Cell Phones Cause Cancer? Probably Not.

OK, I hate cell phones, so I'm no fanboy... but I hate junk science even more.

No doubt you've heard some rumblings about an award-winning neurosurgeon named Dr Vini Khurana who reported that cell phones double your risk of brain tumors. The web is all a flutter trying to make you scared of your own shadow, yet again... so I thought I'd add my two cents.

First of all there have been numerous numerous cell phone cancer studies before, none of which found a causal link. Dr. Khurana noted that these studies were flawed, because brain tumors take a very long time to develop... so any such study should restrict itself to people who have used cell phones for 10 years.

woah... that narrows the field... so much so that I'm not certain if Dr. Khurana had a large enough sample to support his claims. I've looked all over the internet, and I couldn't find any info on his sample size. The most recent study that cleared cell phones of any wrongdoing had 420,000 test subjects. If Dr Khurana is using anything less than a sample size of 2,000, then the odds are good that he found nothing more than a statistical anomaly.

In other words... that's like trying to gauge the number of rowdy drunks in the US, but restricting your research to a bar during the Superbowl. You aren't going to get a reliable number that way...

Also... even if his claims are true, what's the actual increase in risk? Brain cancer is very rare... and this increase is not nearly as bad as the tenfold increase in lung cancer due to smoking. Brain tumors cause 13,000 deaths per year in the USA, out of 2,400,000 total... or about 0.5%. This new study -- if true -- means that if you've been a cell phone freak for ten years, your odds of dying from a brain tumor shot up a whole half percentage point.

Pump up on the broccoli and Omega 3s and you'll push that back down, I'd wager...

Although, there might be something to it... perhaps the analog cell phone technology from 10 years ago was much worse for you... or perhaps there was some chemical in old cell phone batteries... or some cancer causing flame-retardant in the ear pieces. It warrants more study, and perhaps you should use a hands-free system for a while.

Until they discover BlueTooth turns you into a zombie...