01 July 2015
France: "I am 18 Years
Old and Electrohypersensitive"
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Mélody, electrohypersensitive
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Toulouse: The long,
hard battle of Mélody, electrohypersensitive, to pass the baccalaureate
by Fabrice Valery,
france3-regions,
26 June 2015 (translated from French by the Editor of this
blog)
This is an unusual story:
Mélody, 18, diagnosed with electrohypersensitivity, suffers terribly from
electromagnetic waves. She is taking distance-learning courses and will
take the baccalaureate (bac) L this year. Not always easy.
She could be a student like
any other, taking the bac in literature, at the Saint-Sernin high school test
center in Toulouse. But Mélody suffers from electrohypersensitivity and
"benefits" (in theory) from accommodations to take these tests in
conditions which keep her away from the electromagnetic waves that make her
suffer so much.
Isolated during the written tests
In order to take the written
tests, Mélody was placed in a room away from other bac candidates, alone with a
proctor. She has a certificate for electrosensitivity and it is this
document which allowed this special accommodation. "No cell phone
nearby", explains her mother. "No Wi-Fi and even less wave
interference which is very powerful and aggravates the situation."
The bac is also... an
ordeal!
But all did not happen as
foreseen: during one of the written tests this week, the proctor switched
on his cell phone and computer while Mélody was taking the test.
Thursday, for the oral in English, she had to wait two hours in a
corridor with other final-grade students... all having cell phones!
Courses at home since her
5th year [7th grade in U.S.]
Mélody is used to working
alone. She has not been going to class since the 5th year and takes
courses at home from the national center for distance-learning education [centre national d'éducation à distance (CNED)].
A task that is often difficult and less substantial than classroom
studies with a "real" teacher. However her health takes
priority.
Tremendous pain
Mélody's (and her parents')
electrosensitivity was detected only in 2011 by Professor Dominique Belpomme,
well-known Parisian oncologist and specialist in the effects of waves on the
body. Years before, her parents wondered what ill was affecting them:
violent headaches, nausea, vomiting, tinnitus, loss of concentration,
electrical current in the neck and throat... It was torture.
Mélody even
developed an auto-immune disease, cholinergic urticaria. "It's a
little like the pores of your skin being brutally transformed into small
blisters, with the burns that go with it", explains her mother.
A
mobile phone tower opposite the home
Mélody's parents appealed to Antenne 31, a group of associations which
oppose the installation of mobile phone emitters near places of residence.
"As part of the initial measures in our home," explains
Mélody's mother, "they advised us to remove cordless phones and cell
phones and try to protect ourselves from the mobile phone tower which is near
our house". In order to "protect" themselves, the family
had to change the layout of rooms in the home in L'Union, near Toulouse:
on the ground floor near the garage, the waves are not as strong as
upstairs!
Here you may
consult waves near your home on the site of the French Frequency Agency (ANFR -
Agence nationale des fréquences
Thriving, nevertheless
This
handicap (which is not however recognized as such) has made Mélody a bac
candidate like no other. She is not, however, a young lady cut off from the
world. She is passionate about information, politics, culture.
Music is for her a true haven of peace: piano especially, which she
learned to play by herself. She also loves the movies. But she must
go during off-peak hours and hope that other moviegoers will switch off their
cell phones and not just keep them in silent mode.
Explaining, always
explaining "the invisible"
"No," says her mother,
"it is not a genetic disease; nor does one catch it, as people often
ask us." Electrosensitivity is a reaction of the body to the
electromagnetic waves that surround us.
The most difficult thing, even passing
the bac with a certificate like Mélody, is to explain, and continue to explain,
that one is suffering "because of something intangible and invisible."
This affliction is unknown to the general public and even scientists
continue to battle over the effects of electromagnetic waves on the human body.
With
a degree and... free
On 7 July, Mélody will, like the other candidates,
become impatient over learning her results. "I don't want any more
of the CNED [distance-learning program] ," she says. The bac, for
her, will be a liberation.
"I am 18 years old and
electrohypersensitive" by Mélody
We are publishing here a long letter written by Mélody for a better understanding of her situation. I am 18 years old and electrohypersensitive (EHS). I am studying through a distance learning program with the CNED. It was when I was 13, on the terrace of our home on 27 May 2010 towards 4.30 in the afternoon, that I found myself covered with giant hives from head to toe for no apparent reason. On the tower opposite our house, Orange had had an antenna installed on 21 May 2010. We did research to try to understand what could have caused the hives, called "cholinergic". The conclusion was objective and clear. We understood that I had an allergy to electromagnetic waves. The relay antenna, 66 meters [216 feet] high, located 280 meters [918 feet] from our house, was making us sick without knowing it, each time an important change occurred on the antenna. The discovery of my electrohypersensitivity was a relief, because for years, my parents and I had had many health problems without understanding the origin of these painful ailments which neither we nor the doctors could name. Today, this affliction which sticks to the skin has a name, but I am extremely worried about the future, for ours as well as that of today's and future children, and for the people who are still ignorant about the potential danger of electromagnetic waves. We are far from being against modernity, but we do not want to be sacrificed, like they said at a meeting of the Regional Health Agency (ARS). I was only 13 years old at the time, and to my great disillusion, an engineer told me: "In any case, we prefer sacrificing the electrohypersensitive people rather than depriving the world's population of their cell phones". I was shocked to hear this. Afraid of having misunderstood, we had him repeat the word "sacrifice". He replied, "Yes, sacrifice" without hesitation and without any qualms. I know full well that we must make progress in modernity but without danger to humanity... We must not doubt the danger of this new scourge. What is the future of an EHS child? These new wireless technologies: Invisible, Intangible, Odorless, Silent, Tasteless, have many consequences for health. Much proof has already been established in France and in the world. Is money more important than human lives on this magnificent planet? My affliction often results in headaches (very strong compression on the skull like a vise), continuous tinnitus, at times, more brutal and intense, a lack of concentration, memory problems like forgetting the words one means, backaches, tingling in the neck (like an electrical current), muscular aches, especially in the mornings when the body has remained sedentary during the nighttime, stinging of the eyes and sometimes red, dry eyes that itch, burning sensation in the stomach and sometimes vomiting. The nights are at times short, with insomnia from 2 to 4 in the morning. All these painful ills do not come at the same time, but some occur daily. What makes this physical (not mental!) ailment worse is to not be taken seriously and to be considered a hypochondriac. We would very much like to move, but where? We like our city and to move does not mean being safer. More relay antennas have to be installed without lowering the threshold... they are even more powerful in the countryside. The exposure to waves is more and more dangerous and stronger since 4G. We are developing more and more new invisible wireless technology. However, a cell phone can function with less voltage, and one can lower the threshold to 0.4 V/m instead of 60 V/m. We live with this ill daily, all the while trying to find a solution to survive day to day, because we love life. This sensitivity to electromagnetic waves is for me the sixth sense of our body. We feel invisible pulsations. If some people are not sensitive like us, the waves are still going through them. It is here that we can become aware that the invisible on this earth may be as dangerous as the visible. I would like to live a normal life like everyone else, to be a young lady who is free to go everywhere without being confronted by these electromagnetic waves. I am trying to have a social life like everyone else. Often I pretend that there is nothing, but unfortunately I pay for it when I have become too exposed. In the courtyard of my school, there is also a 33-meter-high relay antenna [108 feet]. During this time, I was suffering unbearable headaches. I remember that it was only beneath a protective covering in the school playground that I felt some relief, without knowing why... This wireless technology is a new addiction worse than drugs because it starts much earlier. It is not too late to react!
Mélody
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