Board of health sending letter to school board questioning installing of Wi-Fi in local public schools

By KENNEDY GORDON Examiner Staff Writer

Updated 1 day ago

The local board of health wants to know why the public school board went ahead with a plan to install Wi-Fi systems in all its schools even as parents raise concerns that the technology can cause harm.

“Can we not encourage them to used wired (Internet) until more information is in?” asked board member Jim Embrey after a presentation by members of the Kawartha Safe Technology Initiative during Wednesday’s monthly meeting of the board.

“It seems like a no-brainer to me.”

The meeting was held at the Peterborough County-City Health Unit.

Kathy McDermid of the initiative gave a short presentation outlining her group’s concerns that the radiation from wireless Internet can have health effects, particularly on children exposed to it over the course of a school year.

“Can we not encourage them to used wired (Internet) until more information is in? It seems like a no-brainer to me.”
Jim Embrey

She cited new research claiming the radiation given off by wireless routers and computers is more powerful than previously thought.



“This is the equivalent of placing a cell tower in each and every schoolyard,” she said.
Several other members of the group were in the audience.

The Kawartha Pine Ridge District School Board has been phasing in wireless Internet networks in all its schools, replacing the older hard-wired connections.

While no link has been proven, the concerns are enough to call for a moratorium until all the facts are in, McDermid said, explaining that the World Health Organization has classified the radiation from cell phones and wireless Internet a Class 4b, meaning it may be a potential carcinogen but has not been studied enough.

She asked the board to request that the Kawartha Pine Ridge District School Board used wired Internet until Wi-Fi is declared Class 4, or safe, acknowledging the health board doesn’t really have a say.

“I think policy set out by this board could be a strong guiding force,” she said.

McDermid told the health board schools want to see more children using laptops, netbooks and even their own tablets and smartphones, making the need for Wi-Fi more important.

“If it means people can’t come in with their laptops and their whatevers, so be it,” said Coun. Henry Clarke, a health board member. “Hardwire (the schools) and be done with it.”

Cavan Monaghan Mayor John Fallis made a motion that the health board write to the school board to inquire why the decision was made to go wireless. The motion was carried.

“I think this community is very interested in where this is going,” said health board chairman Andy Sharpe, deputy mayor of Havelock-Belmont-Methuen.

NOTE: The Peterborough County-City board of health gave its thanks to Dr. Dick Ito, the health unit’s dental consultant, for his work on the Healthy Smiles program over the past five years. He was presented with a framed print … Health unit administrative assistant Wendy Freeburn gave board members a presentation on A Day In The Life of the health unit’s busy secretaries … board members will experiment with electronic agendas on laptops in the weeks to come, slowly replacing paper agendas.

kgordon@peterboroughexaminer.com

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