Dr. Weeks’ Comment: Now we read about the real cell phone radiation.
I have warned patients for over a decade about the danger of these conveniences which one engineer told me was more dangerous than a chain saw. He told me “I would rather let my 10 year old son play with a running chain saw than an activated cell phone.”
And the cell phone companies also know the risks. That is why they warn you in the small print to never have the cell phone ON and closer than 5/8th of an inch to your body. Read the manual.
| Top 20 Highest Radiation Phones | Top 20 Lowest Radiation Phones | Find Your Phone |
On Aug. 7, 1996, the FCC created guidelines on cell phone radiation (RF) exposure with input from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).The guidelines created a measure of the rate that body tissue absorbs radiation energy during cell phone use called the specific absorption rate (SAR). The SAR for cell phone radiation was set at a maximum of 1.6 watts of energy absorbed per kilogram of body weight. The limit was set due to the thermal effects of cell phone radiation (all RF radiation can heat human body tissue at high enough levels) – it was not set to mitigate other biological effects cell phone radiation might have such as DNA damage or cancer. The FCC SAR limit is based upon a cell phone call that averages 30 minutes when the cell phone is held at the ear. SAR levels for cell phones sold in the US range from a low of 0.19 to the maximum of 1.58. Holding a phone away from the body or using a wired earpiece lowers the amount of radiation absorbed, and text messaging rather than talking, further lowers that amount. The following two charts list the top 20 highest and lowest SAR levels for cell phones sold in the United States. The list provides the maximum possible SAR level from the phone (many phones have differing SAR levels depending on where and how the phone is used). If your phone is not on either list, you can find the SAR level for your specific phone by checking the online FCC database.
FOR THE GRAPHS in this presentation, see this website: http://cellphones.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=003054 |
