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Re: Question: EMF Researcher Made Up Data, ORI Says (Science, 2 July, 1999)

At 04:14 PM 08/18/2002 -0400, RuthWeiner@aol.com wrote:
In a message dated 8/18/02 12:05:01 PM Mountain Daylight Time, lists@richardhess.com writes:

Recent studies apparently have formalized the threshold (see: it's NOT an
LNT model) in the 2-4mG region for magnetic fields.

Could you give some citations, please?  I thought the whole controversy was settled more than a decade ago.  The Bonneville Power Administration did some studies showing fairly conclusively that no consistent dose-response relationship could be demonstrated.  The Leeper/Wertheimer study was discredited years ago (that was a study supposedly correlating childhood leukemia with line-of-sight powerline existence).

It seems the recent BRITISH JOURNAL OF CANCER article didn't acknowledge it's discreditation.

I don't know the magnetic field of the average hair dryer, but if there is a threshold, it would have to be quite a bit above that.

I love that example--it always comes up. I think there is a difference between 24x7x365x? exposure (or even 12x7x365x? exposure) as opposed to three minutes of hair drying.

Even if we look at gauss-hours I don't think the hair dryer comes out to much. I don't think my wife uses her hair dryer more than 3 minutes per day.

One place which admits to be biased but offers primary sources for
reference is http://www.powerlinefacts.com


"Admits to be biased" is an understatement.  I looked at the site and was struck by three things:
(1) claims are made without actual citations, like journal volume, actual date of publication, page number, who the authors were -- anything so that I could actually go to the UNM library and look it up.  

These actual citations are found if you follow the site's hot links. I was impressed that the claims are BACKED UP with links to summaries and references. There is more detail about each of these on that site, but the citations mentioned should be enough for you to find them.


=====>Here is the California study--soon to be released
http://www.dhs.ca.gov/ps/deodc/ehib/emf/RiskEvaluation/riskeval.html

=====>A Population-Based Prospective Cohort Study of Personal Exposure to Magnetic Fields during Pregnancy and the Risk of Miscarriage  

De-Kun Li1; Roxana Odouli1; Soora Wi1; Teresa Janevic1; Ira Golditch2; T. Dan Bracken3; Russell Senior3; Richard Rankin4; Richard Iriye5

EPIDEMIOLOGY 2002;13:9-20

=====>A Nested Case-Control Study of Residential and Personal Magnetic Field Measures and Miscarriages  

Geraldine M. Lee1; Raymond R. Neutra1; Lilia Hristova1; Michael Yost2; Robert A. Hiatt3

EPIDEMIOLOGY 2002;13:21-31

=====>British Journal of Cancer
 
A pooled analysis of magnetic fields and childhood leukaemia

A. Ahlbom, N. Day, M. Feychting, E. Roman, J. Skinner, J. Dockerty, M. Linet, M. McBride, J. Michaelis, J. H. Olsen, T. Tynes, P. K. Verkasalo

p 692-698, Volume 83, Number 5, September 2000 

(2) much of the material, like the glioblastoma question, is a rehash of what was brought up years ago,

I didn't study this years ago. See Brit J. of Cancer study for new analysis of old data.

(3) essentially all the claims of harm boil down to something like (I am paraphrasing, not quoting) "re-examination of the data showed an increased risk of (miscarriage, leukemia, brain cancer, etc.)  Re-examination of data means, to me, manipulating your statistics (perhaps to show the result you want?)  What does "show an increased risk of..." mean?

As I understand it, at least the article in the Br. J. of Cancer based the statistic across multiple studies to increase the population and reduce the margins of error in the statistical analysis.

 Does it really mean that there is a direct positive correlation between exposure to electromagnetic fields and observed incidence of the health effect, including correction for confounding factors, and including the negative or "control" showing  that less exposure to electromagnetic fields means less incidence of whatever the health effect is?  How was exposure measured?  Did the subjects carry gauss meters?  Did the researcher record how many times they were close to some appliance that generated an electromagnetic field?  the strength of those fields?  Was there a correlation with distance?  

I'm not sure any of these questions are fully answered in any study to your and my total happiness. As to "control" groups, I thought it was based on Observed/Expected arguments similar to the hormesis of ionizing radiation studies. Yes, I realize that the shipyard worker study for hormesis has a separate control group. Very well done.

I have found this information useful in helping to slow down some (err
rather unwanted) new high-end residential development under some 330kV
power lines.

Are you really slowing down that development because of the information on the website, or do you just not want the residential development?  Hey, I used to be real active with environmental organizations, and I observed firsthand how anything remotely applicable was used to slow down or stop unwanted (by whom?) developments.  that's one reason I got fed up.  I believe in being honest.  For example, I do not believe that air pollution can be tied to deaths, but I certainly think we are entitled to clean air.

The entire neighborhood is up in arms about a particular development that was somehow allowed to go on despite laws that would have restricted the development (something about a broken datestamp (just kidding, but almost that bad)). We picked on EVERYTHING possible to show the negative impacts.

QUOTE from my letter: "The first perspective on the desired setback should be that it is no closer than the HUD requirements, which is 200 feet from the center line, or 125 feet from the edge of the right of way. This, already is an increase of 50 feet over that proposed in the draft Revised EIR....
We hope to see the EIR revised to use a setback of at least 250 feet, preferably 335 feet. "

My uncertainty between 250 and 335 was based on the fact that the current flowing through the lines was not documented at the time magnetic field strength measurements were made. I went into a fair amount of detail as to how the assumptions would need to be modified. The 200 foot HUD claim has to do with no houses within the fall distance of the lines--not even that was taken into account.


It is actually only a controversial issue because those like the contrbutors to that website keep it alive.

EPIDEMIOLOGY?
BRITISH JOURNAL OF CANCER?

 I am not surpried there was cheating. That is not the first study claiming a positive correlation between EMF exposure and some health effect that was discredited.

Since you convinced yourself about radiation by getting a monitor, how about an gauss meter?  I suggest you compare the fields from the ordinary appliances that you ge within feet or inches of with the fields inside a house, or even outside, under a high-tension line.  I am not being facetious.  I was very interested in the early studies in this area, and might have been convinced of a correlation, had subsequent data supported it.

I'm considering that, but I actually have fairly sensitive (if inaccurate) equipment for detecting magnetic fields: analog audio tape recorders <smile> (see http://www.vignettesmedia.com/ ). I live in a very quiet field area. I am well aware that hair dryers and such create large fields. I'm not worried about that (I don't use one). I don't use electric blankets (sheesh, I live in So Cal---I u$e central air conditioning <$igh>).

As I've said, because of my tape recorders (I do tape restoration professionally, but as a side job) and my shortwave receivers (I used to do work for Voice of America) I don't live near power lines. I avoided them strictly for the electromagnetic compatibility issues. The last house I bought (1984) was, I believe, BEFORE the New Yorker article that started the whole public outcry (at least from my perspective). I believe later that was disproven.

Thanks for writing!

Richard