Introduction: Mobile phone radiation carcinogenicity was once very popular, causing a variety of health concerns. Recently, a million women study at the University of Oxford showed that there is little evidence that using a mobile phone increases the risk of brain tumors, whether in terms of overall, tumor subtype or tumor site.
Mobile phones, tablets, bracelets and other smart devices bring convenient life at the same time, its own "contained" radiation also makes everyone very troubled, coupled with the "radiation carcinogenic" theory is controversial, there is the so-called "use of mobile phone calls will induce brain tumors" said. In recent years, the promotion and use of 5G technology has exacerbated everyone's concerns about mobile phone radiation. For this problem, as early as 2003, the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention Institute of Health Education has done relevant research, meta analysis shows that mobile phone electromagnetic radiation does not lead to brain tumors. Several studies over the next dozen years have also shown that there is no evidence that brain tumors are linked to cell phone radiation.
On 29 March 2022, the University of Oxford and the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IEL) jointly published a paper entitled "Cellular Telephone Use and the Risk of Brain Tumors: Update of the UK Million Women Study" in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute (JNCI) Research article (Figure 1). The study, which conducted an investigative study of millions of women in the UK, further demonstrated that cell phone use does not increase the risk of brain tumors.
Figure 1 Research results (Source: [1])
The research team used data from a study of millions of women in the UK that is still ongoing today. Between 1996 and 2001, around 1.3 million British women born between 1935 and 1950 were included in the study. In 2001, about 776,000 participants completed questionnaires on mobile phone use, and about half of them were surveyed again in 2011. The researchers linked participants' cell phone usage to the National Health Service database's records of death and cancer registries (including non-malignant brain tumors) for an average follow-up of 14 years, focusing on the relationship between cell phone use and the risk of various specific types of brain tumors, such as glitter, acoustic neuroma, meningioma, pituitary tumor, and also investigated whether cell phone use was associated with eye tumor risk.
The study found that:
1. There is no difference in the risk of glioma, acoustic neuroma, meningioma, pituitary tumor or eye tumor for people who have never used a mobile phone or a mobile phone;
2. There was no significant difference in the risk of brain tumors in people who had never used a mobile phone and those who used a mobile phone, including tumors in the temporal lobe and parietal regions of the brain;
3. Most people prefer to use mobile phones in the right hand, but the risk of developing a right brain tumor and a left brain tumor is similar;
4. People who use mobile phones every day, talk through mobile phones for at least 20 minutes per week, and/or use mobile phones for more than 10 years have no increased risk of developing any type of brain tumor (Figure 2).
Figure 2 Relative risk of brain tumors in people who have never used mobile phones (1 minute or more per week, more than 10 minutes per week) and those who have never used mobile phones in mid-2011 (Source: [1])
All in all, there is little evidence that using a mobile phone increases the risk of brain tumors, whether in terms of overall, tumor subtype, or tumor site. However, the researchers also pointed out the limitations of the study, which did not include children or young people.
The problem of mobile phone radiation has always attracted widespread attention, but in fact, everyone has some misunderstandings about the so-called radiation. We often say that the radiation carried by mobile phones, computers, etc. with radiation is non-ionizing radiation, and the energy is relatively low, and the real carcinogenic risk is ionizing radiation. Common ionizing radiation includeS-rays, γ rays, etc., which carry high energy and can penetrate human tissues, thereby destroying DNA, cells, and then causing damage to human body functions.
In theory, cell phone radiation is unlikely to cause brain tumors. In fact, although inconsistent conclusions have been drawn due to different regions and populations, there is no substantial evidence to prove that there is a correlation between the two. That said, the available evidence suggests that using a mobile phone does not increase the risk of brain tumors, and we don't need to panic too much.
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Written by | Qingyao
Typography | Qiao Weijun
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Resources:
[1] Schüz J, Pirie K, Reeves GK, et al. Million Women Study Collaborators. Cellular Telephone Use and the Risk of Brain Tumors: Update of the UK Million Women Study. J Natl Cancer Inst. 2022 Mar 29:djac042. doi:10.1093/jnci/djac042. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 35350069
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