==
Aspects on the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) 2020 Guidelines on Radiofrequency Radiation
Lennart Hardell, Mona Nilsson, Tarmo Koppel, Michael Carlberg. Aspects on the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) 2020 Guidelines on Radiofrequency Radiation. J Cancer Sci Clin Ther. 2021; 5(2): 250-285. doi: 10.26502/jcsct.5079117.
Abstract
The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) published 2020 updated guidelines on radiofrequency (RF) radiation in the frequency range 100 kHz to 300 GHz. Harmful effects on human health and the environment at levels below the guidelines are downplayed although evidence is steadily increasing. Only thermal (heating) effects are acknowledged and therefore form the basis for the guidelines. Despite the increasing scientific evidence of non-thermal effects, the new ICNIRP guidelines are not lower compared with the previous levels. Expert groups from the WHO, the EU Commission and Sweden are to a large extent made up of members from ICNIRP, with no representative from the many scientists who are critical of the ICNIRP standpoint.
Excerpts
"As a general rule ICNIRP, WHO, SCENIHR and SSM have for many years dismissed available studies showing harmful effects from non-thermal RF exposure and have based their conclusions mainly on studies showing no effects. Results showing risk are criticized, disregarded or not even cited while studies showing no risks are accepted as evidence of no risk in spite of severe methodological problems. Many statements by these agencies are misleading and not correct. They are easily rebutted by reading the relevant publications....
All these expert groups dominated by ICNIRP consequently reach similar conclusions that there are no health effects below ICNIRP guidelines. No representative from the scientific community that is of the opinion that there is increasing evidence of health risks below the ICNIRP guidelines, e.g. as expressed in the EMF Scientists Appeal [24], has ever been a member of the expert groups at the WHO, the EU, the SSM or ICNIRP. Certainly scientists who do not discount evidence of health effects from exposure to RF radiation that are observed at exposures below guideline levels should be represented....
ICNIRP is not representative of the scientific community since it does not include representatives from scientists that agree there is evidence of harmful effects at levels well below ICNIRPs limits although these scientists are in majority in the scientific community [24]."
Conclusion
"ICNIRP’s conclusion [48] on cancer risks is: “In summary, no effects of radiofrequency EMFs on the induction or development of cancer have been substantiated.” This conclusion is not correct and is contradicted by scientific evidence. Abundant and convincing evidence of increased cancer risks and other negative health effects are today available. The ICNIRP 2020 guidelines allow exposure at levels known to be harmful. In the interest of public health, the ICNIRP 2020 guidelines should be immediately replaced by truly protective guidelines produced by independent scientists."
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5g tests the limits of trust
Dariusz Leszczynski, Tekniikka & Talous, Jan 20, 2022 (Google translation from Finnish)
Dariusz Leszczynski estimates that the regulation of radiation in mobile communications is not sufficiently based on scientific evidence. More data. Coverage of 5g networks is increasing all the time.
In 2020, the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation (ICNIRP) updated its safety guidelines regarding exposure to radio frequency radiation (RF-EMF) emitted by wireless communication devices such as mobile phones and their base stations. The previous standard was from 1998.
The World Health Organization WHO recommends the mentioned guideline, which has been adopted by a large part of the world's countries and has become part of the wireless regulatory framework. Although the US uses IEEE/ICES and FCC standards, it also seeks to "harmonize" with Icnirp.
ICNIRP's safety instructions are based on one basic principle, according to which the only proven health effect caused by radiation exposure is the thermal effect. It appears when the temperature of the skin tissue rises above 1 degree Celsius, and when the temperature rise falls below one degree Celsius, the radiation is considered harmless to health. ICNIRP's view is that the radiation level of wireless devices according to its safety guidelines is not sufficient to produce a temperature rise in skin tissue. Furthermore, according to ICNIRP's science review, without that temperature rise there can be no proven effects. ICNIRP has drawn up its safety instructions to protect consumers only from possible thermal effects, which the commission considers sufficient.
However, there are a large number of experimentally observed thermal-independent, non-thermal effects in both animals and laboratory-grown cells caused by exposure to wireless radiation well below the current exposure limits set by ICNIRP. The researchers are concerned that similar, non-thermal reactions would also occur in users of mobile devices. This could lead to health problems. According to ICNIRP's scientific position, this could not happen. Is the assessment of scientific evidence biased? Not all observations made by researchers about non-thermal effects can be "pure hallucinations".
ICNIRP's instructions therefore only prevent the occurrence of an acute heat effect lasting from minutes to hours, but not repeated and long-lasting from months to decades. Although there have been published studies on acute effects that occur during or shortly after exposure, there are very few publications on long-term chronic exposure. The application of ICNIRP's standards to the real situation seems to be based on a mere safety assumption without a scientific basis.
The standard is advertised as sufficient for every user regardless of age or health. ICNIRP assures that all population groups are equally protected, whether it is the growing and developing body of a small child, or an elderly person suffering from a chronic, potentially fatal disease, or a young, healthy, robust adult man.
Since human experimentation is limited for obvious ethical reasons, we need to look at epidemiology to determine long-term effects. Studies of long-term biological effects or health effects can take years and have limitations, so information is scarce. That is, there is no evidence to guarantee that Icnirp's safety instructions would cover everyone, regardless of age or health status, also taking into account how long people have been using wireless devices. It's all about assumptions without a scientific basis.
Looking at the ICNIRP commission, it is easy to see that the members have very similar views on key issues. They have expressed almost the same opinion; "wireless networks are absolutely safe within all security limits set by ICNIRP." The scientific assessments prepared by ICNIRP's experts are often in conflict with the assessments of researchers outside the organisation's operations. It is even more interesting to observe how the members of the commission act when they are placed in national scientific committees in the company of scientists from outside the organization. In this case, they may draw conclusions that conflict with ICNIRP's views. Recently, these dissenting opinions were published by, among others, the BERENIS Committee in Switzerland,
For most users of wireless technology, Icnirp is just an abbreviation. Consumers are told that it acts only as a committee on science with no other influence, be it industry or a government radiation regulatory body. However, many users are not aware of how Icnirp works in practice. For your consideration:
1. ICNIRP is a group of about a dozen scientists who do not claim to represent anyone but themselves.
2. It presents itself as outside the lobbying influence of industry and national radiation protection organizations.
3. Retired members will be replaced by new members elected by the current members.
4. ICNIRP's selection criteria and their justifications for selecting new members are not publicly available. Only members know why a person has been selected for their group.
5. ICNIRP is not responsible for the scientific decisions it makes to any party.
6. No one can control the methods used by ICNIRP to achieve the safety guidelines it recommends.
7. No one supervises its operation.
8. It is not legally responsible for its scientific statements. Legal liability is limited to what members say. It's just a matter of instructions and no one is legally obliged to use them. Even if the instructions turned out to be incorrect, no one could legally sue ICNIRP.
However, the telecommunications industry and national radiation protection organizations have ended up using ICNIRP's safety instructions. By doing so, they are legally responsible for any health risks caused by the devices they manufacture, even if they meet ICNIRP's guidelines. In other words, the Commission avoids the legal responsibility that remains with the operators in the field if the use of the equipment causes health problems. The members themselves are responsible only to "God and history" for all the right or wrong decisions they make.
In order to fully understand the great significance of this complete lack of oversight of Icnirp's operations, it must be remembered that the safety guidelines developed by Icnirp are the only guidelines used by the industry that manufactures and operates wireless communication equipment and infrastructure in most of the world.
Basically, ICNIRP's security guidelines legitimize the operation of the telecommunications industry, which in 2019 had an annual value of approximately $1.74 trillion worldwide. The ICNIRP in question is an organization that claims to be completely independent of all outside interests and operates without any kind of supervisor or control, without responsibility for its scientific decisions.
The introduction of the new 5th generation wireless communication, 5g, which is currently underway, has further raised the debate about the validity of ICNIRP's standards. New in wireless 5g communication is the use of millimeter waves and frequencies above 20 GHz – 300 GHz. Although millimeter waves can transfer large amounts of data, they have the problem of how far the data can be sent within the limits of short wavelength bandwidth. This causes very frequent deployment of base stations (cell antennas) in different areas. Roughly estimating, one small base station would be placed on every other lamp post, and base stations would also be required inside buildings. In practice, this leads to the fact that in a few years, urban environments will be saturated with millimeter waves, when 5g has been fully implemented.
In its 2020 guidelines, ICNIRP assures that consumers' health is fully protected. How does the Commission know that? Research on millimeter waves and health is limited. Recently published scientific reviews have selected various databases and found only a small number of studies on the health effects of millimeter waves. Most of the publications deal with radiation measurements and dosimetry, not biological or health effects. In 2019 Simkó and Mattsson published a review that included only 97 experimental studies and in 2020 Leszczynski published a review of 99 experimental studies. In 2021, Karipidis et al. published a review that included 107 experimental studies. Most millimeter wave studies consist of small, laboratory or animal experiments,
The lack of research causes confusion and problems in communities. When users ask for scientific evidence about the health effects of 5g millimeter waves, they get no answers. Research has not yet been done sufficiently and the safety of 5g cannot be scientifically proven. However, it would be possible to conduct a sufficient number of studies on 5g that would either show whether the health effects are minor or even insignificant.
It is interesting, but also worrying, to note what Rodney Croft, chairman of ICNIRP, a professor of psychology at the University of Wollongong, Australia, stated in an interview on Australian TV on June 16, 2020: "There is no harm associated with 5g". "Look, it's quite true that the amount of research looking at 5g is very limited, but from a science perspective, this is simply not relevant."
In this scientifically and legally complex situation, there is an urgent need to carry out an independent validation of the results of ICNIRP's scientific review and the validity of its safety guidelines.
The author is PhD, DSc, docent of biochemistry at the University of Helsinki and editor-in-chief of the Radiation and Health section of Frontiers in Public Health (impact factor 3.709). He has worked from 2000 to 2013 as a research professor at the Radiation Protection Center.
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Health risks from radiofrequency radiation, including 5G, should be assessed by experts with no conflicts of interest
Lennart Hardell, Michael Carlberg, Health risks from radiofrequency radiation, including 5G, should be assessed by experts with no conflicts of interest. Oncol Lett. 2020 Oct;20(4):15. doi: 10.3892/ol.2020.11876.
Abstract
The fifth generation, 5G, of radiofrequency (RF) radiation is about to be implemented globally without investigating the risks to human health and the environment. This has created debate among concerned individuals in numerous countries. In an appeal to the European Union (EU) in September 2017, currently endorsed by >390 scientists and medical doctors, a moratorium on 5G deployment was requested until proper scientific evaluation of potential negative consequences has been conducted. This request has not been acknowledged by the EU. The evaluation of RF radiation health risks from 5G technology is ignored in a report by a government expert group in Switzerland and a recent publication from The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection. Conflicts of interest and ties to the industry seem to have contributed to the biased reports. The lack of proper unbiased risk evaluation of the 5G technology places populations at risk. Furthermore, there seems to be a cartel of individuals monopolizing evaluation committees, thus reinforcing the no-risk paradigm. We believe that this activity should qualify as scientific misconduct.
==
The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection: Conflicts of interest, corporate capture and the push for 5G
June 2020
This 98 page report
was commissioned, coordinated and published by two Members of the European
Parliament – Michèle Rivasi and Klaus Buchner. The report was written by Hans
van Scharen with editing by Erik Lamberand additional research support from Tomas Vanheste.
The Greens/EfA group in the European Parliament financed the preparation of this report.
Excerpts
“This report deals with an
issue of which the importance cannot be overrated: the possible health effects
of Radiofrequency Radiation (RfR) or electro magnetic fields (EMF). It deals more specifically with how the scientific
debate has been hijacked by corporate interests from the Telecom industry.”
“The findings of this report
(‘The International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection: Conflicts
of interest and the push for 5G’) give us an uncomfortable déjà-vu: many facts
and processes that lead to the actual situation whereby European authorities –
from the European Commission to most of the member states – simply close their
eyes for real scientific facts and early warnings. We have seen exactly the
same scenario in the debate on Tobacco, asbestos, climate change and
pesticides.
Also in its latest guidelines
from March this year, ICNIRP assures the world that there is no scientific
evidence of adverse health effects from the radiation that comes with the new
communication technologies, within the limits it proposes. But at the same time
a growing number of scientists and also citizens are worried that EMFs do cause
health problems. ICNIRP pretends to be scientifically neutral, and free from
vested interests of the Telecom industry. We show with this study that this is
‘playing with the truth’ or simply a lie.”
“In the debate on EMF and possible health effects, terms like ‘corporate
capture’ of scientific research and ‘war game science’ are
often used, and references to the tactics of the tobacco industry are often
made. According to several authors, these tactics also influence organisations
like ICNIRP and WHO’s International EMF Project….”
“This appears to be a global
issue. US researcher, Norm Alster, in his report ‘Captured
Agency’ describes what this kind of corporate capture can lead to by referring
to the workings of the FCC (Federal Communications Commission), which is the
main official US institution that deals with Telecom issues, and is sometimes
mentioned in critiques of ICNIRP: “That is a term that comes up time and time
again with the FCC. Captured agencies are essentially controlled by the
industries they are supposed to regulate. A detailed look at FCC actions—and
non-actions—shows that over the years the FCC has granted the wireless industry
pretty much what it has wanted”.
“As a result, consumer safety,
health, and privacy, along with consumer wallets, have all been overlooked,
sacrificed, or raided due to unchecked industry influence. (…) Most insidious
of all, the wireless industry has been allowed to grow unchecked and virtually
unregulated, with fundamental questions on public health impact routinely
ignored. (…) Industry control, in the case of wireless health issues, extends
beyond Congress and regulators to basic scientific research. And in an obvious
echo of the hardball tactics of the tobacco industry, the wireless industry has
backed up its economic and political power by stonewalling on public relations
and bullying potential threats into submission with its huge standing army of
lawyers. (…) Industry behaviour also includes self-serving public relations and
hyper aggressive legal action. It can also involve undermining the credibility
of, and cutting off funding for, researchers who do not endorse cellular
safety. It is these hardball tactics that recall 20th century Big
Tobacco tactics.”
Conclusion
“ICNIRP presents itself, and is
described by the European Commission and in the media, as an independent
international commission that gives advice based on scientific evidence. We
believe that there are various reasons to question this (self)-image.
The composition of ICNIRP is
very one sided. With only one
medically qualified person (but not an expert in wireless radiation) out of a
total of 14 scientists in the ICNIRP Commission and also a small minority of
members with medical qualifications in the Scientific Expert Group, we can
safely say that ICNIRP has been, and is
still, dominated by physical scientists. This may not be the wisest composition
when your remit is to offer advice on human health and safety to governments
around the world.
As one can read in the 45
portraits of the members of the ICNIRP commission and of the Scientific Expert
Group (SEG), they all share the same position on the safety issues:
non-ionising radiation poses no health threats and the only effects it has are
thermal. ICNIRP says "non-ionising radiation poses no health threats if it
does not heat the tissue by more than 1 °C", by which it admits that there
are possible health effects, but only if exposure levels to strong radiation
are too high”.
Over the past years, and on
many platforms, various EMF-experts have stated that ICNIRP is wrong to
continue dismissing certain scientific studies showing adverse health effects –
like the American NTP-study - and is mistaken in its almost dogmatic conviction
that “non-ionising radiation poses no health threats and the only possible
health effects it has are thermal in case of strong radiation”.
Even after much criticism from
members of the global scientific community, ICNIRP still adheres to the
paradigm that the only proven effects (on health) are thermal. “ICNIRP appears
to take into account only the warming of tissue and uncontrolled muscle
contractions, although they claim in the most recent advice, that they also
evaluated other mechanisms”, writes Dutch Professor Hans Kromhout, who is
currently leading a long-term study (in the Netherlands) into the effects of
mobile phone use on human health, and who is chairman of a special committee on
Electromagnetic Fields of the leading Dutch Health Council, which advises the
Dutch government.
It seems that “a closed circle
of like-minded scientists” has turned ICNIRP into a self-indulgent science
club, with a lack of bio-medical expertise, as well as a lack of scientific
expertise in specific risk assessments. Thereby, creating a situation which
might easily lead to “tunnel-vision” in the organisation’s scope. Two leading
experts, Hans Kromhout and Chris Portier, confirmed to us that ICNIRP is a
closed, non-accountable and one-sided organisation.
As many scientists and critical
observers have pointed out, it seems that ICNIRP members are either oblivious
to, or are ignoring, scientific studies that find possible adverse health
effects in the absence of heating. Even though some ICNIRP-members have
themselves acknowledged that industry-funded scientific research tends to
produce less findings showing adverse health effects of EMF, whereas publicly
funded studies – like the NTP-study – do find significant links between EMF and
adverse health effects, this does not seem to influence one iota the views of
ICNIRP-members.
The majority of
ICNIRP-scientists have done, or are doing, research partly funded by industry.
Is this important? As we argue in the introduction, we believe it is.
Scientific publications, co-authored by two ICNIRP-scientists – Anke Huss and
Martin Röösli, confirm the importance of funding. In 2006 and 2009 they did a
systematic review of the effects of the source of funding in experimental
studies of mobile phone use on health, and their conclusion was that, “industry-sponsored studies were least
likely to report results suggesting (adverse health) effects”. And theirs is
not the only study that showed this, as there have been numerous studies of the
differences in reporting from industry-funded research versus publicly-funded
research that suggest a strong funding bias on the results.
In addition to the fact that
certain members of ICNIRP, are simultaneously members of the International
Committee on Electromagnetic Safety (ICES) of the US-registered Institute of
Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), we have seen further evidence of a
close cooperation between ICNIRP and ICES, an organisation in which many people
from the media and telecom industries, as well as from the military, are
actively and structurally involved. During the current
leadership of ICNIRP, these ties have become even closer “with the goal of setting internationally
harmonized safety limits for exposure to electromagnetic fields”. This must surely be considered as a situation in which
conflicts of interest are a real possibility.
It is clear from ICES minutes that ICNIRP worked very closely with IEEE/ICES on the
creation of the new RF safety guidelines that were published in March 2020. And
this implies that large telecom-companies such as Motorola and others, as well
as US military, had a direct influence on the ICNIRP guidelines, which are
still the basis for EU-policies in this domain ….
Despite ICNIRP positioning
itself, during the last 25 years, as the sole purveyor of scientific truth when
it comes to possible relation between EMF and adverse health effects, it would
not be right to hold this scientific NGO solely accountable if, one day, it
were to become undisputed that EMF do cause health problems. National
governments, as well as the European Commission, which is, after all, the
‘Guardian of the Treaty’, have a duty of care and protection of their citizens,
and therefore should also take the legally binding ‘precautionary principle’
into account.
We think that the call for more
independent scientific assessment in this area is, for all the arguments
mentioned above and in what follows, fully justified.
That is the most important
conclusion of this report: for really independent scientific advice we cannot
rely on ICNIRP. The European Commission and national governments, from
countries like Germany, should stop funding ICNIRP. It is high time that the
European Commission creates a new, public and fully independent advisory
council on non-ionizing radiation. The funds currently allocated to ICNIRP
could be used to set up this new organisation. And given the overall rise in
R&D funding via Horizon Europe, with a foreseen budget (for 2021-2027) of
between 75 and 100 billion euros, funding should in no way constitute an
insurmountable hurdle to setting up this new, truly independent, body.”
P.S. Dr. Christopher Portier, while the Director of the CDC National Center for Environmental Health, represented the U.S. government on the expert working group convened in 2011 by the International Agency for Research on Cancer of the World Health Organization to review the carcinogenic classification of radio frequency radiation.
See also:
5G : l’impartialité du comité qui guide l’Europe pour protéger la population des ondes en question
Un
rapport de deux députés européens accuse la commission internationale
de protection contre les rayonnements non ionisants d’être trop proche
de l’industrie des télécoms.
Stéphane Mandard, Le Monde, 19 juin 2020
==
The Lies Must Stop Disband ICNIRP: Facts Matter, Now More Than Ever
Louis Slesin (Editor), Microwave News, April 9, 2020
Excerpts:
"... science has taken a back seat to politics. The failure to separate fact
from fiction has made the battle against the coronavirus far worse,
especially in the U.S. Much the same can be said of how governments and
scientific committees have addressed electromagnetic health risks.
The public has been fed lies and half-truths about the health effects
of RF/microwave radiation ... since
the 1970s. The campaign has created a culture of confusion, especially
with respect to cell phones and cancer. In this environment, why would
anyone be surprised that sensational conspiracy theories about 5G have
found a footing?
The Microwave News website is chock-full of articles
describing how the public has been misled time and time again. Here are
two current examples from those who are supposed to serve as the world’s
experts and to protect us from EMF/RF hazards: the members of the International Commission of Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection, ICNIRP for short.
The first is from Eric van Rongen of The Netherlands, the current chairman of ICNIRP... Two minutes into his PowerPoint narration you
can hear him say, “There is no evidence from all [this] scientific
information for the induction of cancer by radiofrequency fields” ...
Anyone who has been paying any attention at all knows that ...The U.S. National Toxicology Program has found “clear evidence” that exposure to RF radiation can lead to cancer.
... the NTP study is only one of many that show an
RF–cancer link. It’s the most important and the most persuasive, but
hardly the only one.
ICNIRP may not agree with the NTP finding, but that is what
the $30 million animal study showed. Its members want you to think that
they know better and that the NTP results are untrustworthy....
The second example comes from a[n annual] report prepared for the Swedish Radiation Safety Authority
by a nine-member panel of experts ... Van Rongen
and Switzerland’s Martin Röösli,
who is also on ICNIRP, are members of this panel....
... the NTP warning was the most important RF–health
development not only of 2018, but of the decade and most likely of the
new millennium. Yet the expert panel chose to ignore it.‡
... That was the headline news of 2018. “Clear evidence” was a
game changer; leaving it out of the annual update is a sure sign of
bias ... it could well have been the title of the panel’s 2018
update. But van Rongen, Röösli and the others ignored it.
This cannot go on. The first step is for ICNIRP ... to be disbanded. The Swedish panel should also be
dissolved and reconstituted with a more balanced membership. Indeed, all
expert committees should be broadened to include those who allow that
more than RF tissue heating may be at work.
But most important: The lies and distortions must stop. Otherwise,
confusion and conspiracy theories will continue to run rampant. The net
result is that the entire RF research enterprise will lack credibility,
which, unfortunately, is the objective of many of the leading players.
To read the full article: https://microwavenews.com/news-center/time-clean-house
==
March 11, 2020
New Guidelines Adopted by the International Commission on Non‐Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP)
Protect Us Only from Thermal or Heating Effects
