Is it true that wearable device radiation does not affect a person's health?

Electromagnetic radiation from most consumer electronics, such as computers, televisions and cell phones, can cause a dramatic physiological reaction in his body. Symptoms include burning and stinging sensations in the skin, nausea, headaches, insomnia and memory loss. In extreme cases, such as Segerbeck's, breathing problems, heart palpitations and loss of consciousness are also serious consequences. A cell phone in an active state - such as when it is making or receiving calls or searching for signals with high levels of radiation - can have this effect on Segerbeck. Normally, as long as the phone isn't sending or receiving a signal, it doesn't produce enough radiation to affect him. But he didn't react to the sound of the phone ringing. On one occasion, he recalls being on a sailboat with friends, and he was standing on the foredeck when someone he didn't recognize made a phone call from the lower deck, which resulted in a headache, nausea, and loss of consciousness. As long as Segerbeck was within range of a cell phone signal (the safe distance varies depending on the model of the phone and the level of radiation it produces), he had the feeling that his "skull could no longer contain his brain". Sweden is the only country in the world that recognizes electromagnetic hypersensitivity as a functional disability, and Segelbeck's experience was instrumental in shaping this policy. Individuals with EMI in Sweden-about 3 percent of the country's population, or about 250,000 people, according to official government statistics-are able to receive the same privileges and social benefits as blind and deaf people. Where necessary, the local government also funds the electronic "sanitization" of the homes of people diagnosed with EMF allergies and helps them install metal electromagnetic shielding. Electromagnetic fields (EMFs) are ubiquitous, and our bodies are constantly exposed to a variety of EMFs, most of which are extremely low-frequency radiation (ELFs, from household appliances, transmission lines, etc.) and radio frequency (RF, from cell phones, cordless telephones, communication antennas, and TV towers, etc.). Even our bodies themselves produce weak electromagnetic fields, such as electrical stimulation from brain and heart activity. Ionizing radiation - from X-rays, CT tomography scans, and atomic bombs - can cause serious damage to the body, and they are usually classified as carcinogens. However, very low-frequency radiation and radiofrequency are non-carcinogenic and are generally considered to be almost completely harmless to the human body. Because non-ionizing radiation is not energetic enough to break molecular bonds, it does not directly cause the cellular damage that can lead to disease. But this type of radiation is everywhere. "We are in a sea of non-ionizing radiation every day." says John Boyce, a professor of medicine at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine and scientific director of a Maryland-based biomedical research company called the International Epidemiology Institute. Most scientists agree that this ocean is harmless. Cell phones are safe, and conditions like EMF allergies don't even exist, they say, because the electromagnetic fields that trigger them are weak and not enough to cause health effects. Non-ionizing radiation from cell phones does not cause any known effects on the human body. In fact, one of the generally recognized effects of non-ionizing radiation is that it may cause a slight heating of tissues in close proximity to it. The U.S. Federal Communications Commission has established limits for electromagnetic radiation from cell phones - called the Specific Absorption Rate, or SAR - below which no significant heating occurs. According to many researchers, the symptoms experienced by Segelbeck and many other EMF-allergy sufferers may in fact be the result of a misdiagnosis or a psychological condition. Some experts say that people like Segelbeck may also be suffering from psychological disorders, or a manifestation of the "anti-placebo effect," where you think something will make you sick and then you actually get sick. In a review published last year in the journal Bioelectromagnetics, it was noted that there is no evidence that people with allergies have a stronger-than-normal perception of electromagnetic fields, but the study found evidence of an anti-placebo effect in the same group of people. The cell phone industry was very clear about the study. "The scientific evidence obtained through intensive scrutiny strongly demonstrates that:wireless devices do not pose a public **** health and safety hazard." John Worth, vice president for public **** of the CTIA-Wireless Coalition, the international organization representing the wireless communications industry, said. "And, there is no working principle that proves that devices that meet the electromagnetic radiation standards promulgated by the FCC will have a negative impact on human health." This view is shared by a number of major research organizations, including the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP), the American Cancer Society, and the World Health Organization. (The ICNIRP believes, however, that ratings of health effects from wireless devices should continue to be made as wireless technology spreads further.) Voss also points out that statistics from cancer registries - more so than the database of the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) program conducted by the U.S. National Cancer Institute - also show no increase in the incidence of brain cancer from the beginning of the 20th century to the present. In Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden, where cell phone use began earlier than in the U.S., the incidence of brain cancer also remained steady from the 1970s to the early 1910s. If cell phones have the potential to cause brain cancer, then there should be a corresponding increase in incidence. "If you look at all the biological and experimental studies," Voss says, "the overwhelming evidence proves one thing, and that is that there is no link between cell phones and health damage." Segerbeck was once an accomplished telecommunications engineer. He spent more than 20 years at Ellemtel, a subsidiary of Swedish telecom giant Ericsson, leading an engineering team that designed the advanced integrated circuits used in prototype communications systems. He worked with the latest and greatest computers and communications equipment of the time, much of which was available only to Ericsson and the Swedish military. But the effect of this work on him was that his body was exposed to excessive non-ionizing radiation from computers, fluorescent lights and the wireless antennae mounted outside his window. In the late 1980s, 10 years after he began working in telecommunications research, he noticed the first symptoms - dizziness, nausea and headaches, as well as burning sensations and redness of the skin. Of the 20 or so members of his group, all but two reported the same symptoms, he says, but he was the most reactive at the time. His electromagnetic sensitivity has continued to worsen, and he says that even radar from low-flying airplanes now affects his body. Segelbeck believes it's a combination of the intense electromagnetic storms in his office and toxic odors that may be emanating from brand-new computers that are causing the condition. "But none of the company's doctors could figure out what was going on," He said. Agni Frederiksson, who ran Segbeck's group at Ellemtel and retired from Ericsson in 2006, said the frequently reported symptom was "a feeling of heat in the face," but everyone attributed it to the new computer workstations. When Segerbeck's team members started calling in sick and colleagues in other departments started reporting similar symptoms, Frederiksson recalls, "We started to look seriously at what might be causing these problems. In the groups that reported the highest concentration of symptoms, panic was rampant." The company opened a new workplace for the most affected employees, about half a dozen of whom were in this fully shielded room. Others switched to other computer workstations, and still others were asked to reduce the amount of time they spent working in front of computer screens. No one had ever been in a situation like this before. "What's so special about us?" Frederiksson recalls questioning at the time. He later realized that other companies had experienced similar problems, except that the information had been kept in-house. Segelbeck was the most critical member of the company's design team at the time, and Ericsson went to great lengths to keep him on the job. In the early 1990s, the company installed metal shields around his bedroom and study at home so that he could sleep and work without being exposed to radiation. To get him out of the house, the medical establishment also provided Segelbeck with an anti-electromagnetic-radiation suit, which is typically used by engineers who work in close proximity to telecommunications towers and high-voltage power lines. The company even customized a Volvo sedan so he could commute safely to and from work. By the mid-1990s, however, when cell phone towers began to dot Stockholm, he stopped going to work and was forced to retire to the mountains. In 1993, Ericsson published a report entitled Allergies in the Workplace, which focused on what was happening in the laboratories in Segerbeck. In the foreword, Ellemtel's vice president, Olga 6?1 Mattson, and executive director, Rodopi Johnson, wrote: "A new problem has emerged in the work environment: allergies. When dealing with traditional occupational injuries, you can establish a clear relationship between their causes and effects. Allergies are an exception. At the end of the 1980s, when the first serious cases occurred at Ellemtel, we were completely at our wits' end. Soon we saw allergies as a serious threat to the company's business development. ...... We began to wonder if we were not facing a penalty for modernization." A year later, Ericsson closed the laboratory where Segbeck and his group were working.In 1999, the company fired Segbeck. "He was no longer able to do the job we hired him to do," an Ericsson spokeswoman said. An Ericsson spokesman said. Segbeck took his case to a Swedish labor arbitration court, but lost. He admitted he had no way of proving exactly what caused the condition. "It's very difficult to know what exactly causes it and what kind of effects it has." He says, "No one can say exactly what it is that makes us sick." And it's unlikely that he'll ever find a suitable treatment from a healthcare provider. Even a trip to the hospital, where the electronics could kill him, he says. Alrika Aberg, a doctor who specializes in electromagnetic allergies, has followed Segelbeck from the earliest stages of his illness and has treated more than 800 allergy sufferers. She says she's found that the severity of the symptoms varies, from the mildest insomnia and dizziness to the very severe conditions Segelbeck experienced. "There is always electrical activity going on in all the cells of the body, so it's not surprising that the entire body of a person with electromagnetic allergies would be affected," she said. She said. For those who report milder symptoms, Aberg advises them to clear their homes of all wireless electronic devices, including cell phones, cordless phones, wireless computer networking devices and more. But people can still be exposed to radiation from other people's wireless devices. There are hundreds of electromagnetic allergy "refugees" in Sweden, she said, who have had to move to avoid the effects of electromagnetic fields, some more than once. She says one couple with allergies simply live in a caravan so they can move quickly if their symptoms worsen. "The diagnosis of EM allergies is controversial, and many people simply don't know or care about it," says Aberg. Aberg said, "But a lot of people (with EM allergies) feel unsafe where they live. We shouldn't feel free to add more EMFs regardless of how people react to them."