WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--In honor of the Environmental Protection Agency's Children's Health Month, the National Coalition for Responsible Technology, a collaboration of health advocacy groups, will hold a rally outside the Supreme Court on Tuesday, October 17, 2017, from 11 a.m. - 1 p.m.
Participants will include representatives from Environmental Health Trust, ElectromagneticHealth.org, What Is 5G?, California Brain Tumor Association, Center for Safer Wireless, California Alliance for Safer Technology, Campaign for Radiation Free Schools, and others.
The group will draw attention to FCC exposure guidelines for wireless radiation, which are not biologically-based, but instead are based on a long-outdated physics assumption that the only potential risk from wireless exposures is from heating. Thousands of scientific studies, over many decades, including U.S. Government research, and telecom industry funded research, clearly show harmful effects from non-thermal levels of this radiation. The risks are of even greater concern for children.
Health advocates say the FCC exposure guidelines should consider all risks, especially given there are thousands of studies showing biological and health effects at non-thermal exposures.
The rally will draw attention to a federal preemption in the Telecom Act of 1996 that limits state and local governments’ ability to influence the siting of antennas on health grounds. And speakers will address efforts in many states today to pass legislation granting the wireless industry carte blanche to erect new ‘distributed’ antennas on utility poles, lamp poles, street signs, and other municipal infrastructure.
Resistance to 4G LTE and 5G ‘distributed’ antennas has been growing nationally. Scientist letters claim effects from 5G antennas will include large increases in blindness, hearing loss, infertility, melanoma, neuropathic pain, impacts on immune function, and impacts on red blood cells, leading to very low oxygen in the tissues. Effects on insects (including bees and other pollinators), birds, small mammals, and almost all plants are expected to be even more severe than the effects on humans.
Ellen Marks, Chair of the California Alliance for Safer Technology that is fighting legislation that would enable 5G antennas in CA, says: "I am disappointed that our government is not adequately warning parents about wireless radiation risks. Considering the extensive science linking cancer and other negative health effects to wireless radiation our government has a responsibility to protect public health – especially that of innocent children.”
Camilla Rees, MBA of ElectromagneticHealth.org and Manhattan Neighbors for Safer Telecommunications, says, "An ‘antennas everywhere’ approach to telecommunications only serves the short-term financial interests of the wireless industry. The U.S. should be investing instead for the long-term in optical fiber directly to the home.”