Safety and Safe Use of Cellular Phones

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The Issue

With the growing popularity of hand-held cellular phones (or cell phones), questions have been raised about the safety of being exposed to the radiofrequency (RF) energy they emit.

Background

The number of cell phone users in Canada has risen from 100,000 in 1987 to more than 9.5 million in 2001. This rapid expansion has raised health concerns about RF exposure, including alarming media reports that appear to link their long-term use to diseases such as brain cancer.

Cell phones are portable radio devices that transmit and receive signals from a network of fixed, low-power, base stations. The transmitting power of a cell phone varies, depending on the type of network and distance from the base station. The power generally increases as you move farther away from the nearest base station.

Prior to 1996, all cell phones in Canada were analog devices that operated in a lower cellular frequency band than that of the digital system, which was introduced in 1997. The electromagnetic energy given off by cell phones is a type of non-ionizing radiation, similar to the radiation that occurs naturally in thunderstorms.

RF electromagnetic energy is used in radio communications and broadcasting, as well as in medical treatments and industrial heating. Unli