Yet More Studies Show That 5G Isn't Hurting You

from the stop-getting-your-news-from-YouTube dept

On the one hand, you have a wireless industry falsely claiming that 5G is a near mystical revolution in communications, something that's never been true (especially in the US). Then on the other hand you have oodles of internet crackpots who think 5G is causing COVID or killing people on the daily, something that has also never been true. In reality, most claims of 5G health harms are based on a false 20 year old graph, and an overwhelming majority of scientists have made it clear that 5G is not killing you (in fact several incarnations are less powerful than 4G).

Last week, more evidence emerged that indicates that no, 5G isn't killing you. Researchers from the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA) and the Swinburne University of Technology in Australia both released studies last week in the Journal of Exposure Science and Environmental Epidemiology. Both studies are among the first to look exclusively at 5G, and the only people who'll be surprised by their findings get all of their news from email forwards and YouTube. From an ARPANSA press statement on its first study's findings:

"‘In conclusion, a review of all the studies provided no substantiated evidence that low-level radio waves, like those used by the 5G network, are hazardous to human health,’ said Dr Karipidis, Assistant Director, Assessment and Advice at ARPANSA."

The second study, which focused on RF energy specifically in the millimeter wave band (the ultra-fast but limited range variant of 5G) also found no health impact that could be replicated by other studies:

"‘This meta-analysis of the experimental studies also presented little evidence of an association between millimetre waves and adverse health effects,’ said Dr Karipidis. "Studies that did report biological effects were generally not independently replicated and most of the studies reviewed employed low-quality methods of exposure assessment and control."

Now that doesn't mean these studies are the definitive answer to questions surrounding 5G's impact on human health, but the evidence we do have continues to indicate that the technology isn't killing you. Granted the actual underlying scientific evidence is headed in the complete, opposite direction of the conspiracy theorists and assorted dipshits who've been attacking telecom infrastructure (or employees) because some supplement-grifting nitwit said so on YouTube.

The reality is, and continues to be, that 5G isn't interesting enough to warrant hyperventilation over its supposed revolutionary impact on communications, or its supposed diabolical impact on human health. But since neither opinion is a real money maker, the truth continues to play second fiddle to bullshit, whether it's coming from the mouths of wireless carriers or complete crackpots.

Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: 5g, conspiracy theories, safety, science, studies


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  1. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 23 Mar 2021 @ 6:51am

    Our wallets, however...

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. icon
    That Anonymous Coward (profile), 23 Mar 2021 @ 7:01am

    Thats just what they want you to think!!!!!!!!!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. icon
    crade (profile), 23 Mar 2021 @ 7:01am

    Re:

    I was going to ask if there were any studies showing it helps us yet

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    identicon
    David, 23 Mar 2021 @ 8:04am

    So how do you explain the Havanna embassy incidents?

    Do you expect everybody to wear tinfoil hats to avoid a repetition?

    Now I hear you taking a deep breath and starting "this isn't at all ..." but frankly you do that every time conservatives offer easy to grasp explanations countering the gobbledygook of so-called scientists and the fake media.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. icon
    crade (profile), 23 Mar 2021 @ 8:48am

    Re: So how do you explain the Havanna embassy incidents?

    An "easy to grasp explanation" is otherwise known as a guess (maybe an educated guess if you are being generous).. What you do in that case is check to see if you can validate your guess.. Thats what studies like this are trying to do.. If you find that the guess doesn't validate, then you assume that guess was wrong and move on to the next one. It's not perfect for sure, the validation can be flawed instead, but as the independent validations pile up you can get pretty good confidence in them.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  6. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 23 Mar 2021 @ 9:00am

    It's spelled Havana.

    So you troll when it's beyond your grasp. Got it.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  7. identicon
    David, 23 Mar 2021 @ 9:07am

    Re: It's spelled Havana.

    Actually, it's spelt "La Habana". The transliteration to non-Spanish languages differs between different languages but admittedly the U.S. version is "Havana".

    link to this | view in thread ]

  8. icon
    Ninja (profile), 23 Mar 2021 @ 9:08am

    Re: So how do you explain the Havanna embassy incidents?

    Dude, that's before 5G. Seriously, how do you conspiracy freaks sleep at night?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  9. This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    identicon
    David, 23 Mar 2021 @ 9:15am

    Re: Re: So how do you explain the Havanna embassy incidents?

    Your denial lends credibility to the claim.

    Instead indulging in more gobbledygook, you could simply have pointed out that Havana has absolutely no connection to 5G (they'd probably be glad if they had).

    Instead your response was so complex that it isn't accessible to people who want to believe nonsense and sounds like you are part of some group trying to cover up some nefarious truth.

    This is why QAnon works. Because no shit is crazy enough that it won't trigger some complex and long-winded repudiations giving it the credibility it could never garner by itself: if it were mere made-up batshit crazy talk, surely nobody would bother painstakingly refuting it?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  10. This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    identicon
    Al Bedo, author "Reflections On Planets", 23 Mar 2021 @ 9:35am

    "(in fact several incarnations are less powerful than 4G)"

    getting-all-your-"news"-from-the-gov't-dept

    Why would less power be relevant unless microwaves ARE potential harm?

    Your purpose here is to pooh-pooh even the possibility. But negative results prove what? NOTHING.

    You deliberately evade that microwaves can kill birds flying at fair distance. -- Buy a mouse at a pet store, put it in a microwave and see what happens. -- And just try to say I propose to torture animals without admitting that you already KNOW the result, kids.

    Again, with proposed power levels are up to 1KW, and if knew beans about beams from phased arrays which concentrate that power, then you simply wouldn't take the childish view that there's nothing for anyone except kooks to worry about.

    Also you ignore what I've written before: already been tested that tens of GHz frequencies can go right through walls and with a bit of computer inference from towers 'tother sides, effectively see persons. Of course, this being Techdirt, you never think of privacy, nor worry about experimenting on the masses of proles.

    [BTW: "incarnations" instead of "versions" is your usual attempt to spice up and is not just inapt but WRONG.]

    link to this | view in thread ]

  11. This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    identicon
    Al Bedo, author "Reflections On Planets", 23 Mar 2021 @ 9:36am

    Report finds microwave energy likely made US diplomats ill

    WASHINGTON (AP) - A new report by a National Academy of Sciences committee has found that "directed" microwave radiation is the likely cause of illnesses among American diplomats in Cuba and China.

    The study found that "directed, pulsed radio frequency energy appears to be the most plausible" explanation for symptoms that included intense head pressure, dizziness and cognitive difficulties. It found this explanation was more likely than other previously considered causes such as tropical disease or psychological issues.

    https://apnews.com/article/politics-science-havana-cuba-china-8eee2de0d887e67d530d1a6f272d7 81c

    Now, all I have here is a conclusive official study, while you kids have the flag button, ad hominem, and amazing ability to gainsay facts. -- Let's mock.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  12. This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    identicon
    Al Bedo, author "Reflections On Planets", 23 Mar 2021 @ 9:41am

    Re: Re: So how do you explain the Havanna embassy incidents?

    Dude, that's before 5G.

    NO, not for a purposed weapon system: the frequencies exist outside of any relation to "5G", see?

    Seriously, how do you conspiracy freaks sleep at night?

    And after first non sequitur, you prove lack any sort of logic except to make a typical ad hom attack.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  13. identicon
    Al Bedo, author "Reflections On Planets", 23 Mar 2021 @ 9:52am

    And the big question is: WHY does minion go round on this AGAIN?

    A study finding negative result is not going to settle any question: it cannot.

    By frequent defending,Techdirt evidently is all for "5G", though variously pretends it's all hype and is little deployed so far. Why is that?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  14. This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    identicon
    Al Bedo, author "Reflections On Planets", 23 Mar 2021 @ 9:53am

    And the big question is: WHY does minion go round on this AGAIN?

    A study finding negative result is not going to settle any question: it cannot.

    By frequent defending,Techdirt evidently is all for "5G", though variously pretends it's all hype and is little deployed so far. Why is that?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  15. This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    identicon
    Al Bedo, author "Reflections On Planets", 23 Mar 2021 @ 9:55am

    Re: And the big question is: WHY does minion go round on this AG

    So, no better topics? Or some other cause? (It does fit Techdirt's support of globalism, surveillance capitalism, and of course casting all opponents to those as "conspiracy kooks".)


    Second comment because the browser session stopped working: one of those recurring "coincidences" that supports a little conspiracy here to disriminate against viewpoints, as too will the "hiding".

    link to this | view in thread ]

  16. icon
    Designerfx (profile), 23 Mar 2021 @ 10:13am

    Re: So how do you explain the Havanna embassy incidents?

    you're going to have to pursue actual science here, not quote a theory with no supporting information.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  17. icon
    Designerfx (profile), 23 Mar 2021 @ 10:15am

    Re: "(in fact several incarnations are less powerful than 4G)"

    Oh man! how will we survive! We've only had tv signals going through walls for an entire century now and cellphone signals going through walls for a few decades, and wifi for a few decades. Clearly this is all scary and too new for us!

    /facepalm

    link to this | view in thread ]

  18. icon
    Designerfx (profile), 23 Mar 2021 @ 10:17am

    Re: And the big question is: WHY does minion go round on this AG

    So you're saying the only evidence you will accept is that which supports your viewpoint?

    Why do you even post then?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  19. icon
    crade (profile), 23 Mar 2021 @ 10:59am

    Re: Re: Re: So how do you explain the Havanna embassy incidents?

    I was aiming more for the
    " but frankly you do that every time conservatives offer easy to grasp explanations"
    part, which has more credibility to me.

    Just look at how long corrupt pseudo-science managed to keep "cigarettes cause cancer" down.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  20. identicon
    Rocky, 23 Mar 2021 @ 11:08am

    Re: Re: Re: So how do you explain the Havanna embassy incidents?

    This is why QAnon works. Because no shit is crazy enough that it won't trigger some complex and long-winded repudiations giving it the credibility it could never garner by itself: if it were mere made-up batshit crazy talk, surely nobody would bother painstakingly refuting it?

    The things is, QAnon-believers and other intelligence-challenged people use circular reasoning. If no one refutes their inane ideas, they say it's proof that it's true, but if someone try to refute the ideas, they say it's proof that it's true.

    Regardless what someone says it will validate their belief in their eyes, because for these people it's not about not truth or facts, it's an issue of faith.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  21. identicon
    Pixelation, 23 Mar 2021 @ 2:36pm

    What do you mean 5G isn't hurting me? All of the advertising is killing me.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  22. icon
    ECA (profile), 23 Mar 2021 @ 3:27pm

    Re: So how do you explain the Havanna embassy incidents?

    That was Audible sound. They could hear it. Even Sub audible can cause Problems, this is High range Freq.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  23. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 23 Mar 2021 @ 3:42pm

    Re: Re: Re: So how do you explain the Havanna embassy incidents?

    lolwut?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  24. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 23 Mar 2021 @ 3:44pm

    Re: Re: Re: So how do you explain the Havanna embassy incidents?

    Learn how argumentum ad hominem actually works. (Hint: Not the way you think it does.)

    link to this | view in thread ]

  25. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 23 Mar 2021 @ 3:46pm

    Re: "(in fact several incarnations are less powerful than 4G)"

    Power, blah blah blah:

    Frequency is irrelevant with sufficient intensity. I can kill you with yellow light. True fact.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  26. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 23 Mar 2021 @ 3:48pm

    The 5G Bad! crowd should be attacking all of outer space, especially the sun. I would certainly not be averse to funding an expedition to the sun for their army.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  27. identicon
    Rocky, 23 Mar 2021 @ 4:20pm

    Re: Report finds microwave energy likely made US diplomats ill

    You are kind of stupid. It has been known for ages that being exposed to RF-energy above a certain level is harmful. Nobody is disputing that.

    What you fail to grasp is that unless you feel the need hug a 5G cell-antenna the amount of energy you are exposed to is negligible to miniscule. You are probably getting more exposure from the cellphone you have in your pocket, regardless of what technology it uses.

    If you actually understood how RF-energy propagates and how it's absorbed by the human body we could talk about the human body's SAR and how the energy levels of 5G transmissions has zero relevance to what happened at the Cuban Embassy.

    Now, go read up on the Frey Effect and we'll see if you are smart enough to figure it out.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  28. icon
    Boba Fat (profile), 23 Mar 2021 @ 10:46pm

    I got my first covid vaccine dose last week, and my 5G reception has never been better!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  29. identicon
    David, 24 Mar 2021 @ 1:07am

    Re:

    Both plausible claims.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  30. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 24 Mar 2021 @ 1:33am

    Re: And the big question is: WHY does minion go round on this AG

    A study finding negative result is not going to settle any question: it cannot.

    Don't confuse absence of evidence with evidence of absence. There is an absence of evidence when it comes to the existence of God. There is evidence of absence of damage on exposure to low level RF.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  31. icon
    Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 24 Mar 2021 @ 3:45am

    Re: "(in fact several incarnations are less powerful than 4G)"

    "Again, with proposed power levels are up to 1KW, and if knew beans about beams from phased arrays which concentrate that power, then you simply wouldn't take the childish view that there's nothing for anyone except kooks to worry about."

    1 KW distributed across the area of a few square miles aren't enough to beat the static electricity you generate by walking, and vanishes completely in the roughly 200 WATT you get hit by just walking on a sunny day. In a far more hostile mix of frequencies, at that.

    Your argument is literally that you are complaining that some kid with a water gun standing half a mile away might hit you with a sprinkle, while you're standing to your hips in the ocean.

    Learn some fucking math, then learn a fucking sense of proportion - preferably before you start screaming that the sky is falling because you can't understand the evil withcraft of numbers.

    "...already been tested that tens of GHz frequencies can go right through walls and with a bit of computer inference from towers 'tother sides, effectively see persons."

    If people were denser than the walls in question and there was a receptor the size of a bus conveniently placed on the far side, yes. Otherwise, as usual you're tossing out a word salad of science you can't understand but must be bad since none of the actual experts and physicists actually educated in this stuff are scared.

    No, 5G isn't hazardous unless you're afraid the likely price gouging of shady telcos will do bad things to your blood pressure.

    Now as before the sole bad thing about 5G is that it is badly hyped - in most places you'll never see the utility of it, with normal 4G coverage not even being ubiquitous yet - and that unscrupulous telcos, first and foremost in the US, are looking at it as a way to salt your monthly bill.

    You seem to live in a world where anyone with an actual education and expert knowledge of physics must be part of a giant conspiracy - because it's not as if 5G is unknown sorcery. It's an application of normal electromagnetism with effects and consequences which have been known for a century.

    "You deliberately evade that microwaves can kill birds flying at fair distance."

    Well, yeah, and when a phone mast becomes a directional microwave emitter set to saturate a human-sized target with 800 watts focused over a foot-wide volume, THEN I'll get worried, because some asshole will have built themselves a maser.

    But for you to stand in a steady bombardment of cosmic radiation of all frequencies and complain about a phone mast putting out a millionth of that power, is just insane. If that use of electricity worries you I suggest you go unscrew the fuses in your apartment power box, because the wiring of your flat or basement is already holding you in an electromagnetic field multiple times as powerful as what that phone mast half a mile away will add.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  32. icon
    Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 24 Mar 2021 @ 4:00am

    Re: Report finds microwave energy likely made US diplomats ill

    "Now, all I have here is a conclusive official study, while you kids have the flag button, ad hominem, and amazing ability to gainsay facts. -- Let's mock."

    Yeah, let's mock. Because what you brought there is as relevant as holding up your microwave and screaming "OH MY GOD! DEATH RAYS!"

    Did you even read the link you posted? No. Understand the language? Apparently not. Tell me, you sad sack of lunacy, do you even english?

    Let's start with the very first sentence of that link; "The study found that "directed, pulsed..."

    Emphasis mine. They're talking about a god damn maser, you nincompoop. It's to a phone mast what a laser is to a light bulb, dimwit. Yes, directed and focused energy is bad. Good thing, then, that a radio transmitter isn't unidirectional, meaning the energy follows the good old natural law of electromagnetic diffusion.

    And then we come to actual proportion and basic science 101; The real world where you are, at every moment, exposed to hundreds of watts of cosmic radiation, most of which either passes harmlessly through you or is deflected right back. A million times stronger than what your 1 KW phone mast is distributing across few miles worth of volume.

    Yeah, let's mock. You, the brilliant "very stable genius" who appears to think that if there was a genuine hazard, actual scientists would be covering it up or somehow have missed it, and that phone masts wouldn't suddenly be a major military weapon, given the money they've spent on finding fast or slow death rays.

    Here's a far more realistic hazard prognosis for you; 5G is a hyped technology which won't be properly usable for any but perhaps 1% of the population but is being advertised as the Next Big Thing Everyone Needs by shady telcos who think, with justification, that it will allow them to price gouge their hapless consumers.

    Run with that one instead and you might gain more traction than spilling random keywords about the foul witchcraft of basic science that you don't understand and apparently fear as a result.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  33. icon
    Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 24 Mar 2021 @ 4:07am

    Re: And the big question is: WHY does minion go round on this AG

    "By frequent defending,Techdirt evidently is all for "5G", though variously pretends it's all hype and is little deployed so far. Why is that?"

    Because there's nothing more to say about it; It's an overhyped and largely impractical technology mainly rolled out to enable unscrupulous telcos to pick the pockets of their customers and possibly extend an average wifi router's range to a few hundred yards.

    The science is well known. It's as basic as it gets with the sole difference being better signal resolution through computer processing.

    And I'd hesitate to say "techdirt" is "for it" given that these factors are well known among the tech-savvy. We are, mainly, not against idiots throwing their money at the useless and irrelevant, because that simply isn't affecting us.

    If anything I believe most of us here may be more in favor of actually expanding 4G to the point where that network protocol works as advertised instead. Today it's a fact that most people are in effect rolling on a 3G bandwidth cap, no matter what their phone tells them, because the 4G mast is barely in range and thus the signal is crap.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  34. icon
    Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 24 Mar 2021 @ 4:10am

    Re:

    "The 5G Bad! crowd should be attacking all of outer space, especially the sun."

    This, right there. The average solar panel absorbs about as much radiation in a cross-section as the average person. That's around 200 watts. Most of it either passing harmlessly through or being reflected.

    The 5G nutbags are literally floating up to their necks in water and screaming in hysteric fear that some kid with a water pistol might come closer enough they might get hit by a stray drop.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  35. icon
    bhull242 (profile), 24 Mar 2021 @ 3:26pm

    the only people who'll be surprised by their findings get all of their news from email forwards and YouTube

    I dunno. Some of them are luddites who refuse internet or cable and just assume all tech is dangerous.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  36. identicon
    Ana, 26 Mar 2021 @ 4:31am

    5g

    It's crazy how people can believe such things. But, well, in this era, disinformation is really easy. However, as you can see at https://demyo.com/, 5g is not free of risks, but they are not related to healthy. But that's another thing.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  37. icon
    Scary Devil Monastery (profile), 26 Mar 2021 @ 4:37am

    Re:

    ...and the sane man fails to see a correlation where the conspiracy nut will determine that both your statements must be linked rather than just separate factual statements.

    link to this | view in thread ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.