5 ms·

First clear evidence cell phone radiation can cause cancer in rats

60 points by ValentineC 9y ago

grecy 9y ago
How long until laws are passed making it illegal to sue cell phone manufacturers or carriers for selling a product that causes cancer?
- agumonkey 9y ago
  if cigarettes found a way to stay in business cellphones won't die soon
x1798DE 9y ago
I'm not sure I buy this. Given that the prior plausibly is low and earlier studies have not found any increased risk of cancer, and it sounds like they were looking for increases in any kind of cancer, this seems like a result that was bound to happen by chance anyway. If they replicate these particular findings in a preregistered trial, that might move the needle (even better if someone else does). Unfortunately, if a new preregistered trial does come out showing that this is negative, I doubt it will be as widely disseminated, or undo the association between cell phones and cancer created by this story.
jimrandomh 9y ago
What the Quartz article says the results were: > "The papers found that, in male rats, this exposure increased malignant tumors called schwannomas in the connective tissues that surround nerves in the heart, raised the risk of heart conditions, and led to evidence of DNA damage. Baby rats born to mothers during the trial had lower birth weights. The scientists also found a statistically significant increase in lymphoma (cancer of the lymph nodes) among female mice and heightened rates of liver cancer in the male mice." What the paper says the results were (https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/ntp/about_ntp/trpanel/2018/march/tr595peerdraft.pdf https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/ntp/about_ntp/trpanel/2018/march/t...): > "In the 2-year studies, there was significantly lower survival in the shared male sham control group compared to almost all exposed groups, for both modulations. Survival began to decline at a faster rate than in exposed groups after week 75. In the sham control group, 28% of animals survived to study termination, compared to 48% to 68% for exposed groups across both modulations. Lower survival in sham control male rats was largely attributed to higher severity of chronic progressive nephropathy and there was a spectrum of lesions in other organs considered secondary to chronic progressive nephropathy that occurred at higher incidences in male sham controls. Survival in the shared female sham control group was significantly lower than the 6 W/kg CDMA-exposed group; however, it was similar to all other exposure groups, across modulations. At study termination, there was no effect on body weight in male or female rats, and there were no exposure-related clinical observations." So the Quartz article says cell phone radiation kills rats, and the paper says that rats are less likely to die if they're exposed to cell phone radiation. Then the paper p-hacks its way through a bunch of specific conditions and subtypes of cancer, but really, that won't fool anyone who actually reads the paper and actually understands what they're reading. But it did fool the Quartz author, apparently.
- stevens32 9y ago
  The paragraph immediately below in the paper states: > At the 14-week interim evaluation, there were increased incidences of right ventricular cardiomyopathy in the heart of male rats following exposure to GSM- and CDMA-modulated cell phone RFR compared to sham controls. And a little further down: > Following exposure to GSM- or CDMA-modulated cell phone RFR, there were increases in the incidences of malignant schwannoma in the heart of male rats
  - jimrandomh 9y ago
    Right, that's the p-hacking section. If the death rate goes down and also the causes of death shift around, it's dishonest to focus narrowly on the subset of causes of death that went up. And if you look at so many different things that something as obscure and specific as "malignant schwannoma in the heart" is, then your paper better mention multiple-hypothesis correction, which this one doesn't. (I predict that this paper, which went to the press before peer review, will not pass peer review, for this reason.)
    - owlsaway 9y ago
      As a person who reads papers and is (seemingly) confident in their ability to debunk claims that manipulate data, could I ask your advice? How do you approach hot-button questions in health-related fields? I find it hard to navigate the deluge of information out there related to keeping in good health re: diet, exercise, personal routines and habits, etc. It feels like there are so many conflicting opinions, all with people trying to influence your behavior and nudge you towards living one way or another. Weasel words, twisted data, fake news, or whatever you want to call it seem to be a big part of this, too. To relate to this specific post, I'm taking a course as part of my EE degree right now on EM Wave Propagation and even that prof gave a little talk about the negative health risks of cell phones, which I found... odd, to say the least. I still don't know what to make of his cautionary words, or whether I should take them to heart. I feel ignorant and naive, and am unsure of how to live my life at times. What do you do to navigate all of this?
saas_co_de 9y ago
> When the draft results of the papers were published earlier this year, all results were labeled “equivocal,” meaning the study authors felt the data weren’t clear enough to determine if the radiation caused the health effects or not. But the panel of peer reviewers (among them brain and heart pathologists, toxicologists, biostaticians, and engineers) re-evaluated the data and upgraded several of the conclusions to “some evidence” and “clear evidence.” The study was conducted on Male and Female Mice and Rats and initially found no conclusive evidence at all. On reevaluation peer reviewers found that there was evidence for Male Rats only (as I read it) which is a pretty weak result. The full study results are here: https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/about/org/sep/trpanel/meetings/docs/2018/march/index.html https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/about/org/sep/trpanel/meetings/doc...
tompagenet2 9y ago
Ars covered this particular story and were deeply skeptical, attributing the findings to selective use of p values: https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/03/a-critical-analysis-of-the-latest-cellphone-safety-scare/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/03/a-critical-analysis-...
- cornholio 9y ago
  At least we know for sure the male vs. female incidence is completely bogus: But there's still one significant increase in cancer in their data, so let's look more closely at that: "A statistically significant increase in the incidence of heart Schwannomas was observed in treated male rats at the highest dose." When it comes to this type of cancer, the control group of 817 rats developed four tumors. But critically, all of those tumors occurred in females; none in males. This apparent sex bias will necessarily exaggerate the impact of any tumors in any of the male experimental populations. And that's exactly what you see happening. In one female population, 2.2 percent of an experimental group developed this type of tumor, but that was not a statistically significant result. By contrast, in this male population with the significant difference, only 1.5 percent of the animals developed these tumors. A low-dose group of males had the same number of tumors, but the group was larger and so the result slipped below significance. These numbers suggest that the one statistical effect seen in this study is caused by the unusually low tumor incidence in the control group, rather than a specific effect of cellphone radiation.
downandout 9y ago
Assuming this data is accurate, I’m curious how this will affect smart watch usage, since these devices are in such close proximity to body parts that normally wouldn’t be exposed to radiation by a cell phone. My Apple Watch 3 with cell functionality is not only on my wrist, but somewhat often close to my head, hips, and stomach.
- lopmotr 9y ago
  It only causes heart cancer, so that's OK. Also OK for women and non-mice.
  - perl4ever 9y ago
    I don't generally hold my phone near my head or heart.
- discreteevent 9y ago
  I was told that the focal point of the radiation may be a couple of feet from the source when it's a phone. I can't get Google to confirm this (quickly) and I don't know about a watch (does it depend on the size of the antenna?). To be honest, focal point only makes sense to me for a parabolic antenna - so I'm just repeating what I heard.
- amelius 9y ago
  You could wrap it in tinfoil while not using it.
Gibbon1 9y ago
This study is like a bad penny.
GregoryPerry 9y ago
In his circa 1985 book Body Electric, Robert O. Becker M.D. cites to several published research studies he conducted related to acceleration of mitosis by electromagnetic fields.

60 points by ValentineC 9y ago

How long until laws are passed making it illegal to sue cell phone manufacturers or carriers for selling a product that causes cancer?

agumonkey 9y ago
if cigarettes found a way to stay in business cellphones won't die soon

x1798DE 9y ago

I'm not sure I buy this. Given that the prior plausibly is low and earlier studies have not found any increased risk of cancer, and it sounds like they were looking for increases in any kind of cancer, this seems like a result that was bound to happen by chance anyway. If they replicate these particular findings in a preregistered trial, that might move the needle (even better if someone else does). Unfortunately, if a new preregistered trial does come out showing that this is negative, I doubt it will be as widely disseminated, or undo the association between cell phones and cancer created by this story.

jimrandomh 9y ago

What the Quartz article says the results were: > "The papers found that, in male rats, this exposure increased malignant tumors called schwannomas in the connective tissues that surround nerves in the heart, raised the risk of heart conditions, and led to evidence of DNA damage. Baby rats born to mothers during the trial had lower birth weights. The scientists also found a statistically significant increase in lymphoma (cancer of the lymph nodes) among female mice and heightened rates of liver cancer in the male mice." What the paper says the results were (https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/ntp/about_ntp/trpanel/2018/march/tr595peerdraft.pdf https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/ntp/about_ntp/trpanel/2018/march/t...): > "In the 2-year studies, there was significantly lower survival in the shared male sham control group compared to almost all exposed groups, for both modulations. Survival began to decline at a faster rate than in exposed groups after week 75. In the sham control group, 28% of animals survived to study termination, compared to 48% to 68% for exposed groups across both modulations. Lower survival in sham control male rats was largely attributed to higher severity of chronic progressive nephropathy and there was a spectrum of lesions in other organs considered secondary to chronic progressive nephropathy that occurred at higher incidences in male sham controls. Survival in the shared female sham control group was significantly lower than the 6 W/kg CDMA-exposed group; however, it was similar to all other exposure groups, across modulations. At study termination, there was no effect on body weight in male or female rats, and there were no exposure-related clinical observations." So the Quartz article says cell phone radiation kills rats, and the paper says that rats are less likely to die if they're exposed to cell phone radiation. Then the paper p-hacks its way through a bunch of specific conditions and subtypes of cancer, but really, that won't fool anyone who actually reads the paper and actually understands what they're reading. But it did fool the Quartz author, apparently.

stevens32 9y ago
The paragraph immediately below in the paper states: > At the 14-week interim evaluation, there were increased incidences of right ventricular cardiomyopathy in the heart of male rats following exposure to GSM- and CDMA-modulated cell phone RFR compared to sham controls. And a little further down: > Following exposure to GSM- or CDMA-modulated cell phone RFR, there were increases in the incidences of malignant schwannoma in the heart of male rats
- jimrandomh 9y ago
  Right, that's the p-hacking section. If the death rate goes down and also the causes of death shift around, it's dishonest to focus narrowly on the subset of causes of death that went up. And if you look at so many different things that something as obscure and specific as "malignant schwannoma in the heart" is, then your paper better mention multiple-hypothesis correction, which this one doesn't. (I predict that this paper, which went to the press before peer review, will not pass peer review, for this reason.)
  - owlsaway 9y ago
    As a person who reads papers and is (seemingly) confident in their ability to debunk claims that manipulate data, could I ask your advice? How do you approach hot-button questions in health-related fields? I find it hard to navigate the deluge of information out there related to keeping in good health re: diet, exercise, personal routines and habits, etc. It feels like there are so many conflicting opinions, all with people trying to influence your behavior and nudge you towards living one way or another. Weasel words, twisted data, fake news, or whatever you want to call it seem to be a big part of this, too. To relate to this specific post, I'm taking a course as part of my EE degree right now on EM Wave Propagation and even that prof gave a little talk about the negative health risks of cell phones, which I found... odd, to say the least. I still don't know what to make of his cautionary words, or whether I should take them to heart. I feel ignorant and naive, and am unsure of how to live my life at times. What do you do to navigate all of this?

saas_co_de 9y ago

> When the draft results of the papers were published earlier this year, all results were labeled “equivocal,” meaning the study authors felt the data weren’t clear enough to determine if the radiation caused the health effects or not. But the panel of peer reviewers (among them brain and heart pathologists, toxicologists, biostaticians, and engineers) re-evaluated the data and upgraded several of the conclusions to “some evidence” and “clear evidence.” The study was conducted on Male and Female Mice and Rats and initially found no conclusive evidence at all. On reevaluation peer reviewers found that there was evidence for Male Rats only (as I read it) which is a pretty weak result. The full study results are here: https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/about/org/sep/trpanel/meetings/docs/2018/march/index.html https://ntp.niehs.nih.gov/about/org/sep/trpanel/meetings/doc...

tompagenet2 9y ago

Ars covered this particular story and were deeply skeptical, attributing the findings to selective use of p values: https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/03/a-critical-analysis-of-the-latest-cellphone-safety-scare/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2018/03/a-critical-analysis-...

cornholio 9y ago
At least we know for sure the male vs. female incidence is completely bogus: But there's still one significant increase in cancer in their data, so let's look more closely at that: "A statistically significant increase in the incidence of heart Schwannomas was observed in treated male rats at the highest dose." When it comes to this type of cancer, the control group of 817 rats developed four tumors. But critically, all of those tumors occurred in females; none in males. This apparent sex bias will necessarily exaggerate the impact of any tumors in any of the male experimental populations. And that's exactly what you see happening. In one female population, 2.2 percent of an experimental group developed this type of tumor, but that was not a statistically significant result. By contrast, in this male population with the significant difference, only 1.5 percent of the animals developed these tumors. A low-dose group of males had the same number of tumors, but the group was larger and so the result slipped below significance. These numbers suggest that the one statistical effect seen in this study is caused by the unusually low tumor incidence in the control group, rather than a specific effect of cellphone radiation.

downandout 9y ago

Assuming this data is accurate, I’m curious how this will affect smart watch usage, since these devices are in such close proximity to body parts that normally wouldn’t be exposed to radiation by a cell phone. My Apple Watch 3 with cell functionality is not only on my wrist, but somewhat often close to my head, hips, and stomach.

lopmotr 9y ago
It only causes heart cancer, so that's OK. Also OK for women and non-mice.
- perl4ever 9y ago
  I don't generally hold my phone near my head or heart.
discreteevent 9y ago
I was told that the focal point of the radiation may be a couple of feet from the source when it's a phone. I can't get Google to confirm this (quickly) and I don't know about a watch (does it depend on the size of the antenna?). To be honest, focal point only makes sense to me for a parabolic antenna - so I'm just repeating what I heard.
amelius 9y ago
You could wrap it in tinfoil while not using it.

Gibbon1 9y ago

This study is like a bad penny.

GregoryPerry 9y ago

In his circa 1985 book Body Electric, Robert O. Becker M.D. cites to several published research studies he conducted related to acceleration of mitosis by electromagnetic fields.