We are in an era of unprecedented psychological manipulation of the science on potential health effects of EMF and RFR.
Over the last few years, the BioInitiative Working Group has worked many hours on the European Commission’s science reviews of EMF and RFR. What they say matters. It’s the expert committee for the European Union (EU) recommending whether EMF and RFR public safety limits are okay, or need substantial revision. You know where we stand on this. The limits are grossly inadequate in Europe and the US.
The European Scientific Committee on Emerging and Newly Identified Health Risks (SCENIHR) did a bad job of it in 2009, and has unsurprisingly disappointed us again in 2015. Through deceptive language tactics, the Committee has deliberately put out misinformation to erase what should have been clear findings of potential health effects of electromagnetic fields. Health effects that matter greatly to millions of regular people who want to know about EMF.
What’s their NAME?
The Scientific Committee for Emerging and Newly Identified Health Risks, right? Emerging (not proven). Newly identified (not conclusively demonstrated).
What is the NAME OF THEIR REPORT?
“Final opinion on Potential health effects of exposure to electromagnetic fields (EMF)” Not conclusively proven health effects.
What did they conclude?
That there are no conclusively proven biological effects.
How Could That Happen?
” While the scope of the Opinion [SCENIHR, 2015a] did include potential health effects, it was not SCENIHR’s objective to decide whether the possibility of an effect exists, as erroneously suggested by Sage et al. It should be noted that the term “risk” already accounts for probability of a harmful effect and that various levels”. (SCENIHR Leitgeb, 2015)
WHAT?
It would be just an academic farce if our lives didn’t depend on the outcome. But, we do. All around the planet, we depend on good advice from educated experts that are supposed to be independent thinkers and good analysts of what is a ‘potential health effect’. No amount of dust-kicking can obscure the basic fact that the SCENIHR failed to do what it was directed to do.
Read for yourselves. This is double-speak. The SCENIHR’S science review that has failed to carry out the central question asked of this Committee. This is an assessment on which the fate of billions of human beings depends, and upon which global health rests.
For SCENIHR to issue an unwarranted finding of ‘all clear’ by redefining the reporting terms and misreporting the evidence is bad for science, bad for the public and intensely bad for school children who are sitting in classrooms with WiFi all day, required to use wireless tablets for schoolwork. Read more: http://www.bioinitiative.org/rebuttal-emf-effects/
From Dr. Louis Slesin: Once again, power-frequency magnetic fields have been found to act as a cancer promoter.
Eighteen months ago an international team led by Elisabeth Cardis in Spain showed cancer promotion in workers exposed to chemicals and extremely low frequency (ELF) EMFs. Now an Italian team has found essentially the same promotional effect in animals exposed to ionizing radiation and ELF EMFs.
Rats, which received a single low-dose of gamma radiation early in life and were exposed to magnetic fields for their entire lifetime, developed higher than expected rates of three different types of cancer: Breast cancer and leukemia/lymphoma, as well as an extremely rare and obscure tumor, called malignant schwannoma of the heart.
The new study, which was carried out at the Ramazzini Institute in Bologna, Italy, is part of the most ambitious EMF animal project ever attempted.
Close up of a PG&E LED streetlight in Santa Rosa California
There is a major push all over the country to install LED streetlights based on assumptions of saving energy and money. In places where the LEDs have been installed there are so many complaints. On February 16 Sebastopol will consider whether or not to allow PG&E to install the LED streetlights. PG&E owns the streetlights and requires cities to opt-in to the changeout.
PG&E is currently installing LED streetlights in Santa Rosa, and we took a team to investigate, measure and photograph there. What we found is, unlike the warm yellow streetlights, the LED’s are very white, with cold blue tones, and painfully bright.
Mary Carvalho who lives in Santa Rosa writes, “Has anyone noticed lately that the night sky is lit up like a full moon every night?”
Paul Marantz, a lighting designer said about the yellow streetlights, “there was a warmth about them that’s missing from the new lights. And because of the way the LEDs are designed, it’s a much more directed light, with more glare.”
When the environment is saturated with blue rich light it causes melatonin reduction which can affect sleep. Harvard Medical School reported blue light has a dark side. “Light at night is bad for your health, and exposure to blue light emitted by electronics and energy-efficient lightbulbs may be especially so.”
PG&E LED streetlight
Bob Parks, executive director of the International Dark-Sky Association states, “Now, people can certainly close their blinds and block-out that rich blue-white light. The problem is that every other species on the planet can’t do that, so you have an impact on everything else. And not just animals — we are talking plants, trees, right down to one-cell organisms.”- Earth Island Journal
The Department of Energy (DOE) and IEEE reported there are serious health risks from LEDs if inexpensive drivers are used. DOE writes, “Why is flicker bad? For one thing, in addition to being annoying and distracting, it can cause eyestrain, blurred vision, and impairment of performance on sight-related tasks. And in those who are flicker-sensitive, it can cause debilitating headaches and migraines — 10% of the population is estimated to suffer from migraines, and that’s only one of the groups prone to flicker sensitivity. According to the IEEE recommended practice, flicker has been reported to contribute to autistic behaviors, and can be a trigger for epileptic seizures.… Some of these problems might occur even when the flicker isn’t detectable by the eye.”
The EMF Safety Network sent a list of questions to PG&E about their LED streetlights. We await their answers. We can trust PG&E will cut costs and we can’t be certain they will tell the public the truth. We don’t know whether or not PG&E will be using the streetlights for wireless transmissions, as has been done in Los Angeles and Florida. The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) had a presentation on their website that touted the benefits of “intelligent” wireless streetlights.
We don’t know if PG&E is installing these, but we do know the rapid increase of microwave technologies deployed on our homes and in our neighborhoods, largely without informed consent, threatens privacy, public health, children, wildlife and nature.
The other risk is whether or not the LED streetlights add unintentional radiation to the power lines, creating “dirty electricity” like PG&E smart meters do. Samuel Milham, MD and David Stetzer, Electrical Engineer wrote a peer reviewed published paper in 2013. They wrote, “Dirty electricity, also called electrical pollution, is high-frequency voltage transients riding along the 50 or 60 Hz electricity provided by the electric utilities… has been associated with cancer, diabetes and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in humans.
Some people claim brighter streetlights will help reduce crime. However, Earth Island Journal reported “Public safety was a big motivator behind the Oakland conversion project, and it may seem intuitive that brighter lights improve safety. However, some studies suggest that though brighter streets make people feel safer, they have no impact on actual crime levels.”
In 2015, PG&E’s claims of LED cost and energy savings were merely assumptions. In the CPUC 2015 Uncertain List they stated, “market move to LED technology requires verification.” As yet PG&E has offered no proof. In addition the city claimed the streetlight conversion would be free, however PG&E intends to recover streetlight costs through customers rate increases. So we all pay for the LED streetlights.
Why should perfectly good streetlights be scrapped for a risky technology whose benefits are questionable? A study published in late 2010 in the journal Environmental Science and Technology found that LEDs contain lead, arsenic and a dozen other potentially dangerous substances. While it is possible that the LED’s save energy, it’s not worth the cost to public and environmental health.
In September 2015, the Sebastopol city council had the PG&E streetlight conversion on their consent calendar. Due to complaints, they took the issue off consent and put it on the regular agenda. At that meeting, Rich Emig, Public Works superintendent, gave a report acknowledging the LED health risks. Public comments included one woman who said when she was a child she had seizures from light flicker. See the Sebastopol City Council’s video which starts at 1:40:00
Considering the city acknowledged the serious pubic health risks, why are they bringing it back to the council, and why have they not notified the public of this issue that will affect each and everyone of us?
Darkness is a requisite part of life. “Half of your life, half of the lives of all nature, half of all human history has occurred between sunset and sunrise. We and all of the natural kingdom have evolved in a landscape that segues from a bright blessed day to a dark sacred night. A dark night is really that–sacred. Every cell in the human body has time-related functions, part of the bigger circadian system. I’m referring to science, not some woo-woo feel-good incense-laden chanting mysticism. Healthy life depends on critical functions for which the absence of light is essential.”
1. All outdoor lighting shall be full cutoff, or fully shielded.
2. If LED lights are used, they shall have a correlated color temperature (CCT) less than 3000K.
3. All lights shall minimize glare, sky glow, and light trespass. —–Excerpt and recommendations from www.Nightwise.org
The city of Berkeley California was recently sued by the wireless industry CTIA (Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association) over their Cell Phone Right to Know ordinance. The ordinance requires retailers to warn customers about cell phone risks. Berkeley’s advisory at point of sale states: “To assure safety, the Federal Government requires that cell phones meet radio frequency (RF) exposure guidelines. If you carry or use your phone in a pants or shirt pocket or tucked into a bra when the phone is ON and connected to a wireless network, you may exceed the federal guidelines for exposure to RF radiation. Refer to the instructions in your phone or user manual for information about how to use your phone safely.”
CTIA argued the ordinance would be misleading, give off an impression of harm, and would violate retailers’ First Amendment rights by forcing them to distribute information they might disagree with.
In September U.S. District Court Judge Chen ruled that Berkeley’s law is not a violation of the industry’s first amendment rights, but did tell Berkeley to remove one controversial line about the risk to children, which they did.
Last week’s hearing was to remove the ban, now that the line has been removed, and allow implementation. Ted Olson, attorney for the CTIA, sent Judge Chen 25 pages of further argument after his original decision. The Judge agreed to allow further argument last week. Larry Lessig, Harvard Constitutional Law Professor and Robert Post, Dean of Yale Law School are defending Berkeley pro bono.
Yesterday, less than one week after the court hearing, Judge Chen removed the ban on the Berkeley law despite CTIA’s numerous arguments. Chen also denied the wireless group’s motion to stay his order dissolving the injunction pending appeal.
This week the Maine Supreme Court upheld the finding of utility regulators regarding smart meter safety. The Court supported this difficult to follow position: “It is one thing to make a finding that evidence is credible regarding potential harm and quite another to find there is a legally credible threat of harm—that a credible threat of harm is in fact credible: likely and probable to result in harm.”
The court weighed health and safety precautions with utilities bottom line. “The Commission, therefore, properly rejected Friedman’s approach because it would require an impractically high threshold for ensuring safety, and as a result would render nearly all utilities unsafe.”
The Court upheld this position, even though they knew there is evidence of risk. “The Commission acknowledged that there had been some evidence presented of potential future risk posed generally by RF exposure,…”
The key to the ruling is what the court calls, “balancing the potential for harm against the usefulness and pervasiveness of the technology at issue.”
This ruling culminates a four year legal battle in Maine over the health and safety effects of smart meters. Even though the legal burden was on the utility (CMP) to show smart meters were safe, the Court ignored this and placed the burden on the customer to pay to avoid the risk of pulsed radiation smart meters emit.
Ed Friedman stated: “ The Court has miserably failed the people of Maine. They ignored independent testimony from international experts on the credible threat of harm RF exposures at smart meter levels pose, and instead chose to believe the “Marlboro Man” that smoking is good for us.”
We are in an era of unprecedented psychological manipulation of the science on potential health effects of EMF and RFR.
