Diagnose:Funk – Once, 10 years ago...
Is mobile phone radiation carcinogenic? Since the results of the REFLEX study in 2004, which detected DNA strand breaks, this question has dominated the debate in both scientific and media circles.
Ten years ago, in spring 2016, this question was answered with the publication of the results of the NTP study: mobile phone radiation can cause cancer when exposed to near-field radiation. The NTP study, conducted by world-leading experts from the National Toxicology Programme (NTP) in the USA, cost 25 million dollars and was the largest laboratory study to date. The findings regarding 2G (GSM) and 3G (UMTS) technology:
- Clear evidence of a link to tumours in the hearts of male rats. The tumours were malignant schwannomas.
- Some evidence of a link to tumours in the brains of male rats. The tumours were malignant gliomas.
- In a further group of rats, precancerous cellular changes (hyperplasia of glial cells).
- No tumours developed in the control group.
This refuted the null hypothesis and established that the WHO’s 2011 classification of mobile phone radiation, based on epidemiological studies, as “possibly carcinogenic”, has now been confirmed by biological studies and that a higher classification is required.
2018: BERENIS, the Swiss Government’s “Advisory Expert Group on Non-Ionising Radiation”, presented
an analysis of both studies (NTP and Ramazzini).
2023: The results of both studies are discussed in detail in the German Bundestag’s report on the technology assessment of mobile communications.
2025: Prof. James C. Lin and the US Department of Health and Human Services emphatically reaffirm the NTP findings.
2026: Denial of the cancer risk by the industry-regulation complex continues.