G J Hyland
[back] Cell phone tower, tetra, mobile phone critics

Dr Hyland is an Honorary Associate Fellow of the University of Warwick, UK, and a member of the International Institute of Biophysics, in Neuss-Holzheim, Germany, where he is involved in biophoton research. 

During the last 6 years, he has been particularly concerned with potential health hazards associated with non-thermal influences of the low intensity, pulsed microwave radiation used in GSM/TETRA telecommunications, which are contingent on aliveness, raising awareness of the importance of this neglected dimension to the problem (which is not taken into account in existing safety guidelines governing human exposure), and considering how this technology can be rendered more electromagnetically biocompatible.

He is regularly invited to speak on these subjects at national and international conferences and meetings, and inquires such as this, and gave evidence to the Science and Technology Select Committee on ‘Mobile Phones and Health’ in 1999, and to the IEGMP in 1999, some of his recommendations featuring in their final report (the Stewart Report).

Recent publications include a review article for The Lancet (November 2000) – ‘Physics and Biology of Mobile Telephony’ – and a report commissioned by the Scientific and Technological Options Assessment (STOA) Programme of the EU Directorate General for Research – ‘The Physiological and Environmental Effects of Non-ionising Electromagnetic Radiation’ – which was published by the European Parliament in March 2001.

[December, 2000] How Exposure to GSM & TETRA Base-station Radiation can Adversely Affect Humans by G J Hyland

Basingstoke and Deane MOBILE TELECOMMUNICATIONS INQUIRY 10th October 2002 --G.J. Hyland

FORWARD to Mast Sanity website

Hyland GJ.  Physics and biology of mobile telephony.Lancet. 2000 Nov 25;356(9244):1833-6. Review. PMID: 11117927 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE] Although safety guidelines--to which mobile telephones and their base-stations conform--do protect against excessive microwave heating, there is evidence that the low intensity, pulsed radiation currently used can exert subtle non-thermal influences. If these influences entail adverse health consequences, current guidelines would be inadequate. This review will focus on this possibility. The radiation used is indeed of very low intensity, but an oscillatory similitude between this pulsed microwave radiation and certain electrochemical activities of the living human being should prompt concern. However, being so inherently dependent on aliveness, non-thermal effects cannot be expected to be as robust as thermal ones, as is indeed found; nor can everyone be expected to be affected in the same way by exposure to the same radiation. Notwithstanding uncertainty about whether the non-thermal influences reported do adversely affect health, there are consistencies between some of these effects and the neurological problems reported by some mobile-telephone users and people exposed longterm to base-station radiation. These should be pointers for future research

Quotes

The popular belief that adverse health effects can be induced only by the heating effect of GSM radiation is a fallacy. The Physiological and Environmental Effects of Non-ionising Electromagnetic Radiation by G.J. Hyland

In GSM, the basic ‘flash rate’ is 217Hz; these flashes are, however, emitted in groups of 25 (each group being defined by the absence of the 26th flash) at the rate of 8.34Hz a frequency lying in the range of the human alpha brain wave activity. How Exposure to GSM & TETRA Base-station Radiation can Adversely Affect Humans by G J Hyland

‘The potential for the development of a number of antipersonnel applications is suggested by the research published in the USSR, East Europe and the West. Sounds and possibly even words which appear to be originating intracranially can be induced by signal modulation at very low average power densities. Combinations of frequencies and other signal characteristics to produce other neurological effects may be feasible in several years. The possibility of inducing metabolic disorders also suggested. Animal experiments reported in the open literature have demonstrated the use of low level microwave signals to produce death by heart seizure or by neurological pathologies resulting from breaching of the blood-brain barrier’.    The Physiological and Environmental Effects of Non-ionising Electromagnetic Radiation by G.J. Hyland

More disturbing is that the low frequencies that characterise the GSM/TETRA pulsing are close to those at which it is known that human mood and behaviour can be influenced in a number of ways (ranging from depression/docility to rage), depending on the kind/ frequency of modulation used, it being actually possible to induce sounds, and even words, intercranially by appropriate modulations of the microwave signal. Exposure to GSM & TETRA Base-station Radiation can Adversely Affect Humans by G J Hyland

In conclusion, it can hardly be disputed that to enjoy an acceptable quality of life requires more than simply an absence of terminal disease. Adverse health effects in humans of the kinds already reported worldwide such as headaches, sleep disruption, impairment of short-term memory, etc. - whilst maybe not life-threatening in themselves, do nevertheless have a debilitating effect that undoubtedly affects general well-being, and which in the case of some children could well undermine their neurological and academic development, as is already evident from experience in the case of a number of infant/junior schools at which a GSM Base-station is located. It should be stressed, however, that, to date, the apparent absence on a global scale of more serious pathologies attributable to exposure to the emissions of GSM/TETRA Base-stations is no guarantee of immunity in the long-term; indeed, as mentioned earlier in Para.10, there is already an increasing number of reports [19] of unexplained clusters of cancers in the vicinity of certain GSM Base-stations, whose non-involvement remains to be established. How Exposure to GSM & TETRA Base-station Radiation can Adversely Affect Humans by G J Hyland

17Hz is very close to the frequency (16Hz) at which radio-frequency /microwave radiation of sub-thermal intensities that is amplitude modulated in various ways - in particular, continuously (sinusoidally) and discontinuously (pulsed) - is reported, mainly under in vitro conditions, to cause: (i) a significant increase in loss (efflux) of calcium from brain cells, which is, however, reproducible only under certain exposure conditions [4], and which occurs even in the case of dead brain tissue; since calcium triggers release of neurotransmitters, any disturbance in the delicate balance of this chemical could well upset the integrity of the nervous (and also the immune) system; (ii) increased levels [5] of Ornithine Decarboxylase (ODC), a (rate limiting) enzyme that plays an important role in DNA replication, and possibly also in cancer promotion (see Para.9); (iii) opposing (and thus possibly stress inducing) effects [6] on the principal inhibitory and excitatory neuro-mediating brain chemicals that underpin the activity of the central nervous system. In addition, it should further be noted that the TETRA frame repetition rate is also close to the frequency at which seizures can be provoked in people suffering from photosensitive epilepsy by exposure to a light, flashing at between 15-20 times per second (see Para.8). How Exposure to GSM & TETRA Base-station Radiation can Adversely Affect Humans by G J Hyland

More meaningful is to ask whether there is an established potential risk to human health from exposure to GSM/TETRA radiation: the answer is undoubtedly ‘yes’. It is probably true to say that if a similar degree of risk and uncertainty as to subjective noxiousness obtained in the case of a new drug or foodstuff, it is unlikely that they would ever be licensed. How Exposure to GSM & TETRA Base-station Radiation can Adversely Affect Humans by G J Hyland

The use of mobile phones by pre-adolescent children is thus to be strongly discouraged, and the siting of Base-station masts in the vicinity of schools and nurseries (including those hidden in church towers and in illuminated signs, such as those at petrol stations, for example) must be strongly resisted: financial gain must not be allowed to be the overriding consideration. How Exposure to GSM & TETRA Base-station Radiation can Adversely Affect Humans by G J Hyland

17. In conclusion, it can hardly be disputed that to enjoy an acceptable quality of life requires more than simply an absence of terminal disease. Adverse health effects in humans of the kinds already reported worldwide such as headaches, sleep disruption, impairment of short-term memory, etc. - whilst maybe not life-threatening in themselves, do nevertheless have a debilitating effect that undoubtedly affects general well-being, and which in the case of some children could well undermine their neurological and academic development, as is already evident from experience in the case of a number of infant/junior schools at which a GSM Base-station is located. It should be stressed, however, that, to date, the apparent absence on a global scale of more serious pathologies attributable to exposure to the emissions of GSM/TETRA Base-stations is no guarantee of immunity in the long-term; indeed, as mentioned earlier in Para.10, there is already an increasing number of reports [19] of unexplained clusters of cancers in the vicinity of certain GSM Base-stations, whose non-involvement remains to be established. How Exposure to GSM & TETRA Base-station Radiation can Adversely Affect Humans by G J Hyland