Fourth generation (4G) phones are in use now and 5G ones are about to be released. The radiation was also representative of an older form of cell phone technology, 2G and 3G. Since the radiation was more intense and given over the whole body, it is hard to extrapolate the danger to human health. Though rodents are useful tools for learning about basic biology, they don’t necessarily indicate how humans will respond. Back to top Rats Are Not HumansĮven if the results had been more consistent, it would still be difficult to know what they mean for human health. “All told, these features of the study make it difficult to judge whether the cancer effect was real,” he says. The female rats, female mice, and male mice were not affected. (In past studies, some of the control animals have developed these types of tumors.)Ī further curiosity about the study was that only male rats seemed to be affected. Because cancer affects animals more as they age, it’s possible that the control rats simply didn’t live long enough to develop tumors. Making this result more difficult to interpret is that, for unknown reasons, the control rats did not live as long as the experimental rats. When sample sizes are small, simple chance can play a large role in the outcomes. The total number of rats in each treatment group was 90. However, there are reasons to doubt these numbers, Dr. These cancers are generally rare in humans, and also deadly, so if cell phone radiation increases their incidence, it is something to worry about indeed. None of the control rats (which did not receive radiation) developed either cancer. They found that 6% of the male rats exposed to the highest dose of cell phone radiation developed malignant schwannomas in the heart, while 2 to 3% developed gliomas in the brain. (The amounts given were more than are permitted for humans by the Federal Communications Commission.) They then looked in different tissues for signs of cancer. In their study, the National Toxicology Program investigators zapped more than 1,200 rats and mice with cell phone radiation - equivalent to that emitted by 2G and 3G phones - over their entire body for nine hours a day for two years. Those limitations fall into three main categories, he says: statistical challenges, extrapolating lessons from rodents to humans, and questions about dosing. “But we have to recognize the limitations that come along with it.” “The bottom line is it’s a really cool study,” Dr. But according to Lawrence Dauer, a radiation expert at MSK, there’s no reason to freak out just yet. These results generated some scary-sounding news headlines. They also reported finding what they said was “some evidence” in the animal studies that cell phone radiation could cause a brain cancer called glioma. To the surprise and alarm of many, the investigators found what they called “clear evidence” that cell phone radiation could cause a type of nerve tissue cancer called a malignant schwannoma in rats. The argument that cell phones cause cancer lacks biological plausibility because the energy contained in the waves is too low to cause damage. Final results were released to the public in November 2018. The study cost $20 million and took more than ten years to complete. Their approach was to expose laboratory rodents to high doses of cell phone radiation over their entire life span and see if they developed cancer as a result. To obtain more solid evidence, a team of scientists at the National Toxicology Program, a division of the National Institutes of Health, undertook an in-depth study. Numerous studies of cell phone radiation and cancer have been conducted over the years to address the issue, but none has been definitive.
Ever since, the question of whether cell phones cause cancer has buzzed quietly in the background as the technology has become omnipresent in our lives. He said it caused his wife’s brain tumor. An MSK radiation expert discusses the study’s limitations and weighs in on the evidence related to cell phone use and cancer risk.īack in 1993, a Florida resident named David Reynard went on CNN’s Larry King Live to warn about the dangers of cell phone radiation. A government-funded study published last year raised concerns about the dangers of cell phone radiation.