Implanted RFID Chips Linked To Cancer

An anonymous reader writes "The Associated Press is reporting that microchip implants have induced cancer in laboratory animals and dogs. A series of research articles spanning more than a decade found that mice and rats injected with glass-encapsulated RFID transponders developed malignant, fast-growing, lethal cancers in up to 1% to 10% of cases. The tumors originated in the tissue surrounding the microchips and often grew to completely surround the devices. To date, about 2,000 RFID devices have been implanted in humans worldwide, according to VeriChip Corp." We recently discussed the California ban on companies requiring such implants.

Comments

Re:So what's the cause?

[NeverVotedBush]

RFID does not emit radio signals. It absorbs them selectively and the RFID scnner/transmitter senses the change to the emitted field to know what the RFID is saying. But the RFID tag (passive tags) just basically sit there and alternately go high impedance or short out their antennas to convey information. They get their power from the RF signal itself.

Re:Competely ridiculous

[MillionthMonkey]

More junk science.

News flash #1: RFID chips do not emit any RF except when they're being read.

News flash #2: Glass is inert.

So is chrysotile asbestos.

Re:Nothing fishy here

[Scrameustache]

The FDA is overseen by the Department of Health and Human Services, which, at the time of VeriChip's approval, was headed by Tommy Thompson. Two weeks after the device's approval took effect on Jan. 10, 2005, Thompson left his Cabinet post, and within five months was a board member of VeriChip Corp. and Applied Digital Solutions. He was compensated in cash and stock options.

Thompson, until recently a candidate for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, says he had no personal relationship with the company as the VeriChip was being evaluated, nor did he play any role in FDA's approval process of the RFID tag.

"I didn't even know VeriChip before I stepped down from the Department of Health and Human Services," he said in a telephone interview.

Yet another amazing coincidence. If I could just pay a dollar in taxes every time this happens, somebody sure could get rich. Looky, it's the aspartame approval process all over again!

August 8, 1983-- Consumer Attorney, Jim Turner of the Community Nutrition Institute and Dr. Woodrow Monte, Arizona State University's Director of Food Science and Nutritional Laboratories, file suit with the FDA objecting to aspartame approval based on unresolved safety issues.

September, 1983-- FDA Commissioner Hayes resigns under a cloud of controversy about his taking unauthorized rides aboard a General Foods jet. (General foods is a major customer of NutraSweet) Burson-Marsteller, Searle's public relation firm (which also represented several of NutraSweet's major users), immediately hires Hayes as senior scientific consultant.

Fall 1983-- The first carbonated beverages containing aspartame are sold for public consumption.

Seems like a planted story to me..

[Jerry]

In the early 1980s RG Serle was in trouble. Their animal studies showed that Aspartame caused brain cancer. A Researcher for the company blew the whistle and Congress was investigating. RG Serle brought in a problem solver who began by throwing having the rats with brain cancers removed from the studies. The whistle blower, for some reason, reversed his statements. The acting head of the FDA approved Aspartame for human consumption, then resigned. A few weeks later he was announced as the head of the legal department of the new Nutrasweet corporation. His two assistants were the lawyers Congress assigned to investigate the RG Serle problem.

Shortly after that stories linking Saccharine with cancer flooded the media while the Nutrasweet corp flooded the media with stories about Nutrasweet and its safety. Within months the use of Saccharine plummeted to single digit figures and Nutrasweet took over the artificial sweetener market.

For his leadership RG Serle gave Donald Rumsfeldt a $6M retiring bonus.

I am waiting to hear of a competitive RFID chip entering the market. One that is "cancer free". Then I'll know who planted this story.