Cellular phones and electrosensitivity
A criticism of a Finnish study

August 16, 2002

To the Editor:
 
Some media have reported on an article in Bioelectromagnetics¹ describing a Finnish study of cellular phones and electrosensitivity. As this study has incorrectly been supposed to prove that electrosensitive people do not react on cellular phones, a critical comment is called for.
 
The date of the test is not specified in the article. In a Swedish press release the study was referred to as "a new scientific study". The truth is that it took place three years ago, in May 1999.
 
According to the Bioelectromagnetics article, a portable laptop computer (Compact Contura AERO 4125) was used to operate the phones. It should be noted that a laptop computer is not designed for switching cell phones on and off. Some auxiliary equipment must have been used. This auxiliary equipment is not described in the article.
 
Laptop computers have processors inside. It has repeatedly been observed that electrosensitive people get more or less severe symptoms when subjected to processor noise. Even low-power processors, like those in wristwatches, may cause reactions at distances up to one metre. This is just everyday experience - no scientific study of this phenomenon is known. Unless special precautions were taken (filtering and screening), the cables connecting the phones to the auxiliary equipment and the computer almost certainly conducted processor noise to the cell phones, which were mounted just a few inches from the head of the test subject. As there is no description of the auxiliary equipment, one cannot exclude the possibility that the processor-noise radiation was stronger in the "off" than in the "on" position.
 
The report says, "The experimenter operating the phones via the computer was positioned behind an opaque screen, about 1.5 m from the subject." The screen was opaque indeed; the test subjects were not allowed to look behind it until the test was finished for everybody. If, at an early stage, they had discovered that there was a laptop computer, they had certainly refused to take part in the test.
 
It had been agreed that no electronic equipment other than cellular phones was to be present at the test location. In the invitation letter it was stated that a computer would be used for "remote control" of the phones, but none of the test subjects suspected that this "remote control" meant a distance of less than one meter! According to one of the test subjects the distance from the computer to the test seat was between 0,5 and 1 meter.
 
If no symptoms had been reported, the conclusion would have been that the exposure was too weak for producing symptoms. As it was, many symptoms were reported. Twenty symptoms and sensations were listed in Table 1 of the article. On the top of the list you find Pain and warmth in the head, headache, and sensations in the eyes, neck, and face.
 
"Typically, the symptoms occurred soon after the start of a test, in some cases even before the phone was switched on. A few subjects perceived such intolerable symptoms that they decided to discontinue at early stages of some tests."
 
The disclosure that electronic equipment had been in use close to the test seat provoked anger among participants, and the word "fraud" was used. However, "fraud" is not necessarily the relevant characterization. It may as well have been ignorance.

 
Ragnar Forshufvud, M.Sc.

1 M.Hietanen, A.-M.Hämäläinen, T.Husman: Hypersensitivity symptoms associated with exposure to cellular telephones: No causal link. Bioelectromagnetics Vol. 23, Issue 4, 2002, pp.264-270.