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'Wi-Fi Illness' Spreads To Ontario Public Schools
An anonymous reader writes "Readers of Slashdot might be familiar with Lakehead University's ban on WiFi routers a few years ago in Thunder Bay, Ontario because of 'health concerns,' a policy apparently still in effect. Now it seems a group of concerned parents in a number of communities in Ontario have petitioned the local school boards over similar concerns at public schools, where their kids are apparently experiencing 'headaches to dizziness and nausea and even racing heart rates' — symptoms that appear only when they are in school on weekdays, not on weekends at home. 'The symptoms, which also include memory loss, trouble concentrating, skin rashes, hyperactivity, night sweats and insomnia, have been reported in 14 Ontario schools in Barrie, Bradford, Collingwood, Orillia and Wasaga Beach since the board decided to go wireless ...' Besides Wi-Fi signals, could there possibly be any other logical explanation for kids having more symptoms of illness on school days than at home on weekends or in the summer?"
"Besides Wi-Fi signals, could there possibly be any other logical explanation for kids having more symptoms of illness on school days than at home on weekends or in the summer?"
Um, being in school doesn't count as a reason?
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Don't people in Canada have WiFi at home? Surely if the illness was WiFi related they'd be suffering at home, in cities, on planes, or any other populated place?
Could there be any other explanation? Uh, well of course. Schools are hotbeds of spreading sickness, this is nothing new. For this to really mean something, how about they look at places that have a lot of wifi going on without all the germ spreading. Maybe they could look at dense urban areas that have a lot of wifi yet everyone lives in their own apartment and aren't picking their nose and then getting a drink from the water fountain.
School boards are so.... Yea.
Someone flopped a steamer in the gene pool.
And the parents happily shell out for their kid's iPhones, yet protest school board meetings against WiFi in schools.
The symptoms, which also include memory loss, trouble concentrating, skin rashes, hyperactivity, night sweats and insomnia
Thats funny I read about this as a kid.
'I cannot go to school today, ' Said little Peggy Ann McKay. 'I have the measles and the mumps, A gash, a rash and purple bumps. My mouth is wet, my throat is dry, I'm going blind in my right eye. My tonsils are as big as rocks, I've counted sixteen chicken pox And there's one more-that's seventeen, And don't you think my face looks green? My leg is cut-my eyes are blue- It might be instamatic flu. I cough and sneeze and gasp and choke, I'm sure that my left leg is broke- My hip hurts when I move my chin, My belly button's caving in, My back is wrenched, my ankle's sprained, My 'pendix pains each time it rains. My nose is cold, my toes are numb. I have a sliver in my thumb. My neck is stiff, my voice is weak, I hardly whisper when I speak. My tongue is filling up my mouth, I think my hair is falling out. My elbow's bent, my spine ain't straight, My temperature is one-o-eight. My brain is shrunk, I cannot hear, There is a hole inside my ear. I have a hangnail, and my heart is-what? What's that? What's that you say? You say today is...Saturday? G'bye, I'm going out to play! ' Shel Silverstein
Doctors do Massage in Longview WA now, who knew?
This is so ridiculous. It could be ANYTHING in the environment at these schools. Tainted water, Chinese drywall, toxic mold, contaminated food. The list is endless. But I can tell you one this it's not is the wi-fi.
"Besides Wi-Fi signals, could there possibly be any other logical explanation for kids having more symptoms of illness on school days than at home on weekends or in the summer?"
Yes, it is called "Believing shit that isn't real." Our minds can have powerful effects on our bodies and in particular on how we feel, since ultimately the mind is what does the feeling. So people believe that something causes a given set of symptoms, thus they experience those symptoms.
Happens all the time with the WiFi types. People have been up on the evils of "radiation" for a long time, WiFi is just their newest target.
Personally what I think the school needs to do is this: Tell people "Ok, for the next two weeks we are shutting down WiFi, you let us know if you get any better." However don't actually shut it off. Have the APs stop broadcasting SIDs and accepting connections, but leave the radios broadcasting at full power. Then after that say "Ok we are turning back on now, in a test mode, no data for two weeks. tell us if you feel worse." At this point shut the APs down completely.
At the end, when people say that during the "off" time they were fine and during the "on" time the problems came back, you get to reveal the test results and say STFU.
Seriously, if there is something to this WiFi thing how come we can't get any laboratory results on it? The answer to that is because there is nothing to it, it is all in the heads of the people who allegedly have the problems.
Remember when everyone was scared that cell phones would give you cancer?
Just because the U.S. is a republic does not mean it is not a democracy. Democracy/republic are not mutually exclusive.
Hmmm... I have 3 WiFi routers at home and have never been sick, Schools are also a hotbed for excuses. Starting with "My dog ate my homework" and now evolving into "The WiFi made me forget"
-Keith M
(Too lazy to sign up for an account)
How much do you want to bet that these concerned parents are credulous proponents of alternative medicine?
I can imagine their rapt attention at reading how much danger their kids are in, and they trust someone with MD after their name (as if it's not a diploma mill degree anyway) more than an engineer or physicist.
This whole subject is dominated by that folk etymology mentality where something that sounds smart and appeals to an aging housewife's intuition gets spread around at bridge games and finds its way into Reader's Digest or whatever checkout aisle trash they flip through on the toilet these days.
Stress.
Sick building syndrome. (newer buildings this may be a real issue)
Kids want out of school and will lie about anything to get out.
You infected your kid with hypochondria.
Your kid is weak and the world is gonna kill him.
But wifi? really? mmmmmmmmm no. Maybe those kids should stay in school for a little more of science class and learn why this is COMPLETE BULLSHIT.
"Sounds like x, I read that it matches the symptoms perfectly" is exactly what produced this crap in the first place.
My guess, it's the parents. The parents want the children to be sick and press/force it upon the children to be sick. Its a common incident in lawsuits.
Parent: "Its ok, just tell me that your getting sick from the stuff at school. You don't need to hide it, just tell me."
Child: "But I'm fine, nothings wrong."
Parent: "Please, you shouldn't bottle these things up. Just tell me that its making you sick and I'll make it stop. Now please, don't hide these things from me."
Child: "But there really isn't anything wrong."
Parent: "Now we've talked about this, you don't need to keep secrets from me. Just tell me its making you sick because I know it is. So just be honest and go ahead and tell me its making you sick and then we can go have ice cream. And then we can talk to everyone about this because they will like to hear what you have to say."
Child after hearing they will get a reward and lots of positive attention for agreeing to claim it makes them sick: "Yes mommy, it makes me feel really ill and sick. Can we have that ice cream now?"
Keep instilling that its making them sick after a while mind over matter will happen and you'll have a child with a minor form of hypochondria that will claim its the school since they are getting rewards for it and lots of positive attention, the two things most children want it abundance.
Attention... all grammer nazi"s! Is they're anything; wrong with: my post,
Obviously it's the Wifi. There's nothing else on earth that's ever caused these symptoms in anyone, especially teenagers.
So, why are the /. interested? Is the mere mention of 'technology' enough to exceed the threshold of importance?
(Has Slashdot become a sewing circle?)
Have they checked the air quality and ventilation of these buildings before ascribing blame to some new technology? Sick school syndrome is real and to blame for many of the symptoms believed to be caused by the offending gamma-powered wi-fi routers.
The real trouble here isn't the fact that they may remove wi-fi from the schools, although to be fair that would suck. The danger is that if some kids are experiencing actual symptoms like memory loss and rashes, the real cause goes ignored. Wi-fi as a scapegoat could wind up being a dangerous thing.
Mold my butt. If the kids are getting sick from radio waves, take away their cell phones. That'll cure'm quick!
As a physician I would venture that not only caffeine but pretty much anything can produce those symptoms. That is why they're called "non specific symptoms". Of course this reminds me of the guy who claimed to be ill from signals coming from a cell phone tower, only to discover that the cell phone tower in question hadn't actually been turned on for the past 12 months...
Seriously, there are a lot of sick people. However sadly there are also people who claim to be sick in order to obtain a secondary benefit. These people can be understood in that, for whatever reason, they feel that malingering is the easiest way to get what they want. Unfortunately they tie up health resources that could be used to help those who are really sick when they do so.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
But to be a fair experiment, you'd have to conceal the fact that the wi-fi is turned off from the children. The reason for this is that the most likely cause of all the illness is children feigning it to get of school.
All I want is a secure system where it's easy to do anything I want. Is that too much to ask ~~ Randall Munroe
No.
If that were the case, the teachers and staff - who are exposed a lot more - would be getting symptoms too.
Here's a really easy test: Turn off all the wireless routers in the building and keep it a secret from the children and parents as best you can.
$5 says nothing will change.
=Smidge=
...otherwise many of their cordless phones would be emitting the same "wifi" signals that wireless routers do.
Perhaps the children are suffering from stress caused by video game, Internet, phone, and texting withdrawals at school.
Kids don't want to go to school. I know I didn't when I was a kid and I was even good at school. I was always happy for an excuse to stay home from school. Didn't often work for me, since mom was a teacher and fairly clever, but still.
So kid doesn't want to go to school says "But mom, I feel sick!" and make up some symptoms. Mom says ok and lets them stay home. Mom notices that these symptoms only happen when the kid has been going to school. Never on the weekend, never during summer. Mom goes and looks them up online, rather than asking a doctor, and finds the anti-WiFi nutters. She says "Oh my god, this must be it!" The kid, of course, latches on to it as it means less time in school.
I'm sure it is a combination of these two as well as others (like kids who legitimately feel like crap in school because of stress). It all adds up to a manufactured panic about WiFi.
Hell maybe I should get in on this! In recent years, as WiFi has rolled out all over work, I've had less energy than I used to. I am tired easier, and seem to just be over all a bit slower than I was. Not drastic, but noticeable. Must be the WiFi... ...
or maybe the fact that I'm 30, and have gained weight. Nah, couldn't be that, must be the WiFi.
No it isn't. The difference is in whether x is a real thing or not.
# cat
Damn, my RAM is full of llamas.
Both when I was in college and now at my work place, there's externally mounted Cisco devices with high gain antennas mounted to the walls.
This is seriously bad medical House, M.D. style logic, but, there's a thin veneer of plausibility that if you drill holes into a wall full of black mold, the mold may be getting out through those holes.
I bet there aren't many buildings which are bad enough to have walls full of black mold, yet are airtight enough so that drilling a few extra holes into the interior walls will make any big difference in the amount of spores getting into the breathing air. Note that ventilation and wind will cause a pressure difference that will move air through the walls, it's only a matter of how much, because there are always holes and cracks in any regular house wall.
Exactly. I, for one, am sick and tired of the 'blame everybody but the self' mentality that pervades society. It creeps up more and more everyday. I don't know how the Canadian legal system works, but wouldn't the burden of proof lie with the parents? Can they cite one study, just one fracking conclusive study that proves that it is these routers and acess points causing the children, oh the poor freaking children's ailments? Seriously. Show me one study where it has been positively shown that signals that fall in the range of the wifi consortium jurisdiction are causing people to get sick. Prove it. Prove it. Prove it. Evidence, or GTFO.
And people wonder why education gets worse. These damn parents are so sue happy, they just attack attack attack the schools every damn opportunity that presents itself. So the schools become so hamstrung in bureaucratic idiocy that they are afraid to do anything because some snot-nose little johnny's parents might sue.
This. Two things. Taking personal responsibility and the scientific method. The sooner society actually adopts these two solid mentalities, the better off we all will be. Until then this world will continue to be run amok by victimized-its-not-my-fault-blame-the-world-can-i-get-some-money-too asshats.
End rant.
'We are trying to prove ourselves wrong as quickly as possible, because only in that way can we find progress.' RPF
Mold my butt. If the kids are getting sick from radio waves, take away their cell phones. That'll cure'm quick!
No shit. Have a tech bring a spectrum analyzer in and end the discussion once and for all. Odds are, they're getting a hell of a lot more exposure to ionizing radiation from the cell phones they have jammed into the sides of their pretty little heads that from some roof-mounted WAP that's fifty or sixty feet away.
... not because they're feeling ill, they'll get over that, but because they're being raised by morons.
I feel sorry for the kids, I really do
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
It's not like we eat solid foods which contain all kinds of minerals.
It is the disgustingly toxic school food, pesticides, lead paint, asbestos, or poor treatment by faculty that cause these symptoms. Or the water that tastes like piss out of drinking fountains, or the treatment like prisoners for no reason. Enough to drive anyone to experience psychosomatic effects and lose all motivation and drive to live.
They say all children profile like psychopaths before they leave high school. I can tell you why, anyone living in the bullshit environment forced unto people until they are legally an adult will drive you fucking nuts. Did that maybe ever occur to anyone? That metal detectors, fully armed sherifs and security guards authorized to use force every 10 feet? Or maybe it is the getting thrown in a cold dark room for a week because you got beaten up, and zero tolerance says that counts as a violent offence? Maybe being forced to memorize out of context information out of logical order and without being taught its applications or purpose? Maybe if schools actually treated students like people, instead of monsters, maybe if schools taught information in a logical order, and taught it, instead of forcing meaningless memorization, maybe, if schools actually provided half way decent meals for the price, or water that didn't make your stomach hurt, or didn't make you dress in an oddly specific arbitrary fashion. Maybe then it wouldn't be such fucking hell. Maybe then the children would actually be able to think, feel, and learn. But like that will ever happen.
Where is the mod rating for "scary"? Also,