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Health

Mobile phone safety

There has been considerable research into this controversial topic. You are welcome to wait until they can conclusively state that it causes a disease process or you can listen to the warning signs. Remember that for something to be conclusive, it typically has to endure longitudinal studies. It is basically too early to say whether mobiles are safe in the long term. Don’t forget – the base stations are also concerning especially their proximity to where you live.

A few important facts – radio waves at their current guideline levels can cause a change in brain activity, although it is not known why; all experts agree that we must limit the use of mobiles by young children. Some interesting findings – laboratory tests on mice have shown that radiation from mobile phones can have an adverse effect on their overall health, a study by scientists in Finland, suggested that the electromagnetic radiation did affect human brain tissue, but they played down their findings saying more research was needed to see if the effects were the same in living people. Another study by scientists in Sweden, claimed to have found a link between analogue mobile phones and brain tumours.

You can minimise your exposure to radio waves in the following ways; only make short calls and do not use it more than necessary; children should only use if absolutely necessary; find out the specific absorption rate (SAR) of your mobile (reflects how much radio wave energy is absorbed into the body from the phone); keep your mobile phone away from your body when it is in standby mode; only use your phone when the reception is strong. Weak reception causes the phone to use more energy to communicate with the base station; If possible, use a mobile phone that has an external antenna. This keeps the radio waves as far away from your head as possible.