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Mobile phone cancer warning as malignant brain tumours double

telegraph.co.uk

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Re: Mobile phone cancer warning as malignant brain tumours double

#41

Post by coldtea »

consp wrote: post #29
bitL wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it's a bit different; those who developed/didn't lose protective measures in their DNA won't be affected and those that are out of luck will be excised from the gene pool. So statistically cell phones won't cause tumors, because only adaptable would survive. And for cancer it usually is a large mix of factors that starts them, so it's difficult to filter out noise and figure out compound factors from simple hea…

> BTW, exercise kills as well. There are also known cases of heavy smokers/drinkers that made it to 100. Outliers, not in any way related to the general trend and a bad argument in general.

>Outliers, not in any way related to the general trend and a bad argument in general.

Numbers please.

Re: Mobile phone cancer warning as malignant brain tumours double

#42

Post by ItsMe000001 »

everdev wrote: post #24

Is it possible to get cancer in your hand or thigh? I'm sure phones are held in hands or pockets for longer durations than they're held up to heads.

You only get cancer in tissues with active cell division, such as the skin or epithelial tissue.

For the hand that's the skin. Most cells in the body don't divide after your initial growth phase (all the way to adulthood). You are "produced" once and from then on there only is "maintenance", which includes growth of new cells only in tissues that absolutely require it throughout lifetime. Evolution turned it off in as many cells of an adult body as possible because cell division always is risky, especially with increasing (cell/tissue) age.

Re: Mobile phone cancer warning as malignant brain tumours double

#45

Post by emodendroket »

I'm curious how much time most people spend actually talking on their phones now compared to pre-smartphones. Also, while I suppose being in an active call probably changes the amount of radiation at play, I'd expect, if cell phones are causing cancer, an attendant rise in, say, testicular cancer.

Re: Mobile phone cancer warning as malignant brain tumours double

#46

Post by mfoy_ »

taneq wrote: post #34
consp wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> BTW, exercise kills as well. There are also known cases of heavy smokers/drinkers that made it to 100. Outliers, not in any way related to the general trend and a bad argument in general.

When we're talking about 1-in-17,600 chances to begin with, I think outliers are relevant.

I suppose you are more likely to die from exercise than from brain cancer... but I think it's also true that you're much more likely to die from lack of exercise than from exercising.

Re: Mobile phone cancer warning as malignant brain tumours double

#47

Post by emodendroket »

CommieBobDole wrote: post #15
mhb wrote: post #5

Maybe the paper addresses this, but don't most people hold the phone predominantly on one side or the other? Wouldn't the locations of the tumors be more on that side of the brain? And wouldn't that provide some pretty good support for the association?

I can't find the cite right now, but I recall there was a study some years back that found that heavy mobile phone users didn't have any higher rate of brain cancer than the general population, but among those who did get cancer, there was a strong statistical correlation between the side of the head where they most used the phone and the location of the cancer.

I recall reading that this data was self-reported and, if taken at face value, would suggest that using a cell phone on one side of your head actually prevented cancer on the other, relative to base rates (in other words, the self-reported data is probably not accurate).

Re: Mobile phone cancer warning as malignant brain tumours double

#48

Post by Beltiras »

everdev wrote: post #24

Is it possible to get cancer in your hand or thigh? I'm sure phones are held in hands or pockets for longer durations than they're held up to heads.

Those tissues might not be as susceptible to damage by radiation, or have more corrective mechanisms to deal with the damage.

Re: Mobile phone cancer warning as malignant brain tumours double

#49

Post by emodendroket »

perl4ever wrote: post #43

I wonder how many people hold their heads close to a running microwave while they are watching to see if something is overheating...

They probably don't do that making direct contact between their heads and the machine for an hour at a time. Seems like a bad comparison.

Re: Mobile phone cancer warning as malignant brain tumours double

#50

Post by INTPenis »

dbatten wrote: post #16

"They analysed 79,241 malignant brain tumours over 21 years, finding that cases of GBM in England have increased from around 1,250 a year in 1995 to just under 3,000." ~2000 new cases per year in a country with 53 million people? I'll take my chances. I'm fascinated how people obsess over the unproven and ultimately minuscule health risks associated with using a cell phone or drinking a glass of wine or eating chocol…

Still though, I always have and always will prefer to use my headset when talking on the mobile.
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