Mobile Phones and Immunity

Mobile phones and Immunity

At this time, when most of us are aware of the importance of a strong immune system, research is showing that mobile phone radiation can damage cells that play a vital role in immune defense – our lymphocytes.

Here’s what recent studies have found.

 

The Greek study

Dr Dimitris Panagopoulos, a biophysicist from Athens University, compared the effects of mobile phone radiation to the effects of drinking too much coffee. 1

In a study published late last year, he tested human two groups of peripheral blood lymphocytes, white blood cells important for immunity, from six healthy volunteers. The first group of cells, he exposed to radiation from a 3G mobile phone in talk mode. The next group, he exposed to a dose of caffeine that was 290 times above the recommended limit.

Both exposures caused chromosome damage to the cells.

Next, he exposed cells to both the mobile phone radiation and high dose of caffeine. These cells showed a ‘dramatic’ increase in chromosome damage.

He concluded that exposure to levels of mobile phone radiation that were 136 times lower than international standards (ICNIRP Guidelines) caused even more damage than excessive levels of caffeine.

Based on his observations, he recommended that standards for mobile phone radiation be lowered.

The Slovak study

Another study on human lymphocyte cells, this time from the Slovak Republic, also showed damaging effects from exposure to mobile phone radiation. 2

Sachin Gulati and team exposed human lymphocytes cells to radiation at 1923, 1947.47 and 1977 MHz, the frequency channels used by 3G mobile phones. Exposures lasted for 1 or 3 hours.

The researchers found that frequency affected the way the lymphocytes responded, suggesting that future research should test each frequency used by a technology.

They also found a ‘small but statistically significant’ increase in DNA damage, with greatest effects at the 1977 MHz carrier frequency.

  1. Panagopoulos, DJ, ‘Comparing chromosome damage induced by mobile telephony radiation and a high caffeine dose: Effect of combination and exposure duration’, Gen Physiol Biophys 39(6):531-544, Nov 2020, doi: 10.4149/gpb_2020036.

  1. Sachin Gulati, S et al, ’Effects of different mobile phone UMTS signals on DNA, apoptosis and oxidative stress in human lymphocytes’, Environ Pollut 267, 115632, Dec 2020, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envpol.2020.115632

What can you do?

Limit your exposure to mobile phone radiation by using:

You can find more news in the latest, free issue of EMR and Health available here

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