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The V 83
●
Cooperate in providing users of wireless phones with the
best possible information on possible effects of wireless
phone use on human health.
The FDA belongs to an interagency working group of the federal
agencies that have responsibility for different aspects of RF
safety to ensure coordinated efforts at the federal level. The
following agencies belong to this working group:
●
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health
●
Environmental Protection Agency
●
Occupational Safety and Health Administration
●
National Telecommunications and Information
Administration
The National Institutes of Health participates in some
interagency working group activities, as well.
The FDA shares regulatory responsibilities for wireless phones with
the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). All phones that are
sold in the United States must comply with FCC safety guidelines
that limit RF exposure. The FCC relies on the FDA and other health
agencies for safety questions about wireless phones.
The FCC also regulates the base stations that the wireless
phone networks rely upon. While these base stations operate at
higher power than do the wireless phones themselves, the RF
exposures that people get from these base stations are typically
thousands of times lower than those they can get from wireless
phones.
Base stations are thus not the subject of the safety questions
discussed in this document.
3. What kinds of phones are the subject of this update?
The term “wireless phone” refers here to handheld wireless
phones with built-in antennas, often called “cell”, “mobile”, or
“PCS” phones. These types of wireless phones can expose the
user to measurable Radio Frequency energy (RF) because of the
short distance between the phone and the user’s head.
These RF exposures are limited by FCC safety guidelines that
were developed with the advice of the FDA and other federal
health and safety agencies. When the phone is located at
greater distances from the user, the exposure to RF is drastically
lower because a person's RF exposure decreases rapidly with
increasing distance from the source. The so-called “cordless
phones,” which have a base unit connected to the telephone
wiring in a house, typically operate at far lower power levels,
and thus produce RF exposures far below the FCC safety limits.
4. What are the results of the research done already?
The research done thus far has produced conflicting results,
and many studies have suffered from flaws in their research
methods. Animal experiments investigating the effects of Radio
Frequency energy (RF) exposures characteristic of wireless
phones have yielded conflicting results that often cannot be
repeated in other laboratories. A few animal studies, however,
have suggested that low levels of RF could accelerate the
development of cancer in laboratory animals. However, many of
the studies that showed increased tumor development used
animals that had been genetically engineered or treated with
cancer-causing chemicals so as to be pre-disposed to develop
cancer in the absence of RF exposure. Other studies exposed
the animals to RF for up to 22 hours per day.
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