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Portland City Council May Ask FCC To Investigate Health Risks of 5G Networks (inverse.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Inverse: Fearing unknown health risks, members of the City Council in Portland, Oregon, will vote Wednesday to oppose the rollout of 5G wireless networks. In a proposed resolution, Mayor Ted Wheeler, along with Commissioners Chloe Eudaly and Amanda Fritz, write that there's evidence suggesting wireless networks can cause health problems -- including cancer. They express concern that the Federal Communications Commission has not conducted enough research to demonstrate that 5G networks are safe, while at the same time prohibiting state and local governments from passing their own regulations on telecommunications technology. And while Wheeler, Eudaly, and Fritz are correct about the FCC's power to dictate how state and local governments manage wireless networks, the connection between 5G networks and cancer is a lot more complicated than they say it is.
"There is evidence to suggest that exposure to radio frequency emissions generated by wireless technologies could contribute to adverse health conditions such as cancer," reads the proposed resolution. This evidence comes from a large-scale study conducted by the National Toxicology Program (NTP), a division of the US Department of Health and Human Services. The final results of this study, published in November 2018, showed a strong association between the type of radiation used for mobile phone signals and certain types of cancerous tumors in lab rats. But that's where the situation gets tough. The NTP study, which took place over 10 years and involved exposing more than 7,000 rats and mice to radio-frequency radiation, focused on signals used by wireless technology under the 2G and 3G standards. It's nearly impossible to say whether these results will apply to 5G hardware.
"Since the available research doesn't address 5G, the Portland City Council's resolution demands that the FCC embark on another such research project to assess the health effects of 5G," reports Inverse. "Presumably, it would take just as long to conduct another study on the hypothesized connection between 5G and cancer, but by that time, the industry will almost certainly have moved on to 6G -- or 7G."
"There is evidence to suggest that exposure to radio frequency emissions generated by wireless technologies could contribute to adverse health conditions such as cancer," reads the proposed resolution. This evidence comes from a large-scale study conducted by the National Toxicology Program (NTP), a division of the US Department of Health and Human Services. The final results of this study, published in November 2018, showed a strong association between the type of radiation used for mobile phone signals and certain types of cancerous tumors in lab rats. But that's where the situation gets tough. The NTP study, which took place over 10 years and involved exposing more than 7,000 rats and mice to radio-frequency radiation, focused on signals used by wireless technology under the 2G and 3G standards. It's nearly impossible to say whether these results will apply to 5G hardware.
"Since the available research doesn't address 5G, the Portland City Council's resolution demands that the FCC embark on another such research project to assess the health effects of 5G," reports Inverse. "Presumably, it would take just as long to conduct another study on the hypothesized connection between 5G and cancer, but by that time, the industry will almost certainly have moved on to 6G -- or 7G."
Think of all the new RF we've had in the past couple of decades with WiFi and cell towers absolutely everywhere.
What's happened to the rates of incidence of new cancer cases over that time? They're flat/down.
https://progressreport.cancer....
I call BS.
Yep looks like Portland citizens just don't believe real science. They don't like vaccines,, so it follows that the same kind of faith-based "science" that claims all wireless signals cause cancer would be believed as well..
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
That's it. Just a simple "no". The inhabitants of Portlandia are free to believe in their confectionery fantasies. No one else has to entertain them. The FCC merely has to say "no". "No, the government will not participate in your bizarre beliefs. Look how far that's gotten you with your anti-vaccine stance. Yeah....so, no. You got a problem with it? You provide the hard, peer-reviewed evidence with replicable results that support your stance and then the government will take your concerns under advisement. Until then? No."
This is why telecom companies install towers and then leave them unplugged for a month or so.
They wait for all the nutjobs to come out of the woodwork, complaining about all sorts of psychosomatic ailments from headaches to bunions, just to show how idiotic they are.
At this point the anti-wireless lobby need to all be handed copies of "The Boy Who Cried Wolf" and be required to take a quiz on what they learned. The only good thing about these whackos is that they at least cannot make the world more dangerous for everyone else the way those idiot anti-vaxxers do.
While I agree some studies should be done since 5G works at a different frequency range, I'm not about to go crazy over it. If organisms weren't designed to live with constant exposure to various forms of radiation, we wouldn't have evolved on a planet with a sun.
It's the same frequencies as 4G LTE, plus millimeter wave, which is also non-ionizing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Federal agencies would get very little done if they agreed to do every study request from every piss-ant city.
How about Portland gets one of its state universities to do the study, and on the city's dime. I would also suggest donations from carriers, but that might taint the results.
The lowest exposure level used in the studies was equal to the maximum local tissue exposure currently allowed for cell phone users. This power level rarely occurs with typical cell phone use. The highest exposure level in the studies was four times higher than the maximum power level permitted for local tissues. They were full body exposed to these levels for 10 minutes every 10 minutes.
If you artificially heat things up (10W/kg) they tend to get burnt and develop cancer. Also female rats didn't seem to have this effect, only male rats and they only deviated slightly from controls with the majority of male rats living longer due to not developing kidney problems later in life.
The data is highly suggestive and methodology flawed to make any decisions.
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There's nothing new about this. These are the people who say they're allergic to WiFi. A practicing engineer I occasionally used to work with had a wife who was "allergic to the radio signals emitted by smart utility meters", so they moved their whole family to a rural town in Alabama to get away from the smart meters that were rolling out in Houston. There have been documented cases of communities formally complaining about ill effects from the signals emitted by newly constructed cell towers in their area, only for them to find out that the towers hadn't even been turned on yet. The national radio quiet zone in Virginia/West Virginia has become a haven for "RF-allergic" nutjobs in recent years.
The RF frequency might be different, but the complaints are the same. Might cause cancer...if you massively over-expose the subject for months at a time with no break. Might cause headaches, toothaches, backaches, or other aches...which seem to have nothing to do with whether the signal is actually present, but instead have more to do with when the person thinks the signal is present. Might cause fevers, rashes, or other reactions...which either continue regardless of the signal or else disappear once the person is given proper medication for their undiagnosed condition/moved to a controlled location away from the actual source of their problems.
The "research" these people are doing is in all the wrong places. They simply need to go back to textbooks and learn some basic statistics, physics, or biology, but instead they'll consult Facebook and "Doctor Google" for their answers.
We have been over this study, an article I submitted about it last year was discussed at length and the general conclusion was the study really showed that generally it was safe, but if they generated enough end points, you could get some statistically significant effects.
1. That is known as p-hacking and is recognized as not a best practice.
2. The effects that did appear, were not dose dependent so likely the result of p-hacking.
I think in a few of their end points, the exposure was shown to be protective, that is how you know the p-hacking basically identified some randomness, but the cohort was so small, it had statistical significance.
Wax on, wax off baby!
Cell phone transmissions make city councils nuts.
Have gnu, will travel.
It doesn't matter whether it's technically safe or not, what if Portland just doesn't want 5G, and instead of arguing about all the reasons why are just taking whatever relevant actions to stall or prevent it? There is nothing wrong with that. We haven't even saturated the limits of 4G yet, and it's quite possible there are additional concerns of somehow this is going to cost the town money or increase general costs. if her whole town is set up to operate off of 4 g, and it's working, then by not allowing 5G, I can continue to keep their town operated the way they like it. Newer and faster does not always equal better and if you're satisfied with the way things are,well if it's not broke don't fix it. There's no reason why things have to be the same everywhere. That's the whole reason for having different places in order to have the option of different ways to do things without being questioned.
At least the big pharma and corporate overlords EXIST.
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Yeah, to point to those studies and say they PROVE that cell phones cause cancer is like pointing to people who died in a fire and say they PROVE that you shouldn't heat up your house.
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Look at the bars on your phone. Those bars translate into tiny fractions of a mW. Comparing favorably against the amount of electricity your own muscles give off when flexing. The inverse square law pretty much guarantees that people will be safe from the towers. Now, cellphones TRANSMIT as high as 3W, but as I understand it, the proposal isn't to end existing cell phone use, so if they cause cancer, they will probably do it on 4g as easily as 5g. There is 0 reason to ban the equipment from being put in place.
There is science illiteracy in action.