Global News Post: Mobile Phones

INDIA: Mobile Towers Affect Wildlife

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<div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">NEW DELHI, India (NNN-BERNAMA) -- The Environment Ministry feels radiation emitted by mobile towers has ill effects on wildlife, especially birds and bees, and has asked the Department of Telcommunication not to permit such structures within one-km radius of each other, reports Press Trust of India (PTI). <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">In an advisory, the Ministry has said that there is an "urgent need" to refine the Indian standard on safe limits of exposure to electro-magnetic radiations (EMR). <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Till it is reformed, "a precautionary approach shall be preferred to minimise the exposure levels and adopt stricter norms possible, without compromising on optimum performance of the networks," it said. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">It noted that the radiations could be having varying negative impact on wildlife, particularly birds and bees. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Accordingly, it asked the DoT to ensure that new mobile towers are not constructed within one-km radius of the existing ones "so as not to obstruct flight path of birds, and also not to increase the combined radiations from all towers" in the area. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">"To prevent overlapping of high radiation fields, new towers should not be permitted within a radius of one kilometre of the existing towers. Sharing of passive infrastructure if made mandatory for Telecom Service Providers can minimise need of having additional towers," it said. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The Ministry asked the DoT that location and frequencies of cellphone towers and other towers emitting EMR, should be made available in public domain. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">"This can be at city/district/village level. Location- wise GIS mapping of all cellphone towers should be maintained which would, inter alia, help in monitoring the population of birds and bees in and around the mobile towers and also in and/or around wildlife protection areas," the advisory said. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The advisory has been issued on the basis of an expert committee study on the possible impacts of communication towers on wildlife and bees. The panel was constituted by the Environment Ministry in 2010. -- NNN-BERNAMA<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
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INDIA: Mobile Towers Affect Wildlife

NEW DELHI, India (NNN-BERNAMA) -- The Environment Ministry feels radiation emitted by mobile towers has ill effects on wildlife, especiall...

Mobile Internet Overtaking Conventional Media in India

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</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">By Saraswathi Muniappan<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">NEW DELHI, India (NNN-Bernama) -– Smart devices are fast overtaking conventional media in India with 20 million of the estimated 48 million mobile Internet users having shifted 50 per cent of their newspaper and television time to their mobile screens.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">They browse for entertainment, all categories of news, travel and sports content, a survey on Mobile Internet behaviour and usage study conducted by ViziSense, India’s leading online audience and ad measurement platform, revealed.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Of all mobile Internet users in India, 87 per cent are online on mobile every day and 70 per cent of the daily mobile Internet users fall in the age group of 24-34 years.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“Almost half of these users go online through their cellphones every 2-3 hours and the duration of these visits is more than an hour. Almost 60 per cent of these users have been on this medium for over a year already,” said ViziSense in a statement.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Email and social media are the primary drivers of mobile Internet, said the study, which combined an online survey conducted with ViziSense India online panellists (Internet users with mobile phones) and recorded responses from 2,024 users who accessed the Internet through their cellphones.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">However, consumption of content is starting to shift in favour of the two new screens -– Mobiles and Tablets -- and the categories which see frequent or daily consumption include News, Games and Entertainment, Travel, Education and Search, it said.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">These users are also easing into mobile e-commerce with almost 80 per cent having performed some form of financial transaction through their mobile phone -– payment of utility bills, purchase of products and services -- and 28 per cent of mobile internet users have even used ‘mobile money’.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The penetration of tablets, and rising demand for them, is keeping the IT and media industries excited. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The survey also revealed that 14 per cent of these users already possessed a tablet while another 60 per cent planned to buy a tablet soon. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The survey establishes two major trends: the shift in screens is for real, and English print is migrating to mobile phones through Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) sites and applications, especially around lifestyle, travel and sports content.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The survey also tracked the usage by the 18 per cent women subset within this group of Mobile Internet users, and found that women outscore men when it comes to accessing books or education, entertainment and travel-related content through their cellphones.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">India has the world’s second largest mobile phone user base with over 929.37 million users as of May 2012. It has the world’s third-largest Internet user-base with over 121 million as of December 2011. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="direction: ltr; text-align: justify; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">-- NNN-BERNAMA<o:p></o:p></span></div></div>

Mobile Internet Overtaking Conventional Media in India

By Saraswathi Muniappan NEW DELHI, India (NNN-Bernama) -– Smart devices are fast overtaking conventional media in India with 20 million o...

Scientists Point to Possible Health Effects of Cell Phones

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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif; line-height: 18px;"><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: x-small;">By Zulima Palacio from Washington</span></b></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span>  </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">This past May, in a major policy shift, the World Health Organization said electromagnetic fields produced by mobile phones are possibly carcinogenic. Although the International Association for the Wireless Telecommunication Industry says there's no evidence that cell phones have a negative impact on health, many people are wondering exactly how electromagnetic fields, including those generated by cell phones, might harm them.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
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</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The World Health Organization says at least five billion people around the world use mobile phones and those who use those most frequently could be at risk for malignant brain tumors.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Many scientists welcomed the WHO statement, but some said it did not go far enough because it didn't mention impacts on human health from cell towers and other wireless devices.<span>  </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Camilla Rees is founder and director of ElectromagneticHealth.org, an advocacy group that's been critical of the mobile phone industry.<span>  </span>She explains the basics of electromagnetic fields.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Boost-Mobile-Samsung-Phone-Black/dp/B0042L64GM?ie=UTF8&tag=glob036-20&link_code=bil&camp=213689&creative=392969" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img alt="Boost Mobile Samsung Seek Phone Black Color" height="320" src="http://ws.amazon.com/widgets/q?MarketPlace=US&ServiceVersion=20070822&ID=AsinImage&WS=1&Format=_SL160_&ASIN=B0042L64GM&tag=glob036-20" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><img alt="" border="0" height="1" src="http://www.assoc-amazon.com/e/ir?t=glob036-20&l=bil&camp=213689&creative=392969&o=1&a=B0042L64GM" style="border: none !important; margin: 0px !important; padding: 0px !important;" width="1" />“An electromagnetic field is a wave with a frequency. The frequency may be long or tight. It's energy; it's packets of energy that is a natural phenomenon on earth, but it is also modulated by mankind to create telecommunication spectrums that are artificial frequencies that are not found in nature and that our bodies are not adapted to,” Rees said.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Rees says research on the biological impact of electromagnetic fields goes back to the 1950s. Those impacts include not only cancer, but other effects on living cells and their genetic material, their DNA.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Rees is especially concerned about the growing pollution from electromagnetic fields near schools, like these cell phone antennas next to a high school football field in a Washington suburb. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Scientists disagree about the health effects of electromagnetic fields. But they all agree that caution should be used when it comes to children, the most vulnerable group. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Some health experts believe the effects could be wide-ranging. Dr. Ashok Agarwal heads the Center for Reproductive Medicine at Cleveland Clinic. He has done several studies on the impact of cell phone use on male fertility.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“We demonstrated that men who use cell phones for more than four hours per day have a significant reduction in their semen quality in most of the semen parameters such as sperm count, mobility, and morphology,” Agarwal said.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Dr. Agarwal says other scientists have gone farther in finding damage to DNA and other changes attributed to electromagnetic fields.<span>    </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Neuroscientist Nora Volkov, at the National Institutes of Health, has been using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to study human brain responses to electromagnetic fields. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“What our study does show is that the human brain is sensitive to the effects of electromagnetic radiation from cell phone exposure, when the cell phones are placed by the side of the head,” Volkov said.<span>   </span><o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Volkov's study did not determine long-term impact. But she compares her initial studies to those done decades ago on the health effects of tobacco.<span>  </span>She says scientists had to wait 15 to 30 years before there was conclusive evidence that smoking causes cancer. <o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">On the safety of cell phones, scientists offer these suggestions. “When it comes to children and adolescents, I would give the recommendation to parents to encourage them not to use the cell phone by the side of the head but instead to use the speaker phone mode or with a wire, and certainly would not recommend for them to sleep with their cell phones under their pillows," Volkov said.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Dr. Ashok Agarwal from Cleveland Clinic.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“The technology is very important for our day-to-day life, but we need to be aware that there may be some possible side effects that can be there with overuse of these technologies,” Agarwal said.<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The evidence on the cancer-causing potential of cell phone radiation is not yet conclusive, but the World Health Organization's cautionary stand is certain to fuel intensified research into electromagnetic fields and their impact on public health.</span> <span style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">(VOA News)<o:p></o:p></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><br />
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Scientists Point to Possible Health Effects of Cell Phones

By Zulima Palacio from Washington This past May, in a major policy shift, the World Health Organization said electromagnetic fields prod...