A review of studies conducted on cell phones over the past 30 years assures that cell phone use does not increase the risk of brain cancer.
- A study commissioned by the WHO claims that mobile phones and wireless devices are not linked to an increased risk of brain cancer.
- These conclusions are based on the analysis of data collected between 1994 and 2022 in 22 countries.
- Previous data had led the WHO to classify mobile phones as “possibly carcinogenic to humans.”
For several years, the “waves” of mobile phones have fueled fears and suspicions. But the conclusions of a major study commissioned by the World Health Organization (WHO) are reassuring.
Data collected over nearly three decades, published in the journal Environment International, show that there is no link between mobile phone use and an increase in brain cancer.
Brain: no association between mobile telephony and cancer
To take stock of the potential effects of wireless technologies on health, and more specifically on the brain, the researchers reviewed 63 studies conducted on the subject between 1994 and 2022 in 22 countries. They sought to determine whether devices that use radio frequencies such as smartphones, but also radios, TVs and baby monitors increase the risks of cancers of the central nervous system (including the brain, meninges, pituitary gland and ear), salivary gland tumors and brain tumors.
Bottom line: The analysis found no association between the use of wireless technologies that emit non-ionizing radiation and cancer. The devices use frequencies and energy levels low enough not to damage DNA.
“Regarding the main question, cell phones and brain cancer, we found no increased risk, even with exposure of more than 10 years and the maximum categories of call time or number of calls,” comments Mark Elwood, co-author of the study and honorary professor of cancer epidemiology at the University of Auckland in New Zealand.
Exposure to radio waves is not a danger to human health
Exposure to radio waves was classified as possibly carcinogenic to humans in 2011 by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC). Professor Ken Karipidis of the Australian Radiation and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA), who worked on the new study, notes that the decision by the WHO-created intergovernmental cancer research agency was “based on limited evidence from human observational studies.”
“This systematic review of human observational studies is based on a much larger dataset than that reviewed by IARC, which also includes more recent and more comprehensive studies, so that we can be more confident that exposure to radio waves from wireless technology is not a danger to human health.”he concludes in a press release from his agency.
In an article by The Conversation Writing with Sarah Loughran, he adds that the results of the new study are encouraging because they confirm that national and international safety limits on radio waves are protective.