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The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection: Conflicts of Interest , Corporate Capture and 5G 

Jun 20, 2020 | 0 comments

Conflicts of Interest in the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection

A new investigative 98-page report from two members of European Parliament on conflicts of Interest of International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection has been released.

“A non-governmental organization based in Germany, ICNIRP is recognized by the World Health Organization as an “independent scientific commission”. A parliamentary report published on Friday June 19 questions its impartiality. Initiated by two environmental MEPs, the German Klaus Büchner and the Frenchwoman Michèle Rivasi, the report accuses the ICNIRP of being under the influence of the telecommunications giants and of not taking into account scientific publications alerting to health risks linked to the development of 5G. It draws in particular on the work carried out by Investigative Europe, a European collective of investigative journalists.” – Le Monde , Stéphane Mandard

“This is reminiscent of the trivialization of asbestos, where it has also been claimed for years that it is harmless. The health damage caused by radio radiation has been scientifically investigated since 1932 [2]. The governments of most western countries, on the other hand, have ignored the scientific results and have followed a group of industry-related “scientists”. They have given the health effects too little thought. ”The Rivasi-Buchner report should have consequences for the limit values, the legislation for the construction of cell phone masts and thus also for the expansion of 5G – a question that will soon be dealt with the Federal Constitutional Court has to deal with.” – Prof. Dr. Klaus Buchner in “The mobile phone industry determines its own limit values”

EHT notes: The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) is considered by some governments to be an “international authority” on radio’frequency safety.  ICNIRP  issues recommendations on safety limits for wireless and electromagnetic fields which some countries adopt for their regulatory limits on human exposure.  However what people do not know is that ICNIRP is a private invite only closed club of under a dozen scientists.  ICNIRP was started with industry money flowing to the founder and many ICNIRP commissioners today have received industry money or work in labs where industry money flows. 

Excerpts from the “The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection: Conflicts of interest , corporate capture and the push for 5G “ 

“That is the most important conclusion of this report: for really independent scientific advice we cannot rely on ICNIRP. The European Commission and national governments, from countries like Germany, should stop funding ICNIRP. It is high time that the European Commission creates a new, public and fully independent advisory council on non-ionizing radiation. The funds currently allocated to ICNIRP could be used to set up this new organisation. And given the overall rise in R&D funding via Horizon Europe, with a foreseen budget (for 2021-2027) of between 75 and 100 billion euros, funding should in no way constitute an insurmountable hurdle to setting up this new, truly independent, body.”

“It seems that “a closed circle of like-minded scientists” has turned ICNIRP into a self-indulgent science club, with a lack of bio-medical expertise, as well as a lack of scientific expertise in specific risk assessments. Thereby, creating a situation which might easily lead to “tunnel-vision” in the organisation’s scope. Two leading experts, Hans Kromhout and Chris Portier, confirmed to us that ICNIRP is a closed, non-accountable and one-sided organisation.”

“As many scientists and critical observers have pointed out, it seems that ICNIRP members are either oblivious to, or are ignoring, scientific studies that find possible adverse health effects in the absence of heating. Even though some ICNIRP-members have themselves acknowledged that industry-funded scientific research tends to produce less findings showing adverse health effects of EMF, whereas publicly funded studies – like the NTP-study – do find significant links between EMF and adverse health effects, this does not seem to influence one iota the views of ICNIRP-members.”

“This report deals with an issue of which the importance cannot be overrated: the possible health effects of Radiofrequency Radiation (RfR) or electro magnetic fields (EMF); It deals more specifically with how the scientific debate has been hijacked by corporate interests from the Telecom industry and conflicts of interest.

After having read the reports of a journalistic collective called Investigate Europe, the many articles from Microwave News as well as all the publications from independent scientists from around the world, who for years have all been ringing alarm bells on adverse health effects from the use of mobile phones and EMF, we decided that we needed to dig deeper into this strange, unknown to the public but powerful scientific NGO based in Germany called the ‘International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection’ (ICNIRP).

The findings of this report (‘The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection: Conflicts of interest and the push for 5G’) give us an uncomfortable déjà-vu: many facts and processes that lead to the actual situation whereby European authorities – from the European Commission to most of the member states – simply close their eyes for real scientific facts and early warnings. We have seen exactly the same scenario in the debate on Tobacco, asbestos, climate change and pesticides.

Also in it’s latest guidelines from March this year, ICNIRP assures the world that there is no scientific evidence of adverse health effects from the radiation that comes with the new communication technologies, within the limits it proposes. But at the same time a growing number of scientists and also citizens are worried that EMFs do cause health problems. ICNIRP pretends to be scientifically neutral, and free from vested interests of the Telecom industry. We show with this study that this is ‘playing with the truth’ or simply a lie.”

“Whether those declarations of interests are really checked is something that the Italian ‘Vallisoletana Association of people affected by mobile phone antennas’ (AVAATE) questioned in their public statement from July 2015, attacking ICNIRP: “It is hard to understand whether ICNIRP investigates the Declarations filed by appointed members of the ICNIRP Commission and Scientific Expert Committee, since in some cases these members report that they work or have worked for these organisations but do not specify what they have done or whether they are paid. It is also hard to understand how ICNIRP controls the content of the declarations by the appointed members of their Expert Committees, when in most cases the most contentious aspects of the biographical statement are not reported in these statements.”

Read The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection: Conflicts of interest , corporate capture and the push for 5G  by Klaus Buchner  and  Michèle Rivasi

See Dr. Hardell present on conflicts of Interest between the EMF Project and ICNIRP.

See Theodora Scarato Present on Telecom Influence