A Report on Non-Ionizing Radiation

NTP Cancer Study
Now Due Early 2018

August 30, 2017

The National Toxicology Program (NTP) will release the “complete results” of its $25 million project on cell phone cancer risks early next year, according to a statement posted on its Web site yesterday.

“The complete results from all the rats and mice studies will be available for peer review and public comment by early 2018,” the NTP states. The animals were exposed to GSM or CDMA radiation for two years before they were sacrificed and evaluated for signs of cancer.

The NTP report had been expected by the end of this year.

The final report has been highly anticipated since the spring of last year when the NTP announced that cell phone radiation increased the incidence of tumors in the brain and heart of male rats. At the time, the NTP posted some partial results from the rat experiments. No details of the mice studies have yet been made public. The early release followed a story on the findings in Microwave News.

NTP’s announcement of a cell phone–cancer risk attracted worldwide attention. The NTP results led the American Cancer Society and Consumer Reports, two organizations that had long been skeptical about a cancer link, to change their positions and advise caution in the use of wireless phones. Even so, many in the media, notably reporters at the New York Times and the Washington Post, expressed skepticism and told their readers to disregard the results. “Don’t Believe the Hype” ran the headline in the Washington Post. (See our “News Media Nix NTP Cancer Study.”)

The cell phone manufacturers —Apple, Google, Nokia (Microsoft) and Samsung— have all remained largely silent.

In addition to the animal studies, the NTP will release its findings showing DNA breaks in the brains of the male rats. The original plan was to publish those results as a stand-alone paper, but they will now be part of the general report.

One of the most commonly cited reasons to discount the NTP results has been that brain cancer rates have not been increasing in the general population. This may be true for all brain tumors combined, but it does not apply to the most virulent and deadly type, glioblastoma multiforme, better known as GBM. The incidence of GBM is rising in the U.S., as well as in other countries, including The Netherlands and the U.K. (Senator John McCain was recently diagnosed as having a GBM.)

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