Research Scientist's Letter to ATT

In October 1999, Dr. George Carlo, then head of the world's largest research program funded by the wireless industry, wrote 28 identical letters and sent them to the chairmen and CEO's of the cellular telephone industry. They were the ones who paid for his six-year effort and they deserved to hear, directly from him, his candid assessment of the findings their studies had produced.

These findings include, (compared to non-cell phone users):
- Higher rate of death from brain cancer among handheld phone users;
- Greater risk of acoustic neuroma, a benign tumour of the auditory nerve that is well in range of the radiation coming from a phone's antenna;
- Doubled risk of rare neuro epithelial tumours on the outside of the brain in cell phone users;
- Correlation between brain tumours occurring on the right side of the head and the use of the phone on the right side of the head;
- Radiation from a phone's antenna can cause functional genetic damage.

You can read the entire letter here.

Now the question is, what kind of impact did these $25 million research findings have on the wireless industry's position on cell phone safety? Not a whole lot. In fact, Dr. Carlo's funding ended that year (1999) and was never renewed. To date, the industry has ceased funding any credible scientific research into wireless safety, and still maintains the position that cell phones are safe to use. Go figure.