The World Health Organization`s
International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC} says its study of
cell phone use and cancer rates is inconclusive, failing to find a definitive link.
The study, the first in a series of combined data analyses of head and neck tumors published as part of the internationally coordinated INTERPHONE project, is published by the International Journal of Epidemiology.
Overall, the authors said they found no increase in risk of glioma or meningioma with use of mobile phones. There were suggestions of an increased risk of glioma at the highest exposure levels, but biases and error prevent a causal interpretation, they said. The possible effects of long-term heavy use of mobile phones require further investigation, they add.
"An increased risk of brain cancer is not established from the data from Interphone,” said Dr. Christopher Wild, Director of IARC. “However, observations at the highest level of cumulative call time and the changing patterns of mobile phone use since the period studied by Interphone, particularly in young people, mean that further investigation of mobile phone use and brain cancer risk is merited."
The study was welcomed by the wireless industry. Michael Milligan, Secretary General of the Mobile Manufacturers Forum said the study provides further reassurance about the safety of cell phones.
“The overall analysis is consistent with previous studies and the significant body of research, reporting no increased health risk from using mobile phones," Milligan said.
Not a clean bill of health
But Wild told Reuters it is “premature” to say there is no cancer risk with cell phone use, underscoring the study`s suggestion that more research is needed. He said part of the study`s shortcomings has to do with the length of the time period covered in the research. At the beginning of the study, he said, cell phone use was much less than it is today.
The research was also based on subjects remembering, and accurately estimating, how much time they spent using cellular phones.
For decades, health advocates have worried that the radio waves emitted by cellular phones caused brain tumors to form.
In October 2009, A meta-analysis of cell phone cancer studies found that there is "possible evidence linking mobile phone use to an increased risk of tumors." The researchers, from the University of California, Berkeley, and a consortium of Korean institutions, said more research is needed to arrive at a more definitive conclusion.
