Mortality by neoplasia and cellular telephone base stations in the Belo Horizonte municipality, Minas Gerais state, Brazil
Abstract
Pollution
caused by the electromagnetic fields (EMFs) of radio frequencies (RF)
generated by the telecommunication system is one of the greatest
environmental problems of the twentieth century. The purpose of this
research was to verify the existence of a spatial correlation between
base station (BS) clusters and cases of deaths by neoplasia in the Belo
Horizonte municipality, Minas Gerais state, Brazil, from 1996 to 2006
and to measure the human exposure levels to EMF where there is a major
concentration of cellular telephone transmitter antennas. A descriptive
spatial analysis of the BSs and the cases of death by neoplasia
identified in the municipality was performed through an
ecological-epidemiological approach, using georeferencing. The database
employed in the survey was composed of three data banks: 1. death by
neoplasia documented by the Health Municipal Department; 2. BSs
documented in ANATEL ("Agência Nacional de Telecomunicações":
'Telecommunications National Agency'); and 3. census and demographic
city population data obtained from official archives provided by IBGE
("Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística": 'Brazilian Institute
of Geography and Statistics'). The results show that approximately 856
BSs were installed through December 2006. Most (39.60%) of the BSs were
located in the "Centro-Sul" ('Central-Southern') region of the
municipality. Between 1996 and 2006, 7191 deaths by neoplasia occurred
and within an area of 500 m from the BS, the mortality rate was 34.76
per 10,000 inhabitants. Outside of this area, a decrease in the number
of deaths by neoplasia occurred. The greatest accumulated incidence was
5.83 per 1000 in the Central-Southern region and the lowest incidence
was 2.05 per 1000 in the Barreiro region. During the environmental
monitoring, the largest accumulated electric field measured was 12.4 V/m
and the smallest was 0.4 V/m. The largest density power was 40.78
μW/cm(2), and the smallest was 0.04 μW/cm(2).
Do you want to read the rest of this article?
...
Evidence of radiation damage was even found in potted plants inside
patient homes (Waldmann-Selsam and Eger, 2013). Thus, this study is
certainly complementary to the study by Eger and Jahn (2010) and other
research that has shown effects on the health of people by phone masts
located in their vicinity (Santini et al., 2002; Eger et al., 2004; Wolf
and Wolf, 2004; Abdel-Rassoul et al., 2007; Khurana et al., 2010; Dode et al., 2011;
Gómez-Perretta et al., 2013; Shahbazi-Gahrouei et al., 2014; Belyaev et
al., 2015). In the introduction to the International Seminar on "
Effects of Electromagnetic Fields on the Living Environment " in 1999 in
Ismaning, Germany, organized by WHO, ICNIRP and German Federal Office
for Radiation Protection (BfS), M. Repacholi, head of the International
EMF Project of the WHO, said: " By comparison, influences of these
fields on plants, animals, birds and other living organisms have not
been properly examined. ...
...
Among the emission sources, we highlight the mobile phone antennas due
to their high number, which have been the object of numerous studies
(Röösli et al., 2010). However, almost the majority of these studies,
which have dealt with the potential effects of the emitted radiation on
health, have focused on the location of the antennas and exclusively in
the proximity of the cases of disease (Atzmon et al., 2012; Dode et al., 2011;
Elliott et al., 2011 Elliott et al., , 2010 Shahbazi-Gahrouei et al.,
2014; Stewart et al., 2012). Although the use of the distance to the
antenna as an exposure indicator has been questioned in several work
papers (Foster and Trottier, 2013 ), few alternatives have been
presented for the execution of epidemiological studies on the potential
effects of the RF-EMF generated by the telephone antennas. ...
No comments:
Post a Comment