TYLER HAMILTON AND ROBERT CRIBB
STAFF REPORTERS
Scientists, academics and public health officials from around the world are gathering in Ottawa today to debate how governments should manage such global health risks as mad cow disease, climate change and influenza.
But there's also a less talked about — and potentially sweeping — health concern listed on the conference agenda: electromagnetic radiation from cellphones.
The three-day event, hosted by the World Health Organization, will spend time exploring whether unanswered questions around the potential long-term health risks of cellphones are grounds for precaution as wireless devices explode in popularity, most recently among children.
"The possibilities that cause most concern are cancers of the brain or other parts of the head, and neurodegenerative disease, memory loss or loss of mental faculties, all resulting later in life from exposures accumulated earlier in life," states a draft of an unreleased WHO case study, obtained by the Toronto Star.
"If there are such effects, the global burden of disease could be enormous, with a significant fraction of the world population potentially affected."
Assuring that global burden never emerges will require a much different approach by health officials, say many scientists and health experts interviewed by the Star, including better public disclosure of potential health risks around cellphone use, a far greater investment in research, and closer scrutiny of industry marketing to children.
Based on dozens of interviews, research studies and internal Health Canada documents, the Star has compiled a list of health policy changes Canadian health officials should consider as long as the science around long-term cellphone use remains uncertain.
Prudent avoidance: Until the scientific evidence becomes clearer, government health agencies such as Health Canada should formally adopt a precautionary approach already adopted or recommended by many health authorities in Europe, many experts agree.
This just-in-case strategy recognizes that waiting around for conclusive evidence of a health threat has in the past led to terrible and irreversible consequences.
The Ontario Public Health Association (OPHA) has urged public and regulating bodies in Canada "to lean toward caution until use has been proven safe," in a position paper on cellphone risks. "There is no cause for public alarm but there is no basis for public leniency either."
Dr. Cherif Matta, co-author of the OPHA paper and now a Halifax-based cellphone researcher, says the message about potential risk isn't reaching Canadians.
"We haven't seen any strong public statements about this in Canada even though there were very significant studies. It is not generally known to the public," he says. "It remains controversial and it remains to be proven safe.
"What is proven is that they do cause biological effects. This is known ... it doesn't mean it will lead to health hazards. But we know there are effects."
A clearer cautionary message from Health Canada would empower consumers and make the industry more accountable, critics say.
In Europe, the precautionary approach has included public statements — mostly directed at parents — warning of the potential impact of cellphone signals on developing bodies. In the United Kingdom, for example, children are discouraged from making non-essential calls.
"We are recommending precaution, but that doesn't mean we feel phones should be banned and that children under a certain age should never use one," says Dr. Michael Clark, scientific spokesperson with the U.K. radiation protection board. "But should they be spending hours, particularly very young children, talking to their friends on a mobile phone? Parents should discourage it."
However, limiting cellphone use among children in response to unproven health risks could have profound economic impacts for Canada's $10-billion cellphone industry, which employs 25,000 Canadians and boasts 15 million customers.
Discouraging exposure to cellphones could take a heavy financial toll on an industry that boosts profits by expanding its customer base and encouraging greater cellphone use.
In pursuing any policy of precaution, the improved productivity, convenience, and safety offered by cellphones, as well as the industry's importance to the Canadian economy, would need to be balanced against long-term health concerns.
Service providers and device manufacturers across North America also worry a precautionary message will be perceived as an admission there are harmful effects from cellphone frequencies. Legal experts say this perception could open a flood of lawsuits claiming harm.
"You have to follow the science, and the precautionary principle is not based on science," says Joe Farren, a spokesperson for the Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association, the industry's main lobby group in Washington.
But the science is cloudy, and the potential risks may be too enormous to ignore, according to the WHO case study.
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`If you don't know (the potential effects), why take the risk of exposing someone with an actively growing brain?'
Dr. Cherif Matta, cellphone researcher
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Promoting headsets: Several health agencies, including the WHO, believe that a major way of reducing exposure to cellphone frequencies is to get more people, particularly children, into the habit of using headsets — similar to campaigns encouraging seatbelt use.
Headsets, experts agree, can reduce radiation exposure dramatically by keeping the cellphone away from the skull.
"Requiring use of hands-free kits is a low-cost option that is effective, if used carefully, in reducing (radio frequency) exposure," according to the WHO case study.
Health Canada has no program to encourage headset use, even by children. Most cellphones sold in Canada come without headsets, though a majority of models now have built-in speakers that allow for hands-free use in certain situations.
Industry messaging: The fact the cellphone industry is aggressively going after younger customers is evident in a new generation of phones branded with images of Barbie and Hello Kitty, as well as the emergence of cellphone services that let children watch video clips of Elmo, Daffy Duck or Big Bird.
Some critics say Health Canada should follow the lead of its British colleagues in discouraging the wireless industry from marketing to children.
The U.K.'s Stewart Commission urged in a 2000 report that the cellphone industry "refrain from promoting the use of mobile phones by children." It cited the uncertainties around health effects and the likelihood children are more vulnerable to the signals.
Dr. Martin Blank, an associate professor of physiology and cellular biophysics at Columbia University, is among a growing chorus of scientists who support this position, despite the lack of hard data pointing to serious health risks.
"It's not clear what the hazard is or level of hazard, but I think it's irresponsible to market to kids," says Blank.
The OPHA's Matta agrees.
"If you don't know (the potential effects), why take the risk of exposing someone with an actively growing brain?"
Health Canada's Bradley argues his agency has no ability to stop industry from targeting young users.
"In an economy such as we have in North America and Europe, how can you tell the manufacturer not to target a certain market?" asks Bradley. "You can just hope that an informed public decides whether or not a product dies on the shelf."
Asked how the public can make those informed decisions, Bradley conceded his agency's official position may need updating and is being reviewed.
Product packaging: Every cellphone must be tested for the amount of energy deposited in body tissue. That measurement is referred to as Specific Absorption Rate (SAR). By law, the maximum SAR limit for a cellphone is 1.6 watts per kilogram for the head and neck and .08 w/kg averaged over the whole body.
All phones sold in Canada are within the current legal limit, but different phones can have different SAR ratings — and it's often difficult to find those ratings. Better disclosure of SAR values on cellphone packaging would provide consumers with a greater awareness of the issue and give them the option of choosing models that emit the least radiation, similar to the way consumers might prefer a food product with lower trans-fat content.
Boost research: The federal government should provide Health Canada with more funding for independent research in this area, many scientists agree.
Health Canada's own internal documents reveal the agency lags behind other G8 countries in spending, with only $150,000 a year earmarked for research.
"Since there is some threat, some link, then when things are so prevalent in society we need to do the research," says Dr. Ab Guha, a Toronto neurosurgeon and co-director of brain tumour research at the Hospital for Sick Children.
The fear is that serious health effects such as early-onset Alzheimer's or cancers, if there is a link with cellphone use, may take many more years or even decades to emerge. For this reason, says Guha, long-term population studies are essential.
In 1998, officials from Health Canada's radiation protection bureau tried to add four questions to Statistics Canada's national population health survey so they could get a sense of cellphone use among Canadians, internal documents show. The idea was to use this information to track everything from headaches and depression to lymphoma and brain tumours among cellphone consumers.
Bradley says StatsCan never accepted the questions, and this put an end to the proposed program. "We don't have plans at this time to put (the questions) back in," he says.
In the meantime, Canada has been participating in a massive 13-country epidemiological survey being overseen by the WHO's International Agency for Cancer Research. The results from all countries will be analyzed to look for associations between cellphone use and incidences of head, neck and salivary gland cancers. Findings will be published in 2006.
The wireless industry is funding two-thirds of Canada's contribution to the study.
Copyright Toronto Star Newspapers Limited.