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Health and safety information
methods and performance requirements for hearing aids
and wireless phones so that no interference occurs when a
person uses a compatible phone and a compatible hearing
aid at the same time. This standard was approved by the
IEEE in 2000.
FDA continues to monitor the use of wireless phones for
possible interactions with other medical devices. Should
harmful interference be found to occur, FDA will conduct
testing to assess the interference and work to resolve the
problem.
10.
What are the results of the research done already?
The research done thus far has produced conflicting
results, and many studies have suffered from flaws in their
research methods. Animal experiments investigating the
effects of radio frequency energy (RF) exposures
characteristic of wireless phones have yielded conflicting
results that often cannot be repeated in other laboratories.
A few animal studies, however, have suggested that low
levels of RF could accelerate the development of cancer in
laboratory animals. However, many of the studies that
showed increased tumor development used animals that
had been genetically engineered or treated with cancer
causing chemicals so as to be pre-disposed to develop
cancer in the absence of RF exposure. Other studies
exposed the animals to RF for up to 22 hours per day.
These conditions are not similar to the conditions under
which people use wireless phones, so we don t know with
certainty what the results of such studies mean for human
health.
Three large epidemiology studies have been published
since December 2000. Between them, the studies
investigated any possible association between the use of
wireless phones and primary brain cancer, gioma,
meningioma, or acoustic neuroma, tumors of the brain or
salivary gland, leukemia, or other cancers. None of the
studies demonstrated the existence of any harmful health
effects from wireless phone RF exposures. However, none
of the studies can answer questions about long-term
exposures, since the average period of phone use in these
studies was around three years.
11.
What research is needed to decide whether RF
exposure from wireless phones poses a health risk?
A combination of laboratory studies and epidemiological
studies of people actually using wireless phones would
provide some of the data that are needed. Lifetime animal
exposure studies could be completed in a few years.
