There’s still no proof that mobile phones and the radiation they emit cause cancer, according to two new government studies conducted on mice and rats. While similar research has been pursued for over two decades now, the latest scientific efforts focused on ultra-high doses of cell phone radiation on rodents that they wouldn’t be able to test on humans. The rat study led by John Bucher of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences yielded an inconclusive link with slightly higher tumor rates in rodents that were exposed to such extreme levels of radiation, though the chief researcher behind the project remains adamant people have no reason to worry.
Mr. Bucher and a number of other experts who scrutinized the new findings are quick to point out that weak connections between cell phone radiation and cancer found in such studies are far from a viable cause for concern because while the emissions tested in a laboratory environment are identical in nature to that generated by cell phones, their actual volumes are way beyond anything people would be exposed to in real-world environments, even after a prolonged period of time. Additionally, any weak links between mobile phones and cancer that science managed to uncover so far have all been observed exclusively in animals, whereas higher cancer risks in humans have never been discovered by any credible research. The latest such studies are now being peer-reviewed and anyone who’s still worried about their mobile phone possibly causing cancer can simply make calls via headphones or an earpiece, hence not placing the source of what’s still believed to be entirely harmless radiation close to their brain.
The heavily irradiated rats that on average developed slightly more tumors than the regular ones actually ended up living longer than their peers, though Mr. Bucher isn’t convinced the radiation or cancer are directly related to that phenomenon. Theoretically, the radiation could have reduced inflammation, consequently lowering the risk of the subjects developing a rat disease, the researcher speculated. Concerns about cell phone radiation are likely to become more prominent in the coming years as 5G deployment efforts intensify and lead to millions of new small cell sites being installed throughout the world, with some such appeals already starting in parts of the United States.