Epidemiological Studies on Tumor Incidence in Cell Phone Users [Health Effects]

There is a general agreement among researchers that people who use a cell phone for ten years or fewer are not more likely to develop a brain tumor than those who do not regularly use it. This has been the emerging trend for several years, and it recently has been confirmed by publication of the summary report of a large international epidemiological study-the INTERPHONE project. However, the challenge is what happens after ten or more years of regular use, since brain tumors are known to have latencies longer than ten years and maybe as long as 30 years. A very important aspect of this and all epidemiological studies is RF exposure assessment. Objective information on the frequency and duration of cell phone use are obtained from cell phone operators and from the information stored in the cell phone currently in use, as surrogates. Information on the extent of exposure to RF fields from cell phones and on other known and suspected risk factors for childhood brain tumors are obtained by means of computer-assisted personal interviews.