In a landmark ruling in the case brought by Environmental Health Trust against the Federal Communications Commission, the court ruled the commission’s refusal to update 1996 human exposure limits and its failure to consider non-cancer health effects and environmental impacts from 5G and wireless technologies was capricious, arbitrary, and not evidence-based.

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Washington, D.C.: In a press conference held Aug. 16, 2021, doctors and scientists are calling for action by the federal government after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit’s August 13, 2021, decision found the Federal Communications Commission failed to explain why it ignored science showing harmful effects from wireless radiation.

The Court Decision

The landmark ruling in the case Environmental Health Trust et al. v the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) found the FCC violated the Administrative Procedure Act because the FCC’s  2019 decision not to update its 1996 exposure limits failed to address impacts of long term wireless exposure, failed to address unique impacts to children, failed to address the testimony of people injured by wireless radiation, failed to address impacts to wildlife and the environment, and failed to address impacts to the developing brain and reproduction. 

The court remanded the issue back to the FCC for reasoned decision making on numerous issues. The court specifically ordered the FCC to do the following:

1.  “Provide a reasoned explanation for its decision to retain its testing procedures for determining whether cell phones and other portable electronic devices comply with its guidelines.”
2.  “Address the impacts of RF radiation on children, the health implications of long-term exposure to RF radiation, the ubiquity of wireless devices, and other technological developments that have occurred since the Commission last updated its guidelines.”
3.  “Address the impacts of RF radiation on the environment.”

Expert participants in the press conference include:

• Devra Davis PhD, MPH, EHT President
• Dr. Hugh Taylor MD Chair of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences, Yale School of Medicine and Yale-New Haven Hospital, president of American Society of  Reproductive Medicine
• Edward B. Myers, EHT attorney
• Theodora Scarato MSW, EHT Executive Director
• Frank Clegg, CEO of Canadians for Safe Technology and former President of Microsoft Canada
• Paul Ben Ishai PhD, Professor Physics at Ariel University
• Elizabeth Barris, The People’s Initiative Foundation
• Cindy Franklin, Consumers for Safe Cell Phones

Full biographies are below.

“The Commission’s failure to provide a reasoned explanation for its determination that exposure to RF radiation at levels below its current limits does not cause negative health effects unrelated to cancer renders inadequate the Commission’s explanation for its failure to discuss the implications of long-term exposure to RF radiation, exposure to RF pulsation or modulation, or the implications of technological developments that have occurred since 1996, including the ubiquity of wireless devices and Wi-Fi, and the emergence of “5G” technology…we find the Commission’s order arbitrary and capricious in its complete failure to respond to comments concerning environmental harm caused by RF radiation.” – US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, August 13, 2021 Ruling

The Legal Case

The case EHT et al. v. FCC centers around the FCC’s safety limits for human exposure to radiofrequency radiation- the wireless radiation emitted from 5G, cell tower, cell phone, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and wireless technologies. These exposure guidelines developed by industry connected groups were adopted in 1996 by the FCC just after the EPA was fully defunded from working on wireless radiation and non-ionizing electromagnetic fields. Until being defunded, EPA had been tasked to develop human exposure limits for wireless- radiofrequency (RF) radiation (See EPA slide presentation, letter updating the FCC on guidelines and US Science Advisory Board recommending the EPA develop guidelines) . FCC limits on human exposure have remained unchanged since 1996.

In 2013, the FCC asked the question in a formal Inquiry- should these 1996 limits be changed? Do children need more protections? Should the FCC change the way companies radiation test cell phones at a distance from the body? Over 7 years, the FCC received thousands of responses to their Inquiry, all of which were put on the 18-34 record . However in 2019, the FCC issued a decision refusing to change these 1996 exposure limits for wireless radiation. We took the FCC to court because the record contained hundreds of peer reviewed published studies showing harm from wireless radiation at levels that were very low, lower than FCC thresholds. In addition, hundreds of scientists and organizations representing thousands of medical doctors were on the FCC record recommending public exposure be reduced due to this mounting evidence. The vast majority of submissions said loud and clear, “Wireless radiation is harmful. FCC limits do not protect us.”

Yet the FCC ignored the science and recommendations to change the 1996 safety limits submitted to the record of the 2019 Order Docket 19-226. The FCC then declared that it would retain the existing 1996 wireless RF radiation standards and terminated the Inquiry. FCC limits are based on the premise that overheating is the only harm from wireless radiation. So long as tissue is not overheated, safety can be assured. The FCC even further asserted without evidence that the same approach would prove relevant to the higher frequencies to be used in 5G networks.

The Environmental Health Trust and our scientific advisors had submitted thousands of pages of evidence to the FCC and met numerous times with FCC staff. When the FCC clearly ignored the science, we took legal action.

About Environmental Health Trust

The Environmental Health Trust, a scientific nonprofit, lead petitioner in the case against the FCC, has worked on the issue of wireless radiation for over a decade submitting thousands of pages of evidence to the FCC in the years leading up to the court’s decision. EHT scientists testified in 2009 Senate hearings (CSPAN link ) and 2008 Congressional hearing (CSPAN link) on cell phone radiation- the last ones ever held. Following the last hearing, EHT held a conference in Washington DC attended by the FCC with presentations by NIH and the American Cancer Society later followed by the release of a Research Agenda. Although funding for US government research in the area dried up, EHT scientists continued to publish numerous studies on the health effects of non -ionizing electromagnetic radiation and organized numerous national and international scientific conferences on the issue.

EHT co-founder Dr. Ronald Herberman, who founded the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute (UPCI) and helped discover natural killer cells capable of killing cancer . issued the first recommendations by a US medical institution to his faculty recommending that they reduce cell phone radiation in a memo featured in the New York Times article “Researcher warns of brain cancer risk from cell phones.”

EHT sent a letter to President Biden calling for federal accountability on this issue. EHT coordinated a letter to the FDA on their biased 2020 literature review on the science on cell phones and cancer. EHT has sent letters to the National Park Service, and governments of France, Bermuda, India, Guernsey, British Columbia Trustee’s and more. EHT’s resources include a database on international policy action, letters by scientists on 5G, practical steps to reduce exposure, printable resources on safe technology, a video library, toolkits on Wi-Fi in School and 5G.

Bios of Press Conference Panelists

Devra Davis, PhD, MPH, Co-founder and president of Environmental Health Trust

Devra Davis PhD, MPH was a founding director of the Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology of the U.S. National Research Council, National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and has worked on numerous environmental exposures, from chemicals to lead to air pollution. Among the NAS reports she directed were those advising that tobacco smoke be removed from airplanes and the environments of young children. She was also a Clinton appointee to the Chemical Safety And Hazard Investigation Board,former Senior Advisor to the Assistant Secretary for Health in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, anda member of the team of Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change scientists awarded the Nobel Peace Prize with the Honorable Al Gore in 2007.

Dr. Hugh S. Taylor, MD, Chair of Obstetrics, Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences, Yale School of Medicine and Yale-New Haven Hospital, president of American Society of Reproductive Medicine

Dr. Hugh S. Taylor MD has served as President of the Society for Reproductive Investigation and will be president of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine in 2021. He is a member of the National Academy of Medicine. Dr. Taylor is the Anita O’Keeffe Young Professor and Chair, Department of Obstetrics Gynecology and Reproductive Sciences at Yale School of Medicine and Chief of Obstetrics and Gynecology at Yale-New Haven Hospital.
Dr. Taylor’s research on prenatal exposure to cell phone radiation was published in Scientific Reports. Dr. Taylor is also Professor of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental biology at Yale University. Dr. Hugh Taylor received his undergraduate training at Yale University, his medical degree from the University of Connecticut School of Medicine, residency in Obstetrics and Gynecology at Yale and his postdoctoral training included a fellowship in Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility as well as a fellowship in Molecular Biology, both at Yale. Dr. Taylor is a board certified specialist in Obstetrics and Gynecology and in Reproductive Endocrinology. He is a recipient of ten National Institutes of Health research grants and directs The Yale Center for Reproductive Biology. Dr. Taylor has published more than 400 articles and in leading medical journals.

Edward B. Myers, Attorney for Environmental Health Trust in EHT et al. v. FCC

Edward B. Myers has practiced law over 40 years representing government, trade associations, and private clients in complex regulatory matters involving energy, telecommunications, and the environment. In 2018, Mr. Myers worked with the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) in a successful challenge to an order of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that had sought to eliminate any environmental review of 5G cell towers and transmitters. The NRDC filed an amicus brief in the EHT case. Mr. Myers is a graduate of Gettysburg College and the University of Notre Dame Law School.

Frank Clegg, CEO of Canadians for Safe Technology and former President of Microsoft Canada

Frank Clegg founded Canadians for Safe Technology (C4ST), a national, not-for-profit, volunteer-based coalition of parents, citizens, and experts. C4ST’s mission is to 1) educate and inform Canadians and policy makers about the dangers of the exposures to unsafe levels of radiation from technology; and 2) to work with all levels of government to create healthier communities for children and families.

Mr. Clegg was the President of Microsoft Canada from 1991 to 1996 and was re-appointed to that post from 2000-2005. He has played a leadership role in the country’s technology sector and in the broader Canadian community for many years. Mr. Clegg holds an Honors Degree in Mathematics from the University of Waterloo.

Paul Ben Ishai, PhD, Professor Physics at Ariel University

Paul Ben Ishai PhD is currently a Senior Lecturer with the Department of Physics, Ariel University, Ariel, Israel, and the Head of the Laboratory of Terahertz Dielectric Spectroscopy. He was the Director of the Hebrew University’s Center for Electromagnetic Research and Characterization, Department of Applied Physics and has published over 50 articles including several papers on 5G frequencies and the skin. Until 2016, he was involved with the Laboratory of Prof. Feldman, concentrating on dielectric research. His research interests include soft condensed matter physics, glassy dynamics, biophysics, sub-terahertz spectroscopy, and dielectric spectroscopy. He currently holds 3 patents in these fields. He received the Ph.D. degree in applied physics from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Theodora Scarato, MSW, Executive Director of Environmental Health Trust and a petitioner in the case.

Theodora Scarato directs EHT programs and coordinates scientific programs in the US and internationally with EHTs Senior Science Advisors. Scarato is lead policy analyst and researcher for the EHT database on international actions– the most comprehensive collection of information on policy actions on cell phones and wireless.

Scarato has led efforts for federal accountability. She is on the board of PhoneGate Alert. Her Freedom of Information requests found the CDC hired an industry consultant for website rewrites. Her communications with the EPA were submitted as key evidence in the Natural Resources Defense Council Amicus Brief submitted in the FCC lawsuit and provide critical information for legislators. She also coordinated the scientific review of the Oregon Health Department Report on wireless radiation which resulted in a planned September 2021 hearing in the Oregon Senate to investigate the issue. She has championed efforts for safe technology in schools and her efforts lead to the Maryland Council on Children’s Environmental Health to issue recommendations to reduce children’s Wi-Fi exposure. She has coordinated efforts to hold the WHO EMF Project accountable to their online factsheets that downplay the science and the letter by scientists to the WHO EMF Project remains unanswered to this day. Scarato has long worked to showcase the conflicts of interest at ICNIRP as documented in scientific articles and was featured in an European Parliament member’s report on ICNIRP conflict of interests.

Scarato co-authored a landmark paper on why and how to reduce radiofrequency wireless in buildings and has presented at the National Institutes of Health, the New Hampshire State 5G Commission, the San Francisco Teachers Union, the University of California San Francisco and the American Federation of Teachers.