Panorama stokes wi-fi hysteria

The blogosphere is in uproar over the recent Panorama show titled: “Wi-Fi - A Warning Signal”, which, despite offering absolutely no evidence of any risk whatsoever from wi-fi networks, still saw fit to spend an hour scaremongering about the subject. You can see the original program here or read the short BBC News story that goes with the program here.

There’s little I can add to the debate at this point, except maybe to collate a few of the more interesting points for your easy digest. We were shown by “expert” Alisdair Phillips that levels of “electrosmog” in the classroom (from wi-fi) were three times higher than those in the playground (from a phone mast). That these levels were still 600 times below the accepted safe limit was not dwelled upon. That Alisdair Phillips is better known as the man who sells tin foil hats was not mentioned at all.

Panorama’s case hinged largely upon the revelation that the Swedish government recognises electrosensitivity as a disability affecting 3% of the population. However, Swedish resident DennisJ reports the following:

* In 2004, Olle Johansson, who appears as an expert in the program, was awarded Misleader of the Year 2004. In reality he’s not much of an expert at all.

* I have found no indications that there are such things as official disabilities in Sweden or that “the Swedish government recognises radiation sensitivity as a disability.” What have happened is that the government has granted various kinds of support to “electrosensitives”. But it doesn’t mean that electrosensitivty exists, The National Board of Health and Welfare seems to regard it as an psychosomatic illness.

* That it affects 3% of the population is perhaps a half truth at best. 3 percent of the participants said in a survey that they were sensitive to, oversensitive to or allergic against electric or magnetic fields. One tenth of those was in a severe situation, and it’s not clear that even all of those should be regarded as disabled. The Swedish association for the elctrosensitives has, in comparison, 2400 members.

Finally, a bit of original research from myself. Professor Henry Lai of Washington University was presented as an expert in the field of bioelectromagnetics who claimed to have found health effects at similar levels of radiation to wi-fi, stating that thousands of papers had shown an effect. A few minutes on Google, however, and some interesting facts crop up. Firstly, Professor Henry Lai earned a PhD in psychology, not biology or electromagnetics. Secondly, one of the papers showing these effects was co-authored by himself and a man called Professor Bill Guy. This showed that spatial learning in rats was negatively affected by a certain form of radiation. Guy has since retired, but when he discovered Lai using this paper to illustrate the dangers of mobile phone technology, he had to explain to Lai that the findings were not applicable to mobile phone use at all, but to radar.

That wi-fi is simply radio waves, the same kind of radiation that has been pulsing through us for the last hundred years, the same radiation that brings us wonderful TV signals like, er, Panorama, was not dwelled upon, or even seen fit to mention. Panorama’s argument seems to be based on the idea that just because there’s no credible evidence of wi-fi being dangerous, doesn’t mean it’s safe. No-one’s yet conclusively proved that electricity won’t suddenly disobey physics, grow heavy and fall out of power lines. Do you think we should ban electricity until we can prove this won’t happen?

So there you have it. The army of blogs thrown up in the spare time of amateur scientists really can perform better researched, more unbiased journalism than the BBC. Join the revolution, my friends.

Add comment May 24th, 2007