Atawhai

Perhaps you people think you know better.
http://www.stuff.co.nz/tech...
Mobile phones 'appear safe' - expert
AAP
Last updated 16:30 16/11/2009
Mobile phones appear to be "very safe", says an expert who also points to initial community-wide suspicions about the rollout of mains power and microwaves.

Professor Rodney Croft, executive director of The Australian Centre for Radiofrequency Bioeffects Research (ACRBR), said concerns over the location of mobile phone base stations should similarly dissipate over time.

"There really isn't a great deal of difference between your basic FM radio antennae and your base station's antennas," Prof Croft told AAP.

"... radio transmissions have been around for a long, long time and people don't seem to mind being exposed to that."

Prof Croft, who is Professor of Health Psychology at the University of Wollongong, said humans had "a tendency to be suspicious of all new things".

"When microwave ovens first came out there was a great deal of suspicion about them, when mains power came out there was a great deal of suspicion about it," he said.

"People do move on ... providing, of course, no science comes our showing it is more dangerous.

"And certainly the centre's view is that's not likely to happen."

Prof Croft's comments comes ahead of the imminent release of the World Health Organisation's (WHO) Interphone study, a decade-long investigation into the health implications of mobile phone use.

The report could be released before the year's end, and there is speculation that it will draw a definitive link between long-term mobile phone use and an increased risk of brain tumours.

Prof Croft rejects this. He said WHO was expected to discount some of the research which had highlighted cancer links as methodologically flawed and "clearly not correct".

"But it will still leave open the possibility that long-term effects have not been looked at adequately, and may turn out to be a problem," Prof Croft said the WHO's anticipated findings.

"It all seems to be pointing to the same thing ... that there is not a problem (with mobile phone use)".

"Our perspective is that we don't see any science indicating a health effect ... It really looks very safe."

His comments also follow those of prominent Sydney-based brain surgeon Dr Charlie Teo, who last month said people should "err on the side of safety" and take simple steps to reduce their exposure.

Dr Teo said mobile phones should be used on loud speaker while other electronic devices, like a clock radio, should be placed at the base instead of the head of the bed.

A broader discussion of mobile phones and health will take place at a free public symposium on Tuesday, November 17, in Melbourne.

Speakers will include Dr Bernard Veyret from the International Commission for Non-Ionising Radiation Protection, an arm of WHO.

The ACRBR-backed event - Science and Wireless 2009 - will be held at Swinburne University's Hawthorn Campus from 6pm AEDT.

Dear Alan

It's not that we think we know better it's that we don't trust the people who are making the decisions. On Waiheke a consent application had a photomontage of the new cellsite with the ridgeline as the backdrop and based on this photo claimed the visual effect was less than minor. In reality the backdrop is the view of the bay and the 12m tower is very noticeable. It's 'bending of the truth' that creates this mistrust and until the phone companies wake up to themselves and start to treat people with due respect there is always going to be negative reactions to their plans. The ball is in the phone companies court. Chit chat like Prof Croft's comments do nothing to solve the totally unacceptable mess the phone companies have created, I haven't enjoyed wasting the last 18 months of my life fighting cellsites but I can't walk away from it because the thing is a permanent instrusion in My Backyard and I haven't got enough satisfactory answers from the phone companies to allow me to happily accept the change. I believe everything can be resolved but while the phone companies run the show it ain't going to happen and that's not right.

Please read this article. Celltowers do not decrease property values.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/n...

Cell towers don't affect property values, says researcher

3:45 PM Friday Feb 5, 2010
Nearby cell towers don't appear to affect property values, says new research. Photo / Paul Estcourt.
Nearby cellphone towers have no effect on property values, says a study conducted by an Auckland academic.

Olga Filippova, a property lecturer at the University of Auckland, focused her study on 3126 homes sold across four Auckland regions - Manukau, Auckland City, Waitakere and the North Shore.

The study took place between January 2005 and December 2007, and compared their Quotable Value NZ sale prices to their proximity to 46 cell phone towers.

All the 3126 homes were all located within 500 metres of cell phone towers, with the study divided into 50m increments.

"Sales that were close to the towers had no significant price impact," Filippova said.

Filippova said she was surprised by the results of the study, as she had been expecting to find that proximity to cell phone towers would affect the value of homes.

"I was surprised given that past research found that there was a negative impact [on values]," she said.

Filippova presented her findings at last month's Pacific Rim Real Estate Conference.

Her findings will be peer reviewed within the next two months, she said, and will then be submitted to an international property journal.

She said homeowners with houses located near cell phone towers may get some relief from her findings.

"There are different concerns that are associated with cell phone towers," she said. "Of course there is health risk and visual impact."

Manukau City Councillor Sharon Stewart, who has been fighting the construction of cell towers in residential areas for 12 years, was surprised to learn of the results of Filippova's study.

"Real Estate agents are telling us that it's very hard to get anyone to hop out of the car and have a look at a house that's got a cell phone tower in front of it," she said.

Greg Roy, a real estate agent and director of Total Focus Property, said 40 per cent of would-be house buyers were put off by homes being located close to cell phone towers.

"I would say that you would be looking at a 10 to 30 per cent drop in value [if a home is located near a tower]," he said.

Roy said two recent deals his company dealt with had "fallen over" because of the potential for cell phone towers to be built in front of the homes.

"They are not on the market anymore," he said. "They've been taken off."

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