Letter to Editor, Gulf Islands Driftwood
July 30, 2012
This will attempt to correct misinformation presented in a “Viewpoint” article which apparently relied on government and industry information to claim that radiofrequency/microwave radiation – EMR – is supposedly safe. This is also to refute some of the misrepresentation found in the letter to the editor defending the flawed “smart” meter program by project head Gary Murphy (both pieces: G.I. Driftwood, 07/25).
This is a timely discussion, as we witness the public being forced to accept technology that is failing in all other areas where deployed. Everywhere these invasive systems have been forced on an unsuspecting public, reports of damage to equipment, fires, explosions, huge bill increases and health damages follow. The Gulf Islands can soon expect a swarm of Hydro’s ‘Corix’ installers, who care less about our ‘do not install’ signs and other good intentions to avoid the “smart”meter. This is why our local Safe Technology group will assist in blocking and locking your safe conventional meter. Forcing this on everyone represents an end to our democratic right to a safe, secure, affordable electrical grid as well as to our right to a safe home environment free of genotoxic, cancer-causing EMR. Without this right, it can be argued that we lose what’s left of our democracy altogether. Are we really okay with this?
Corix is on record – on YouTube even – for kicking down doors, scaling locked fences, ripping down ’do not install’ signs and threatening people, revealing the brutal bully behind the polite mask of an increasingly-privatised BC Hydro. Hydro even uses the words: “precautionary principle” to sell us on this money grab. There are few if any benefits to customers from the “smart” meter plan.
Regarding the relatively new form of air pollution – electrosmog – by which the “smart” meter plan functions – increasing worldwide reports, both scientific and anecdotal, of adverse reactions in many species, should be taken seriously. In Europe, where pulsed digital wireless radiation was prevalent much earlier than here, the diagnosis of EHS – electro hypersensitivity – is an accepted “functional impairment” or “disability”, for which compensation can be awarded. Not so in North America, where medical people have yet to get up to speed with this growing affliction, said to affect 3 to 5% of the population in very serious ways, with around 35% having less severe – and largely unrecognized – symptoms.
In a May 2011 position letter signed by forty published scientists and doctors, Dr. David Carpenter, MD, Director, Institute for Health and the Environment, U. Albany, USA, states:
“…. people are increasingly affected by ambient microwaves due to the growing popularity of wireless devices such as cell phones and Wi-Fi Internet. Therefore, the mass deployment of smart grids could expose large chunks of the general population to alarming risk scenarios without their consent. According to seven surveys done in six European countries between 2002 and 2004, about 10% of Europeans have become electrosensitive, and experts fear that percentage could reach 50% by 2017. The most famous person to publicly reveal her electrosensitivity is Gro Harlem Brundtland, formerly Prime Minister of Norway and retired Director of the World Health Organization (WHO).”
Why would we allow “smart” technology that invades privacy and can be brought down by a cyber attack or solar flare? Why accept technology that imposes continuous, powerful EMR spikes from every meter, as well as around 300,000 radiation spikes daily from a network of collector transmitters in every area – all signalling to massive cellular/WiMAX antennas via EMR? This is powerful stuff and is best avoided, which is why we are calling for a “smart” meter-free zone status for the Gulf Islands.
Dr Carpenter et al: “Wireless smart meters typically produce atypical, relatively potent and very short pulsed RF/microwaves whose biological effects have never been fully tested. They emit these millisecond-long RF bursts … with a maximum of 190,000 daily transmissions … Thus people in proximity to a smart meter are at risk of significantly greater aggregate exposure than with a cell phone, not to mention the cumulative levels of RF/microwaves that people living near several meters are exposed to. With smart meters, the entire body is exposed to the microwaves, which increases the risk of overexposure to many organs.”
Our widely discredited ‘Code Six’ EMR exposure guidelines are among the least protective in the world. In 2007, the EU called for much stricter EMR standards.
In May, 2011, the Council of Europe called on governments to “take all reasonable measures to reduce exposure to electromagnetic fields.” It stated: “… certain high frequency waves used in the fields of radar, telecommunications, and mobile telephony, appear to have ….potentially harmful, non-thermal, biological effects on plants, insects, and animals as well as the human body even when exposed to levels that are below the official threshold values.” And yet our governments remain under industry influence in allowing ever-increasing EMR exposure.
It is fact that replicated, peer-reviewed and published “gold standard” science now shows serious and potentially-irreversible harm from pulse-modulated, microwave radiation.
Dr. Carpenter: “The apparent adverse health effects noted with smart meter exposure are likely to be further exacerbated if smart appliances that use wireless communications become the norm and further increase unwarranted exposure.”
“…… many scientists and medical experts urgently recommend that measures following the Precautionary Principle be applied immediately — such as using wired meters — to reduce biologically inappropriate microwave exposure.”
We need to stop the madness now and to claim our rights to safe, secure, affordable electricity. Water and gas “smart” meters are the next targets.
Chris Anderson 250-537-5102
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDMYc1qlhFY
