Still Not Causing Cancer

This late-breaking non-news just in from Bob Park's What's New:

CELL PHONES: FIVE YEARS LATER THEY STILL DON'T CAUSE CANCER.
A study in the current issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute found no increased cancer risk from cell phone use over a 20 year period. This is an update of a Danish study in JNCI five years ago. The Danes keep good records. By just going to the computer they could compare cell phone use with the National Cancer Registry. I was invited to write an editorial in the same issue, JNCI, Vol 93, p.166 (Feb 7, 2001). I noted that cancer agents act by breaking chemical bonds, creating mutant strands of DNA. Microwave photons, however, aren't energetic enough to break a bond. Predictably, fear mongers said there must be an induction period. Still waiting. In 1993, a man whose wife died of brain cancer was a guest on Larry King Live. Her cancer, he said, was caused by a cell phone. The evidence? "She held it against her head and talked on it all the time."

Posted on December 8, 2006 at 19.30 by jns · Permalink
In: All, It's Only Rocket Science

One Response

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  1. Written by S.W. Anderson
    on Saturday, 9 December 2006 at 17.36
    Permalink

    Obviously, Larry King's guest was flogging a purely subjective notion, one probably heavily laden with emotion and maybe guilt, as fact. Just as obviously, King and CNN weren't presenting anything useful or helpful for viewers, but rather sensationalizing a woman's death and exploiting people's uncertainty.

    The cell phone question deserved investigation, including longterm observations in the field. Now, with the Danish findings, the technology is cleared, at least in that fashion.

    But I'm sure you realize the Danish historical/statistical findings on their own hardly qualify as airtight scientific proof.

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