As if there isn't enough in our modern technological life to frighten us, it turns out Wi-Fi may be hazardous to our health.
Wi-Fi causes headaches and other neurological symptoms in children. Wi-Fi elevates heart rates. Wi-Fi damages DNA.
There's even a new Wi-Fi disease: electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EMH).
At least this is what many researchers are claiming.
But for as many metaphorical Chicken Littles hysterically shouting "the Wi-Fi sky is falling," there are an equal number of "Jane, you ignorant slut!" responses from scientists who claim there cannot possibly be any ill-effects from something as low-powered as Wi-Fi.
I've been investigating this Wi-Fi health conundrum since my post on instructing you on "How To Install a Wi-Fi Router – and Why." A literally "Anonymous" commenter replied that Wi-Fi "is a known health hazard."
Wanting to have my facts in order before dismissing Anonymous' claims, I decided to do a little research. I discovered a hotbed of controversy concerning Wi-Fi's claimed ill-effects.
The good news
We've heard this "wireless is dangerous" song for years, how the electromagnetic fields created by and radiation emanating from cellphones is bad for us.
And yet cancer rates have actually dropped during the age of the cellphone. Not stayed even, not a statistically irrelevant rise. Dropped.
The most recent report from the National Cancer Institute at the National Institutes of Health, released a couple of weeks ago, states "incidence rates have declined for cancers of the lung, colon and rectum, oral cavity and pharynx, stomach, and brain" by approximately 1 percent per year.
Except this report take us only to 2007 – the year the iPhone came out, which accelerated the number of Wi-Fi-equipped phones in our pockets.
But even if we lack data from the age of iPhone and Android, we have other scientific facts to comfort us.
Two French cancer researchers vehemently disputed the findings of a recent study describing how using a laptop equipped with Wi-Fi destroys DNA by stating:
Genotoxicity of radiofrequencies is not a matter of opinion: radiofrequency energy absorption cannot break DNA molecules…there is no known biologically plausible mechanism by which non-ionizing radio waves of low energy can disrupt DNA.
And in May 2006 – again, prior to the iPhone and the current Wi-Fi-equipped smart phone tsunami – the World Health Organization insisted:
Considering the very low exposure levels and research results collected to date, there is no convincing scientific evidence that the weak RF signals from base stations and wireless networks cause adverse health effects.
Well, that sounds definitive. So what's all the hubbub?
Witness for the prosecution
Much of the current Wi-Fi furor started in Canada. "16x9: The Bigger Picture," an investigative newsmagazine show on the GlobalTV network, ran a report on October 17, 2010, about how a Wi-Fi hotspot installation at the St. Vincent-Euphrasia Elementary School in Meaford, Ontario, was adversely affecting some students. The day after the report aired, parents voted to ban the school's Wi-Fi hotspot, to be replaced by hard-wired connections.
Quoted extensively in the two-part report was a Dr. Magda Havas, an associate professor of environmental and resource studies at Trent University, Peterborough, Ontario, and an advocate of removing all Wi-Fi from Canadian schools. On her YouTube channel, Dr. Havas demonstrates how electromagnetic radiation (EMR) elevates heart rates, explaining that our bodies are bioelectrical (it's why Dr. Frankenstein uses lightning to transfer the spark of life to his creature) and has published papers documenting her assertions.
Dr. Havas and other "Wi-Fi is bad" advocates also believe as much as 5 percent of the population suffer from Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity (EMH) or just electrosensitivity (ES), exhibiting allergic-like systems when exposed to low energy electromagnetic waves such as those created by Wi-Fi.
And, no one has adequately explained the symptoms described by the St. Vincent-Euphrasia students and others.
However, a determined group of academics claim Havas and her ilk are trafficking in fear without a scientific leg to stand on.
A Canadian site called EMF & Health ("dedicated to real science") issued a direct challenge to Dr. Havas' research, wishing to duplicate her results under more stringent conditions. The EMF academics claim the concern about Wi-Fi and other "dirty electricity" (cellphone towers, high voltage electrical lines):
has been fed by a wide array of misleading information on the Internet as well as various reports in the media. These alarmist's reports are contradicted by the vast majority of solid scientific evidence.
Aside from this Canadian dust-up, there's also been numerous reports (abstracts of which you can read here and here) – and just as many challenges about methodology (which you can read here and here) – that sitting with a Wi-Fi-equipped laptop near your, er, reproductive organs can damage DNA.
Final answer
So, is Wi-Fi hazardous to your health?
To some, maybe. But as the 2008-2009 Annual Report of the President's Cancer Panel, "Reducing Environmental Cancer Risk," which included examination of exposure to all wireless technologies, concluded:
At this time, there is no evidence to support a link between cell phone use and cancer. However, the research on cancer and other disease risk among long-term¨ and heavy users of contemporary wireless devices is extremely limited. Similarly, current and potential harms from extremely low frequency radiation are unclear and require further study.
In other words, we don't know.
What's a body to do? If you're worried, take what reasonable precautions you can. But unless you get a headache or you feel your heart racing around Wi-Fi, I wouldn't worry about it. Just breathing carbon monoxide-polluted air and eating sugared processed food is probably far worse for you.
