Woman Gets €800/month For EMF 'Disability'

[zapta]

I was wondering how long it would take someone to post this as a typical "make your blood boil, look at these idiots" bit. As usual, the people who get angry are the ones who are idiots.

What a classy way to join a discussion...

[NiHaoMike]

It pays to see who does underwrite those studies; Motorola has underwritten a number of studies that say cell phones and whatnot are safe; do I believe them?
About as much as I believe Monsanto says Round UP herbicide is safe.

Most (knowledgeable) GMO supporters don't actually use GMOs or the chemicals often used with them. While practically all wireless engineers do use wireless at home, and in fact, many use more than the average consumer does.

Thus far, the most significant health hazards of cell phones and other wireless devices are indirect, as in stuff like texting while driving and people playing with them late into the night instead of getting enough sleep. Correlating heavy use of wireless devices with health problems can thus give the impression that the wireless itself is to blame.

Maybe we should push for infrared communication with RF fallback in order to boost bandwidth and reduce RF exposure at the same time? Those who then claim that infrared is harmful should then be reminded that old fashioned incandescent bulbs emit a lot of it.

[LukeW]

About as much as I believe Monsanto says Round UP herbicide is safe.

  Look over there, vaccines and chemtrails!

Research into this area suggests that most of the people affected have been exposed to chemicals, usually in an industrial setting or via cleaning products. For reasons that are not understood this causes them to be sensitive to certain types of EMF under certain conditions.

What a load of crap.
Any kind of science or research at all to support this? And no, Alex Jones and PrisonPlanet don't count as peer-reviewed sources.

[apis]

Actually, it's quite interesting that you keep talking about beliefs. I never used that word ...

You used the words like "idiots" and "most doctors refused to believe it".

Right, and you just ignore the ones that contradict your beliefs.

No, you are missing the point.  Anyone can post a link to their favourite PubMed study, it doesn't really prove anything. There have been many studies that have not found any correlation. You need to do a survey of all the literature in order to draw any conclusion. That's why WHO's opinion is of value since their recommendations are typically based on a systematic literature review performed by experts in the field.

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=Electromagnetic+hypersensitivity+who&l=1
Also, it's mentioned in the BBC article, the very first link in the very first post.

But the BBC also wrote this:

In the UK, electromagnetic hypersensitivity is not a recognised condition.
That's because Public Health England says there is no scientific evidence that electromagnetic fields damage people's health.
The WHO agrees and believes more research on long-term health effects needs to be done.

That seems a bit contradictory from the first statement, no?

Having looked at the WHO link you provided I have to wonder if you bothered to read it?

The majority of studies indicate that EHS individuals cannot detect EMF exposure any more accurately than non-EHS individuals. Well controlled and conducted double-blind studies have shown that symptoms were not correlated with EMF exposure.
[...]
EHS has no clear diagnostic criteria and there is no scientific basis to link EHS symptoms to EMF exposure. Further, EHS is not a medical diagnosis, nor is it clear that it represents a single medical problem.

Source: http://www.who.int/peh-emf/publications/facts/fs296/en/

WHO also has a good FAQ on EMF:

Conclusions from scientific research
In the area of biological effects and medical applications of non-ionizing radiation approximately 25,000 articles have been published over the past 30 years. Despite the feeling of some people that more research needs to be done, scientific knowledge in this area is now more extensive than for most chemicals. Based on a recent in-depth review of the scientific literature, the WHO concluded that current evidence does not confirm the existence of any health consequences from exposure to low level electromagnetic fields. However, some gaps in knowledge about biological effects exist and need further research.
[...]
There is little scientific evidence to support the idea of electromagnetic hypersensitivity. Recent Scandinavian studies found that individuals do not show consistent reactions under properly controlled conditions of electromagnetic field exposure. Nor is there any accepted biological mechanism to explain hypersensitivity. Research on this subject is difficult because many other subjective responses may be involved, apart from direct effects of fields themselves. More studies are continuing on the subject.

Source: http://www.who.int/peh-emf/about/WhatisEMF/en/index1.html

So it looks like WHO agree with what most people have been saying in this thread, EHS is a real problem for many but it's likely not caused by EMF.

[timb]

The tiny spiders that live behind my eyelids told me that EMF and Morgellons and chemtrails are really CIA experiments.


Sent from my Tablet

[zapta]

Mojo Chan, the science is settled with numerous researches. Don't be a science denier.

[Mechanical Menace]

About as much as I believe Monsanto says Round UP herbicide is safe.

I will say this;
Much of what we "Think" is scientifically conducted studies is little more than propaganda.

But even the propaganda study from the other side of the RoundUp argument actually showed that male mice drinking Round Up suffered less cancers and there was no ill effects in either gender, well when you took into account the line of mice used are purposely bred for their absurdly high spontaneous cancer rates and they were left alive much longer than anybody except for the Big Organic industry would count as ethical...



And I can't believe I just stuck up for Monsanto.

[CatalinaWOW]

I was wondering how long it would take someone to post this as a typical "make your blood boil, look at these idiots" bit. As usual, the people who get angry are the ones who are idiots.

The WHO recognizes this condition. There have been tests where it has been determined to exist in controlled conditions: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21793784

Note that in that test they found that the woman in question was sensitive to the EMF being turned on or off, but not to it simply being on or off. Since many wireless devices are quite aggressive about power management these days that happens a lot.

Research into this area suggests that most of the people affected have been exposed to chemicals, usually in an industrial setting or via cleaning products. For reasons that are not understood this causes them to be sensitive to certain types of EMF under certain conditions.

I can see this being the next CFS (ME). Dismissed at first, most doctors refused to believe it, but now recognized and starting to be understood. I happen to suffer from that and I'm just glad mine developed in the 2000s and not 10 years earlier when I would probably have been told it was psychological and dismissed.

Mojo, there may be some needles in this haystack, but I am disappointed to hear someone with some knowledge of technology using such loose terminology as "exposure to chemicals".  Without exposure to chemicals like water, salt and hemoglobin you die.  The only hope of finding if there is something going on is to create focused hypotheses and test them. 

Even if you do understand the nuances, using speech like this arms the half (or less) informed who do such things as conflating ionizing radiation with RF radiation.

[AF6LJ]

About as much as I believe Monsanto says Round UP herbicide is safe.

I will say this;
Much of what we "Think" is scientifically conducted studies is little more than propaganda.

But even the propaganda study from the other side of the RoundUp argument actually showed that male mice drinking Round Up suffered less cancers and there was no ill effects in either gender, well when you took into account the line of mice used are purposely bred for their absurdly high spontaneous cancer rates and they were left alive much longer than anybody except for the Big Organic industry would count as ethical...



And I can't believe I just stuck up for Monsanto.

I never saw the study; a study on its own is meaningless unless you can see all everything involved in the making of that study. Including but not limited to the discussions that set the ground rules for the study.

[AF6LJ]

Mojo Chan, the science is settled with numerous researches. Don't be a science denier.

The science is never settled that is the beauty of the scientific method.

That phrase is often used by groups who are afraid of further study.

[mos6502]

Say what?

[apis]

When you start really looking at this stuff you realise that there is a lot of stuff that medical science doesn't understand. The diagnosis for Reiter's is "eliminate all other possibilities". It's been known about for 100 years, and that's the state of the art.

I'm not saying that EM sensitivity is what people claim it is necessarily, but there is compelling evidence that there is something happening here. The court has accepted expert advice on that.

I don't question that, but when people insist it's caused by EMF when most of the science contradicts it, a lot of people will just disregard it as silly and those who have real problems don't get help that actually works. Even worse, if people start isolating themselves in remote areas because they believe EMF is dangerous for them, they will both suffer from the isolation and they never find out what they really are sensitive to.

[timb]

No, you are missing the point.  Anyone can post a link to their favourite PubMed study, it doesn't really prove anything. There have been many studies that have not found any correlation.

The point is that while people may not be able to detect EM emissions, in that and a few other tests they have been able to detect a change in EM emissions. So your ability to point to studies that tested the former does not disprove the latter.


 You need to do a survey of all the literature in order to draw any conclusion. That's why WHO's opinion is of value since their recommendations are typically based on a systematic literature review performed by experts in the field.

That seems a bit contradictory from the first statement, no?

Nope. The WHO recognises the condition. The UK doesn't, buy the WHO does. It says that more research is needed and that there is no scientific explanation at the moment, but it still recognises that the condition exists, even if it is psychological.

As I said, we have been here before. With CFS initially it was dismissed because there was no scientific explanation (still isn't well understood) and there is no known test that can detect it.

I actually have two such conditions. I also have Reiter's, for which there is no test and no scientific explanation. There might be one day because it is related to lupus, and is known to be some kind of autoimmune problem, but there isn't much effort going into research.

When you start really looking at this stuff you realise that there is a lot of stuff that medical science doesn't understand. The diagnosis for Reiter's is "eliminate all other possibilities". It's been known about for 100 years, and that's the state of the art.

I'm not saying that EM sensitivity is what people claim it is necessarily, but there is compelling evidence that there is something happening here. The court has accepted expert advice on that.

WHO recognizes the condition in that the people clearly have *some issue* but, as all current studies have conclusively shown, it's not caused by RF.

Like you said, it could be exposure to industrial cleaning products or just plain psychosomatic (which doesn't mean they're crazy, per say). Either way, if you know anything about RF you'd know that a cell phone or WiFi router doesn't even remotely have the power to affect human tissue (beyond *possibly* heating a small area a fraction of a degree, which is negligible).

My money is on psychosomatic issues. The brain is a powerful thing; there's a story from WW2 where a GI had been shot, but the field hospital was out of morphine, so the nurse injected him with saline and his pain went away. So, his brain thought it was getting morphine and either started ignoring the pain signals, or more likely dumped a load of endorphins (which is essentially endogenous morphine) and that stopped his pain.

So, if someone sees a cell phone and thinks that will cause them to feel ill, their brain will actually make them feel ill, which reinforces the whole notion. They basically get stuck in a feedback loop, ironically not unlike a PLL.


Sent from my Tablet

[Zero999]

Either way, if you know anything about RF you'd know that a cell phone or WiFi router doesn't even remotely have the power to affect human tissue (beyond *possibly* heating a small area a fraction of a degree, which is negligible).

I agree. This is why it's nearly impossible for RF energy of this kind of strength to be causing any health problems: there's just no mechanism. The radiation from a phone is no different to the IR from a heat lamp or fire, it just penetrates deeper into the body. In fact a fire will emit some energy in the microwave region but it will be dwarfed by the massive output in the IR part of the spectrum.

[Chris C]

My money is on psychosomatic issues. The brain is a powerful thing; there's a story from WW2 where a GI had been shot, but the field hospital was out of morphine, so the nurse injected him with saline and his pain went away. So, his brain thought it was getting morphine and either started ignoring the pain signals, or more likely dumped a load of endorphins (which is essentially endogenous morphine) and that stopped his pain.

Reading about Marine (the woman on disability), I see she's tried lots of things to reduce her RF exposure.  Many of which helped, but only briefly.  She consistently concludes that this is because her sensitivity worsened.  And does not even once suggest the possibility that she may have been experiencing the placebo effect, or that by coincidence, she was just having a good week.

She also reports a doctor found that her thalamus was receiving 35% of the oxygen that it should.  This is the region of the brain responsible for sensory and motor signals, consciousness, alertness, and sleep.  In short, all the things she's having problems with.  To her, this verification that RF is destroying her brain.  To me, this is verification she's unable to distinguish between cause and effect.

Just plain bad science.  And it's not hard to find a doctor or scientist who will validate a faulty conclusion.  It's just a matter of trying enough of them.

As I mentioned, my mother is a paranoid schizophenic.  One characteristic of that is that you always blame something external for whatever problems you're having.  I didn't get along with her as a child, as she was already quite crazy and abusive (though nothing compared to now).  But true to her condition, she decided I must be the crazy one.  Took me to a psychologist, a good one, who at least helped heal some of my trauma.  But that didn't solve the real issue, in fact it made less willing to tolerate her abuse, so she switched me to another psychologist.  Then another, and another, in rapid succession.  Until she found one that after 30 minutes of speaking with me, told her that I was hopelessly crazy, and would "surely be dead or in jail by age 18".  That was what she wanted to hear, so no more psychologists.

She was satisfied for a while, until she saw a news report on teenage drug abuse, and decided I must be on drugs.  Took me to a doctor for blood tests, no drugs.  Immediately took me to another, same result.  And another.  And so on, until the last said "we can't detect any drugs, but your son's arm is covered in track marks, so we're sure he must be using them".  Of course it was covered with track marks - from constant drug testing.  But again, that was what she wanted to hear.

Now if I'd just told you that "doctors and scientists believe that I am insane, and had a raging teenage drug problem", without giving you the context, you might have believed it.

Similarly, take it out of context that the WHO recognizes EHS, and you might believe they think RF is responsible for it.  Yet, from their page on it:

"Treatment of affected individuals should focus on the health symptoms and the clinical picture, and not on the person's perceived need for reducing or eliminating EMF in the workplace or home. This requires:

* a medical evaluation to identify and treat any specific conditions that may be responsible for the symptoms,
* a psychological evaluation to identify alternative psychiatric/psychological conditions that may be responsible for the symptoms,
* an assessment of the workplace and home for factors that might contribute to the presented symptoms. These could include indoor air pollution, excessive noise, poor lighting (flickering light) or ergonomic factors. A reduction of stress and other improvements in the work situation might be appropriate."

What is notably absent here?  Any recommendation to reduce RF exposure.  They do not recognize RF as even a potential cause of EHS.

[timofonic]

Let's give tinfoil hats to everyone!

This topic is too complex to understand and if often plagued of misinformations. Some animals are able to perceive some RF frequencies, but we aren't sure about many things about our damn fucking complex and twisted biology.

Despite this can be an issue, it's marginal compared to good nutrition, mental health and bad education. Many of these people have mental illness and associate it with this or whatever shit their minds build, and it can happen to very intelligent people too. Mental health sucks.

http://gizmodo.com/a-lot-of-published-psychology-results-are-bullshit-1727228060

Do you want to see pseudoscience shit that can make Batteriser futuristic magical-like science fiction technology? Look at it.

* I have some hope in a future serious approach of neuroscience, with advanced brain analysis, tests and even manipulate it in different ways to regulate or improve it.
* There's some research in neurogenesis too, that might be quite interesting.

And this is said from a guy with ADHD, one of the most studied disorders. Drugs help, but they have no fucking clue of making adult therapy and are unable to empathize, but trowing guilty to me all time. What the fuck!

They are often even more insane than me in extreme ways (I know many of them) but not having my fucking disorder makes them very hard to understand it. You would be surprised how rude can they be.

My once private tutor helped me a lot more than all these scammers in most of my shitty life, but I have zero money right now. Anyone want to adopt me and teach me electronics? I'll clean your home or whatever

Back to electrons, ladies and gentlemen. We would need massive cognitive augmentations to understand just a fraction of this shit.

[zapta]

Say what?

It's in his mind only. In the hospital scene the doctor turned on the electric switch but he didn't notice it.

[Red Squirrel]

Say what?

It's in his mind only. In the hospital scene the doctor turned on the electric switch but he didn't notice it.

I was actually just thinking about that, and that's how they should handle people who truly think they are sensitive to EMF.  Get them in a room that is completely free from any EMFs, perhaps something in a steel container or something.  Use various instruments from advanced things to simple things like radio to show to the person that there is no EMF but also reassure the doctors/scientists in that room that there is indeed no EMF so it can act as a baseline for the experiment.  Then start to ramp up various sources of EMF without the person's knowledge while monitoring them and asking if they feel anything.

Basically if they can scientifically debunk that the person is actually sensitive to EMF then they should not get any kind of disability.  If anything it would prove as a good research experiment just in case somehow this is really a real thing that we just don't know about.   

Really I think this approach should be done for ANY condition that someone goes on disability for.   Make sure people arn't just trying to milk the system.

[mikeselectricstuff]

Wasn't there a story a while ago about a town where lots of people started complaining of symptoms when a new antenna tower was built, but it later transpired that it wasn't even turned on at the time?

It's not like it would be hard to test this - there are plenty of screened EMC test chambers around the world, so would not be unreasonable to require anyone claiming benefits to be tested.
Though I'm sure some people would claim they got symptoms from proximity to spiky foam absorbers...
 

[coppice]

Wasn't there a story a while ago about a town where lots of people started complaining of symptoms when a new antenna tower was built, but it later transpired that it wasn't even turned on at the time?

Its possible the tower and the sickness were related. Maybe the construction people let something nasty get in the public water supply? The real downside of people jumping to spurious conclusions is it stops them looking for real issues.

It's not like it would be hard to test this - there are plenty of screened EMC test chambers around the world, so would not be unreasonable to require anyone claiming benefits to be tested.
Though I'm sure some people would claim they got symptoms from proximity to spiky foam absorbers...

That's easy. Just compare their performance in a chamber with the spike kind of absorber and a chamber with the flat ferrite plate kind.

[Delta]

Mojo, you are a complete spacker.  Your determination to rally against pretty much everything makes you look somewhat idiotic. Electro hypersensitivity is complete bollocks, your one favourite study (with a sample size of one) proves nothing.

The woman in the article clears has mental health issues, but it's nothing to do with Big Electro beaming nasty Frequencies into her head...

[Zero999]

Mojo, you are a complete spacker.  Your determination to rally against pretty much everything makes you look somewhat idiotic. Electro hypersensitivity is complete bollocks, your one favourite study (with a sample size of one) proves nothing.

The woman in the article clears has mental health issues, but it's nothing to do with Big Electro beaming nasty Frequencies into her head...

Indeed, I don't think anyone here has said that she doesn't have health problems and that she doesn't need the money, just that it's obviously not caused by non-ionising EM radiation.

[SL4P]

...and you guys thought my footer-signature was silly.

[amyk]

Wasn't there a story a while ago about a town where lots of people started complaining of symptoms when a new antenna tower was built, but it later transpired that it wasn't even turned on at the time?

http://mybroadband.co.za/news/wireless/11099-massive-revelation-in-iburst-tower-battle.html

It's not like it would be hard to test this - there are plenty of screened EMC test chambers around the world, so would not be unreasonable to require anyone claiming benefits to be tested.
Though I'm sure some people would claim they got symptoms from proximity to spiky foam absorbers...

The reluctance of them to be tested makes it all the more difficult to, however.

That's exactly what they did in the study I linked to earlier. They found that while the test subject couldn't tell if there was an artificial EMF field or not, they could tell when it was turned on or off.

I can tell when equipment with a CRT is turned on/off, because I can hear the high frequencies. Ditto for my router and computer (coil whine), and I can hear the magnetron in the microwave too. That doesn't mean I'm sensing the EMF from it. I can also hear the sound a dental x-ray machine makes when it fires, but that doesn't mean I'm sensing the burst of (ionising!) radiation.

Perhaps that person just has unusually sensitive hearing and is triggering on something else, maybe something as simple as the click of a relay or the researcher actuating a switch?

[macboy]

Mojo, you are a complete spacker.  Your determination to rally against pretty much everything makes you look somewhat idiotic. Electro hypersensitivity is complete bollocks, your one favourite study (with a sample size of one) proves nothing.

The woman in the article clears has mental health issues, but it's nothing to do with Big Electro beaming nasty Frequencies into her head...

Mojo-chan is EEVBlog forum's biggest troll. Why do you guys even give him the satisfaction of responding to his lunatic rantings?