ISIS Press Release 22/11/04

Announcing Science in Society # 24
Winter 2004

Biological effects of EMFs still in search of a mechanism

More and more biological effects of electromagnetic fields are documented at weaker and weaker field intensities, suggesting that the current exposure standards - which are aimed at preventing outright heating of tissues - may be up to 10 million fold too high, if we are to really protect the public. Researchers are finding long-lasting brain damage in rats exposed to mobile phones, as well as a range of health problems among people living near the mobile phone masts.

Still, the regulators profess themselves powerless to lower the exposure limits because of the lack of plausible mechanisms - within conventional mainstream science - that could explain how fields with such minute energies could have any biological effects. Leukaemia, DNA damage in brain cells and other electromagnetic field effects cannot be explained unless scientists communicate and collaborate across the disciplines, which they are currently unable to do, partly due to the lack of interdisciplinary education, partly due to existing funding structure in research and the general culture of mainstream science that overwhelmingly discriminates against innovative people and ideas (see also SiS 17). Will our government take the radical steps needed in scientific research funding and in science education to improve both the quality of our science and its ability to protect the public?


Informant: newcriteria

Ileagally cut and pasted by Phil

Guest contributors

November 22, 2004

Vodafone, we've got your number

Matin Samuel

If high-frequency masts are so safe, why aren’t they in the boss’s back garden? Vodafone, we’ve got your number PHONE MASTS: do they cause cancer? You need to find out, I need to find out; one judge says this, some scientists say that. Nobody seems to know for sure. This is the solution. Site a giant one in the middle of the lawn of each director of each mobile telephone company in the country. By law. You say they are safe, old chum. Well, on you go. Explain that one to the neighbours next time little sweetums complains of a headache. Give them the earnest speech about safe levels of radio wave emissions. See how it plays at Tumbletots. If tumours the size of pancakes start popping up on your estate, then we will know. Maybe you don’t think this is such a good idea. We will know then, too.

Your product, you use it. Sounds a fair manifesto to me. The Government did not need to ban smoking from public areas last week; a decree stating that to claim a dividend from British American Tobacco the recipient would need to be firing up at least 60 a day would have done the trick. Get that through the Lords and see what happens; by the end of the week 20 Bensons would contain more vitamin C than oranges. Gangs of inspectors could swoop on board meetings at Rothmans. If they can see across the room, they disqualify everybody in it. “This badge says you better spark up that big boy, pal. Those nails don’t look very yellow to me.”

A new era of corporate responsibility. What fun. Make the chairmen of banks keep their money at the Ealing branch, anonymously. No staff falling over each other to act efficiently when the boss walks in, either; no special treatment, no “better look after this one, George, he owns the place”. The big shots are given the same 17-year-old trainee that haunts us all; she is trying to reboot her computer using a paperclip, the supervisor has gone to lunch and the rest of the staff are on a team-building exercise near Coventry. The executive personal banker drives a car worth about two grand, same as the bloke they sent to talk to me about investments. He looked like he was more in need of racing tips.

Why stop with the boss? Celebrity beer-pushers should not be teetotal. The guy prescribing 20 grams of sugar and a small salt mine to kids at breakfast should not get to start his own day with grapefruit and blueberries. Let us have some accountability here. Would the proprietor of shopping channel Auctionworld have been selling items for 27 times the value price if he were made to kit his own house out with the same bargains? If phone masts are such a healthy addition to a rural landscape, let the chairman of Vodafone hum along to one in his back yard.

“Is this your car, sir?”

“Yes it is, officer. I wasn’t speeding, was I?"

“No, sir. In fact, you were 10mph under the limit for this stretch of road.”

“I see. Everything else is in working order? The lights, the exhaust...”

“Absolutely, sir. Your vehicle appears to be in excellent condition.”

“Then this is just a routine check, right? No problem, officer, I’ll be on my way.”

“I’m afraid I can’t let you do that, sir.”

“Why not?”

“Because you’re Richard Branson and it says here you should be on a train.”

“But, hold on, I’m running 30 minutes late already. The nearest station must be ten miles away. I’ll have to change twice. There are leaves on the line. It’s a Sunday service. Engineering work near Milton Keynes. A replacement bus service beyond Knutsford. I won’t get there until midnight. You have to understand, I . . .”

“Very sorry, sir. Rules are rule.

(Branson hands his keys over and is escorted to a bus stop, sobbing.)

“Don’t worry, Mr Branson, I’m told they will be putting an extra cheese sandwich on at Redditch.”

We could call it Bernie’s law. A few years ago Bernie Ecclestone, the chief executive of Formula One, had the misfortune to mislay his VIP pass and was forced to make his way to the British Grand Prix as a regular punter. He was directed to a park-and-ride in a nearby county, dropped off in a swamp, herded across three paddy fields, negotiated his entry with the aid of several attendants who could not have found their back pockets using both hands and a compass and by the end of the day was so taken with his consumer experience he was talking about wiping the event from the calendar. He has had it in for the Silverstone circuit ever since.

An hour-long yomp through the scenic splendour of Northamptonshire is a minor inconvenience, though. Playing fast and loose with what Woody Allen called his second favourite organ, as companies do over phone masts, is a national tragedy in waiting.

Earlier this month Vodafone turned up at Tolladine golf course near Worcester after nightfall and erected a 45ft mast without planning permission or local consent. A retrospective application was made for a temporary mast and lodged with the council last week.

A spokesman said the company liked to work speedily to provide the best quality of service. He didn’t say that at 9pm, though, because like just about every other Vodafone employee — beyond shadowy ninja mast erectors — he had long gone home, no doubt to a residence that does not have a buzzing steel pole beside it. As it stands, one might call that a perk of the job.
s.”


Informant: Mast Network

Yesterday I recieved a letter from the planning inspectorate to say an appeal by O2 against Tandridge District Council is dismissed. This is the second mast I have been involved in fighting in Oxted, Surrey. The first which happened last year, involved putting pressure on the land owner who subsequently withdrew his permission to allow a 12.5 metre mast to be erected on his land.Good result we were very happy.

This second one was for an O2 3g 15 metre mast to be sited by a park on a grass verge at the front of a neighbours house.Luckily Tandridge Council agreed with us on this one and refused it.Of course O2 appealed and we all stepped up a gear to make our feelings known. Luckily through mastsanity we even managed to get Caroline Lucas down when she visited a Tetra mast at our local fire station.She visited our site and promised to write to the inspectorate herself.

Again a phone mast took over my life for a few months,neglecting my children and husband (but then he is big enough to look after himself) but I have to say it is all worth it to get the result we wanted.

My worry now is that all we have done is to move the problem 100 yards up the road which still does not solve anything but at least for the time being we are 2:0 to us.

Thank you for your website and to Yasmin (don,t expect you will remember me) for advising me a few months ago. It has been great to get so much imformation and posters etc to print off and also invaluable to realise that we were not alone and that people up and down the country are all fighting the same as us.

Keep up the good work.

Love Debbie Pitt (mad mast women from Oxted)

PS Celebrated last night so hope this all makes sense.


From: Mastsanity

Sent: 10 November 2004 13:55

Subject: FW: Dentist's Cancer Warning

It was reported in the Birmingham Evening Mail yesterday that a Top city dentist has warned of spiralling mouth cancer in the West Midlands. John Hamburger, a senior lecturer at Birmingham Dental Hospital, said the disease was on the increase among teenagers and children as well as the elderly. Smoking and heavy drinking raise the risk of contracting mouth cancer, which is the sixth most common cancer in the western world. But Mr Hamburger said: The good news is that the great majority of these cancers can be detected by dentists at routine dental check-ups. Early tumours can be very successfully treated.


It is not surprising that we are now seeing an increase of mouth cancers in teenagers and children as well as the elderly. Since when did our children all start smoking and drinking heavily? One thing our children most certainly have in common is the over use of mobile phones. “RADIATION” has got to be the cause.

I am calling on all our Scientists, Politicians, Health Officials, every Mother and Father to stand up and say ENOUGH! It is not rocket science.

Due to the demand on Dentists, the latest advice has been to reduce visits to once every two years. We want prevention not cure, stop this madness before it starts.

Sir William Stewart Head of Health Protection for the UK has called for caution especially for children under the age of sixteen, when is anyone going to listen? We need radiation warning signs on the phones. Emergency use only phones for children, allowing them to use the lowest radiation phones on the market with access to input emergency use only phone numbers. This would not only help protect their health but would also cut down crime rate from bullying by text messages, stealing phones and stop access to unsuitable websites.

There is an IMMEDATE URGENT need to STOP putting the Health and Wealth of the Mobile Phone Industry and Government before the Health of the Nation.

I want a future for our Children, not one filled with fear, pain, anxiety and possible death from CANCER as a result of preventable over exposure to radiation.

Eileen O’Connor

From: Mast Network

LOCAL COMMUNITY SUPPORT FOR ADVERSE PLANNING & DEVELOPMENT APPLICATIONS
97 Spa Crescent, Little Hulton, Gtr Manchester, M38 9TU
TEL: 0871 750 3992 : FAX: 0161-278 3344
EMAIL: info@planningsanity.co.uk
WEB: www.planningsanity.co.uk

CAMPAIGN URGES PUBLIC TO DEMAND MINISTER PUTS PHONE MAST HEALTH FIRST

Planning Sanity are demanding in light of the Court of Appeals decision on Friday in the Harrogate Phone Mast Health case that Ministers redraft planning policy to reflect the Ministers own arguments in the Court of Appeal, and the view of a substantial number of communities who have consistently raised concerns over the potential ill health of children attending schools close to phone masts, and other sensitive locations such as residential property.

Director of Planning Sanity Chris Maile said “Communities can sit back and be forever walked on or they can fight back. The easy remedy is to put pressure in this election year on our politicians to take the action needed to protect our children. A report due to be published any day will show that the emission from High Voltage Cables (which are very similar to that of phone mast emissions) HAS caused a doubling of leukaemia in young children, the report known as the Draper report which the Government has deliberately sat on for 3 years looked at over 37,000 cases of childhood cancer. Will this Government now do the right thing to protect the public from the effects of EMF emission or continue to sit on their backsides. If it is the latter then let the public rise up and say clear and loud we will no longer accept a fence sitting, backside sitting approach from our politicians on this topic”.

CAMPAIGN URGES LOCAL COMMUNITIES AFFECTED BY TELECOMMUNICATION MASTS TO IMPLEMENT THEIR RIGHT TO PAYMENT OF COMPENSATION

Any person who owns or occupies premises (or land) and as a result sees their property value drop (research suggests an average 25%), or has other adverse effects on their lands usage (perhaps effect on their quality of life) can seek compensation from the Phone Operator for what is termed 'injurous affection'. Planning Sanity is urging thousands of communities across the UK to use their rights under Code 16 of the Electronic Communication Code to seek compensation.

Chris said “It is time for communities affected adversely by phone mast installations to fight back and give the Phone Operators who are quite prepared in the name of profit to put children's life's at risk a bloody nose that they will never recover from. If sufficient numbers of people exercise their rights then potentially operators could be facing claims amounting to £billions. The Ombudsman (although compensation under this scheme is NOT awarded by the Ombudsman) awarded 4 Swindon families a total of £117,500 due to the effects of a mast. It does not take a genius to calculate the potential cost to the operators from a wholesale payout of compensation”.

END.

EDITORS NOTE: Contact Chris Maile 0161 278 3355

A simple change to the wording of the Governments advise contained in paragraph 30 of Planning Policy Guidance Note 8 (PPG8) would effective reverse the decision of the Court of Appeal, this could be undertaken relatively quickly without even the need to refer it to Parliament. The problem lies in the phase 'it is the Government's firm view that the planning system is not the place for determining health safeguards'. By simply removing that passage, and sending an advise slip to local planning authorities the problem now being faced would be resolved. It would then be up to each individual local planning authority to look at the question of health on a case by case basis.

The Secretary of State in his Skeleton Argument in the Harrogate case conceded that children were in a special category of persons at greatest risk (para 22 of his Skeleton Argument):- “The Inspector's approach was perfectly consistent with this, enabling him to conclude that on the material that the First Respondent (T-Mobile) had put before him: “.....the appeal proposed in its present form provides insufficient reassurance that there would be no material harm to the living conditions (in terms of health concerns) specifically of the group identified by the Steward Report as potentially vulnerable: that is of young children, in this case both Woodfield Community Primary School and St Roberts Catholic Primary School”.”

Having conceded that children are at risk the Secretary of State could use his powers under Section 132 of the Communication Act 2003 order OFCOM to suspend or restrict the service of Electronic Communications in order 'to protect the public from any threat to public safety or public health'. The simple question is how can he not use those powers now that he has conceded the risk. It should be noted hat OFCOM also have powers to protect the health of children and the vulnerable (S3(4) of that Act).

Planning Sanity has published a briefing paper on the procedure for seeking compensation under Code16 of the Electronic Communication Code this can be downloaded from: http://www.planningsanity.co.uk/forums/masts/compX.html

Compensation is claimed through the Lands Tribunal and payable by the Phone Operators. Claims could be made several years after a mast has gone up using the same basic process as that of seeking compensation when homes are affected by major public projects under compulsory purchase powers. Claims (in theory) could be paid out not only on loss of the value of property, but also the lose of the enjoyment (or usage) of that property, and might affect not only residential property but also businesses that are adversely affected. Claims can be made in Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Planning Sanity helpline 0871 750 3992 11am to 8pm Mon to Fri.


Informant: Don Maisch


Tetra from Cumbria
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/409501/

In case any of you are trying to advise land and property owners let them know about this story. Birmingham council not cannot demolish a block of flats because of masts that have been put on the. The operators would be without a signal and are stopping demolision!

Check out the following link:
http://icbirmingham.icnetwork.co.uk/eveningmail/news/tm_objectid=14865787&method=full&siteid=50002&headline=family-weapon-of-mast-destruction-name_page.html
http://tinyurl.com/4u9qy

Yasmin
Mast Network


Family weapon of mast destruction

Nov 12 2004

By Neil Elkes, Evening Mail

Families were today bracing themselves for a battle with mobile phone companies over new plans to erect masts.

02 has applied to Birmingham City Council to replace a large mast on a tower block, with three smaller ones.

Orange, which has previously removed a mast from the derelict 13-storey Lake-house Court, on Fosseway estate, New Oscott, has also submitted plans for three "micro masts" next to the Place 2B pub, in Antrobus Road, at Beggars Bush junction and on a verge in Witton Lodge Road.

The plans have sparked outrage from residents who oppose both applications.

Retired Graham Millington, who has helped raise an 800-name petition against the mast nearest his Antrobus Road home, said: "We do have health concerns.

"But we are also worried about adding to traffic lights, pedestrian crossings and street lights with a 10-metre mast as it is a a very cluttered area already."

The council has been trying to demolish the eyesore tower block - dubbed Birmingham's tallest mobile phone mast platform - for more than a year.

But legal agreements and leases between the council, 02 and Orange means the council would be landed with huge costs if it went ahead with the demolition because it would leave both firms without mobile phone coverage in the area.

An Orange spokesman said: "The larger mast would have a range of up to a mile, the micro masts are a lot less powerful and can only reach about 330 yards in all directions. That is why three are needed to replace the big one we took down."

The stalemate between the council and the two mobile phone giants has held up not only the tower's demolition, but also the regeneration of the estate.

Housing officers are currently looking to re-home the remaining handful of families left in the estate's 11 maisonette blocks.

A housing spokeswoman said: "We can confirm that three planning applications have been submitted in the area and are currently going through the planning process."

The article which I have transcribed below appears in today's edition of THE SUNDAY TIMES. The Tipperary farmer who wants a mast removed from his property, mentioned toward end of the article, is John Ryan whose account of the severe bio effects he and his family have suffered is well known in Ireland and has been posted by you earlier this year:

MOBILE PHONE HEALTH COMPLAINTS
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/264613/

Simmering masts row
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/262043/

John Ryan: Phone mast wrecks my life
http://omega.twoday.net/stories/232655/


Imelda, Cork.




From THE SUNDAY TIMES, November 14, 2004. Print edition, page 10

"CARE HOME RESIDENTS REBEL OVER MOBILE PHONE MAST"

by Richard Oakley

It is a nursing home that guarantees residents a good reception, but most have decided they do not want it.

Hillview, a residential care unit for elderly people in Carlow town, is at the centre of a row over a mobile-phone base station to be installed on its premises. The equipment, put in place by Vodafone, includes antennae attached to the roof and a "control room" on the first floor. It has improved coverage for locals of Carlow, but has led to protests from some of the home's residents concerned about possible health repercussions.

"We want this base station to come down and the sooner the better," said Mary White, a Green party councillor who is representing the residents. "A nursing home is not a proper site for it. "Guidelines in Carlow state that it would be better if such infrastructure was not placed near schools, residential areas and community facilities. We think this should also include nursing homes even though they may be commercial premises."

Residents/Relatives Against Masts, a pressure group, has been set up to campaign against the base station, but last week agreed not to talk publicly pending negotiations with the home's owners.

A spokeswoman for Vodafone said the company had informed Carlow's town council that it was going to install the base station, as was required. She said it did not require planning permission and that there were no objections. The spokeswoman added that it had been in operation for a number of weeks and there were no safety concerns or health risks as it was subject to radiation regulations. "We have entered into a five-year contract and money has changed hands. We are talking with the owners, but that is all we are prepared to say at this stage," she said. She added that the people of Carlow had been "demanding better coverage" and that the base station was "one of the busiest in the country". She refused to say how much the contract was worth to the home's owners.

James O'Byrne and Catherine, his wife, who run the £600 a week home, are understood to have told residents that it would be removed and that Vodafone had agreed to this.

South Eastern Health Board said it believed the base station had been deactivated and would be removed.

Phone companies in Ireland have generally refused to remove base stations when concerns have been raised by landlords. In one case, Vodafone has sought a fee to remove one from the land of a farmer in Tipperary who is claiming adverse effects, even though the mast on his land has been shown to adhere to safe radiation levels."

The 500 metres from habitation recommendation - this came from the Stewart Report and can be accessed on the internet. No withstanding the recommendation, 'Phone companies seem to be able to plonk masts wherever they like. The one in our village is 14 metres from front doors and has been causing the usual symptoms - chronic insomnia and headaches; sore bloodshot eyes; earache and tinnitus; nose bleeds. Also, ulcerated mouths and throats; rashes/eczema; exacerbation of existing symptoms - and of course exhaustion and depression!

Several dogs have developed growths on paws; loss of appetite; vomiting and restlessness; one dog a growth in its mouth and one cat a tumour in its throat. Noone will take any notice of the evidence from Russia and Schwarzenburg which prove the actual effects of electromagnetic radio frequency emissions.

Regards,

Gill Lyden