EMF Awareness Day 2018, by Dave Ashton

Note: EMF Awareness Day 2018 marks the third anniversary of the death of Debra Fry's daughter, Jenny, who took her life due to the Wi-Fi in her school. This tragic story was recently covered by the Mirror:

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/school-wifi-networks-could-put-12602188


I wanted to write a brief article to mark EMF Awareness Day on 11th June 2018. I haven't planned this, or done any preparation, so this is just going to be a few random thoughts on the issue of EMFs (Electromagnetic Fields), now that the harmful pulsed microwave radiation from wireless technologies - certainly in the UK where I live - is just about impossible to avoid.

As I think that I've mentioned before, I'm not a scientist, and so I try to steer clear of delving too deeply into the science. I'm very happy to leave discussion of this to the experts. However, I do try to keep up with the general thrust of what the science is showing, and with any significant developments - good or bad - on what I call 'the issue' (yes, I know that there are some other things going on in the world right now, besides the monumental health implications of whole-body exposure to harmful radiation of most of the world's population in some ghastly biological experiment - it's just that I can't really think of anything that's more important).

The funny thing is that until I finally realised that I was severely 'electrosensitive' - and we can debate whether a physical and life-changing awareness of the harm that non-native EMFs is doing to our bodies is a sensitivity, or whether it is actually a well-honed and necessary advance warning system - I'd probably never even heard of electromagnetic radiation, and certainly hadn't heard of electromagnetic hypersensitivity.

Once you do stumble across "the issue" though, for whatever reason, and you start reading books, articles, and gain an understanding of the scientific investigations that have taken place over many, many years, you start to gain a greater appreciation of the extent of the problem, and are likely experience a growing incredulity and disbelief that it is being allowed to happen.

You have to unlearn and unpick many of your ideas about how you may have thought that the world, politicians and other 'authorities', health and protection organisations operate. In a way, you are forced, by the evidence, to understand that a conspiracy that dwarfs any that have been carried out before by the likes of Big Tobacco, Big Oil, Big Pharma and so on, is really taking place, openly, and with the full support of most of the population, which remains blithely unaware that its insatiable demand for all things wireless, 'smart' and 'convenient' is actually resulting in ill health, and eventually hastening death.

You only have to venture out into the 'real' world, to see people wandering about, zombie-like, perhaps pushing the baby in a pushchair, or maybe pre-teen children coming home from school - all with microwave-emitting phones glued (not literally, but not too far off either) glued to their ears.

Were you to mutter 'brain tumour!' out loud as you passed them, they would momentarily look at you as if you were completely mad, and then return to their conversation. That's if they could even be bothered to look at you at all.

Then, for anybody who has come to realise that their incapacitating symptoms are actually linked to their use of wireless gadgets, or their second-hand exposure to the radiation from the wireless technologies that are present wherever they go (and often in their own homes from neighbours), there are the 'friends' and family members, who greet warnings of the harm that these technologies are doing with incomprehension and disbelief, and who often then distance themselves or lose contact altogether.

Some people are forced to flee homes to avoid exposure to these EMFs, to stop working, and to add insult to injury, they are then condescendingly assured that their problems are all in their head, by individuals who either haven't heard of electrosensitivity before, or who may have some vested interest in claiming that it is a psychological issue which can best be treated with drugs and cognitive behavioural therapy.

The science is non-conflicted out there, in abundance, and yet according to most of the media coverage of EMFs and EHS, it simply doesn't exist.

So, what to do about this? How to warn the masses, and bring about change? How to protect not just ourselves as a species, but all of the other life on the planet which is under threat?

There are many, many ways of trying to bring about awareness and change. These can take the form of signing petitions, writing to or seeing elected officials, contacting health organisations, speaking to health professionals, putting up posters, posting articles and blogs online, attending meetings, taking part in campaigns, supporting political initiatives and Bills, talking to people, shunning 'smart' products and other wireless devices, and so on.

All of this is valid and necessary, and many people are already doing whatever they can.

I do believe that another necessary step will be to loudly say that the radiation levels to which we are exposed are monstrously high, and that we are all being harmed as a result. For much of the world, this will mean exposing an organisation called ICNIRP - the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection - which has set the fatally flawed guidelines followed by many Governments, and which protect commercial, military, and perhaps even political, interests, rather than our own.

Dr Lennart Hardell, who has done so much to expose the conflicts of interest that are rife in organisations such as the World Health Organisation and ICNIRP, recently produced an important review, entitled 'World Health Organization, radiofrequency radiation and health - a hard nut to crack' (link below to this open access paper).

One of the few pieces of formal recognition that EMFs represent a clear and present danger was the 2011 classification by the International Agency of Research on Cancer (IARC) of radiofrequency radiation (such as is emitted by mobile/cell and cordless phones, mobile masts/cell towers, Wi-Fi, smart meters etc.) as a Group 2B Possible Carcinogen, and the work of Dr Hardell was instrumental in this classification. Since that time, he has repeatedly stated that this radiation is a known carcinogen, no ifs, no buts, and that it should be reclassified accordingly.

He is joined by many other scientific and medical experts who have signed the International EMF Scientist Appeal, and who collectively say:

'Numerous recent scientific publications have shown that EMF affects living organisms at levels well below most international and national guidelines. Effects include increased cancer risk, cellular stress, increase in harmful free radicals, genetic damages, structural and functional changes of the reproductive system, learning and memory deficits, neurological disorders, and negative impacts on general well-being in humans. Damage goes well beyond the human race, as there is growing evidence of harmful effects to both plant and animal life.'

Concerning ICNIRP, they add:

'The various agencies setting safety standards have failed to impose sufficient guidelines to protect the general public, particularly children who are more vulnerable to the effects of EMF'

As I said, I am not a scientist, but it seems clear to me that exposure to this ubiquitous radiation in our environment has numerous harmful consequences for humans (let alone other species), one of which is electromagnetic hypersensitivity.

If this is so, we need to drastically reduce, if not eliminate, this harmful agent from our environment. Not just for EHS people, but for all of us. And, if the science showing damage to fertility and DNA is correct, for the future viability of our species.

Organisations that claim that the guidelines protect us, and that there is no 'convincing', 'consistent' or 'conclusive' evidence otherwise, must be challenged, and conflicts of interest among the individuals who are producing these statements must be exposed.

There have been some welcome signs of the re-emergence of investigative journalism on 'the issue', such as the recent exposé of the wireless industry by Mark Hertsgaard (see 3rd link below), and also some coverage in the Mirror newspaper in the UK (by the journalist who wrote the Mirror article about Jenny Fry at the top of this post).

On EMF Awareness Day, I think that we should, as well as remembering the many victims of wireless technologies, whether through cancers, heart disease, electrosensitivity, or any other of the many serious and life-changing health conditions that are linked to EMFs, come to an understanding that if things are ever going to change for the better, the organisations and individuals that are obstructing change need to be named and shamed, and the conflicted assertions that these EMFs are safe, and that the current exposure levels are protective, must be challenged.



World Health Organization, radiofrequency radiation and health - a hard nut to crack (Review)


https://www.spandidos-publications.com/10.3892/ijo.2017.4046


International EMF Scientist Appeal


https://www.emfscientist.org/


How Big Wireless Made Us Think That Cell Phones Are Safe: A Special Investigation - The Nation


https://www.thenation.com/article/how-big-wireless-made-us-think-that-cell-phones-are-safe-a-special-investigation/