It's
a shame that CTV – owned by Bell Canada, used a flawed testing
protocol to misinform the public about the “low” level
of Wi-Fi radiation, in the name of “investigative journalism”.
CTV's reporter, Jon Woodard, requested to speak to parents about this issue and we provided a contact
for him, with whom he had made the arrangement to conduct an interview. That parent was informed that the interview was canceled only late today when he tried to reach the reporter.
Perhaps this is
just a "programme story" to CTV. To us, parents, this is an important
issue about the health of our children. To parents with electrosenstive
children, it is a matter of whether the child can attend school at all.
We strongly
protest against this PR piece being presented as “news”.
Conflict
of interest does not only exist at the CTV/Bell level, but also the
party conducting the measurements. CTV engaged
Planetworks which is a consultant firm serving industry clients.
Planetworks is a vendor involved regularly in celltower rental
contracts.
Measuring
two schools with Wi-Fi and two different schools without Wi-Fi is a
sloppy way to compare. The schools are located
in different neighbourhoods.
The proper way
is to measure a number of schools with (a) Wi-Fi on, (b) downloading
data/video with 20-30 devices in the room at the same time to
represent classroom scenario, (c) measure both the nearfield level -
user contact with the devices, and (d) the farfield - ambient
levels. Then measure in the SAME schools with the
Wi-Fi and all wireless devices (including cordless phones) turned
off.
Walking around
the school with the RF meter is NOT an accurate way to measure. This kind of measurement does not
represent real world usage. Children are using
laptops/tablets/smartphones in direct contact with their bodies,
either in their hands or on their laps against their abdomens and
reproductive organs. This walkaround measurement does not reflect the
real radiation level which children are exposed to.
The “scientific
studies” which Canadian health agencies cite are even more
unrealistic, measuring laptop radiation at 50 cm, 1 meter or other
“further distances”. This is done to report a lower reading of
microwave radiation and is an example of skewing the data.
Comparison
between inside and outside the school is irrelevant:
In May 2011 the
World Health Organization's IARC (International Agency on Research
of Cancer) has classified cellphone/WiFi radiation as 2B Possible
Carcinogen. In October, 2011, Health Canada asked parents to reduce
children's radiofrequency exposure since "children are
typically more sensitive to a variety of environmental agents"
and "there is currently a lack of scientific information
regarding the potential health impacts of cell phones on children".
Just because this type of microwave radiation can be found outside
schools does not mean it is safe.
Homes and
schools are the two places where children spend the most amount of
time. Parents have the choice to take measures to reduce children's
exposure to microwave radiation at home by using wired computers
which offer the same educational benefits with better security and
speed. However, in schools funded by public money and with a captive
audience, children are now FORCED to use wireless laptops and
tablets which bear long-term health risks, and they are given no
choice to avoid this exposure. Reducing
exposure at home and in schools will reduce the majority of
cumulative exposure for children.
What do
cigarette smoke, asbestos, PCB and DDT have in common?
At one time, all
were approved for human consumption, only to have been found harmful
to human health later. Safety standards can be slow to change,
leading to irreparable harm to human health.
School Districts
are constantly complaining about the lack of funding. They should use
the funding to improve existing wired networks instead of spending
additional money on wireless technology.
See
this white paper written
by BC ERAC (Educational Resource Acquisition Consortium) which
represents BC School Districts' IT Departments.
Wireless
Networking for K-12 Education in BC - July 2007
" the
majority of school buildings have some or most teaching and
administrative areas serviced by wired network connections... with
sophisticated router and switching capability for managing traffic
and security."
" wireless
technologies are not able to provide the type of data speed
experienced with wired connections, typically running at 100Mbps or
faster. Thus wireless is still not an obvious replacement for a wired
environment."
"
Many of the risks associated with wireless... Reliability, slow speed
of connections, interference from other devices, cost, security,
manageability, compatibility, scalability and consistency of
technology implementation."
Reporting
“average measurements” is a sneaky way to skew data. See
these
videos: http://www.safeinschool.org/2012/01/ipad-iphone-wi-fi-radiation-and.html Wi-Fi
signals spike every few seconds (at levels higher than cellphone
transmission). They stop and go, emitting in bursts. Therefore, by
averaging the figures, the resulting numbers look ridiculously low.
This is similar to telling people that driving at 120 km/hr is not
dangerous because when averaging with the time the car stopped at
the red light, the "average speed" was only 20 km/hr.
Reporting
only as a % of Health Canada's Danger Code 6 (misnamed as Safety
Code 6).
By
reporting a percentage, most of the public would not know how the
figure converts to actual units and how it compares to other
countries like Switzerland, Luxembourg and China, whose national
maximum exposure limits are actually hundred to thousands times more
stringent than our “danger” standard. The Canadian guideline is
outdated and obsolete, protective of corporations' unrestrained
wireless expansion but not protective of human health, especially
children. http://goo.gl/4pzyE The
European Parliament and the Council of Europe have passed repeated
resolutions calling their member states NOT to use Wi-Fi. The truth
is, even the lowest national exposure limit is already a million
times higher than cosmic background radiation. Human bodies are
simply not developed for the constant artificial pulse-modulated
radiation from cellphone and Wi-Fi, which is being rapidly deployed
all around us. Human bodies conduct electricity and absorb such
radiation. Schools are imposing this human conduction on our
children without parental informed consent.
Russia
is among the earliest countries to have started research on microwave
radiation. This week, Russia is
calling for the replacement of Wi-Fi with wired networks in schools,
out of health concern.
The following is
the announcement by Professor Yuri Grigoriev, Chairman of Russian
National Committee on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection, and member
of the WHO's International Advisory Committee on “EMF and Health”.
19th
June 2012. Translation from the
video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CemiJ-yIA4&feature=youtu.be
Programme
of the Russian Committee on the protection from
non-ionising
radiation with regard to the need to introduce strict
regulations on the use
of Wi-Fi in kindergartens and schools.
'I
have already been informed that pushy parents are already trying to
get
this installed in kindergartens... Everybody sees Moscow...
'
Mobile network connections are very popular amongst children
of various
ages. The duration of conversations on mobile
phones is higher for children
compared to the adult population.
At the same time electromagnetic fields
and radio
frequencies are irradiating the brain every day.
Furthermore,
children are constantly subjected to electromagnetic radiation
and
radio frequencies from the base stations round the clock.
The
problem of preserving the health of children subject to the
developing
conditions of wireless radio communications is referred
to as a priority by
the World Health
Organization.
Electromagnetic radiation from Wi-Fi presents an
additional burden to a
child whose body is in a state of
development and whose mental activities
are in the formative
stage. During this period children are most
susceptible to
negative environmental factors.
WHO, Publication 3, April
2004
Furthermore it is necessary to highlight that the current
regulations were
developed without taking into consideration this
additional influence of
electromagnetic fields. We don¹t
have these regulations yet.
Our Committee believes it is
necessary to:
Firstly, draw the attention of the RF Ministry
of Health and of all of the
other organizations responsible for
the safety of the population, including
children, to the
regulations regarding the use of Wi-Fi in kindergartens and
schools,
and to increase the sanitary and epidemiological control over
the
use of Wi-Fi, and the development of the relevant regulatory
framework.
Secondly, to recommend the use of wired networks
and not networks using
wireless broadband access systems,
including Wi-Fi, in schools and
educational establishments.
