Stronger Pathogens or Weaker Immune Systems?

In 1985, Dr. Robert Becker, a renowned researcher and expert on the
effects of EMFs on the body, was probably more than right when he
wrote in his book, "The Body Electric":

"The admittedly sketchy evidence to date suggests that our
electropollution is presenting us, and perhaps all animals, with a
double challenge: weaker immune systems and stronger diseases. We
shouldn't be surprised, then, at an onslaught of "new" ailments,
beginning about 1950 and accelerating toward the future. In several
cases, new maladies have recently been described as coming from
pathogens that previously weren't capable of inducing disease, and
this, too shouldn't surprise us. Among the newcomers are:

• Reye'e syndrome. First described in 1963, this condition begins
with severe vomiting as a child is recovering from the flu or chicken
pox. It then progresses to lethargy, personality changes,
convulsions, coma, and death. The mortality rate, initially very
high, has now been reduced to about 10 percent, but the incidence has
increased greatly.

• Lyme Disease. A virus disease carried by certain insects, it
produces severe arthritis in humans. It's one of several similar
illnesses that have appeared only recently.

• Legionnaires Disease. This is a pneumonia caused by a common soil
bacterium that has found a second home in air-conditioning systems.
The organism caused us no recognized problems before the initial
outbreak in 1976.

• AIDS. Autoimmune deficiency syndrome is a condition in which the
body's immune system fails completely and its owner often dies. The
patient is unable to resist common, otherwise harmless bacteria and
viruses, and can no longer suppress the seeds of cancer that reside
in all of us. At present, some sort of virus is suspected as the
precipitating cause.

• Herpes Genitalis. This disease isn't new, but its prevalence and
severity have increased tremendously in one decade. Sexual
permissiveness generally takes the blame, but a decline in
immunocompetence may be more important.

Certainly, there are additional factors that may be contributing to
the rise of these and other illnesses. Chemical pollution and the
prevalence of junk food are two of the most obvious. However, these
diseases, as well as cancer, birth defects, and other growth problems
described below, are on the increase throughout the industrialized
world. So are some of the major psychological diseases, such as
depression and compulsive uses of all types of drugs, from caffiene,
nicotine, and alcohol to prescription tranquilizers and the illegal
euphoriants. Although, heart-attack death rates have declined in the
last five years (for no known reason), they're still far higher than
before World War 2. These diseases exist at more or less the same
rates in countries whose chemical toxicity, eating habits, and styles
of life are widely divergent. However, the massive use of
electromagnetic energy is a common denominator uniting all of the
developed nations. In particular, the entire North American
continent, Western Europe, and Japan generate such strong 50- and 60-
hertz fields that they can be sensed by satellites in space. The
populations of these areas are continously bombarded by these ELF
fields." pp.294-295