2023 Short Takes
Declassified Intelligence Report Renews Concern over RF Weapons
A newly declassified, though heavily redacted, report from the intelligence community has put renewed emphasis on the possibility that the condition known as “Havana Syndrome” could be caused by pulsed RF energy.
“Electromagnetic energy, particularly pulsed signals in the radiofrequency range, plausibly explains the core characteristics [of Havana Syndrome, also called ‘anomalous health incidents’] although information gaps exist,” the intelligence panel concluded.
The report, Anomalous Health Incidents: Analysis of Potential Causal Mechanisms, was prepared for the Director of National Intelligence, Avril Haines, and the Deputy Director of the CIA, David Cohen. It was released to attorney Mark Zaid at the James Madison Project in Washington, DC. Salon broke the news yesterday evening.
The names of the authors of the report were censored. “The panel comprised experts from inside and outside the U.S. Government with expertise in relevant areas of science, medicine and engineering,” according to the report. All had top secret clearances.
Symptoms of Havana Syndrome include hearing loss, vertigo, headaches, nausea and various other unexplained neurological complaints.
Support for 2020 Findings of the National Academy of Sciences
The new report, dated September 2022, supports the conclusions of a 2020 assessment by a committee of the National Academy of Sciences, chaired by Stanford University professor David Relman. That panel found:
Considering the available information and the possible mechanisms, the committee felt that many of the distinctive and acute signs, symptoms, and observations reported by Department of State employees “are consistent with the effects of directed, pulsed radio frequency (RF) energy.”
Only about a third of the members of Relman’s group had security clearances. Linda Birnbaum, the former director of NIEHS and the NTP, was a member of the NAS panel.
Two years later, Relman was still concerned about RF radiation. “We have identified an area of science and medicine that I think is very important that we really don’t know a whole lot about,” he told CNN. “How does the human body interact with electromagnetic energy? We really need to understand that better.”
Others believe that Havana Syndrome is a form of mass hysteria. For instance, just last week, Robert Bartholomew, a sociologist, writing in Psychology Today called the whole controversy a “fiasco.” All those symptoms were “not caused by a secret weapon, but an array of health conditions and anxiety,” he argued.
Key Findings
The key conclusions of the new intelligence committee report are:
• “The signs and symptoms of AHIs are genuine and compelling.”
• “A subset of AHIs [has] a unique combination of core characteristics that cannot be explained by known environmental or medical conditions and could be due to external stimuli.”
• “Electromagnetic energy, particularly pulsed signals in the radiofrequency range, plausibly explains the core characteristics, although information gaps exist.”
• “Ultrasound also plausibly explains the core characteristics, but only in close-access scenarios and with information gaps.”
• “Psychosocial factors alone cannot account for the core characteristics, although they may explain some other reported incidents or contribute to long-term signs and symptoms.”
• “Ionizing radiation, chemical and biological agents, infrasound, audible sound, ultrasound propagated over large distances, and bulk heating from electromagnetic energy are all implausible explanations for the core characteristics in the absence of other synergistic stimuli.”
Here are three noteworthy snippets from the new report (unfortunately, the references are not included in what was released):
On the blood-brain barrier (p.7):
On the auditory effect first described by Allan Frey (p.25):
On low-frequency modulation/high-frequency carrier (p.28):
Professor Allowed Back on Campus; No Action Taken
The University at Albany in New York State has closed its investigation of Professor David Carpenter, the director of its Institute for Health and the Environment, without taking any disciplinary action.
After being barred from going to his office most of last year, Carpenter may now once again “teach and conduct research on campus,” according to a statement released by the University on Tuesday evening.
The full text of the statement is below:
On Wednesday, Carpenter issued his own statement, in which he says that he’s “very proud of [his] work with plaintiffs around the country who seek to hold Monsanto responsible for the damage done by its products.” And that he is “humbled and deeply appreciative of the thousands of people who heard about my situation and supported me.” (Full text, below.)
Carpenter Placed on “Alternate Assignment”
Just over two weeks ago, on February 5, the Albany Times Union reported that Carpenter had been “quietly placed on alternate assignment” as the University conducted a “disciplinary investigation” of his work as an expert witness on the health effects of PCBs, a family of highly toxic chemicals, formally known as polychlorinated biphenyls. They were manufactured by Monsanto until they were banned by the EPA in the late 1970s. (More about PCBs here.)
While this investigation was going on, Carpenter was “instructed to not visit any campuses and perform his duties from home,” according to the Times Union.
It is not clear what Carpenter is accused of doing wrong. He donated all his consulting fees, except those for travel expenses, to fund scholarships for his students, with, as the Times Union spells out, “the consent of top university officials.”
His suspension prompted widespread protests. A petition decrying Monsanto’s attacks on Carpenter —posted on Change.org— has been signed by more than a thousand supporters. A rally to draw public attention to his predicament was scheduled to be held at the state capitol in Albany on Thursday, February 23.
Among the professional groups speaking out for Carpenter are the Ramazzini Institute, based in Bologna, Italy, and the International Commission on the Biological Effects of EMFs (ICBE-EMF). The Commission’s release states that Albany’s attempt to silence Carpenter “brings shame to this University.”
In an editorial, Environmental Health News accused the university of helping Monsanto silence Carpenter.
“UAlbany reiterates in the strongest possible terms our full commitment to unfettered academic freedom,” the University stated in its public announcement.
The university’s investigation was prompted by a records request by the Shook Hardy & Bacon law firm, working on behalf of Monsanto, in its litigtion on PCBs. (What remains of Monsanto is now owned by Bayer.) Monsanto is also the maker of Round-Up, a glyphosate herbicide, which has been and continues to be at the center for another major health controversy.
In 2015, IARC classified PCBs and dioxin-like PCBs as a known (Class 1) human carcinogen.
David Carpenter, photo by Paul Buckowski, Times Union
On February 13, the Times Union published a follow-up story detailing how Shook Hardy was using the university’s investigation to try and silence Carpenter in an ongoing case in which he is serving as an expert witness for the Saint Regis Mohawk Tribe. The tribe is suing Monsanto for PCB contamination of its lands, that are adjacent to a chemical dump.
A Major Force in EMF/RF Research
In addition to his work on toxic chemicals, for over 40 years Carpenter has been a leading force in efforts to study and regulate the health effects of electromagnetic fields (EMFs) and radiation.
He led the New York Power Line Project in the early 1980s, which resulted in the confirmation of the landmark epidemiological study by Nancy Wertheimer and Ed Leeper, which first linked power line EMFs to childhood leukemia. The NY project report, issued in 1987, brought international attention to the power line cancer risk. Fifteen years later, in 2001, IARC classified power-frequency fields as a possible (class 2B) carcinogen.
In 1994, Carpenter and Sinerik Ayrapetyan coedited a two-volume collection of review papers, under the title, The Biological Effects of Electric and Magnetic Fields, published by Academic Press.
Carpenter is the coeditor, with Cindy Sage, of the BioIniative Report, which promotes stricter exposure standards for EMFs and RF radiation. First issued in 2007, the Report has been regularly updated.
More recently, Carpenter has raised questions about the safety of 5G radiation, the latest generation of cell phone technology. For this, he was harshly criticized in two separate articles by William Broad, a science reporter at the New York Times. They were published just a few months apart in 2019 (see our “A Fact-Free Hit on a 5G Critic” and “Open Season on 5G Critics”). At about the same time, the Times announced that it had “joined forces with Verizon to create the 5G Journalism Lab.” (See this paid post on the New York Times website.) Verizon is one of the largest telecom companies in the world with revenues on the order of $150 billion a year.
Carpenter, who is 86-year-old, is one of two editors-in-chief of Reviews on Environmental Health, a journal published by De Gruyter.
The Times Union story on Carpenter’s reinstatement is here.
See also: “Professor Says He Was Barred from Campus After FOIA Inquiry,” Inside Higher Ed, February 20.
Abraham Liboff, a biophysicst and journal editor, died on January 9 at the age of 95.
Abe was a wonderful and generous man. On the occasion of his 90th birthday, I wrote an appreciation of his work. You can read it here.
Tribute in Electromagnetic Biology and Medicine
March 21, 2023
Joseph Salvatore and Henry Lai, the current and former editors-in-chief of the journal Electromagnetic Biology and Medicine, have published a tribute to Abe Liboff.
Liboff was the editor of the journal from 1998 to 2010.
“His work has inspired generations of nonionizing-electromagnetic field (EMF) researchers,” they write. “His influence will be felt for many years to come.”
Their tribute is open access.