Everyone’s got a cell phone, compact fluorescent lights are the norm, and we cook our dinners
in the microwave every night.
Or at least I do.
Could all these electromagnetic waves whipping around be harmful?
Hi everyone, Julian here for DNews.
A recent article by Ed Cumming in the Guardian describes a tiny hamlet in West Virginia with
an array of massive radio telescopes looming over it.
Telescopes like this are extremely sensitive; this year in Australia what was originally
thought to be a major breakthrough in the search for life was actually just bursts of
radiation emitted when someone was opening the microwave in the break room before the
timer went off.
So in order to pick up radio waves from the edges of the universe clearly, the town has
to be an electromagnetic dead zone.
That means no cell signals or radio, and if you have wifi in your home, occasionally some
nice men and women from the telescope will come ‘round and ask you to turn it off.
While this sounds like my own personal version of hell, to others it’s a safe haven.
Not from the barrage of facebook and twitter, which I totally get and by the way you can
follow me @JHug00, but from the electromagnetic waves themselves.
Diane Schou is one of the people seeking peace in Green Bank because she claims she’s electrosensitive.
Schou says she moved there after she started getting severe headaches, blurred vision,
and skin rashes.
She describes her symptoms as radiation sickness and attributed it to a US Cellular tower by
her home, but she’s also sensitive to fluorescent lights and electric fences.
She’s not alone either, and since she moved to Green Bank, 40 other electrosensitive people
have joined her.
But is it real?
Can the invisible little waves that constantly surround us have an effect on our bodies?
Science says probs not.
First consider Schou’s own account.
She says she was sensitive only to US Cellular towers, and specifically said she didn’t
react to AT&T.
The problem with that is US Cellular uses frequencies around 850 MHz and 1900 MHz, and
so does AT&T, so right away her claim is looking suspect.
She also likens her symptoms to radiation sickness but there’s a problem there too.
Just because “electromagnetic radiation” has the word radiation in it, doesn’t mean
it’s going to cause radiation sickness.
Radio and microwaves have less energy than visible light, and substantially less energy
than x-rays or gamma rays.
These higher energy waves, along with particles emitted from from nuclear radiation, can damage
tissue and cause radiation sickness by stripping electrons off atoms.
Microwaves?
Not so much.
Most people who report electromagnetic sensitivity also have a wide and varying range of symptoms,
which makes their case harder to substantiate.
There’s also the fact that Schou says she’s sensitive to fluorescent lights.
Fluorescents do emit more UVB radiation than incandescents but UV radiation is at wavelengths
that are orders of magnitude smaller than radio or microwaves.
They’re on the other side of the spectrum as visible light.
So why isn’t visible light also irritating?
Plus the falloff of radiation from compact fluorescent lights, or CFLs, is so steep that
at just 4 feet away it’s equivalent to background radiation.
CFLs are different than incandescents because they flicker, and you might guess the flickering
from fluorescent lights is giving Schou headaches.
But that’s unlikely because modern fluorescent bulbs flicker at 10,000 to 40,000 cycles per
second, and that is way too fast for the human eye to see.
Studies have looked into the claim of Electrosensitivity too, and they haven’t turned up any concrete
evidence it’s a thing either.
A double blind study from 2006 observed 60 self-reported sensitive people as well as
60 non-sensitive control participants.
They were exposed to a 900 MHz pulsing signal, a non-pulsing signal, and a condition with
no signal present.
The sensitive subjects reported symptoms when a signal was present 60% of the time.
They reported symptoms when a signal wasn’t present 63% of the time.
Soooo…
Doesn’t seem like they can really tell.
That’s not to say the symptoms aren’t real.
But the cause is probably not electromagnetic frequencies, it’s the belief that it’s
electromagnetic frequencies.
It could be another case of the placebo effect’s evil twin, the nocebo effect.
So despite the abundance of invisible waves carrying phone calls and dirty snapchats past
you in the air, it looks like you’re going to be A-OK, so long as you think you’re
going to be OK.
If you’re not terrified of radiation, good news, you can also use it to wirelessly charge
your phone.
Yay less wires and more radiation!
Trace explains how it work here.