{"id":5020,"date":"2014-12-16T15:49:19","date_gmt":"2014-12-16T22:49:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/?p=5020"},"modified":"2015-01-20T13:01:07","modified_gmt":"2015-01-20T20:01:07","slug":"worlds-first-medical-study-of-smart-meter-health-complaints","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/?p=5020","title":{"rendered":"World\u2019s first medical study of smart-meter health complaints"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0By Andr\u00e9 Fauteux<\/strong><\/p>\n

La Maison du 21e\u00a0si\u00e8cle magazine<\/strong><\/p>\n

https:\/\/maisonsaine.ca\/sante-et-securite\/electrosmog\/effets-biologiques-des-compteurs-intelligents-pour-analyse-veritablement-independante.html<\/a><\/p>\n

Initially, Montrealer Pierre Lepage was glad to receive the letter Hydro-Qu\u00e9bec mailed him in 2011. It announced the upcoming replacement of the six electric meters located in his basement appartment\u2019s kitchen, by wireless \u201csmart\u201d meters that communicate with radiofrequency microwaves (RF\/MWs). \u201cI told myself, thanks to remote metering, I won\u2019t have to fill out meter-reading cards anymore. But I was ignorant\u201d, Lepage said in a 2012 interview after writing Quebec\u2019s Energy Board to complain that those meters harmed his family\u2019s health. About two weeks after they were installed, Lepage, his wife, father and teenage son all developed flue-like symptoms\u00a0: dizziness, headaches, fatigue, nausea and loss of appetite. \u201cWe thought we caught a virus, but the symptoms lasted for weeks. Later, I developed heart palpitations and high blood pressure for the first time in my life\u201d, the 36-year-old man said. He later covered the meters\u2019 glass globes with four layers of aluminum foil to reduce their RF\/MW emissions, as recommended by Villeray Refuse, the first citizen\u2019s group to oppose mandatory installation of\u00a0 smart meters. \u201cThree days later we felt much better\u201d, Lepage wrote in his\u00a0letter\u00a0to the Energy Board.<\/a><\/p>\n

Health authorities say smart meters are safe because their average RF\/MW emissions are thousands of times weaker than those from cellphones.\u00a0But experts in electromagnetic fields (EMFs) health effects say research is needed because it seems that smart meters\u2019 24\/7, intermittent and unpredictable pulses may be disrupting the synchronized electrical impulses in body cells. Evidence submitted in 2013 to the British Parliament stated smart meters\u00a0\u201chave triggered thousands of complaints of ill health and disabling symptoms worldwide\u201d, according to the\u00a0first study1<\/sup><\/a>\u00a0on smart meter health complaints published this week in a peer-reviewed medical journal. Its author, Dr Frederica Lamech, found that the main symptoms reported by some people exposed meters are the same as those related to other wireless devices for more than 60 years.<\/p>\n

Lamech is a family physician practicing in Melbourne, capital of the Australian State of Victoria. In 2013, she evaluated the symptoms reported by Victorians on a public website after rollout of smart meters in Australian homes which began in 2006. Her case series study analyzes the symptoms experienced by 92 Victorians (87 adults and 5 children).\u00a0\u201cThe most frequently reported symptoms from exposure to smart meters were (1) insomnia, (2) headaches, (3) tinnitus, (4) fatigue, (5) cognitive disturbances, (6) dysesthesias (abnormal sensation), and (7) dizziness\u201d,\u00a0she wrote in her study published in the November\/December 2014 issue of\u00a0Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine<\/i>.<\/p>\n

These symptoms, Dr Lamech wrote, \u201calmost completely overlap\u201d with those a bibliography of more than 2,300 studies on the biological effects of RF\/MW exposures written in\u00a01971-72 by US Navy scientist Zorach Glaser<\/a>. They are also the most common symptoms mentioned in the 2012 Austrian Medical Association\u2019s Guideline for the Diagnosis and Treatment of EMF-related Health Problems and Illnessses (EMF Syndrome). \u201cThis syndrome was first described by Russian researchers in the 1950s, who called dit microwave sickness,\u201d Lamech noted before concluding\u00a0:\u00a0The\u00a0\u201chypothesis that some people can develop symptoms from exposure to the radiofrequency fields of wireless mart meters (\u2026) cannot be disproven without further assesment of the affected individuals and the electromagnetic fields [EMFs] in which they live\u2019\u2019.<\/p>\n

Many of Lamech\u2019s participants said their smart meter\u2019s emissions\u00a0had profound effects on their life\u00a0: being unable to use part of one\u2019s house, spending a lot of money on shielding products or having to move, experiencing financial and relationship problems, being unable to work, etc. Forty percent reported having four or more symptoms and a man who suffered from a single but serious symptom \u2014 chronic, severe nerve pain \u2014 had to go on disability leave. The majority \u201cdescribed clear alleviation of symptom(s) when they moved away from the smart meter(s) or when shielded from the smart meter(s).\u201d Only seven people (8% of cases) stated they suffered from such electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS) prior to their smart meter exposure and 27 (29%) \u2014 most had opted for a non-RF-emitting meter \u2014 claimed their symptoms were triggered by their neighbor\u2019s smart meter. Lamech said the symptoms were unikely caused by another form of pollution located in a specific area since\u00a0: her participants\u2019 place of residence \u2014 67% in Melbourne or its suburbs and 23% in rural areas \u2014almost perfectly correlated to Melbourne\u2019s population.<\/p>\n

According to Australian Associate Professor of neurosurgery Vini G. Khurana<\/a>,\u00a0wireless smart meters may cause\u00a0\u201cadverse neurological effects in people who sustain close proximity to the meters, especially under 10 feet (3 metres)\u201d. These meters\u00a0communicate with other meters and utility \u2018smart grids\u2019 via two antennas using frequencies (900 MHz to 2.4 GHz)\u00a0similar to cordless phones and cell tower. They emit\u00a0\u201cmillisecond-long RF bursts on average 9,600 times a day with a maximum of 190,000 daily transmissions and a peak level emission two and a half times higher than the stated safety signal, as the California utility\u00a0Pacific Gas & Electric recognized<\/a>\u00a0before that State\u2019s Public Utilities Commission, according to Dr David O. Carpenter, former founding dean of Albany University (New York)\u2019s School of Public Health. Thus people in proximity to a smart meter are at risk of significantly greater aggregate of RF\/microwave\u00a0exposure than with a cell phone, not to mention the cumulative exposure received by people living near multiple meters mounted together,\u00a0pole-mounted routers or utility collector meters using a third antenna to relay RF signals from 500 to 5,000 homes.\u2019\u2019 Quoting the\u00a0BioInitiative Working Group<\/a>\u00a0Report coedited by Dr Carpenter, Dr Lamech wrote that such unpredictable pulses disrupt the synchronized biological oscillations within cells.<\/p>\n

RF radiation was classified as\u00a0\u201cpossibly carcinogenic\u2019\u2019 in 2011 by the International Agency for Research on Cancer, based on higher risk of brain cancer in people using a cell or regular cordless phone 30 minutes a day for at least 10 years. But according to Dr Carpenter, a world-reknowned expert on EMF health effects since the 1980s, cumulative exposure to smart meter emissions can be greater and more noxious than those from a cellphone used prudently (limiting the number and length of calls, using the speaker mode or a headset, etc.). \u201cThe report by Lamech\u00a0is valuable for several reasons, Carpenter said.\u00a0 It provides support for the possibility that a sudden increase in RF exposure \u2014 in this case from smart meters \u2014 results in the development of EHS.\u00a0 This observation is consistent with [other] reports \u2026 and suggests that the syndrome can be triggered in susceptible individuals by an unusual or intense exposure to EMFs\u00a0and perhaps to electric current.\u00a0 The Lamech\u00a0report also raises the important question of what characteristics of smart meters, compared with other sources of RF, may be responsible for provoking EHS.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the former head of epidemiologial studies at Canada\u2019s National Cancer Institute in Toronto,\u00a0Dr Anthony B. Miller<\/a>\u00a0 says Dr Lamech\u2019s study needs to be reproduced more rigorously. \u201cA case series produces very weak evidence.\u00a0In spite of what the author feels, the subjects may have been influenced in their reporting by extraneous information – their answers may have been influenced by recall bias. I certainly agree that more studies into this issue should be funded, but they need to be carefully designed, and preferably based upon defined questionnaires administered by trained interviewers, with the case subjects carefully matched to controls.\u2019\u2019 The emeritius professor of public health at the University of Toronto believes children\u2019s exposure to RF\/MWs needs to be reduced because the most recent studies justify their rather being classified as \u201cprobably carcinogenic\u2019\u2019.<\/p>\n

At Quebec\u2019s\u00a0National Institute of Public Health<\/a>\u00a0 scientific advisor Mathieu Gauthier said the study\u2019s design is flawed. \u201cThe method of selection of participants, the type of questions asked, the lack of a control group and lack of exposure measurements greatly limit the contribution of this study. In addition, we expected that the discussion would have mentioned the many other published research on this topic in recent years.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n

In her paper, Dr Lamech said while a case series cannot prove a causal relationship, \u201cit is nevertheless a vital and often essential first step in formulating a new hypothesis\u201d. Suspecting clinicians are only seeing the tip of the iceberg, she echoed other calls by scientists recommending a moratorium on smart meter and smart grid deployment until they are proven safe.\u00a0\u201cAn evidence-based approach, such as the one used in all other areas of medicine, must be applied, which would mean the establishment of a postrollout surveillance study and funding for further research into the particular effects of wireless smart meters\u2026 Living in a wireless smart meter grid makes the\u00a0Austrian Medical Asociation\u2019s recommendation\u00a0<\/a>to\u00a0\u201ctake all\u00a0reasonable measures to reduce exposure to electromagnetic fields\u201d\u00a0impossible to implement.\u201d\u00a0She told us by email her report is aimed at informing health clinicians because they and their patients generally lack knowledge about the effects of wireless technologies.<\/p>\n

Montrealer Jocelyne Morency, who lives in a condominium and is suing Hydro-Quebec and her neighbors who refuse to opt out of the smart meter program, hopes Dr Lamech\u2019s study will inspire others. \u201cHopefully various specialists (physicians, biologists and engineers) will join forces to develop multidisciplinary studies on the effets of smart meters.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n

Dr Anthony B. Miller is an advisor to\u00a0Canadians for Safe Technology<\/a>\u00a0(C4ST), a pressure group founded by the former president of Microsoft Canada, Frank Clegg. C4ST just launched a\u00a0petition<\/a>\u00a0demanding that Health Canada put \u201ca process in place to receive and respond to reports of adverse reactions to electromagnetic radiation emitting devices\u2019\u2019.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/maisonsaine.ca\/sante-et-securite\/electrosmog\/effets-biologiques-des-compteurs-intelligents-pour-analyse-veritablement-independante.html<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0By Andr\u00e9 Fauteux La Maison du 21e\u00a0si\u00e8cle magazine https:\/\/maisonsaine.ca\/sante-et-securite\/electrosmog\/effets-biologiques-des-compteurs-intelligents-pour-analyse-veritablement-independante.html Initially, Montrealer Pierre Lepage was glad to receive the letter Hydro-Qu\u00e9bec mailed him in 2011. It announced the upcoming replacement of the six electric meters located in his basement appartment\u2019s kitchen, by wireless \u201csmart\u201d meters that communicate with radiofrequency microwaves (RF\/MWs). \u201cI told myself, thanks to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[232,178,209,207,211,210,3,213,212,169,18,208],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5020","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-c4st","category-canadians-for-safe-technology","category-dizziness","category-dr-anthony-b-miller","category-fatigue","category-headaches","category-health_and_safety","category-loss-of-appetite","category-nausea","category-quebec","category-smart-meter","category-symptoms"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5020"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5020\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5395,"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5020\/revisions\/5395"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/emrabc.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}