Over the last few weeks, a bit of a storm has erupted over Airtel's applications to spackle the island with the masts required to run the island's third mobile phone network. Naturally there's some serious questions to be answered about these potential eyesores, why they are necessary and why they couldn't share existing sites.
However, lately the furore has largely focused on health implications. Most recently on Tuesday, Mr Roger Coghill rolled in to the island to give a talk at St Martin's Community Centre which has been widely and uncritically reported in the media. The Press proclaims him to be an 'electromagnetic energy expert' and a 'research scientist', and BBC Guernsey never miss an opportunity to point out that he is 'Cambridge-educated'.
But dig a little deeper, and it seems things are not quite what they appear.
As the Press notes (nearly) correctly, Coghill became quite prominent in 1998 when he published independent research arguing that RF emissions from mobile phones damage the immune system, and attempted a private prosecution against a mobile dealer arguing that under the Consumer Protection Act he should be displaying warning labels on phone packaging.
Coghill lost the case. His research was not published in any peer-reviewed journal, and as such represented nothing more than his opinion. More importantly, it was not corroborated by other peer-reviewed studies. But that didn't stop both the case and the research generating a huge amount of media interest: Coghill was cited 119 times in the media between 1998 and 2003, fuelling considerable public fear over the safety of mobile phones.
Around the same time, Coghill set up Coghill Research Laboratories. For the last ten years, he has been conducting research there into the effects of magnetism, electric fields and non-ionising radiation on living tissue.
Coghill has published very few papers in peer-reviewed journals (especially if you don't count papers in European Biology and Bioelectromagnetics, a journal set up by Medcross Group which in turn was founded by... er... Roger Coghill). Of those which have, none effectively demonstrate a causal link between EMR (electromagnetic radiation) and negative health effects.
Nor do any of them provide evidence for the health benefits of Coghill's products, peddled via his website. These consist of a variety of alternative therapy books, highly dubious 'therapeutic' pendants and bracelets, mobile phone shields, and the modestly-named 'Coghill SuperMagnet', which is... er... a magnet. It's a very expensive magnet though, so it must be good at... whatever it does...
So what? The guy's a bit iffy - but there's still lots of research to indicate there are risks from mobiles, right?
Well, it is true that even though we know a lot more than we did 20 years ago, mobile phone masts are still not guaranteed to be safe. Millions of pounds are being poured into epidemiological studies to continue to examine the long-term effects of mobile phone emissions, and rightly so.
But with each study which comes up negative, with the benefit of ever longer case histories to examine, and with each literature review which whittles out the chaff from the previous studies, the odds that we will discover any health risks in a future study get smaller and smaller.
Despite this increasing body of evidence, surveys conducted in Europe, the UK and the US generally indicate that about 3% of the population suffers from a condition known as 'electromagnetic hypersensitivity syndrome' (EHS). This is a recognised condition with symptoms like stress, nausea, headaches and joint pain. The problem for scientists is that it is not known what causes EHS. A number of 'provocation studies' have been conducted into this - basically subjects who claim to have EHS are tested to see how the presence or absence of a mobile phone signal affects their symptoms.
One such study was published by Essex University yesterday and made headline news nationally. In fact there have been more than 30 similar studies published in the past. Most of these gave similar negative results to the Essex study - the few that didn't were either demonstrably flawed, couldn't be repeated even by the same researchers, or had mutually contradictory results.
However, what the provocation studies do show is that although EHS is not caused by the presence of mobile phone signals, subjects are afflicted with EHS when they believe that a signal is present.
Many media outlets have reported this result as saying that EHS is 'all in the mind', but that's not helpful because it belittles the very real and sometimes debilitating effects of EHS - a bit like dismissing depression as being 'all in the mind'. Though other causes of EHS cannot be ruled out, the most plausible explanation is that many subjects suffering from EHS are experiencing the consequences of anxiety brought on by their own fear of 'electrosmog'.
Coghill believes (or at least says he believes) that mobile companies are engaged in a conspiracy to fund biased studies, stymie true research, and cover up the true dangers of mobile technology. True, a lot of research into mobile phone risks is sponsored by mobile phone companies, but that's why there is a scientific peer-review process. What would Coghill be saying if the mobile companies refused to fund this research?
In reality, campaigners such as Coghill are always poised on the sidelines to pump the media with misinformation over any health scare, justified or not, and the media's blind acceptance of their authority converts this into public fear. Whilst Coghill reaps the rewards and boosts his notoriety, the well-being of around 2 million EHS sufferers in Britain alone is in jeopardy.
Acknowledgement: Apart from Coghill's own website, this astonishing thread on the James Randi Educational Foundation forum proved to be an absolute mine of references and links which proved thoroughly useful in researching this post, largely provided by the man himself.
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6 comments:
Your blog refers extensively to me, and I hope you will give me this opportunity of a reply. At the meeting on Tuesday in St Martin, Guernsey, I set out fully as possible before a lay audience the scientific reasons for concern about present ICNIRP guidelines, drawing on the peer reviewed literature. I had a few years previous also organised a conference at the Royal Society of Medicine on Electrosensitivity, at which the Essex research team gave a presentation. At that time some doubts were expressed about the protocol being developed and these have now been repeated by other scientists. As for my arguments that cellphone industry funded studies are biased, and that the industry deliberately downplays the health risks, this is also the view of Dr George Carlo, who was in charge of the industry's own $28 million research program in the 1990s.
The general tone of your comments are disparaging. Most reasonable people would agree that gaining an Open Scholarship to Cambridge University (you failed to mention my Masters degree in Environmental Management, my place on the Institute of Biology Committee for South Wales, my full membership of the Bioelectromagnetics Society, and my modern well equipped laboratory in South Wales, etc) might qualify me to evaluate the scientific literature. By contrast your blog seems only to apply an ad hominem attack on my credibility, and fails if only because it avoids a full presentation of my qualifications.
It is always helpful if critics at least get their facts right. My company was founded in 1981 not around the same time as the Abergavenny Court Case, some 17 years later, as alleged by you. Despite your allegation of people like me pumping the public with misinformation, you give no example whatsoever of that libellous claim in my case, and I challenge you to do so.
I wonder if you even attended the St Martins meeting. If not maybe you would like a copy of the talk I gave, supported by a large amount of peer review published studies. You would also then have heard me say that in my opinion the normal use of a cellphone poses no hazard to health.
As for your comment that I have published few peer reviewed papers, you should recall that I am not a tenured academic whose performance is measured in the number (often repetitive) of papers published, but a research laboratory whose clients often prefer us not to publish our findings. Anyway those few papers we have chosen to publish include British Medical Journal, The Institute of Biology Journal, Biophysics, Biophysica (in Russian), and the European Journal of Cancer Prevention. As for EBAB, this online journal is the only bioelectromagnetics journal in Europe, and its editorial board includes Professors from eminent institutions such as the Karolinska Institute (partly responsible for selecting Nobel Prize winners).
I suggest with respect that before you start attacking people with whose views you disagree you take a close look at the arguments they offer and address those, rather than attempt to drag down their personal details.
Roger Coghill MA (Cantab) C Biol MI Biol MA (Environ Mgt)
As a tailpiece to my previous comment readers should be aware of the latest study today from Aarhus University by Prof Bach Anderson, who reported that users of 3G phones for 45 minutes suffer headaches and attention deficits. In a few weeks time will also be published a Californian Bioinitiative review by a number of eminent scientists which also questions the validity of the ICNIRP Guidelines, for the same reasons as I do.
Picking up on your comments about our magnet therapy products, your readers might like to know that my book on Magnet Therapy has been translated into five languages and gone through three editions, and my book The Dark Side of the brain, though now out of print in hard copy, is commanding a price of several hundred dollars for secondhand copies on Amazon. Some of the magnet products featured in our online shop are now on the National Health Service List, as awareness of the benefits of this novel intervention grows within establishment medicine. The magnets we use are neodymium-boron-iron, and have far superior qualities to the old ferrites.
Finally, your representation of the Court case I brought in 1998 fails to point out that it was followed within 90 days by the UK Government's announcement of the Stewart Committee Inquiry and a subsequent £7 million research program into cellphone health effects. Sir William Stewart, having reviewed the scientific literature, advised against siting masts near schools, hospitals, and daycare centres (as do the Swedish and French Governments, but not it would appear do the Guernsey regulators), and that children should not be given cellphones. The magistrate at Abergavenny only found for the defendant because this local cellphone retailer had at least taken some pains to look into the science, but the same magistrate made it very clear that his decision should not be construed as a judgement about cellphone safety. Yes, I lost the case, but the outcome was to move the scientific debate forward dramatically, and in this respect it was a complete tactical victory.
Sorry, I spotted a typo: the University is Aalborg, not Aarhus. While I am on here, here are further details on the forthcoming Californian review:
website link: Emfacts.com
#772: Major new scientific review questions adequacy of ELF/RF standards
Tuesday July 24th 2007, 2:19 pm
Filed under: 50/60 Hz, Literature reviews, On ICNIRP and WHO, Cancer clusters
PRESS RELEASE July 20, 2007
Contact Information: CL Sage@ sage@silcom.com
Expected release date: 31 August 07 (Internet- Full Public Access)
BioInitiative: A Rationale for a Biologically-based Public Exposure Standard for Electromagnetic Fields (ELF and RF)
An international working group composed of scientists, researchers and public health policy professionals (The BioInitiative) has joined together to document the information that needs to be considered in the international debate about the adequacy (or inadequacy) of existing public exposure standards for extra-low frequency (ELF-EMF) and radiofrequency (RF-EMF). In August of 2007, the BioInitiative will present a science-based assessment of the research and public health policy issues which argue for new, biologically-based exposure standards.
Hey, this is pretty spicy stuff!
Whatever one thinks of Roger Coghill, it does seem rash to base safety standard solely on the ICNIRP figures. The issues surrounding non-thermal effects seem very unclear, and, in light of this, the only reasonable response would be to err on the safe side.
I would be interested to know what the effect of imposing more restrictive standards on the telecoms operators would be. A large number of low power masts, (rather than a few dozen whoppers), I guess.
Your link to the discussion thread was hard work. I only managed a few pages. Roger Coghill seemed evasive ... but he was addressing a generally hostile audience.
Roger Coghill's site was more enlightening. He does his arguments no favours by associating himself with all those questionable magnetic gadgets. I have read generally poor reviews of them, and I can't help thinking that he might be taken more seriously if he wasn't selling those things.
(Also, I found the 'challenge' on his website disgraceful. I've read his defense of it but, despite this, I think it still makes him look like a complete turd. He needs some PR people ... badly.)
Roger,
I guess I ought to address some of the points raised in your response(s!):
- I don't doubt your credentials, but 'avoided' presenting them precisely because the thrust of my posting is that science does not operate on the basis of argument by authority.
- The date your laboratory started is similarly immaterial as far as I am concerned, but for narrative purposes I derived it from this page on your website and also the dates of the earliest citations on that page.
- An example of misinformation provided by you to the media is contained in the Daily Mail of 8th August 2000, article titled "Mobile phones safety muddle", in which you are quoted as saying in connection with mobile phone radiation, 'When that frequency resonates with frequencies in the brain, the brain reacts violently, either by shutting down or, in the case of infants, increasing its activity.' The clear implication is that mobile phone EMR emissions are capable of having powerful negative health consequences regardless of their strength, when the balance of evidence does not support that view.
- I happily admit that I did not attend your talk, because I have not sought to comment on its content. The motivation for my post was not your talk itself, but the unjustified assertions by the media and local lobbyists that you are an impartial, peer-respected expert.
- I cannot comment on either the Anderson or BioInitiative papers without seeing them - I note that latter is not even published yet!
- Finally, your summary of the Stewart Report is rather misleading. In relation to schools for example, Stewart actually recommends that school and parental permission should be sought before siting a macrocell base station (i.e. a higher-powered transmitter) in such a way that the 'beam of highest intensity' falls on the school grounds, as part of the 'precautionary approach'. Stewart also states that 'The balance of evidence to date suggests that exposures to RF radiation below NRPB and ICNIRP guidelines do not cause adverse health effects to the general population' and that 'the balance of evidence indicates that there is no general risk to the health of people living near to base stations on the basis that exposures are expected to be small fractions of guidelines'.
Paul,
The OUR already audits radio mast emissions and they fall well within (generally hundreds of times below) ICNIRP guidelines, exactly in accordance with the 'precautionary approach' recommendations of the Stewart report.
For better or worse, the long-term trend in wireless communications may be a proliferation of very many more localised, lower-power masts, as customers will continue to demand better coverage, higher bandwidth and longer battery life. Planners probably need to start thinking right now about how they are going to deal with this!
Re the JREF forum thread, I've also tracked down an interesting summary of it.
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