Experts put a health warning on 'electrical allergy' advice
By Nic Fleming, Science Correspondent
(Filed: 04/11/2005)
People who believe electricity makes them ill should be informed of ways to reduce their exposure to appliances such as computers and hairdryers, a senior government health adviser said yesterday.
Dr Jill Meara, of the Health Protection Agency, said that while there was no scientific evidence to show electrical sensitivity was real, those who thought they were sufferers should be advised to consider keeping their distance from electric devices.
Brian Stein suffers from electromagnetic sensitivity
However, the Department of Health immediately contradicted the advice and a series of scientists criticised the HPA for advising the public how to avoid health risks that had not been scientifically proven.
Dr Meara, the deputy director of the HPA's radiation protection division, said: "There is no proof that the symptoms are caused by exposure to electromagnetic fields, but people still have real symptoms.
"There is sufficient uncertainty that it is worth telling members of the public practical things they can do to reduce exposure in case they feel they are suffering from these fields.
"It would be things like making sure people are far away from their appliances and buying slightly more expensive [low power] hair dryers, unlike those tinny ones that teenagers use.
"It's not an easy thing to study in a lab as people who suffer from it are not comfortable in an environment with a lot of electrical equipment."
But Sir Colin Berry, emeritus professor of pathology at Queen Mary University, London, said: "If there is no scientific evidence that electrical devices are causing people harm, one should be extremely careful about giving advice to people about what to do. If people believe they are being harmed by something they must take their own steps to avoid them, but I don't think it should be part of government policy to advise them about it."
John Adams, professor of risk at UCL, said: "This is yet another example of the modern disease of compulsive risk assessment psychosis - otherwise known as Crap."
Some researchers believe some people suffer symptoms including fatigue, headaches and skin problems when exposed to electromagnetic fields. But mainstream scientific and medical opinion does not recognise electrical sensitivity as a real condition.
A recent review of 30 studies into electrical sensitivity by Dr James Rubin at the King's College London School of Medicine found no evidence that electrical fields cause ill health.
This study and one being carried out at the University of Essex into whether attention span and memory are affected by exposure to a mobile phone mast have received £750,000 from the Government and telecommunications industry.
The Definition, Epidemiology and Management of Electrical Sensitivity report published yesterday was written by Dr Neil Irvine, an HPA epidemiologist in Belfast. He concluded that there was no proven scientific link between electromagnetic fields and ill health.
Omega this is not true. See under:
http://omega.twoday.net/topics/Wissenschaft+zu+Mobilfunk/
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Cancer+Cluster
http://www.buergerwelle.de/body_science.html
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=electrosensitive
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1108878/
Electrical pollution can influence allergies: the asthma plague
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1139199/
But the report found that for some people the symptoms were real and could have a big impact on their lives. It said some people were so badly affected that they were forced to move house, give up their jobs or move to remote areas.
Brian Stein, 56, a businessman from Nottingham, began to get severe pains in his ear while using his mobile phone about four years ago. Now he cannot use a computer or a telephone for more than a few minutes or travel by modern car, electrified train or on long distance flights.
He had to drop out of the Essex University tests because they made him too ill.
He said yesterday: "The one thing the scientists and authorities don't want to do is talk to people like me who are affected. If they did they might find a way to prove that the condition is actually real."
nfleming@telegraph.co.uk
Publishers wishing to reproduce photographs on this page should phone 44 (0) 207 538 7505 or e-mail syndication@telegraph.co.uk
© Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2005.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/11/04/nelec04.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/11/04/ixhome.html
--------
Dr Jill Meara
National Radiological Protection Board
Chilton, Didcot, Oxon, OXI1 ORQ, United Kingdom
Fax: +44 1235 822 630
Tel: +44 1235 822 612
E mail:
Jill.Meara@hpa-rp.org.uk
jill.meara@nrpb.org
Jrmeara@aol.com (home)
--------
Electro Hypersensitivity
This is a copy of an e-mail I have sent to Jill Meara following her comments on EHS.
Sylvia
Hello Dr Meara
I corresponded with you a year ago, after I had attended the Symposium on EHS at the Royal College of Medicine, where you gave a presentation. I was heartened by your tone at that meeting, feeling that a new system of investigation was going to take place in order to try to resolve the disputed condition of EHS in many individuals. You intimated that the HPA were to "cast their net wider" in order to take in research from around the World in an attempt to establish whether EMR caused ill health in certain sensitive groups.
When asked by me how your measures were going to help my community in Essington (South Staffordshire) who have suffered the effects of numerous mobile phone base stations for 15 years, you answered "I am afraid these measures will not help communities like yours for 5-10 years".
In the wake of the recent publication of a report on EHS by the HPA this statement has been attributed to you (reported in the Telegraph) -
Jill Meara, the agency's deputy director, said: "In the lab, you can't reproduce the symptoms these people report, so scientifically there is definitely no link."
Estimates of the numbers of people around the world affected by electrical sensitivity range from a few per thousand people to a few per million. In about 10% of cases the symptoms are severe enough to affect quality of life. If people had symptoms, Mrs Meara added, they could try cognitive behaviour therapy, or in the case of headaches, painkillers. "They can also reduce their exposure to electrical fields by changing their appliances."
I would like you to explain to me how my community can follow your advice and what exactly you envisage can happen over the next (now) 4-9 years to make that difference.
If laboratories cannot reproduce symptoms experienced by EHS individuals then £7.5m is being wasted at Essex University - and the only answer is to put funding into epidemiological studies in villages like Essington, and many other communities around Britain, where those symptoms are in evidence. These studies need not span several years - all that is required is to monitor what physiological changes take place in the body in areas of high emissions (also easily monitored).
I would appreciate your comments please.
Regards
Cllr Sylvia Wright
-------
Sylvia,
An excellent letter if I may say so. The wind blows one way and Jill Meara follows; it reverses direction and so does she.
It doesn't need me to tell you that the response, if any, will amount to "a waste of rations" as is said in military terms. But that is no reason for not keeping up the pressure.
David
--------
Dear Jill Meara
There was a recent excellent BBC programme in which their reporter spoke from Sweden and mentioned the financial and practical help available from the Government for victims of electro-sensitivity. As the HPA have now denied that the condition exists - but there are many of us who know we are suffering from ES due to phone masts, a great number of us are now seriously doubting the capabilities of the HPA.
Withholding acceptance/knowledge of a condition that so many people are suffering from will not make the condition disappear, nor will it help the public 'trust' the reliability of the HPA's knowledge and 'protection role'!
I am seriously worried that the Health Protection Agency's current responsibility seems only to protect the interests of big business and not the general public's health!
Please will you confirm if you and your colleagues at the HPA have read and taken notice of the attached reports that are available to everyone to read on the Internet?
1. This 7 page Naila report which sets out the other health risks associated with masts.
http://www.tetrawatch.net/papers/naila.pdf
2. PRESS RELEASE May 1, 2005
Cell phone base stations change brain currents and cause unwellness
Research in Austria
The radiation of a cell phone base station at a distance of 80 metres causes significant changes of the electrical currents in the brains of testees (measured by electroencefalogram, EEG). All the testees said they felt unwell during the radiation, some of them seriously.
That is the result of an investigation by a team of Austrian scientists. They measured alpha 1 (8 to 10 Hz), alpha 2 (10 to 12 Hz) and beta waves (13 to 20 Hz). A small density of GSM 900 and GSM 1800 radiation already caused several significant changes in these three frequency ranges. This means the body is stressed - temporarily this may have some positive effect, in the long run however stress certainly reduces the quality of life, capacity for work and state of health.
The results of the research will be published in international scientific magazines and confirmed by replication. The research was financed by Land Salzburg in Austria. The testees were nine women and three men between 20 and 78, who considered themselves 'electrosensitive'. They were invited to sit in a chair, eyes covered and ears plugged. Of course they were not aware of the sequence of the tests.
The side of the room directed at the cell phone base station was shielded against radiation, except for a small part which could be (un)shielded easily. In the first phase, the radiation density near the head was 26 mikroWatt/m2, in the second phase 3327 mikroWatt/m2 and in the third phase 26 mikroWatt/m2 again. Several other environmental parameters were measured to be sure they could not influence the results, such as radiation by television and FM-radio, noise, CO2, temperature, relative humidity, low frequency magnetic fields and soherics (electrical discharges in the atmosphere, possibly causing radiation).
During the second phase the parameters of all the brainwaves, measured by EEG, changed significantly. Afterwards the testees were asked to describe their experiences. All of them felt unwell during the second phase. They reported symptoms like buzzing in the head, palpitations of the heart, unwellness, lightheadedness, anxiety, breathlessness, respiratory problems, nervousness, agitation, headache, tinnitus, heat sensation and depression.
According to the scientists, this is the first worldwide proof of significant changes of the electrical currents in the brain by a cell phone base station at a distance of 80 metres. It has been scientifically established before that the radiation of cell phone base stations leads to unwellness and health complaints.
Cell phone base stations are not the only source of radiofrequent radiation. Also UMTS-videophones, DECT-telephones, WLAN- and WIFI-networks, C2000/TETRA-networks and many other digital wireless communication systems contribute to the level of radiation. In many houses and offices the densities by DECT and WLAN are higher than those by cell phone base stations.
The scientists involved were dr. med. Gerd Oberfeld (Land Salzburg, dept. of environmental medicin), dr. Hannes Schimke (Salzburg University, EEG-measurements, psychofysiology, statistics) and univ. prof. dr. Günther Bernatzky (Salzburg University, neurodynamics and neurosignalling). The research was supported by dr. med. univ. Gernot Luthringshausen (permanent member of the ethical commission of Land Salzburg, neurology and psychiatry).
Sources in German:
http://www.salzburg.com/cgibin/sn/printArticle.pl?xm=1524270 http://www.salzburg.gv.at/themen/gs/gesundheit/umweltmedizin.htm
and 3.
The Balmori paper supports other truly independent research on animals, where psychology cannot be blamed for ill health and loss of wellbeing.
Omega see "Pulsed microwave radiation and wildlife - Are Cell Phones Wiping Out Sparrows?" under:
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/926007/
I look forward to hearing from you, hopefully with some better news for those of us who are adversely affected by being near mobile phone masts, which we cannot switch off or choose not to live near, as is the case with the mobile handsets.
Yours truly
Jane Lee
Glebelands Otterton Devon EX9 7JJ
--------
Jill Meara e-mails
The following is the dialogue so far on EHS studies:
I corresponded with you a year ago, after I had attended the Symposium on EHS at the Royal College of Medicine, where you gave a presentation. I was heartened by your tone at that meeting, feeling that a new system of investigation was going to take place in order to try to resolve the disputed condition of EHS in many individuals. You intimated that the HPA were to "cast their net wider" in order to take in research from around the World in an attempt to establish whether EMR caused ill health in certain sensitive groups.
When asked by me how your measures were going to help my community in Essington (South Staffordshire) who have suffered the effects of numerous mobile phone base stations for 15 years, you answered "I am afraid these measures will not help communities like yours for 5-10 years".
In the wake of the recent publication of a report on EHS by the HPA this statement has been attributed to you (reported in the Telegraph) -
Jill Meara, the agency's deputy director, said: "In the lab, you can't reproduce the symptoms these people report, so scientifically there is definitely no link."
Estimates of the numbers of people around the world affected by electrical sensitivity range from a few per thousand people to a few per million. In about 10% of cases the symptoms are severe enough to affect quality of life. If people had symptoms, Mrs Meara added, they could try cognitive behaviour therapy, or in the case of headaches, painkillers. "They can also reduce their exposure to electrical fields by changing their appliances."
I would like you to explain to me how my community can follow your advice and what exactly you envisage can happen over the next (now) 4-9 years to make that difference.
If laboratories cannot reproduce symptoms experienced by EHS individuals then £7.5m is being wasted at Essex University - and the only answer is to put funding into epidemiological studies in villages like Essington, and many other communities around Britain, where those symptoms are in evidence. These studies need not span several years - all that is required is to monitor what physiological changes take place in the body in areas of high emissions (also easily monitored).
I would appreciate your comments please.
Thank you for your enquiry. I enclose a copy of our press release and the report that more accurately reflects our conclusions than the press reports. There are a couple of things with noting, firstly we were somewhat surprised to find that most of the scientific studies of Electrical Sensitivity (ES) have looked at people who attribute symptoms to power frequency appliances. The area of radio frequency exposures is less well researched and certainly deserves more attention, hence the studies funded by the Mobile Telecommunications and Health Research Programme (MTHR) at Essex and elsewhere. There is no theoretical reason why microwave (radio frequency) radiation should have the same effect on the body as power frequency fields, even though they are part of the same electromagnetic spectrum (as are visible light, ultraviolet and nuclear radiation) so it is unwise merely to extrapolate studies from these different exposures. The MTHR programme is funding epidemiological studies but these are fraught with difficulty in measuring exposures. Most people do not stay in the same place all day and exposures away from home may overwhelm those experienced at home. We have also found that in about half of sites, the largest exposure to people in an area is NOT from the local mast but from one further away. These factors are very difficult to control for in observational studies. Some of the MTHR funding is being used to develop a body-worn exposure meter that may help to make epidemiological studies more useful on the future. I hope this is helpful
Thank you for your reply to my e-mail and for attaching the full report from the HPA on EHS.
I note your comments on epidemiological studies being undertaken and wonder if you could give me more details of where these studies were conducted and the results so far. I would welcome such studies in my village and feel that we would be an excellent subject because of the high number of phone masts and the high incidence of illness and death.
I understand that you need to take care in conducting epidemiological studies on subjects who are electrosensitive, but I still feel that, with todays technology, it is perfectly possible to collect data on the pulsed microwave emissions while monitoring changes in the functioning of the body of the subject. It is irrelevant whether the effects are from a source close by or remote - the main object should be to measure the emissions in the environment where the subject is situated.
I would welcome your further comments on this very serious and urgent matter.
All the MTHR studies are described on the website http://www.mthr.org.uk . The epidemiological study is described as "currently underway" wh ich suggests there are no results yet. As I said in my last E-mail, we are working on a personal exposure device that would allow detection of microwave fields in the environment where people are as they move around.
Could I ask you to let me know if such a device is available as and when this happens. Could you also confirm whether volunteer communities will be sought.
Here is the weblink to the research on the personal exposure meter. As far as I am aware it is not available commercially. You will note that certain problems were found with the test device that need to be addressed. http://www.hpa.org.uk/radiation/publications/hpa_rpd_reports/2005/hpa_rpd_008.htm
I do not know if volunteers are being sought for the MTHR epidemiological studies, you would be best to make direct contact through MTHR. I have copied this to Nigel Cridland the MTHR administrator here who knows a lot more than I about all the projects.
Thank you for passing on my e-mail to Nigel Cridland. I have looked at the details for the PEM meter, but am more interested in the "body suit" that you spoke of in your previous e-mail.
I think I said "body worn" (i.e. clipped to the belt). I did not mean "body suit. Sorry if I confused you.
Nevertheless, this is the device I am more interested in if you have more details.
I only know of one meter, the PEM.
Then you are right, I have misunderstood. I think what is needed is a device to monitor, perhaps, blood circulation, muscle activity (or lack of), nerve impulses, etc., in order to determine what is happening in the body of the subject. Surely, this is the only way. The present practice of asking the person to describe what they are feeling is leading to the unhelpful diagnosis of "all in the mind".
Not our area of expertise I'm afraid. The nearest I can think of is the physiological monitoring that anaesthetists do while people are under anaesthetic.
If epidemiological studies are being done, I would think this type of device is essential. Otherwise results of such studies are always going to be "inconclusive".
--------
Which shows just how much she is missing the point.
a) there are no epidemiological studies
b) MTHR is exhausted, some research appears not to have been done at all, and hardly any other has been published, except the DSTL on Ca++ which was published before being peer reviewed, the obscure driving and mobiles and one or two other bits. None is particularly accessible and the MTHR website is woefully out of date.
c) the dosimeter testing has been at least partly published by HPA, but tells us nothing other than the capacity to check some features of incident radiation on the wearer as they go about their lives. Undoubtedly of interest it monitors the radiation, not the body response. This must not be used to "prove low levels", because the complaint is already that extremely low levels do have a chronic effect, but that we don't know if the cause lies in the MW frequency, the modulation characteristics, or the power levels, or the combined effects of multiple carriers.
d) The RPD is clearly not the place to pronounce on safety, since they self-confessedly do not have the medical expertise. But since they are part of the HPA it is high time they passed it on to others or undertook meaningful collaboration.
Andy
--------
And this from Nigel Cridland.
Sylvia
RE: Electrosensitivity Von: "Nigel Cridland"
Date: Wed, 16 Nov 2005 16:50:29 -0000
to: "Jill Meara"
Dear Mrs Wright,
The MTHR Programme Management Committee considers that whilst the availability of a personal exposure meter is an interesting development, further trials would need to be undertaken before it could be used in a full epidemiological study. The Committee has identified a need for work in this area as part of the proposed second phase of the MTHR Programme, for which funds are currently being sought. We are also keeping in contact with European researchers who have work in progress to further evaluate the potential of the personal exposure meter for epidemiological investigations. Progress towards a full epidemiological study will obviously depend on the outcome of this work and the work proposed by MTHR. Any new developments will be published on the Programme web site at http://www.mthr.org.uk
Regards,
Nigel Cridland
MTHR Scientific Co-ordinator.
--------
From: Eileen O'Connor
Date: Wed, 16 Nov 2005 18:09:37 -0000
Subject: FW: Check out Press Complaints Commission
From Catherine
Press Complaints http://www.pcc.org.uk/index2.html
Commission: The telegraph and the Times ran articles in which they used so called experts to contradict Dr Meara on electrosensativity. 1 SIR COLIN BERRY had no knowledge of the subject. From the quote from him he admits total ignorance of the subject. John Hunt professor of GEOGRAPHY was not even medically or scientifically qualified to send out health advice contradicting a medical Doctor. Making out that people are mentally ill on his advice is very dangerous, as someone recently won a case in European law, who was wrongly committed as insane due to similar ignorance. The use of his Title Professor was misleading as this has no bearing on the subject, as GEOGRAPHY IS NOT THE QUALIFICATIONS REQUIRED, OR RELEVANT for this. The papers did not make his Title of Professor clear. As people were misled by this, a complaint should be submitted, so that this can be corrected in the newspapers. I will also see if a similar thing exists for Academic complaints so this also can be done. I would ask everyone to complain to stop the cover up as the news today about the rise in mouth cancer is very worrying and I fear nothing to do with alcohol.
--------
Dear Jill Meara
Thank you very much for your fast response to my email queries and thank you for your comments.
Please will you expand your kind explanation of research that has to be published in a peer reviewed journal further for me? For instance, is the paper titled 'Increased Incidence of Cancer Near a Cell-Phone Transmitter Station' by Ronni Wolf MD and Danny Wolf MD, published in the Internal Journal of Cancer Prevention Volume 1, Number 2, April 2004, eligible to be considered by the HPA?
As I am just an ordinary concerned person who becomes ill in the vicinity of mobile phone masts, I really do need to know how much protection the HPA is affording myself and the great numbers of other people like me. Please will you let me know what journals the HPA continually scours and uses for information on the adverse health effects from mobile phone masts?
Finally, as the methods used in the Austrian research on electro-sensitivity mentioned in my earlier email do not appear to be expensive or complicated, please can you tell me if similar research is currently being carried out in Britain?
In the meantime, thank you once again for your kind assistance so far.
Best wishes
Mrs Jane Lee
--------
Dr Neil Irvine, CDSC NI, coordination epidemiology, Tel: 028 90263765, Tel: 028 90263765
He is regional epidemiologist of HPA Belfast.
I found also dr. Helene Irvine, Public Health Consultant to the Glasgow Health Board, about GSM phones and masts in 2000,
http://www.feb.se/EMFguru/EMF/cell-health/cellphone-health.html
but I really do not know if she is related to Neil Irvine. There are a lot of people called Irvine.
Mike Clark, Mike.Clark@hpa-rp.org.uk answers the questions to Neil Irvine.
Neil Irvine has written about sexually transmitted infections
http://www.eurosurveillance.org/ew/2005/050203.asp and
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=cache:UXC26P4Jr9UJ:www.aidsmap.com/en/news/B46322FF-ED9A-4FC4-B471-8292356165F3.asp%3Ftype%3Dpreview+%22irvine+n.%22+hpa&hl=en&lr=&strip=1
It is not clear why NRPB has asked Neil Irvine to do the investigation.
Michael Clark of the NRPB says: "There is no evidence for this effect but lots of people report it. They are affected by something, they go a bit strange and all sorts of symptoms appear."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/thisweek/story/0,,1398868,00.html
I think what happens in U.K. now is what happened before in Sweden. Not only the WHO, also Michael Clark of NRPB says many people report EHS/ES.
Still, they act as if it can not be caused by environmental radiation/fields, though the people involved report real physical symptoms and the relationship with more or less radiation/fields.
Dr Neil Irvine, EHSSB Eastern Health and Social Services Board, is mentioned here on page 62 (about physically disabled and sensory impaired people)
http://www.ehssb.n-i.nhs.uk/EBWEB.NSF/0/f374826006e4c54b80256f540041ccd1/$FILE/PDConsultation.pdf
EHSSB is in Belfast.
Neil Irvine has advise about meningococcal disease
http://www.ehssb.n-i.nhs.uk/ebweb.nsf/4cdbab0966e6c2f880256c1d00408939/eafc48183b6e706f80256e6a005171c1?OpenDocument&Highlight=0,irvine
Neil Irvine was one of the authors of a report for HPA before:
http://www.hpa.org.uk/infections/topics_az/injectingdrugusers/Shooting_Up_2004_data.pdf
He has also co-worked on this:
http://www.cdscni.org.uk/publications/MonthlyReports/Volume_13_2004/No%2011.pdf#search='neil%20irvine%20hpa'
I have no idea why Neil Irvine was asked or proposed to write the HPA/RPD 010 report.
Interesting question, just ask him or the HPA.
Frans
--------
Dr Neil Irvine is described on the title page of the report as: Regional Epidemiologist, Communicable Disease Surveillance Centre, Northern Ireland, HPA Belfast.
Now more evident on Google for this latest report, he does have a history with streptococcal infections, HIV and STDs (for example) and his email is neil.irvine@hpa.org.uk . His final report as published may reveal a poor appreciation of EHS and presentation of the issues, but we really should not assume he is a poor epidemiologist.
I'm afraid that knee-jerk reactions that people are either faithfully represented by the press, or that they are necessarily mad, bad or sad just because they don't say what we want, will just not do. It doesn't mean they are good and faithful scientists either, but the basis of dialogue is respect.
Bear with the frustration in this game, it's a long one, and there is a lot of real communication still to do. We must ask direct pointed questions politely, not criticise people we do not know. (There is highly contrasting recent communication with Jill Meara that can be quite instructive here.)
Andy
--------
Response from Jill Meara
Dear Mrs Lee
Firstly, sorry that I called you Mr Lee in the last E-mail, slip of the finger I'm afraid. In general the HPA looks at evidence from all sources but would give especial weight to high quality reports in the peer reviewed scientific literature. However, even these journals can publish reports that do not have the best methodology or that report "chance" findings that are not backed up by their own results or replicated in later studies. Therefore we would always review the detailed methods of any study for possible sources of bias and confounding. The International Journal of Cancer Prevention is a peer reviewed journal but we would still subject any papers in to a quality review. We do not have a list of "publications that we scan", but would take information from any source, but examine it carefully for quality. The problem with epidemiology is that "cheap and cheerful" methods, whilst attractive to researchers who have limited resources, may not end up with a study that is rigorous enough to trust the conclusions drawn. In many ways epidemiological studies are much more difficult to design than laboratory studies precisely because there is no "control" over the lives of real people. Another point is that not all authors draw conclusions that are supported by their data. If you want to know more about the epidemiological studies going on in the UK at the moment, look on the MTHR website at mthr.org.uk. If you want to know more about the design of epidemiological studies, definitions of bias and confounding etc why not try to get hold of an epidemiology textbook such as "Essential Pubic Health Medicine" which is co-written by the Chief Medical Officer Sir Liam Donaldson and his late father who was also a legend in Public Health. You could also look at the website of CASP, which is a programme based in Oxford that trains both Health Service staff and patients how to critically appraise the scientific literature. http://www.phru.nhs.uk/casp/casp.htm
I hope these observations are helpful.
Dr Jill Meara
FFPH Deputy Director/Public Health Physician
--------
Er, yes?
What epidemiological studies?
Please, anyone, help me find them here! As far as I have ever been able to tell, there are no MTHR epidemiological studies, just one or two papers discussing the nature of such studies.
See my earlier summary here:
http://www.tetrawatch.net/science/mthr.php
Andy
From Mast Sanity
--------
HPA-RPD-010: Definition, Epidemiology and Management of Electrical Sensitivity
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1115204/
50% increase in cancer in teenagers - Oral cancer cases increase
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1160454/
An open letter to Rod Read, director of Electrosensitivity-UK
http://www.socialaffairsunit.org.uk/blog/archives/000654.php
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=electrosensitivity
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=HPA-RPD-010
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Brian+Stein
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Jill+Meara
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Rod+Read
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Nic+Fleming
(Filed: 04/11/2005)
People who believe electricity makes them ill should be informed of ways to reduce their exposure to appliances such as computers and hairdryers, a senior government health adviser said yesterday.
Dr Jill Meara, of the Health Protection Agency, said that while there was no scientific evidence to show electrical sensitivity was real, those who thought they were sufferers should be advised to consider keeping their distance from electric devices.
Brian Stein suffers from electromagnetic sensitivity
However, the Department of Health immediately contradicted the advice and a series of scientists criticised the HPA for advising the public how to avoid health risks that had not been scientifically proven.
Dr Meara, the deputy director of the HPA's radiation protection division, said: "There is no proof that the symptoms are caused by exposure to electromagnetic fields, but people still have real symptoms.
"There is sufficient uncertainty that it is worth telling members of the public practical things they can do to reduce exposure in case they feel they are suffering from these fields.
"It would be things like making sure people are far away from their appliances and buying slightly more expensive [low power] hair dryers, unlike those tinny ones that teenagers use.
"It's not an easy thing to study in a lab as people who suffer from it are not comfortable in an environment with a lot of electrical equipment."
But Sir Colin Berry, emeritus professor of pathology at Queen Mary University, London, said: "If there is no scientific evidence that electrical devices are causing people harm, one should be extremely careful about giving advice to people about what to do. If people believe they are being harmed by something they must take their own steps to avoid them, but I don't think it should be part of government policy to advise them about it."
John Adams, professor of risk at UCL, said: "This is yet another example of the modern disease of compulsive risk assessment psychosis - otherwise known as Crap."
Some researchers believe some people suffer symptoms including fatigue, headaches and skin problems when exposed to electromagnetic fields. But mainstream scientific and medical opinion does not recognise electrical sensitivity as a real condition.
A recent review of 30 studies into electrical sensitivity by Dr James Rubin at the King's College London School of Medicine found no evidence that electrical fields cause ill health.
This study and one being carried out at the University of Essex into whether attention span and memory are affected by exposure to a mobile phone mast have received £750,000 from the Government and telecommunications industry.
The Definition, Epidemiology and Management of Electrical Sensitivity report published yesterday was written by Dr Neil Irvine, an HPA epidemiologist in Belfast. He concluded that there was no proven scientific link between electromagnetic fields and ill health.
Omega this is not true. See under:
http://omega.twoday.net/topics/Wissenschaft+zu+Mobilfunk/
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Cancer+Cluster
http://www.buergerwelle.de/body_science.html
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=electrosensitive
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1108878/
Electrical pollution can influence allergies: the asthma plague
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1139199/
But the report found that for some people the symptoms were real and could have a big impact on their lives. It said some people were so badly affected that they were forced to move house, give up their jobs or move to remote areas.
Brian Stein, 56, a businessman from Nottingham, began to get severe pains in his ear while using his mobile phone about four years ago. Now he cannot use a computer or a telephone for more than a few minutes or travel by modern car, electrified train or on long distance flights.
He had to drop out of the Essex University tests because they made him too ill.
He said yesterday: "The one thing the scientists and authorities don't want to do is talk to people like me who are affected. If they did they might find a way to prove that the condition is actually real."
nfleming@telegraph.co.uk
Publishers wishing to reproduce photographs on this page should phone 44 (0) 207 538 7505 or e-mail syndication@telegraph.co.uk
© Copyright of Telegraph Group Limited 2005.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/11/04/nelec04.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/11/04/ixhome.html
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Dr Jill Meara
National Radiological Protection Board
Chilton, Didcot, Oxon, OXI1 ORQ, United Kingdom
Fax: +44 1235 822 630
Tel: +44 1235 822 612
E mail:
Jill.Meara@hpa-rp.org.uk
jill.meara@nrpb.org
Jrmeara@aol.com (home)
--------
Electro Hypersensitivity
This is a copy of an e-mail I have sent to Jill Meara following her comments on EHS.
Sylvia
Hello Dr Meara
I corresponded with you a year ago, after I had attended the Symposium on EHS at the Royal College of Medicine, where you gave a presentation. I was heartened by your tone at that meeting, feeling that a new system of investigation was going to take place in order to try to resolve the disputed condition of EHS in many individuals. You intimated that the HPA were to "cast their net wider" in order to take in research from around the World in an attempt to establish whether EMR caused ill health in certain sensitive groups.
When asked by me how your measures were going to help my community in Essington (South Staffordshire) who have suffered the effects of numerous mobile phone base stations for 15 years, you answered "I am afraid these measures will not help communities like yours for 5-10 years".
In the wake of the recent publication of a report on EHS by the HPA this statement has been attributed to you (reported in the Telegraph) -
Jill Meara, the agency's deputy director, said: "In the lab, you can't reproduce the symptoms these people report, so scientifically there is definitely no link."
Estimates of the numbers of people around the world affected by electrical sensitivity range from a few per thousand people to a few per million. In about 10% of cases the symptoms are severe enough to affect quality of life. If people had symptoms, Mrs Meara added, they could try cognitive behaviour therapy, or in the case of headaches, painkillers. "They can also reduce their exposure to electrical fields by changing their appliances."
I would like you to explain to me how my community can follow your advice and what exactly you envisage can happen over the next (now) 4-9 years to make that difference.
If laboratories cannot reproduce symptoms experienced by EHS individuals then £7.5m is being wasted at Essex University - and the only answer is to put funding into epidemiological studies in villages like Essington, and many other communities around Britain, where those symptoms are in evidence. These studies need not span several years - all that is required is to monitor what physiological changes take place in the body in areas of high emissions (also easily monitored).
I would appreciate your comments please.
Regards
Cllr Sylvia Wright
-------
Sylvia,
An excellent letter if I may say so. The wind blows one way and Jill Meara follows; it reverses direction and so does she.
It doesn't need me to tell you that the response, if any, will amount to "a waste of rations" as is said in military terms. But that is no reason for not keeping up the pressure.
David
--------
Dear Jill Meara
There was a recent excellent BBC programme in which their reporter spoke from Sweden and mentioned the financial and practical help available from the Government for victims of electro-sensitivity. As the HPA have now denied that the condition exists - but there are many of us who know we are suffering from ES due to phone masts, a great number of us are now seriously doubting the capabilities of the HPA.
Withholding acceptance/knowledge of a condition that so many people are suffering from will not make the condition disappear, nor will it help the public 'trust' the reliability of the HPA's knowledge and 'protection role'!
I am seriously worried that the Health Protection Agency's current responsibility seems only to protect the interests of big business and not the general public's health!
Please will you confirm if you and your colleagues at the HPA have read and taken notice of the attached reports that are available to everyone to read on the Internet?
1. This 7 page Naila report which sets out the other health risks associated with masts.
http://www.tetrawatch.net/papers/naila.pdf
2. PRESS RELEASE May 1, 2005
Cell phone base stations change brain currents and cause unwellness
Research in Austria
The radiation of a cell phone base station at a distance of 80 metres causes significant changes of the electrical currents in the brains of testees (measured by electroencefalogram, EEG). All the testees said they felt unwell during the radiation, some of them seriously.
That is the result of an investigation by a team of Austrian scientists. They measured alpha 1 (8 to 10 Hz), alpha 2 (10 to 12 Hz) and beta waves (13 to 20 Hz). A small density of GSM 900 and GSM 1800 radiation already caused several significant changes in these three frequency ranges. This means the body is stressed - temporarily this may have some positive effect, in the long run however stress certainly reduces the quality of life, capacity for work and state of health.
The results of the research will be published in international scientific magazines and confirmed by replication. The research was financed by Land Salzburg in Austria. The testees were nine women and three men between 20 and 78, who considered themselves 'electrosensitive'. They were invited to sit in a chair, eyes covered and ears plugged. Of course they were not aware of the sequence of the tests.
The side of the room directed at the cell phone base station was shielded against radiation, except for a small part which could be (un)shielded easily. In the first phase, the radiation density near the head was 26 mikroWatt/m2, in the second phase 3327 mikroWatt/m2 and in the third phase 26 mikroWatt/m2 again. Several other environmental parameters were measured to be sure they could not influence the results, such as radiation by television and FM-radio, noise, CO2, temperature, relative humidity, low frequency magnetic fields and soherics (electrical discharges in the atmosphere, possibly causing radiation).
During the second phase the parameters of all the brainwaves, measured by EEG, changed significantly. Afterwards the testees were asked to describe their experiences. All of them felt unwell during the second phase. They reported symptoms like buzzing in the head, palpitations of the heart, unwellness, lightheadedness, anxiety, breathlessness, respiratory problems, nervousness, agitation, headache, tinnitus, heat sensation and depression.
According to the scientists, this is the first worldwide proof of significant changes of the electrical currents in the brain by a cell phone base station at a distance of 80 metres. It has been scientifically established before that the radiation of cell phone base stations leads to unwellness and health complaints.
Cell phone base stations are not the only source of radiofrequent radiation. Also UMTS-videophones, DECT-telephones, WLAN- and WIFI-networks, C2000/TETRA-networks and many other digital wireless communication systems contribute to the level of radiation. In many houses and offices the densities by DECT and WLAN are higher than those by cell phone base stations.
The scientists involved were dr. med. Gerd Oberfeld (Land Salzburg, dept. of environmental medicin), dr. Hannes Schimke (Salzburg University, EEG-measurements, psychofysiology, statistics) and univ. prof. dr. Günther Bernatzky (Salzburg University, neurodynamics and neurosignalling). The research was supported by dr. med. univ. Gernot Luthringshausen (permanent member of the ethical commission of Land Salzburg, neurology and psychiatry).
Sources in German:
http://www.salzburg.com/cgibin/sn/printArticle.pl?xm=1524270 http://www.salzburg.gv.at/themen/gs/gesundheit/umweltmedizin.htm
and 3.
The Balmori paper supports other truly independent research on animals, where psychology cannot be blamed for ill health and loss of wellbeing.
Omega see "Pulsed microwave radiation and wildlife - Are Cell Phones Wiping Out Sparrows?" under:
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/926007/
I look forward to hearing from you, hopefully with some better news for those of us who are adversely affected by being near mobile phone masts, which we cannot switch off or choose not to live near, as is the case with the mobile handsets.
Yours truly
Jane Lee
Glebelands Otterton Devon EX9 7JJ
--------
Jill Meara e-mails
The following is the dialogue so far on EHS studies:
I corresponded with you a year ago, after I had attended the Symposium on EHS at the Royal College of Medicine, where you gave a presentation. I was heartened by your tone at that meeting, feeling that a new system of investigation was going to take place in order to try to resolve the disputed condition of EHS in many individuals. You intimated that the HPA were to "cast their net wider" in order to take in research from around the World in an attempt to establish whether EMR caused ill health in certain sensitive groups.
When asked by me how your measures were going to help my community in Essington (South Staffordshire) who have suffered the effects of numerous mobile phone base stations for 15 years, you answered "I am afraid these measures will not help communities like yours for 5-10 years".
In the wake of the recent publication of a report on EHS by the HPA this statement has been attributed to you (reported in the Telegraph) -
Jill Meara, the agency's deputy director, said: "In the lab, you can't reproduce the symptoms these people report, so scientifically there is definitely no link."
Estimates of the numbers of people around the world affected by electrical sensitivity range from a few per thousand people to a few per million. In about 10% of cases the symptoms are severe enough to affect quality of life. If people had symptoms, Mrs Meara added, they could try cognitive behaviour therapy, or in the case of headaches, painkillers. "They can also reduce their exposure to electrical fields by changing their appliances."
I would like you to explain to me how my community can follow your advice and what exactly you envisage can happen over the next (now) 4-9 years to make that difference.
If laboratories cannot reproduce symptoms experienced by EHS individuals then £7.5m is being wasted at Essex University - and the only answer is to put funding into epidemiological studies in villages like Essington, and many other communities around Britain, where those symptoms are in evidence. These studies need not span several years - all that is required is to monitor what physiological changes take place in the body in areas of high emissions (also easily monitored).
I would appreciate your comments please.
Thank you for your enquiry. I enclose a copy of our press release and the report that more accurately reflects our conclusions than the press reports. There are a couple of things with noting, firstly we were somewhat surprised to find that most of the scientific studies of Electrical Sensitivity (ES) have looked at people who attribute symptoms to power frequency appliances. The area of radio frequency exposures is less well researched and certainly deserves more attention, hence the studies funded by the Mobile Telecommunications and Health Research Programme (MTHR) at Essex and elsewhere. There is no theoretical reason why microwave (radio frequency) radiation should have the same effect on the body as power frequency fields, even though they are part of the same electromagnetic spectrum (as are visible light, ultraviolet and nuclear radiation) so it is unwise merely to extrapolate studies from these different exposures. The MTHR programme is funding epidemiological studies but these are fraught with difficulty in measuring exposures. Most people do not stay in the same place all day and exposures away from home may overwhelm those experienced at home. We have also found that in about half of sites, the largest exposure to people in an area is NOT from the local mast but from one further away. These factors are very difficult to control for in observational studies. Some of the MTHR funding is being used to develop a body-worn exposure meter that may help to make epidemiological studies more useful on the future. I hope this is helpful
Thank you for your reply to my e-mail and for attaching the full report from the HPA on EHS.
I note your comments on epidemiological studies being undertaken and wonder if you could give me more details of where these studies were conducted and the results so far. I would welcome such studies in my village and feel that we would be an excellent subject because of the high number of phone masts and the high incidence of illness and death.
I understand that you need to take care in conducting epidemiological studies on subjects who are electrosensitive, but I still feel that, with todays technology, it is perfectly possible to collect data on the pulsed microwave emissions while monitoring changes in the functioning of the body of the subject. It is irrelevant whether the effects are from a source close by or remote - the main object should be to measure the emissions in the environment where the subject is situated.
I would welcome your further comments on this very serious and urgent matter.
All the MTHR studies are described on the website http://www.mthr.org.uk . The epidemiological study is described as "currently underway" wh ich suggests there are no results yet. As I said in my last E-mail, we are working on a personal exposure device that would allow detection of microwave fields in the environment where people are as they move around.
Could I ask you to let me know if such a device is available as and when this happens. Could you also confirm whether volunteer communities will be sought.
Here is the weblink to the research on the personal exposure meter. As far as I am aware it is not available commercially. You will note that certain problems were found with the test device that need to be addressed. http://www.hpa.org.uk/radiation/publications/hpa_rpd_reports/2005/hpa_rpd_008.htm
I do not know if volunteers are being sought for the MTHR epidemiological studies, you would be best to make direct contact through MTHR. I have copied this to Nigel Cridland the MTHR administrator here who knows a lot more than I about all the projects.
Thank you for passing on my e-mail to Nigel Cridland. I have looked at the details for the PEM meter, but am more interested in the "body suit" that you spoke of in your previous e-mail.
I think I said "body worn" (i.e. clipped to the belt). I did not mean "body suit. Sorry if I confused you.
Nevertheless, this is the device I am more interested in if you have more details.
I only know of one meter, the PEM.
Then you are right, I have misunderstood. I think what is needed is a device to monitor, perhaps, blood circulation, muscle activity (or lack of), nerve impulses, etc., in order to determine what is happening in the body of the subject. Surely, this is the only way. The present practice of asking the person to describe what they are feeling is leading to the unhelpful diagnosis of "all in the mind".
Not our area of expertise I'm afraid. The nearest I can think of is the physiological monitoring that anaesthetists do while people are under anaesthetic.
If epidemiological studies are being done, I would think this type of device is essential. Otherwise results of such studies are always going to be "inconclusive".
--------
Which shows just how much she is missing the point.
a) there are no epidemiological studies
b) MTHR is exhausted, some research appears not to have been done at all, and hardly any other has been published, except the DSTL on Ca++ which was published before being peer reviewed, the obscure driving and mobiles and one or two other bits. None is particularly accessible and the MTHR website is woefully out of date.
c) the dosimeter testing has been at least partly published by HPA, but tells us nothing other than the capacity to check some features of incident radiation on the wearer as they go about their lives. Undoubtedly of interest it monitors the radiation, not the body response. This must not be used to "prove low levels", because the complaint is already that extremely low levels do have a chronic effect, but that we don't know if the cause lies in the MW frequency, the modulation characteristics, or the power levels, or the combined effects of multiple carriers.
d) The RPD is clearly not the place to pronounce on safety, since they self-confessedly do not have the medical expertise. But since they are part of the HPA it is high time they passed it on to others or undertook meaningful collaboration.
Andy
--------
And this from Nigel Cridland.
Sylvia
RE: Electrosensitivity Von: "Nigel Cridland"
Date: Wed, 16 Nov 2005 16:50:29 -0000
to: "Jill Meara"
Dear Mrs Wright,
The MTHR Programme Management Committee considers that whilst the availability of a personal exposure meter is an interesting development, further trials would need to be undertaken before it could be used in a full epidemiological study. The Committee has identified a need for work in this area as part of the proposed second phase of the MTHR Programme, for which funds are currently being sought. We are also keeping in contact with European researchers who have work in progress to further evaluate the potential of the personal exposure meter for epidemiological investigations. Progress towards a full epidemiological study will obviously depend on the outcome of this work and the work proposed by MTHR. Any new developments will be published on the Programme web site at http://www.mthr.org.uk
Regards,
Nigel Cridland
MTHR Scientific Co-ordinator.
--------
From: Eileen O'Connor
Date: Wed, 16 Nov 2005 18:09:37 -0000
Subject: FW: Check out Press Complaints Commission
From Catherine
Press Complaints http://www.pcc.org.uk/index2.html
Commission: The telegraph and the Times ran articles in which they used so called experts to contradict Dr Meara on electrosensativity. 1 SIR COLIN BERRY had no knowledge of the subject. From the quote from him he admits total ignorance of the subject. John Hunt professor of GEOGRAPHY was not even medically or scientifically qualified to send out health advice contradicting a medical Doctor. Making out that people are mentally ill on his advice is very dangerous, as someone recently won a case in European law, who was wrongly committed as insane due to similar ignorance. The use of his Title Professor was misleading as this has no bearing on the subject, as GEOGRAPHY IS NOT THE QUALIFICATIONS REQUIRED, OR RELEVANT for this. The papers did not make his Title of Professor clear. As people were misled by this, a complaint should be submitted, so that this can be corrected in the newspapers. I will also see if a similar thing exists for Academic complaints so this also can be done. I would ask everyone to complain to stop the cover up as the news today about the rise in mouth cancer is very worrying and I fear nothing to do with alcohol.
--------
Dear Jill Meara
Thank you very much for your fast response to my email queries and thank you for your comments.
Please will you expand your kind explanation of research that has to be published in a peer reviewed journal further for me? For instance, is the paper titled 'Increased Incidence of Cancer Near a Cell-Phone Transmitter Station' by Ronni Wolf MD and Danny Wolf MD, published in the Internal Journal of Cancer Prevention Volume 1, Number 2, April 2004, eligible to be considered by the HPA?
As I am just an ordinary concerned person who becomes ill in the vicinity of mobile phone masts, I really do need to know how much protection the HPA is affording myself and the great numbers of other people like me. Please will you let me know what journals the HPA continually scours and uses for information on the adverse health effects from mobile phone masts?
Finally, as the methods used in the Austrian research on electro-sensitivity mentioned in my earlier email do not appear to be expensive or complicated, please can you tell me if similar research is currently being carried out in Britain?
In the meantime, thank you once again for your kind assistance so far.
Best wishes
Mrs Jane Lee
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Dr Neil Irvine, CDSC NI, coordination epidemiology, Tel: 028 90263765, Tel: 028 90263765
He is regional epidemiologist of HPA Belfast.
I found also dr. Helene Irvine, Public Health Consultant to the Glasgow Health Board, about GSM phones and masts in 2000,
http://www.feb.se/EMFguru/EMF/cell-health/cellphone-health.html
but I really do not know if she is related to Neil Irvine. There are a lot of people called Irvine.
Mike Clark, Mike.Clark@hpa-rp.org.uk answers the questions to Neil Irvine.
Neil Irvine has written about sexually transmitted infections
http://www.eurosurveillance.org/ew/2005/050203.asp and
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=cache:UXC26P4Jr9UJ:www.aidsmap.com/en/news/B46322FF-ED9A-4FC4-B471-8292356165F3.asp%3Ftype%3Dpreview+%22irvine+n.%22+hpa&hl=en&lr=&strip=1
It is not clear why NRPB has asked Neil Irvine to do the investigation.
Michael Clark of the NRPB says: "There is no evidence for this effect but lots of people report it. They are affected by something, they go a bit strange and all sorts of symptoms appear."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/thisweek/story/0,,1398868,00.html
I think what happens in U.K. now is what happened before in Sweden. Not only the WHO, also Michael Clark of NRPB says many people report EHS/ES.
Still, they act as if it can not be caused by environmental radiation/fields, though the people involved report real physical symptoms and the relationship with more or less radiation/fields.
Dr Neil Irvine, EHSSB Eastern Health and Social Services Board, is mentioned here on page 62 (about physically disabled and sensory impaired people)
http://www.ehssb.n-i.nhs.uk/EBWEB.NSF/0/f374826006e4c54b80256f540041ccd1/$FILE/PDConsultation.pdf
EHSSB is in Belfast.
Neil Irvine has advise about meningococcal disease
http://www.ehssb.n-i.nhs.uk/ebweb.nsf/4cdbab0966e6c2f880256c1d00408939/eafc48183b6e706f80256e6a005171c1?OpenDocument&Highlight=0,irvine
Neil Irvine was one of the authors of a report for HPA before:
http://www.hpa.org.uk/infections/topics_az/injectingdrugusers/Shooting_Up_2004_data.pdf
He has also co-worked on this:
http://www.cdscni.org.uk/publications/MonthlyReports/Volume_13_2004/No%2011.pdf#search='neil%20irvine%20hpa'
I have no idea why Neil Irvine was asked or proposed to write the HPA/RPD 010 report.
Interesting question, just ask him or the HPA.
Frans
--------
Dr Neil Irvine is described on the title page of the report as: Regional Epidemiologist, Communicable Disease Surveillance Centre, Northern Ireland, HPA Belfast.
Now more evident on Google for this latest report, he does have a history with streptococcal infections, HIV and STDs (for example) and his email is neil.irvine@hpa.org.uk . His final report as published may reveal a poor appreciation of EHS and presentation of the issues, but we really should not assume he is a poor epidemiologist.
I'm afraid that knee-jerk reactions that people are either faithfully represented by the press, or that they are necessarily mad, bad or sad just because they don't say what we want, will just not do. It doesn't mean they are good and faithful scientists either, but the basis of dialogue is respect.
Bear with the frustration in this game, it's a long one, and there is a lot of real communication still to do. We must ask direct pointed questions politely, not criticise people we do not know. (There is highly contrasting recent communication with Jill Meara that can be quite instructive here.)
Andy
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Response from Jill Meara
Dear Mrs Lee
Firstly, sorry that I called you Mr Lee in the last E-mail, slip of the finger I'm afraid. In general the HPA looks at evidence from all sources but would give especial weight to high quality reports in the peer reviewed scientific literature. However, even these journals can publish reports that do not have the best methodology or that report "chance" findings that are not backed up by their own results or replicated in later studies. Therefore we would always review the detailed methods of any study for possible sources of bias and confounding. The International Journal of Cancer Prevention is a peer reviewed journal but we would still subject any papers in to a quality review. We do not have a list of "publications that we scan", but would take information from any source, but examine it carefully for quality. The problem with epidemiology is that "cheap and cheerful" methods, whilst attractive to researchers who have limited resources, may not end up with a study that is rigorous enough to trust the conclusions drawn. In many ways epidemiological studies are much more difficult to design than laboratory studies precisely because there is no "control" over the lives of real people. Another point is that not all authors draw conclusions that are supported by their data. If you want to know more about the epidemiological studies going on in the UK at the moment, look on the MTHR website at mthr.org.uk. If you want to know more about the design of epidemiological studies, definitions of bias and confounding etc why not try to get hold of an epidemiology textbook such as "Essential Pubic Health Medicine" which is co-written by the Chief Medical Officer Sir Liam Donaldson and his late father who was also a legend in Public Health. You could also look at the website of CASP, which is a programme based in Oxford that trains both Health Service staff and patients how to critically appraise the scientific literature. http://www.phru.nhs.uk/casp/casp.htm
I hope these observations are helpful.
Dr Jill Meara
FFPH Deputy Director/Public Health Physician
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Er, yes?
What epidemiological studies?
Please, anyone, help me find them here! As far as I have ever been able to tell, there are no MTHR epidemiological studies, just one or two papers discussing the nature of such studies.
See my earlier summary here:
http://www.tetrawatch.net/science/mthr.php
Andy
From Mast Sanity
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HPA-RPD-010: Definition, Epidemiology and Management of Electrical Sensitivity
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1115204/
50% increase in cancer in teenagers - Oral cancer cases increase
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/1160454/
An open letter to Rod Read, director of Electrosensitivity-UK
http://www.socialaffairsunit.org.uk/blog/archives/000654.php
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=electrosensitivity
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=HPA-RPD-010
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Brian+Stein
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Jill+Meara
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Rod+Read
http://omega.twoday.net/search?q=Nic+Fleming
Starmail - 4. Nov, 10:11
