A Report on Non-Ionizing Radiation

ICNIRP: Microwave News Article Archive (2004 - )

December 6, 2021

“Health Safety Guidelines and 5G Wireless Radiation” by James Lin, IEEE Microwave Magazine, January 2022. “Some of the updated [IEEE and ICNIRP] safety recommendations are marginal, questionable, and lack scientific justification from the perspective of safety protection.”

August 26, 2021

Auditory Effects of Microwave Radiation, a new 348-page book by James Lin, published by Nature Springer. Lin, an emeritus professor at the University of Illinois, Chicago, is the editor-in-chief of Bioelectromagnetics. From 2004 to 2016, he was a member of ICNIRP.

May 15, 2021

“Exposure to ELF Magnetic Fields and Childhood Cancer: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis,” PLoS One, May 14, 2021. Significant associations were observed between exposure to ELF-MFs and childhood leukemia. Furthermore, a possible dose-response effect was also observed.”

April 13, 2021

“Science, Politics, and Groupthink,” by James Lin, IEEE Microwave Magazine, May 2021.

Lin faults ICNIRP for preferring to “quibble” over the 2018 NTP and Ramazzini RF–animal studies rather than concluding that they point to a cancer risk. He writes: “The simultaneous penchant to dismiss and criticize positive results and the fondness for and eager acceptance of negative findings are palpable and concerning.”

January 19, 2021

“Electromagnetic Fields, 5G and Health: What About the Precautionary Principle?” Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health, January 19, 2021, by John William Frank of the University of Edinburgh. “After reviewing the evidence cited above, the writer, an experienced physician-epidemiologist, is convinced that RF-EMFs may well have serious human health effects."

November 11, 2020

An advisory panel to the Health Council of the Netherlands is recommending a “cautious approach” to 5G radiation exposures.

The committee is also advising that the 26 GHz frequency band (millimeter waves) not be used “for as long as the potential health risks have not been investigated.”

September 25, 2020

Very little has been written in the popular media about the waveforms used in 5G signals. Two outstanding questions are: How fast are the pulses? How powerful are they?

In 2018, Esra Neufeld and Niels Kuster of the IT’IS Foundation in Zurich issued a warning in a...

June 25, 2020

The German government is the main sponsor of ICNIRP, the International Commission for Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection.

The Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU), which is the bureaucratic parent of the Federal Office for Radiation Protection (BfS), has contributed 70-80% of ICNIRP’s annual income in each of the last three years. This...

April 9, 2020

We’re all frazzled and anxious. The world has changed, seemingly overnight, and we don’t know when and how we will ever go back to normal —whatever that means. One thing we don’t have to worry about is whether 5G radiation is responsible for COVID-19. It’s not. There’s no credible evidence to suggest otherwise.

Yet, there is at least one important parallel between how we’ve been struggling with COVID-19 over the last few months and how we have been dealing with electromagnetic radiation for the last few decades. In each case, science has taken a back seat to politics.

March 11, 2020

The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) has issued updated guidelines for exposures to RF/microwave radiation.

“The guidelines have been developed after a thorough review of all relevant scientific literature, scientific workshops and an extensive public consultation process. They provide protection against all scientifically substantiated adverse health effects due to EMF exposure in the 100 kHz to 300 GHz range,” according to...

February 20, 2019

A major review of cell phone cancer risks is at the center of an ongoing controversy over whether it is biased and should be withdrawn.

The new paper by some of the most prominent members of the RF–health community contends that epidemiological studies do not show an increased risk of brain tumors or acoustic neuroma associated with the use of mobile phones. That is, cell phones are cancer safe.

Titled “Brain and Salivary Gland Tumors and Mobile Phone Use: Evaluating the Evidence from Various Epidemiological Study Designs,” the...

February 20, 2019

It has been nearly eight years since an expert panel of the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) classified RF radiation as a possible human carcinogen. Since then, neither the World Health Organization (WHO) nor the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) has recommended precautionary policies to limit potential health risks.

No U.S. health agency has yet advised the public to reduce RF exposures.

Even after two large animal studies —by the U.S. National Toxicology Program (NTP) and Italy’s Ramazzini Institute— presented clear evidence of a cancer link last year, the WHO has remained silent; ICNIRP responded by calling both animal studies unconvincing.

Now comes the Annual Review of Public Health, which on January 11 posted a paper by five leading epidemiologists who posit that, after a systematic review of all the human studies, they don’t see an elevated cancer risk. The takeaway is that the IARC classification was a mistake.

November 30, 2018

“Systematic Derivation of Safety Limits for Time-Varying 5G RF Exposure Based on Analytical Models and Thermal Dose,” Health Physics, December 2018.

“Another conclusion of this study is that the current ICNIRP (1998) and IEEE (2005, 2010) guidelines urgently need to be revised, as the duty cycle of 1,000 currently tolerated can produce unacceptable temperature increases that may result in permanent tissue damage.” From IT’IS in Zurich.

September 12, 2018

“Critique of the ICNIRP Note of September 4, 2018, Regarding Recent Animal Carcinogenesis Studies,” Ron Melnick, September 12, 2018.

Ron Melnick, formerly with NTP, spells out 15 “extensive and misleading” statements made by ICNIRP on the NTP and Ramazzini cell phone–animal studies. Also today, Ramazzini’s Fiorella Belpoggi  posted her comments. See also Melnick’s commentary on the NTP study posted (Sept 20) by Environmental Research.

September 4, 2018

The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) has determined that the two recent animal studies pointing to a cancer risk from cell phone radiation are not convincing and should not be used to revise current exposure standards. 

In a “note” published today, the 12-member group states that the studies by the National Toxicology Program (NTP) and...

August 29, 2018

“Clear Evidence of Cell Phone RF Radiation Cancer Risk,” IEEE  Microwave Magazine, Sept/Oct 2018.

Jim Lin,12-yr former member of ICNIRP (& editor-in-chief of Bioelectomagnetics), writes: “Perhaps the time has come to judiciously reassess, revise & update [the ICNIRP] guidelines” so that they protect against long-term RF exposures. As of now they only address acute effects.

December 1, 2017

”A few days ago, I received an urgent warning from a longtime contact in Sweden. An industry associate had told him that the U.S. National Toxicology Program’s study on cell phone cancer risks was screwed up and essentially “useless.”

I was tempted to disregard it as nothing more than a corporate delusion. But the original source was said to be Maria Feychting, a professor at the Karolinska Institute and the vice chair of the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP). She had cast doubt on the landmark $25 million NTP RF–animal study in a talk presented at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences —the institute that awards the Nobel prizes in physics and chemistry every year.

I decided I had to check out the rumor.

June 21, 2017

“WHO, RFR and Health —A Hard Nut To Crack (Review),” International Journal of Oncology, posted June 21, 2017.

By Lennart Hardell. A review of WHO and ICNIRP’s roles in the ongoing evaluation of RF and health. Includes details of a March meeting with WHO’s Maria Neira, who denied there are any conflicts of interest at work. Open access.

January 21, 2017

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