Campaign on mobile phone risks

The Campaign for Awareness on Radiation Emissions, CARE, was yesterday launched to raise awareness on the safe way to use mobile telephones and the safe transmission of electromagnetic waves from mobile telephone antennas.

Campaign member Anna Mallia said CARE maintained that if other countries had taken the initiative to adopt a precautionary approach, why should Malta not follow suit?

She said other countries had not continued to rely on the World Health Organisation as regards the effect of mobile telephone antennas on health and their use, particularly by children.

The pressure group has been set up because Malta lacked laws regulating mobile telephone antennas, which were mushrooming in inhabited areas and close to schools.

Malta had liberalised the mobile telephony market, but related health issues were pushed aside, Dr Mallia said.

The health authorities were not being pro-active, nor were they taking a precautionary approach in view of the fact that research was not conclusive.

The government had not felt the need to publish the UK's National Health Service recommendations on mobile telephony, which were available with every mobile telephone in the UK.

The Education Division had only banned mobile telephones from schools, and not for health reasons, Dr Mallia said.

"If the authorities do not want to provide useful tips on how to use mobile telephones, we will do it ourselves," she said.

Quoting an education supplement of The Guardian, she said children were more susceptible to radiation from mobile telephones. Research had shown that children absorbed up to 45 per cent more microwave radiation from mobile telephones than adults due to the variation in thickness of the ear.

The report said there was, as yet, no clear evidence that radiation from mobile telephones was bad for humans. However, it did prove that if mobiles were shown to be dangerous, then children were more at risk than adults.

Dr Mallia said the Malta Environment and Planning Authority did not have the required apparatus to carry out inspections to verify the readings of the installed antennas.

The campaign was not opposed to the development of telecommunications and technology, but was aimed at raising awareness of the effects of emissions from mobile telephones and their antennas, she added.

Individuals, including Alternattiva Demokratika representative Mario Mallia, were joining forces "to make some noise" on the issue. CARE also enjoyed the support of MLP education spokesman Evarist Bartolo, who had put questions on the matter in Parliament.

CARE felt that the public had the right to be informed. They were not even told the basics such as that mobiles should be held as far away from the body as possible when dialing, or sending an SMS.

Referring to the Church's statement, which, unlike that in Italy, allowed the installation of antennas on churches as a service to the community, CARE felt it had rushed too much.

Operators preferred to rent roofs of houses and church tops than a piece of land far from inhabited areas due to higher costs.

Antennas did not have to be installed on churches to be as high and distant from inhabitants as possible, since towers could be built in various localities.

The only success story was in Bahrija, Dr Mallia said, where an action committee had managed to remove a base station from a residential to an uninhabited area.

CARE member Tony Bajada, the only person who has managed to stop the operation of a base station, located opposite his house in Xaghra, until his court case is heard, said that Malta was adopting World Health Organisation standards as regards emission levels.

The maximum level of electromagnetic radiation from antennas in Malta was, therefore, 41 volts per metre. But other countries had reduced their levels drastically as a precautionary measure, and he could not understand why Malta would not do the same.

He also appealed to the government to invest in the apparatus to calculate emissions.

CARE members Anna Mallia, Mario Mallia, Connie Bonnici and Anthony Bajada can be contacted on e-mail addresses annam@onvol.net; woody@maltanet.net; cbonnici@ onvol.net; and tbajada@vol.net.mt respectively.