Power Cables and Cancer
Manila Times
January 22, 2000
Many studies show that wherever there are-fields of electromagnetic radiation there have been found, cancer clusters among the affected population, mostly in children suffering from leukemia. Children are most at risk because their cells are dividing and replicating as they grow.
CANCER is the Philippines third worst, killer disease. It is the second killer worldwide. Philippine health records show much fewer deaths due to cancer before industtialization, but a rapidly increasing rate after. While smoking, toxic chemicals in our food and water and polluted air contribute to the disease, radiation is by far the most deadly and quickest acting cancer-causing element. Power cables and their electromagnetic radiation, acting with air pollution and naturally occurring radioactive radon gas, could be one of the deadliest causes of cancer. Recent scientific research findings support this opinion.
This weekend the countdown to Earth Day 2000 begins and will culminate on Easter Sunday. A special day to renew our commitment to cherish all life on earth, and work for the environmental and the ancestral rights of the people, as we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
The implementation of the Clean Air Act this year will mean lead-free gasoline nine months ahead of schedule. Our air is so polluted that many thousands if not millions of Filipinos are living shorter lives due to breathing ailments such as asthma and lung cancer. The massive cost of medicine, among the highest for developing countries, causes untold hardship and greater poverty.
Air pollution is one of the most hazardous forms of pollution and environmental degradation. It is deadly in itself as we breathe the chemical fumes and traffic exhaust into our lungs. Our bloodstream is contaminated, our cells weaken, immunity levels fall and cancer cells quickly develop. What is aggravating this ever-present danger are electromagnetic, radiation fields created by power cables and transformers. Even cellphones can cause brain tumors if overused.
Last week, I wrote about the protest held-against a big electric pylon erected in 1996 outside the Preda Children's Home in Olongapo City.. That project of the National Power Corporation, the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority, and the City of Olongapo administration was allegedly mired in graft and corruption. Local politicians saw to it that there was an extra pylon erected so that the cables would not pass over their property. Instead they allowed them to pass close to the Children's' Home. If there was no danger from the cables as they claimed, why then divert them away from their homes in Gordon Park?
Many studies show that wherever there are fields of electromagnetic radiation
there have been found cancer clusters among the affected
population, mostly in children suffering from leukemia. Children are most at
risk because their cells are dividing and replicating as they grow. To protect
your family it's time to inspect your surroundings for cables and transformers.
A new scientific breakthrogh published by the Lancet last December 1999 shows that there is a serious connection between electromagnetic radiation and health. The findings have also been published in the International Journal of Radiation Biology and released at a press conference held at the Institute of Mechanical Engineers in,London on Dec. 1, 1999.
The British scientist, Professor Denis Henshaw, a distinguished researcher at Bristol University's human radiation effects group in England, confirms a theory worked out three years ago that electromagnetic radiation is,directly linked to leukemia and other cancers in children.
Professor Henshaw and his team have proven after years of painstaking research and over 2000 field tests to back it up, that the radiation from power cables extends for more than 100 yards on every side of the cables, and that they increase the human uptake of radioactive gas (radon) given off by the earth and the gases in traffic pollution. These gases are made more deadly by the radiation from the cables, damaging the blood cells of humans. Children are the most vulnerable.
The research was funded by the Department of Health and the Medical Research
Council of The United Kingdom. Thefindings are. supported by a parallel study by
professor Richard Doll published in The Lancet in the middle of last December.
Professor Doll was the first to establish the link between tobacco and cancer,
though industry, had strenuously denied such a link for many years.
Now he has established a link between radiation and leukemia. He collated details of every childhood leukemia case in the past four years to find common links to radiation. Clusters of childhood leukemia have been associated with electromagnetic radiation for years but the direct evidence , making the connection was lacking. Now it has been found.
Professor Henshaw's research group discovered the complex interaction between the alternating electric fields surrounding electric cables and the effect when these fields react with naturally occurring radioactive radon gas. Children living near cables could receive a powerful dose of 95 milliseverts of radiation in a year. The maximum allowed for any home is only one millisevert. Nuclear workers are allowed a maximum dose of 50, and this is to be reduced to 20.
Professor if Henshaw said, "It is clear that if there is radon gas or traffic
fumes in the air near pylons then people living nearby, will suffer increased
exposure because of the electric field." Findings such as this leave little
doubt that public health has to have priority over cost-cutting in industry. If
the Earth Day 2000 movement
is to mean anything, it must raise public awareness and prod a response from
Congress and the Senate to increase the standards of safety beyond what is now
the practice.
