Medical professions attending a congressional hearing this week have said that a large-scale study of the long-term health effects of cell phones needs to be carried out, especially in children.  During a hearing before the House subcommittee on domestic policy, Ronald Herberman, director of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute discussed how cell phones affect adult and growing brains.

Herberman used model brains of an adult and a 5-year-old, each with a cell phone held to a corresponding ear to demonstrate that while cell phone radiation travels two inches into the adult brain, it reaches far beyond the center of a child’s brain. “I cannot tell this committee that cell phones are dangerous, but I certainly can’t tell you they are safe,” said Herberman.  Herberman recently made news with his much-publicized memo urging his 3,000 staffers to limit their and their children’s cell-phone use.  “We urgently need to do a study [to resolve this question],” he told the subcommittee, which was chaired by Representative Dennis Kucinich (Democrat-Ohio). (more…)

Researchers from the Cleveland Clinic are warning that cell phone use, including hands-free devices—can affect male fertility.  The information appears in the journal Fertility and Sterility.  Men are warned to ensure that the devices are not kept in proximity to their testicles.

It seems that the men who use hand-free cell phone devices have a tendency to keep the phones in their pants pocket or clipped to the waist belts when the phones are in talk mode.  These practices may be exposing their testicles to damaging radiofrequency electromagnetic waves, explains Ashok Agarwal, PhD, head of the andrology laboratory and the director of the Center for Reproductive Medicine at the Glickman Urologoical and Kidney Institute at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio.  “The Bluetooth devices, which many people are using these days because of health or safety concerns, may not be always so safe. There is a downside,” he says. (more…)

Children and teens who use cell phones are five times more likely to get brain cancer, according to a new study.  The new research raises fears that today’s young people may suffer an “epidemic” of the brain cancer in later life.

Concern has been growing about the health risks of cell phone use for some time.  In July, the director of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute and UPMC Cancer Centers issued an internal advisory memo to about 3,000 faculty and staff members advising them to take precautions to avoid the possible cancer risks of cell phones.  It marked the first time that a major U.S. cancer center had ever issued such an advisory.  The memo advised that children - whose brains are still developing - only use cell phones in emergencies. Adults should keep the phone away from the head and use the speakerphone or a wireless headset, the memo said. (more…)

Dr. Ronald Herberman, director of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute and UPMC Cancer Centers, very recently made headlines by issuing a staff advisory on the potential cancer risks of cell phone use.  Now Herberman is looking to create a research project focusing on long-term cell phone users.  Last week’s announcement represented the first time a U.S. cancer center director issued an advisory to staff and faculty on the potential health risks of cell phone use.

Herberman said he is talking with others, including a researcher at the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, and Dr. Devra Davis, director of the Pitt cancer institute’s Center for Environmental Oncology.  “We don’t want to frighten people.  We want them to take precautions,” Davis announced on CNN’s “Larry King Live.”  Herberman is hoping to secure phone records from cell phone companies or customers so that the research can better identify long-term users who might be at increased risk for health problems, such as brain tumors.   Herberman pointed out other studies’ research tends to rely on user recollections.  Herberman plans to seek funding from organizations such as the National Cancer Institute, once a proposal is developed. (more…)

In another study of cell phone usage and its related adverse health effects, researchers have found that those children whose mothers used cell phones frequently during pregnancy and who are also cell phone users themselves are more likely to exhibit behavior problems.  Dr. Leeka Kheifets, of the UCLA School of Public Health, who helped conduct the study, told Reuters Health that although cell phones offer great convenience, “We need to be looking into what are the potential health effects and what are ways to reduce risks should there be any.”

Kheifets and her team reviewed a group of 13,159 children whose mothers participated in the Danish National Birth Cohort study early in their pregnancies.  As part of the research, when the children reached age seven, mothers were asked to complete a questionnaire about their children’s behavior and health, the mother’s cell phone use during pregnancy, and the child’s use of cell phones. (more…)

The head of one of the country’s top cancer centers has warned his staff that cell phones could be dangerous to their health. Dr. Ronald B. Herberman, the director of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute and UPMC Cancer Centers, issued an internal advisory memo to about 3,000 faculty and staff members advising them to take precautions to avoid the possible cancer risks of cell phones.

Scientists and the federal government have been studying the effects of radiation for years and have established guidelines with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to limit the amount of exposure. Cell phones emit radiofrequency energy, a type of radiation that is a form of electromagnetic radiation, according to the National Cancer Institute. Though studies are being done to see if there is a link between it and tumors of the brain and central nervous system, and so far, findings have been inconclusive. (more…)

Scientists have still not been able to say whether or not cell phone use increases the chances of developing cancer or health problems. The uncertainty over the health effects of cell phone use has created a great deal of controversy, and has left both consumers and medical professionals confused over the possible hazards of these now ubiquitous devices.

Earlier this year, an Australian neurosurgeon published a paper on the Internet saying cell phone use “has far broader public health ramifications than asbestos and smoking.” The doctor, Vini Khurana, analyzed data from more than 100 studies, and concluded that most weren’t long enough to uncover a risk of brain cancer and that children haven’t been adequately studied (more…)

Cell phone exposure - already a suspect in some types of cancer - has been linked to decreased fertility in some men. It seems, spending hours on a cell phone each day may affect the quality of a man’s sperm based on finding from a study of 361 men seen at the infertility clinic at the Cleveland Clinic.

What the researchers learned was that—on average—the more time the men spent on their cell phones each day, the lower their sperm count. Not only did the study reveal a lowering of sperm count, researchers discovered that the men in the study who used cell phone heavily had a greater percentage of abnormal sperm. The findings did not find that cell phones damage sperm. “Our results show a strong association of cell phone use with decreased semen quality. However, they do not prove a cause-and- effect relationship,” lead researcher Dr. Ashok Agarwal told Reuters Health. The findings, published in the journal Fertility and Sterility, add to fuel to the ongoing debate and issues about and surrounding the potential health effects and risks of cell phones and other wireless devices. Some studies, for example, have linked long-term cell phone use to an increased risk of brain tumors. (more…)

Cell phones and their health consequences have become an increasing source of worry, especially as use of the wireless devices has increased exponentially in the last several years. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is no calling for a re-examination of cell phone health risks saying that past studies related to cell phone radiation need to be re-examined given the recent rise in mobile devices and their use. This follows a recent suggestion from the U.S. National Research Council advising further studies should be conducted on children and pregnant women to determine if cell phones or other wireless devices could damage health.

The FDA has asked the National Research Council—a part of the National Academies, a group that provides science, technology, and health policy advice to Congress and the federal government—to identify further research on the effects of long-term exposure to these devices. The council identified the need for studies of the potential health issues resulting from multiple, long-term, and low-intensity radio frequency exposure from mobile devices. Most current studies have evaluated effects of short-term exposure of healthy adults to radio frequency, according to the council.

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