The Interphone brain tumors study is severely flawed

Does not prove that mobile phones are safe

An independent scrutiny of the "13 country Interphone study" reveals serious flaws and biasses that all distort the results in the direction of diminishing the risk to fall ill in cancer. This runs counter to several well-made independent studies that indicate a significant connection between mobile phone usage and brain tumors. As the study was partly funded by the cellphone industry, the suspicion arises that they have influenced the outcome of the study.

The flaws

• Inclusion of insufficiently exposed people. People were included in the study who had been using cellphones for only a few years although it has been well established scientifically that it takes 10-15 years to develop a tumor. Actually insufficiently exposed people constituted a major part of the subjects making it unjustified to call it a "large study" as stated in Interphone press releases. We find it remarkable that great sums are invested in a study that will yield nonsensical results.
• Exclusion of exposed people. The study treats subjects who used a cordless phone as "unexposed" to microwaves, although the radiation exposure is at least as great, or greater (this gives the false impression that brain tumors occur more commonly than they really do among unxposed people)
• Exclusion of children and young adults from the study. This is a serious omission considering that a number of studies indicate that they are especially prone to develop brain tumors (again this leads to an underestimation of the tumor risk).
• Exclusion of many types of brain tumors again yielding an underestimation of risk.
• Exclusion of people who had died from brain tumors, or were too ill to be interviewed as a consequence of their brain tumor. This may have excluded a significant proportion of cases, yielding a misleading reduction of risk.
• Selection bias resulting in a false impression of lower risk than in reality. In the selection of participants to the control group with no tumors, people were asked in such a way that there was a considerable overrepresentation of mobile phone users. This overrepresentation gave the false impression of lower risk (that is a disproportionate number of mobile users without tumor were included).
• The refusal rate (people who did not want to participate) was 41%. The general opinion among scientists is that such a refusal rate is too high to yield reliable results. It is common practice among science journals not to accept such a study for publication because it proves nothing.

Said independent scrutiny of the Interphone study concludes (excerpt):

"In conclusion, Telecom-funded studies have been reporting highly questionable results in comparison with independent studies. Studies independent of industry consistently show there is a significant risk of brain tumors from cellphone use.

...Whatever these results show, they must be interpreted with the understanding that the Interphone Protocol’s design flaws result in a considerable skewing of all reported results".

The report is endorsed by about 50 experts on this issue. They wrote the following endorsing statement:

"We the undersigned believe it is essential that governments and the media understand the independent science regarding cellphone use and brain tumors, as well as the design flaws of the 13 country Interphone study. The widespread nature of wireless telecommunication systems requires that society understand any potential risks, and that this understanding be as current as possible with the latest evidence-based science. We endorse both the message and urgency of this report."

Comment by PSRAST

The flaws of this study are elementary. Every competent scientist should discover them. One flaw might perhaps have been overlooked accidentally in the worst case, but the presence of several serious flaws, all skewing the results in the same direction, gives strong reasons to suspect that the flawing is intentional - an unethical attempt to suppress the truth. This accords well with other observations revealing the dishonesty of the mobile phone industry. Examples of their suppression of the truth are:

• Refusal to consider the serious warnings by Dr Carlo, appointed by the mobile phone corporations to asses the safety of mobile phones. When he arrived at an unfavorable conclusion about their safety, Carlo was attacked, threatened and defamed (see here).

• Remarkable differences between the results of independent studies and mobile phone industry-funded studies regarding the tumor risk. More about this.

It is evident that no industry-funded study including the Interphone study can be trusted and has to be eliminated from the documentation used to assess the safety of cell-phones. When this is done, the tumor risk issue ceases to be unclear because almost all studies denying a risk are industry-funded. What then remains is an overwhelming body of concurrent evidence indicating that cell-phones increase the risk for brain tumors , the more the longer you have used them.

Therefore, there is no excuse for WHO, the European Union and national governments to delay immediate action to limit the use and expansion of this technology. Otherwise a major epidemic of brain cancers caused by cellphone use is inevitable. Unfortunately, it is already too late in too many people who are now unwittingly developing brain tumors, because they are exposed daily to considerable doses of cellphone, cordless phone or base station radiation.

Addition jan 29, 2011

Two interphone study scientists admit important flaw

Two leading scientists who participated in the Interphone study are now warning for mobile phones. They found that the conclusions of the Interphone study, downplaying the tumor risk, was because people with too short exposure to mobile phone radiation were included. When excluding these, they found a significant risk for the serious brain tumor glioma. For more, see here.

Link to the above mentioned review "Cell phones and brain tumors. 15 reasons for concern."