Subject: Re GSM transgenic mice study (Royds)(Fist).
Date: Fri, 15 Sep 2000 221507 -0500
From: Roy Beavers
To: guru
--------------------------------------------------
.......Response from EMF-L........
-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: GSM transgenic mice study (Royds).
Date: Sat, 16 Sep 2000 12:59:22 +1100
From: Stewart Fist
Reply-To: fist@ozemail.com.au
Organization: Independent writer and columnist
To: roy@emfguru.com
References: <39C23F9E.BD85C1FE@emfguru.com>
On the question of the Adelaide Hospital replication:
1. mice need to be a few months old before the exposure begins.
2. not all mice are in the same stages of exposure. Some may be a year old
and have 9 months of exposure, while others may be 18 months old and have 15
months of exposure.
3. Scientists always try to isolate their experimental animal so only one
factor is involved, so there's a good argument for not continuing studies past
the point where the mice begin to suffer all sorts of age-related illnesses
and condictions which can confuse the science BUT:
4. It is also true that R/F potentially creates age-related effects.
This is the dilemma of the scientist, and why he can't answer all the
questions being asked with one single experiment. We need both, at a minimum.
And since cancers generally have an incubation period longer than 18 months,
we can see why it was necessary to use lymphoma-prone mice to get any
meaningful results at all. (You'd need at least 2000 normal mice in each
exposed or control group to get the same statistical results as 100
lymphoma-prone mice)
The questions that should be asked is:
1. Why is no independent research along the same lines being done in the USA?
2. Why wasn't this replication initiated immediately the findings became known
(to the scientists, that was two years before the research was announced in public)?
3. What is the explanation for the high level of B-cell lymphomas? And why
has this been played down, when it is obviously highly significant?
4. Why didn't Repacholi's team autopsy the remaining live mice at the end of
the first Adelaide Hospital trial -- to at least see if there was a higher
level of early-stage lymphomas?
5. Why didn't they also repeat their 50Hz Mains Power study when they found
dose-related kidney disease.
6. Why did they publicly promote the idea that this 50Hz study "proved mains
power to be safe", when the only significant finding was that it didn't appear
to promote lymphomas -- and even that was dubious given the mixed results with
kidney deaths, etc.
7. Why was no-effect seen as highly significant in the 50Hz study, but a
2.4-times increase in lymphoma played down, and said to need replication
before it could be accepted as valid?
If one needs validation by replication, doesn't the other?
--
Stewart Fist - writer and columnist
See http://www.australianIT.com.au/opinion/crossroads/
http://www.abc.net.au/http/sfist/ (some archives)
http://www.electric-words.com (main archives)
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Reprinted with permission of Roy Beavers, http://www.emfguru.com