PR releases

Mobile phones – "underlying weakness" in scientific literature

by Staff Writer | posted on 29 May 2008

Mobile phones and pylons and the possible harmful health effects continue to be of interest and concern to the general public. A new report, published by the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET), today (Thursday 29 May) questions the reliability of scientific literature.

The paper, 'The possible harmful biological effects of low-level electromagnetic fields (EMFs) of frequencies up to 300 GHz' is based on the review of 829 relevant scientific papers from across the world.

The IET is at the forefront of rigorously examining scientific evidence and, to this end, maintains its Biological Effects Policy Advisory Group (BEPAG), a group of six of the UK's top scientists and engineers in the subject area.

Chairman of BEPAG, Professor Tony Barker, a Fellow of the IET, said, "Of particular note in this new position statement is that whilst, on balance, there continues to be no robust scientific evidence of harm, many experimental studies on magnetic fields associated with electricity power distribution do report effects.

"However, when these same experimental studies are repeated by independent groups of scientists, no effect is found. This conundrum is suspected by BEPAG to indicate an underlying weakness in much of the published literature.

"To improve the robustness of the literature, it would be desirable for studies which report apparent low level effects in the absence of plausible mechanisms to be confirmed by other groups prior to publication. Pressures to publish studies as soon as possible, however understandable, may not necessarily be in the best public interest."

The IET publishes its position statement biennially. It is of the opinion that the public availability of electricity and the widespread use of telecommunications both have many demonstrable benefits to society, including those associated with health.

Professor Barker continued, "We are of the opinion that all factors, together with convincing scientific evidence, should be taken into account by policy makers when considering the costs and benefits of both the implementation of precautionary approaches to public EMF exposure and also in the development of exposure guidelines."

Notes:

BEPAG uses refereed papers as its source material, retrieved from a broad global literature search of a range of electronic databases.

The literature searches retrieved a total of 829 relevant papers in 2006 and 2007 combined, a publication rate largely unchanged since 2000. Of these 47% (previously 51%) covered static and low frequencies, primarily relating to power-frequency fields associated with power generation and distribution. 42% (previously 37%) of the papers dealt with RF fields, of which 64% (previously 55%) were specifically related to mobile-phone frequencies (equivalent to 27% (previously 21%) of the total relevant literature). These figures show the continuing trend, observed in previous BEPAG Position Statements, for EMF research to refocus from power frequencies towards mobile-phone frequencies.

The position statement can be downloaded at: http://www.theiet.org/factfiles/bioeffects/postat02final.cfm?type=pdf

The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) is a world leading professional organisation working to develop science, engineering and technology

The IET dates from 1871 and has more than 154,000 members in 127 countries with offices in Europe, North America and Asia-Pacific. It provides a global knowledge network to facilitate the exchange of information

The IET registers more engineers each year than any other UK institution and approaching half the engineers on the Engineering Council register are IET members.

More information, please see www.theiet.org