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Transparancy Needed: Unanswered Questions Asked of the World Health Organization

Environmental Health Trust and numerous expert scientists have written the WHO EMF Project D. Van Deventer to ask critical questions related to the WHO EMF Project Factsheets and Research Review. Questions were asked in 2019 and again in 2020 but EHT has yet to receive any responses.

Remember, the WHO EMF Project is a different entity than the WHO International Agency for the Research on Cancer (IARC).

The IARC vets experts for conflicts of interest and industry ties and has classified RF as a Class 2 B possible carcinogen, whereas the EMF Project (also under the WHO umbrella) is criticized for a lack of transparency and industry loyalty. See (Hardell 2017) published in the International Journal for Oncology with details on the industry ties of the WHO EMF Project.

 

 

Letter sent on November 1, 2020 after numerous emails that went unanswered.

Dear UN Secretary-General and Office of Ethics, 
 
I am writing because I have repeatedly written to Dr. Van Deventer and never received an answer to  specific questions asked by scientists.

 

Dear Dr. Van Deventer,

 

  1. Has the WHO ever investigated the effects of Radiofrequency to trees, birds, insects and wildlife. If not, who is monitoring this issue and ensuring protection for environmental impacts? 
  2. Are you aware of limits for radiofrequency radiation developed to protect birds, bees, trees and wildlife ? 
  3. When will the findings of “clear evidence of cancer” and DNA damage from the National Toxicology Program Study on Cell Phone Radiation be added to the WHO website ? 
  4. I have been informed by experts that although they are a participating country in the WHO EMf Project, they  did not participate in the writing of the latest factsheet on 5G, nor on any factsheets found on the WHO EMF Project website so please clarify the process by which new factsheets are written and published on the WHO website such as the   5G mobile networks and health sheet put online in 2020.  
  5. What staff is part of the WHO TEAM Radiation and health that works on the issue of non ionizing electromagnetic radiation? Please share names and positions. 
  6. According to the WHO webpage, the World Health Organization has NOT done an evaluation of the current body of research on radiofrequency radiation since 1993.  This is stated on the website  “The World Health Organization is undertaking a health risk assessment of radiofrequency electromagnetic fields, to be published as a monograph in the Environmental Health Criteria Series. This publication will..update the monograph on radiofrequency fields (1993).” Has there been any more recent systematic evaluation of the science by the World Health Organization  in terms of health effects performed since 1993? 

Questions by scientists regarding transparency of WHO EMF Project

These questions were first sent on December 2019 and were never answered. These questions are  in regards to the “Call for Expressions of Interest for Systematic Reviews (2019).”

  1. Who specifically will select the teams?

  2. What are the criteria of selection?

  3. One issue often missed in CIO forms are financial relationships between universities and companies. For example, New York University Wireless is so heavily funded by telecommunications companies funding  that it was stated that “the affiliates share in it like an R&D arm.” Will industry funding of universities be stated on the COI forms?

  4. The WHO EMF Project has several factsheets online. Which scientists wrote these and what was the process for the conclusions put forth in these factsheets?

5. Will scientists who are also a part of ICNIRP be identified in the COI process?

Signed,

Henry Lai, PhD, Professor Emeritus, University of Washington, Seattle, WA

Devra Davis PhD, MPH, Environmental Health Trust

Simona Carrubba, PhD, Mercyhurst University, Erie, PA

Kjell Hansson Mild, Department of Radiation Sciences Umeå University SE-901 87  Umeå, Sweden

Semra Tepe Çam, Assoc.Prof., Turkish Atomic Energy Authority Ankara Turkey

Alvaro Augusto de Salles, Ph.D., Professor, Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul- UFRGS, Porto Alegre, Brazil

Alfonso Balmori, BSc , Biologist. Spain

Samuel Milham MD, MPH., Retired Washington State Health Department

Kavindra Kesari, Ph.D, , Senior Scientist, Department of Applied Physics, Aalto University, Espoo, Finland

Livio Giuliani, , “dirigente di ricerca” of Italian National Health Service, ICEMS Spokesman

Jerry L. Phillips, Ph.D., Executive Director, Excel Centers, Professor Attendant, Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry

David O. Carpenter, M.D., Director, Institute for Health and the Environment, University at Albany

Wenjun Sun, PhD , Professor, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, Hangzhou, China

Lukas H. Margaritis, Professor Emeritus of Cell Biology and Radiobiology, Dept of Cell Biology and Biophysics Faculty of Biology, University of Athens

Carl F. Blackman, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (1970-2014), Retired

Dr. Besarion Partsvania, Georgian Technical University

Hidetake Miyata, PhD., , Associate Professor, Department of Physics, Tohoku University, Japan

Marie-Claire Cammaerts,, University of Brussels, Belgium, Retired

Martin L. Pall PHD, Professor Emeritus of Biochemistry and Basic Medical Sciences, Washington State University

Paul Héroux, PhD  , Professor of Toxicology and Health Effects of Electromagnetism, McGill University Medicine, Department of Surgery, McGill University Health Center

Theodora Scarato MSW, Environmental Health Trust 

 

A History of Transparancy Issues

2019 Letter to the WHO EMF Project Unanswered

On December 4, 2019 several scientists who have expertise in electromagnetic radiation wrote Dr. Emilie van Deventer, an electrical engineer and Head of the International EMF Project, at the World Health Organization. Read the letter.