else? Is being behind the a cathode ray tube that bad for you?"
I started using computers at age 5. At age 9 I had one with it's own dedicated CRT (they used the TV before that). I'm now 24. So, I did need to get glasses at 22, however that was for an astygmatism in my left eye, my right eye still has perfect vision.
Now I'm a computer junky, I use them all the time, at work and at home. Until about a year ago, it was always CRTs. I now have an LCD at work, but still a CRT at home (which I am soon going to replace with another).
So in my case, an excessive amount of CRT usage doesn't seem to have caused any nearsightedness. Also not being nearsighted is counter to my genetics, my mother and father are both nearsighted, as is my sister who doesn't make much use of computers and got her glasses much younger than I did.
Again, just a personal anecdote and not a valid representation of the overall situation, but it runs completely counter to yours. I know it's compelling to think your experience is representitive, but it's very often not the case. Trust emprical research, not personal anecdotes.