Cellphones became globally ubiquitous just 10-15 years ago, so the impact of cellphone radiation on our health can only be assessed in a couple of decades. Not so long ago, microwave ovens were blasted as health destroyers. Sure thing! By the intensity of electromagnetic radiation, they are second to none. And though you aren’t supposed to put your head in a microwave oven, many people still reject them for health reasons – it’s better to be safe than sorry.
Scientists have long been warning us that cellphones transmit radiation through ear directly into brain. The more dependent we are on electronic gadgets and the Internet, the louder and more persistent those warnings become. But things may not be as bad as they seem: we, each of us, can minimize the risk.
“Putting you head in a microwave oven is certainly more harmful than walking around with a cellphone in your hand for a whole day. Nevertheless, it’s the cellphones that researchers are focusing their attention on today. Plenty of data has been gathered. There is a special international commission studying the effects of electromagnetic radiation. When the number of cellphone users doubled and the number of children using mobile phones increased five-fold, some evidence of a direct link between cellphone and malignant tumors, above all cancer tumors in brain and ear, has been found. The findings have prompted a British cellphone company to stop producing tubes for kids aged between 4 and 8. Scientists strongly advise parents to prevent children under 8 from using cellphones. As for adults, it should be remembered that the intensity of radiation is inversely proportional to the square of the distance. For example, if you keep your cellphone and your hotel card in one pocket, the card risks being demagnetized. But that won’t happen, if you put the cellphone in another pocket. It’s as simple as that. Just don’t keep you cellphone near your head or put it near your bed when you go to sleep,” Andrei Masalovich, a telecommunications engineer and President of the Inforus consortiu, told the Voice of Russia.
The very latest studies were conducted in the Netherlands and Britain. It was mostly statistical research aimed at tracing correlations between disease rates and living conditions. Living near a high-voltage power transmission line or in a radar station is a hundred times more dangerous than using a cellphone. But would you believe that living in a penthouse or in an upper floor of a multi-storey building is equally harmful? That’s because electromagnetic waves are superimposed on the physical micro-vibrations of an edifice.
Some countries have moved to work out cellphone use norms. They recommend avoiding outdated models and talking on a cellphone for not more than 3-5 minutes not more than once in 20 minutes. Use hands-free sets and don’t use signal enhancers.
Opponents argue that cellphone regulations will impede technological progress. Andrei Masalovich disagrees.
“Bin Laden used to repeat what they had taught him in a terrorist school that any object containing batteries posed a threat. That’s why he carried nothing with him except a Kalashnikov gun because it had no batteries. That’s why he lived so long… But jokes aside, any source of electromagnetic radiation is harmful. The more medics speak about that, the harder companies work on safer technologies,” he said.
Try not to overuse smartphones or tablets if you care about your health, physical as well as mental, since too much time spent in virtual reality undermines your cognitive and communicative abilities in real life.
Ksenia Fokina
technology, Mobile phone, smartphon, health, hazard, Society

http://voiceofrussia.com/2014_01_24/Researchers-ring-alarm-about-harmful-effects-of-radiation-emitted-by-cellphones-6340/