Those of you who remember the classics teacher who claimed wi-fi was affecting his health, may be interested in this BBC news report about other sufferers. Some people even claim to be able to notice minor signal fluctuations.
I mentioned casually to my husband that I could tell when he was sending an e-mail, but he dismissed that as laughable.
I’m astounded to find out this is a recognised disability in Sweden with amazing consequences:
Up to 5 per cent of the population is thought to have this sensitivity, which is recognised in Sweden as a disability. In Stockholm sufferers can have their homes adapted to remove or screen out sources of electromagnetic radiation. If this proves ineffective, they can even rent council-owned cottages in areas of low radiation.
Who’d of thought that I, and four other close neighbours, would be contributing to a wi-fi exclusion zone for 5% of the Swedish population.
3 Comments
This is a difficult one, as it’s entirely plausible that highly-modulated (and pulsed) RF radiation – even at low field intensity – could have adverse physiological effects, and so thorough research must be done. Comparing levels with those considered acceptable for un-modulated signals is not strictly valid.
But still I have to express scepticism. As far as I know, none of the studies done on mobile phone masts have shown any problem. In fact, those mobile users using their phones at some distance from the nearest mast are at most risk, as their handsets have to transmit at maximum power in order to establish contact with the network.
I’m looking forward to reading the results of the Essex University study mentioned in the Times article you cite. Talking of which, that article comes with links to a firm selling EM shielding materials (e.g., fabric-based Faraday cages), and another – which is basically a snake oil merchant – selling “harmonisers” and “cellular repair remedies”. The first of these companies, EMFields, is linked with the supposedly independent lobby group, PowerWatch. Talk about a conflict of interest!
This phenomenon isn’t new to Wi-Fi, it can be caused by all types of radio signal. For example, I feel overcome by nausea every time my wife tunes into Radio 2.
Francis, thanks for that comment. I have a friend who is an engineer who has been involved in this sort of issue (powerlines), and expresses similar scepticism, tempered with caveats about our limits of knowledge.
Hang on, a neighbour is emailing a PDF through my head.. arrgghhhhh..eeeah argghhh, right OK.
Simon, I find the Radio waves from Radio 4 at about 7.45am reduce me to a catatonic state! Am I alone?