Raising the Alarm - electric and magnetic fields

E: The Environmental Magazine, Nov-Dec, 2001 by Becky Gillette

Concerns Linger About Electromagnetic Fields

"Generating comfort" is the slogan of one of the nation's largest utility companies. But the electric and magnetic fields (EMFs) emitted from power lines and electrical appliances may also generate a host of health problems, including miscarriage, cancer and Lou Gehrig's Disease.

Concern about health effects from EMFs first arose in 1979, when a study found that children who lived in close proximity to certain types of electrical lines had a higher risk of leukemia. However, the electric power industry and some U.S. governmental agencies have claimed that research reveals little reason for concern about EMFs.

So why has there been so much effort to suppress the release of government-funded studies on the subject? Recently a draft of a $7 million report on EMFs from the California Department of Health Services (DHS) was made public only after the California First Amendment Coalition filed a lawsuit seeking release of the information.

The DHS report says it is more than 50 percent possible that EMFs could cause a very small increased lifetime risk of childhood leukemia, adult brain cancer and Lou Gehrig's Disease. The report says it is 10 to 50 percent possible that EMFs could be responsible for a small increased lifetime risk of male breast cancer, childhood brain cancer, suicide, Alzheimer's disease and sudden cardiac death. The report also says it is more than 50 percent possible that EMFs could cause a five to 10 percent added risk of miscarriage.

"If true, this would clearly be of concern to individuals and regulators," says the report. But after evaluating each health problem linked to EMFs, it adds, "There is a chance that EMFs have no effect at all." It is hard to see why it took a First Amendment lawsuit to force release of a report with such wishy-washy conclusions. But there are a lot of details in the 309-page report important to those concerned about EMFs.

Location, Location

Joan Tukey, founder of the California Alliance for Utility Safety and Education, says the report proves that it's foolish to locate high-voltage power lines next to schools. "Lines next to schools are significant because this is an involuntary exposure," says Tukey. "There are other sources of high EMFs, such as your microwave or your electric clock next to your bed. But you don't need to stand in front of the microwave, and you can move the clock to the other side of the room."

Tukey says the State of California has a plan to bury new power transmission lines and take other steps that can shield people from EMFs, but utilities have consistently weakened implementation.

The DHS report isn't the first time EMF findings were delayed. An even more substantial study conducted by the National Council on Radiation Protection and Measurements (NCRP) in 1995 has not yet been released. Dr. Constantine Maletskos, a consultant for NCRP, says the status of the report in mid 2001 is still about the same as in 1995. "There was a big hullabaloo about potential recommendations," says Maletskos. "We want to get the research report published irrespective of recommendations. But it may just die, which is too bad because that report contains more information than has ever been discussed by anyone else."

The NCRP report, written by 11 leading experts and leaked to the public in 1995, says the public health recommendations, if accepted, could force "complex and costly" changes in the electric power industry. The chairman of the study committee, Dr. Ross Adey, a clinical neurophysiologist and professor of physiology at Loma Linda School of Medicine in California, says there is significant scientific evidence that suggests even very low exposure to EMFs has subtle, long-term effects on human health. Adey says the NCRP report, squashed by industry "stakeholders," recommends no new high voltage power lines should be built near existing housing developments or schools. The report also recommends that levels in homes should be less than two milligauss.

Some European government regulatory agencies have concluded that there is an increased risk of childhood leukemia and possibly adult leukemia from exposure to EMFs. That conclusion flies in the face of the latest study released by the U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Services (NIEHS), which says evidence of a risk of cancer and other human diseases from EMFs around power lines is "weak." Adey says NIEHS convened an international body of scientists, then rejected its conclusions after it said the risk was real. "The NIEHS falsified that report to say there was no risk," Adey says. "That is one of the most fraudulent things the government has perpetrated on the health of this country."

From his own research, J. Robert Ashley (an electrical engineer experienced in both the academic and industrial sectors) says more work is needed to measure people's exposure to electrical fields. "The electrical field is 10 to 20 times more likely to explain the link between ... power lines and childhood cancers than is the magnetic field," Ashley says. He adds that many investigators have compromised their studies by not separating the electric and magnetic components of EMFs.