About 20 to 25 years ago the New Yorker Mag. included a series on cancer
clusters. The librarians were rather panicked (UCSC) and asked E. H. & S.
to measure the fields presumable emanating from the massive transformers
in their basement. One of the officers enlisted my assistance. I
calibrated the sensitivity of one half a Helmholtz coil. W/ a DMM, they
found the field much reduced in the areas where they worked, but was quite
high in the basement.
*******************************
My response:
I believe that this issue has been settled to good scientific certainty.
The case of cancer supposedly being caused in children by radiation from
power lines, popularized by Paul Brodeur in the New Yorker magazine
series was appropriately debunked, in part by a Front Line video: Currents
of Fear.
The issue of danger due to low levels of radiation is largely a sitution
created by estimating the number of illnesses or fatalities using the
linear, no-threshold statistical model, which is almost certainly not
applicable. In the New Yorker case above (power lines) it was also gross
abuse of statistics.
I have a web page for a University Honors Seminar that I have taught that
deals with this issue:
Included is documentation on several sides of these issues, including the
Union of Concerned Scientists, whose positions with respect to a large
number of issues are very suspect in my opinion (such as against nuclear
power). I believe the great preponderance of the evidence is that there
is no danger from these low levels of electromagneic fields. There seems
to me to be no believable evidence that danger exists.
Dick
***********************************************************************
Dr. Richard E. Berg, Professor of the Practice
Director, Physics Lecture-Demonstration Facility
U.S. mail address:
Department of Physics
University of Maryland
College Park, MD 20742-4111
Phone: (301) 405-5994
FAX: (301) 314-9525
e-mail reberg@umd.edu
www.physics.umd.edu/lecdem
***********************************************************************