Subject: Press release (fwd)
Date: Sun, 6 Jul 1997 151634 -0500 (CDT)
From: "Roy L. Beavers" <rbeavers@mail.llion.org>
To: Multiple recipients of list <emf-l@mail.llion.org>
--------------------------------------------------
Hi everybody:
The following press release from Don Maisch is scheduled to be released in
Australia on Tuesday. (That's Monday in the U.S. It is now Sunday
afternoon in the U.S. I'm sending it out to allow some time for news
agencies to "check sources." The U.S. press needs that to stay even with
the Aussie news services.....)
I recommend you particularly take note of the quotations from Drs
Ross Adey, Richard Stevens and the recent report of study results
by Dr. Maria Feychting of Sweden.....
(We are not likely to be able to get the USA TODAY headlines that the
NCI people were given, but the scientific world is aware.....!!!!)
Cheerio....
Roy Beavers (EMFguru)
rbeavers@mail.llion.org.........http://www.feb.se/EMF-L/EMF-L.html
...............................It is better to light a single candle ...
than to curse the darkness...............................................
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sun, 6 Jul 1997 23:50:29 +1000
From: Don Maisch
To: rbeavers@mail.llion.org
Subject: Press release
Roy
The media have made a big thing out of the NCI study. As usual the
reporters have just reprinted the propaganda served up to them from the PR
flaks! The following press release will go out on Tuesday.
Don Maisch
********************************************************************************
EMFacts Information Service
Tuesday July 8 1997
PO Box 96, North Hobart Tasmania 7002
phone: (03) 6243 0195 Fax: (03) 6243 0340
E-mail: emfacts@tassie.net.au
Media Release
********************************************************************************
The NCI Study; putting a "spin" on science......
On Friday July 4, 1997 both The Australian and The Sydney Morning Herald
featured articles about the just released U.S, National Cancer Institute
study which found that there was no evidence that powerline electromagnetic
fields increase childhood leukemia risks. This study was published July
3rd in the New England Journal of Medicine. Most of the media and power
industry supporters are claiming this study exonerates powerline EMFs as a
health hazard. These claims can not be *scientifically* justified, as the
following will illustrate.
Don MacPhee fron LaTrobe University's school of microbiology states in The
Australian that the results of the NCI Study backed his claims that power
lines did not emit enough energy to cause childhood cancer or any other
form of cancer. Mac Phee said that it was mostly the media and scientists
of "Dubious Quality" that had perpetuated the myth that there was any link
between power lines and cancer. "Its just absolute non-sense", Dr. McPhee
said.
This line is also being actively pushed by the media in the US and is being
promoted as proof that future funding for research should cease.
It is unfortunate that reporters and so called experts who are now calling
the NCI study as positive proof that a risk does not exist from long term
exposure to powerline electromagnetic fields did not take the time to
critically examine what the study actually found, and to examine the
*criteria* which led to the NCI researcher's conclusions.
The researchers actually acknowledge in no less than four places, a
statistically significant increase in acute lymphoblastic leukaemia (ALL)
in children exposed to powerline magnetic fields in excess of 3 milliGauss
finding almost twice (1.79) times the number of expected cases. This is a
CONFIRMATION of many previous studies which have shown a similar level of
association between childhood leukaemia and "magnetic fields" from
electricity. The article in The Australian mentions that the researchers
dismissed as a "statistical fluke" a 24% increase in leukemia risk for
children exposed to what is termed "especially high magnetic fields".
[Guru's note: "magnetic fields" is NOT the equivalent of EMF. It is only
ONE of the now "five or six" known EMF metrics. Of these, the electric
field is probably the most important, though the role of transients,
harmonics, ground currents, radon daughters and the RF frequencies that
"ride" on power lines are also suspect.]
The NCI researchers were able to dismiss this fact by arbitrarily setting a
2 mG level as a cut-off limit. The fact is, that if they had used the 3 mG
level as a cut off point in their calculations, the conclusions would have
been exactly the opposite - that there IS a significant risk!
On july 4th EMFacts e-mailed Professor Ross Adey, one of the most respected
bio-electromagnetic researchers in the U.S. Dr. Adey is the author of
numerous books and research papers on the bio-effects of EMFs. He recently
conducted a $3 million research program for Motorola. His reply on the
NCI study is as follows:
"A number of us worked on the NCI paper through last weekend. Sam
Milham, the Washington State epidemiologist and a pioneer in this
field, points out that if they had included the 3mg level in their
cutoff, the conclusions would have been exactly the
opposite - that there IS a significant risk. And selection of 2mG
is quite arbitrary. David Savitz used 3mG in some of his work.
Obviously there is no steep threshold beyond which risks rise
exponentially.
At the recent Bologna International Symposium, Scuz from U. Mainz had a
paper combining kids from Berlin and Southern Saxony in
high exposure homes to give leukemia odds ratio of 6.8 for young
kids (under 4yrs). So the dismissive attitude of NCI is totally
unrealistic."
Richard Stevens, the epidemiologist from Battelle and editor of the recent
melatonin/breast cancer book, has written a rebuttal letter to the NEJM:
"Surprisingly, for a modern study, the NCI researchers only measured
MAGNETIC fields and did NOT include ELECTRIC fields which are being
increasingly implicated in cancer development and many other adverse health
conditions. Both magnetic and electric fields are being measured in the
landmark UK Childhood Cancer Study due out early next year, as UK
researchers understand the potential importance of electric fields. In the
1996 Ontario Hydro adult worker study conducted by Dr. Antony Miller of
Toronto University in Canada, when they took both fields into account, the
risk rose from 1.6 (magnetic fields only, and similar to the 1.79 in this
study) to 11.2 (both magnetic and ELECTRIC fields considered) - it is
likely to be a similar increase for children.
"If we extrapolate to the evidence (Electromagnetics Forum , Vol.1,No.2
p.5-6 ) that levels of 12 mG affect the ability of melatonin to suppress
cancer cells and that there is some evidence of a dose-response
relationship between 2 and 12 mG, then at levels at or below 2mG, a no
effect result could well be expected.
"With this in mind, the only thing the NCI indicates is that children with
magnetic field exposures at 2 mG and under are not at increased risk of
developing leukemia from their EMF exposure. According to Alasdair
Philips, co-author of the study Extra low frequency electric and magnetic
fields in the bedplace of children diagnosed with leukemia: a case-control
study , published in the June 1996 volume of the European Journal of Cancer
Prevention , it is common to find levels above 3mG near to power lines,
electricity substations and in many city houses.
"Rather than exonerating EMFs, the NCI study gives further support for the
1995 draft guidelines from the U.S. National Council of Radiation
Protection and Measurements. (NCRP) These guidelines generally endorses a
2mG exposure limit.
"As stated in the NCRP's conclusions:
"In arriving at the proposed guidelines, the committee has considered
available laboratory studies on bioeffects and epidemiological reports of
health hazards from electric and magnetic field exposure. . . In key areas
of bioelectromagnetic research, findings are sufficiently consistent and
form a sufficiently coherent picture to suggest plausible connections
between ELF EMF exposures and disruption of normal biological processes,
in ways meriting detailed examination of potential implications in human
health."
What was surprisengly NOT reported in the Australian media was the release
of a much larger Swedish EMF human exposure study less than three weeks
before the NCI study. The Swedish study included approximately 400,000
subjects who had lived within 300 meters of transmission lines in Sweden
for at least one year between 1960 and 1985. The researchers found that
persons who were exposed to magnetic fields both at home and at work are
nearly 4 times likely to develop leukemia than those who were not exposed
to magnetic fields.
To quote from the Epidemiology Press Release of 16 June 1997:
***Exposure to Magnetic Fields at Home and at Work Increases Risk of
Leukemia***
"Dr Maria Feychting and colleagues at the Karolinska Institute and the
National Institute for Working Life in Sweden report in the July issue of
Epidemiology that persons who were exposed to magnetic fields both at home
and at work are nearly 4 times likely to develop leukemia as those were not
exposed to magnetic fields.
"Dr. Feychting and colleagues conducted a case-control study from among
approximately 400, 000 subjects who had lived within 300 meters of
transmission lines in Sweden for at least one year between 1960 and 1985.
The investigators designated as cases 325 residents diagnosed with leukemia
and 223 residents diagnosed with a tumor of the central nervous system. For
each case identified, they selected at random at least two control subjects
of the same sex and five-year age group who had lived in the same parish as
the case.
"They assessed exposure to magnetic fields generated by transmission and
distribution power lines close to each subject's house, excluding buried
power cables from the calculations. They obtained information on each
subject's occupation from five-year censuses. They assessed occupational
magnetic field exposures for each subject through extrapolation of exposure
estimates for each occupation and without knowledge of weather the subject
was a case or control. The investigators took into account in their
analysis other occupational exposures, such as benzines, oil products,
solvents, and welding fumes, that have been associated with leukemia in
earlier studies. They compare the residential and occupational histories of
the cases with the histories of controls.
"Subjects in the highest category of occupational exposure to magnetic
fields (0.20 microT) had nearly double the risk of developing acute myeloid
leukemia, a 40% increase in risk of developing chronic myeloid leukemia,
and a 70% increase in risk for chronic lymphocytic leukemia when compared
with unexposed subjects. Those with high levels of exposure to magnetic
fields at home had double risk of developing acute myeloid leukemia and
chronic myeloid leukemia as those who were unexposed.
"Among subjects who had high exposures to magnetic fields at home and at
work, the risk of developing acute myeloid leukemia and chronic myeloid
leukemia increased more than 6 fold and doubled for chronic lymphocytic
leukemia when compared with subjects who had not been exposed to magnetic
fields.
"Results for central nervous system tumors were consistent with no
increase
in risk."
*******************
One possible reason why the Swedish study was not reported and the NCI was,
is the fact that, according to the Report of the Panel on Electromagnetic
Fields and Health to the Victorian Government , Sept 1992, to quote:
"To date the responsibility for communicating with the community about ELF
fields has rarely been clearly defined and most information is developed
and disseminated by the utilities, as health authorities have not
considered ELF fields as an important health matter."
EMFacts Information Service
PO Box 96, North Hobart
Tasmania
PH: (03) 6243 0195 Fax: (03) 6243 0340
**home page** http://www.tassie.net.au/emfacts/
Archive provided courtesy of WaveGuide, http://www.wave-guide.org
Reprinted with permission of Roy Beavers, http://www.feb.se/EMF-L/EMF-L.html