Cell Tower radiofrequency radiation (RFR) is a new form of environmental pollution and it is increasing in all environments due to the widespread use of cell phones and new wireless networks. Dr. Kent Chamberlin is chair and a professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of New Hampshire. Chamberlin was appointed in 2019 by the university system chancellor to serve on the New Hampshire 5G Commission which developed a list of 15 recommendations, including establishing a 500-meter setback for the installation of cell towers. Download New Hampshire Commission Report here.
Chamberlin describes the credible published science on cell tower RFR radiation and why there is a need for a setback between wireless antennas and homes and schools. He also presents how people are injured by wireless RFR and need safe spaces to live.
When people use wireless devices, the RFR back and forth to the cell tower or router increases the density of RFR. More cell phones sending more data means more RFR in the area. RFR from wireless networks bleeds into nearby people’s living spaces increasing their risk of future health effects. More RFR can also increase their risk of becoming ill with symptoms of headaches, dizziness, rashes, sleeping problems, and memory issues – known as Microwave Sickness, electromagnetic sensitivity, or electromagnetic hypersensitivity. This is why the safest communications networks are fully wired (up to homes and inside homes). This is why it is critical that communities promote and install safe secure wired networks, rather than Wi-Fi and wireless networks. The more people use wired devices, the less RFR in the environment- and in homes and schools.
Research studies on cell tower radio frequency radiation link exposure to harmful health effects. Here are some examples of the scientific evidence:
- Koppel et al 2021 found increasing radiation levels and poor placement and position of wireless antennas can pose a health risk to people at close range ” especially critical for people at particular risk, including persons with medical implants, pregnant women, or chronically ill persons….When a GSM 900 MHz base station was installed in the village Rimbach in Germany it had an influence on the neurotransmitters adrenaline, noradrenaline, dopamine, and phenyletylamine (Buchner and Eger, 2011). The influence on cortisol and thyroid hormones in people living near base stations was shown in other studies (Augner et al., 2010; Eskander et al., 2012). The study concludes with the following recommendations:
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- Antennas should be positioned as far as possible from the general public, like locations at high elevations or remote areas, where the antenna targeted area is not regularly/frequently visited by the members of the public.
- Only low-power output mobile phone base station antennas (<15W) should be used in the city environment.
- To avoid hotspots, created by overlapping arrays, dense packing of many antennas at one site should be avoided.
- Low power output antennas in the city environment should be positioned into locations where the direct beam would not hit members of the public closer than 50m.”
- Zothansiama et al., 2017 published in Electromagnetic Biology and Medicine found changes in blood considered biomarkers predictive of cancer in people living closer to cell arrays.
- Rodrigues et al., 2021 published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health found higher exposure to cell arrays linked to higher mortality from all cancer and specifically lung and breast cancer.
- Meo et al., 2018 published in the American Journal of Men’s Health linked higher cell tower exposures to delayed fine and gross motor skills, spatial working memory, and attention in school adolescents
- Yakymenko 2011 published in Exp Oncology found an increase in cancer incidence.
- Meo et al., 2015 published in Environmental Research and Public Health found higher exposures linked to a higher risk of type 2 diabetes.
- López 2021 published in Environmental Research linked higher exposures to more severe headaches and decreased sleep
- Levitt 2010 published in Environmental Reviews analyzed 100 studies and found ~80% showed biological effects near towers. (PDF)
- Yakymenko et al., 2015 published in Electromagnetic Biology Medicine reviewed 100 studies and showed the oxidative effects of low-intensity RF radiation.
- Buchner et al., 2011 published in Umwelt-Medizin-Gesellschaf and detailed in Oncology Letters followed people in a German town after a cell tower was erected and found stress hormones adrenaline and noradrenaline significantly increased over the first 6 months after the antenna activation and decreased dopamine and PEA levels after 18 months.
- Dode et al., 2011 published in Science of the Total Environment 10 year study on cell phone antennas by the local Municipal Health Department and several universities in Brazil found a clearly elevated relative risk of cancer mortality at residential distances of 500 meters or less from cell phone towers.
- Khurana et al., 2011 published in the International Journal of Occupational and Environmental Health reviewed epidemiological studies and found in 80% of the studies, people living <500 m from base stations had increased adverse neuro-behavioral symptoms and cancer.
- Falcioni et al., 2018 published in Environmental Research exposed rats to RF comparable to cell tower RF levels and found increased cancers.
- In 2011, radiofrequency radiation was classified as a Class 2B possible carcinogen by the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer. Between then and now, the published peer-reviewed scientific evidence has significantly increased. Now, many scientists are of the opinion that the weight of current peer-reviewed evidence supports the conclusion that radiofrequency radiation should be regarded as a human carcinogen (Hardell and Carlberg 2017, Peleg et al, 2018, Miller et al 2018).
- A 2021 research review on effects on wildlife published in Reviews on Environmental Health references more than 1,200 scientific references which found impacts to wildlife from even very low intensities of nonionizing EMFs including impacts to orientation and migration, reproduction, mating, nest, den building, and survivorship (Levitt et al., 2021a, Levitt et al., 2021b, Levitt et al., 2021c). The authors state that the current body of science should trigger urgent protective regulatory action. US and international safety limits for RF-EMF are not designed to protect wildlife despite the fact that birds perch on cell tower antennas and many species’ habitat is in the air close to cell antennas.
