5G & Health: The Move Forward Perspective
This perspective holds that:
- After over two decades of research, no definitive causal link has been shown between cell phone and wireless technologies and cancer or other diseases, as currently regulated.
- The promise of 5G is vast, and everyone stands to gain from a rapid deployment of 5G networks and devices.
- Research should continue to increase understanding of how 5G and other RFR interacts with the body, but there is no scientific basis for changing the manner or pace of implementation for 5G networks and other technologies.
Here are examples from the peer-reviewed research literature that support this perspective:
Impacts of high dose 3.5 GHz cellphone radiofrequency on zebrafish embryonic development (2020)
Subham Dasgupta, Guangxin Wang, Michael T. Simonich, Tingwei Zhang, Lisa Truong, Huaping Liu, Robyn L. Tanguay. Impacts of high dose 3.5 GHz cellphone radiofrequency on zebrafish embryonic development. PLOS One (2020).
"Our results revealed no significant impacts on mortality, morphology or photomotor response and a modest inhibition of startle response suggesting some levels of sensorimotor disruptions. This suggests that the cell phone radiations at low GHz-level frequencies are likely benign, with subtle sensorimotor effects."
FDA: Scientific Evidence for Cell Phone Safety (2020)
This FDA review of peer-reviewed in vivo and epidemiological research finds that research to date does not indicate that negative health effects are likely to result of from RFR related to cell phones. In its review, it considers several papers which assess RFR at higher frequencies utilized by 5G.
5G Wireless Communication and Health Effects—A Pragmatic Review Based on Available Studies Regarding 6 to 100 GHz (2019)
Simkó, Myrtill, and Mats-Olof Mattsson. "5G Wireless Communication and Health Effects—A Pragmatic Review Based on Available Studies Regarding 6 to 100 GHz." International journal of environmental research and public health 16, no. 18 (2019): 3406.
"Regarding the possibility of “non-thermal” effects, the available studies provide no clear explanation of any mode of action of observed effects."
... however this paper also notes: "... the majority of studies with MMW exposures show biological responses. From this observation, however, no in-depth conclusions can be drawn regarding the biological and health effects of MMW exposures in the 6–100 GHz frequency range. The studies are very di erent and the total number of studies is surprisingly low."
Mobile phone use and incidence of brain tumour histological types, grading or anatomical location: a population-based ecological study (2018)
Karipidis, Ken, Mark Elwood, Geza Benke, Masoumeh Sanagou, Lydiawati Tjong, and Rodney J. Croft. "Mobile phone use and incidence of brain tumour histological types, grading or anatomical location: a population-based ecological study." BMJ open 8, no. 12 (2018)
"In Australia, there has been no increase in any brain tumour histological type or glioma location that can be attributed to mobile phones."
Analysis of Mobile Phone Use among Young Patients with Brain Tumors in Japan (2017)
Sato Y, Kojimahara N, and Yamaguchi N. 2017. “Analysis of Mobile Phone Use among Young Patients with Brain Tumors in Japan.” Bioelectromagnetics 38 (5): 349–55. https://doi.org/10.1002/bem.22047.
"Results show that the ownership of mobile phones is not prevalent among young patients with brain tumors in Japan who had been diagnosed between 2006 and 2010. However, as the use of mobile phones among children is increasing annually, investigations into the health effects of mobile phone use among children should continue."
Mobile Phone Use and Risk for Intracranial Tumors (2015)
Alexiou, George, and Chrissa Sioka. 2015. “Mobile Phone Use and Risk for Intracranial Tumors.” Journal of Negative Results in Biomedicine 14 (1): 1–5. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12952-015-0043-7.
"Although some case-control studies have found a positive association between the use of mobile phones and the risk of tumors, other studies have reported no significant association. A possible long-term mobile phone use may lead to increased risk however, the evidences are not yet conclusive and further studies are needed."
"Although some small studies have showed a connection between intracranial tumors occurrence and mobile phone usage, this effect was not verified in larger series. The fact that some studies showed a reduced cancer risk, from biological point of view is difficult to believe that microwave exposure prevent brain tumors, thus possible metholodological errors in these studies should be sought."
M. P. Little, et al. Published in: British Medical Journal 344 (7849): 20–20
Results summarized in NIH National Cancer Institute press release: "U.S. population data show no increase in brain cancer rates during period of expanding cell phone use"
Conclusion: Rates of glioma remained constant for all age groups between 1992 and 2008, indicating that the increase of cell phone use in the U.S. from nearly zero percent to nearly 100 percent of the U.S. population has not increased the risk of glioma in the population.
Excerpt: "Several scientific groups have reviewed the experimental in vivo and in vitro data available for microwave exposure from mobile phone use. No compelling data have suggested that microwave exposure can increase the risk of any type of cancer, or raise rates of somatic or germ cell mutation"
Note on 5G relevance: This study does not directly reference 5G or high-band wireless technologies, however the authors' assertion quoted above does reference microwave exposure. Microwaves include a frequency range of 300 megahertz (MHz) to 300 gigahertz (GHz)*, which includes frequencies utilized by 5G technologies (in the FCC is currently planning for 5G deployment in ranges including 28 GHZ to 95+ GHz)**.
* "Radiofrequency and Microwave Radiation" - Lawrence BerkeleyNational Laboratory, U.S. Department of Energy; ** The FCC’s 5G FAST Plan - U.S. Federal Communications Commission
Notes of Authors: All authors are scientist/researchers at the National Cancer Institute of the U.S. National Institute of Health.
Location of gliomas in relation to mobile telephone use: a case-case and case-specular analysis (2011)
Larjavaara, Suvi, Joachim Schüz, Anthony Swerdlow, Maria Feychting, Christoffer Johansen, Susanna Lagorio, Tore Tynes et al. "Location of gliomas in relation to mobile telephone use: a case-case and case-specular analysis." American journal of epidemiology 174, no. 1 (2011): 2-11
"These results do not suggest that gliomas in mobile phone users are preferentially located in the parts of the brain with the highest radio-frequency fields from mobile phones."
Mobile Phones, Brain Tumors, and the Interphone Study: Where Are We Now? (2011)
Swerdlow, Anthony J, Maria Feychting, Adele C Green, Leeka Kheifets, and David A Savitz. 2011. Environmental Health Perspectives 119 (11): 1534–38.
This paper draws analyses from INTEPHONE Study, a flagship international, coordinated interview case–control study investigating the potential effect of mobile phone use on the risk of the two most common types of brain tumor, glioma and meningioma. It concludes that:
"Methodological deficits limit the conclusions that can be drawn from the Interphone study, but its results, along with those from other epidemiologic, biological, and animal studies and brain tumor incidence trends, suggest that within about 10–15 years after first use of mobile phones there is unlikely to be a material increase in the risk of brain tumors in adults."
Although this paper does not assess 5G specifically, it is one the largest studies conducted of its kind concerning RFR exposure from cell phones, and has been assessed by ICNIRP for implications relevant to its current guidelines.
Brain cancer incidence trends in relation to cellular telephone use in the United States (2010)
Inskip, Peter D., Robert N. Hoover, and Susan S. Devesa. "Brain cancer incidence trends in relation to cellular telephone use in the United States." Neuro-oncology 12, no. 11 (2010): 1147-1151.