LG VX3450 User Manual page 70

Safety
The FDA shares regulatory responsibilities for wireless phones
with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
All phones that are sold in the United States must comply with FCC
safety guidelines that limit RF exposure. The FCC relies on the FDA
and other health agencies for safety questions about wireless
phones.
The FCC also regulates the base stations that the wireless
phone networks rely upon. While these base stations operate at
higher power than do the wireless phones themselves, the RF
exposures that people get from these base stations are typically
thousands of times lower than those they can get from wireless
phones.
Base stations are thus not the subject of the safety questions
discussed in this document.
3 3 . . W W h h a a t t k k i i n n d d s s o o f f p p h h o o n n e e s s a a r r e e t t h h e e s s u u b b j j e e c c t t o o f f t t h h i i s s u u p p d d a a t t e e ? ?
The term "wireless phone" refers here to handheld wireless
phones with built-in antennas, often called "cell", "mobile", or
"PCS" phones. These types of wireless phones can expose the
user to measurable Radio Frequency energy (RF) because of the
short distance between the phone and the user's head.
These RF exposures are limited by FCC safety guidelines that
were developed with the advice of the FDA and other federal
health and safety agencies. When the phone is located at
greater distances from the user, the exposure to RF is drastically
lower because a person's RF exposure decreases rapidly with
increasing distance from the source. The so-called "cordless
phones", which have a base unit connected to the telephone
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wiring in a house, typically operate at far lower power levels,
and thus produce RF exposures far below the FCC safety limits.
4 4 . . W W h h a a t t a a r r e e t t h h e e r r e e s s u u l l t t s s o o f f t t h h e e r r e e s s e e a a r r c c h h d d o o n n e e a a l l r r e e a a d d y y ? ?
The research done thus far has produced conflicting results,
and many studies have suffered from flaws in their research
methods. Animal experiments investigating the effects of Radio
Frequency energy (RF) exposures characteristic of wireless
phones have yielded conflicting results that often cannot be
repeated in other laboratories. A few animal studies, however,
have suggested that low levels of RF could accelerate the
development of cancer in laboratory animals. However, many of
the studies that showed increased tumor development used
animals that had been genetically engineered or treated with
cancer-causing chemicals so as to be pre-disposed to develop
cancer in the absence of RF exposure. Other studies exposed
the animals to RF for up to 22 hours per day. These conditions
are not similar to the conditions under which people use
wireless phones, so we don't know with certainty what the
results of such studies mean for human health.
Three large epidemiology studies have been published since
December 2000. Between them, the studies investigated any
possible association between the use of wireless phones and
primary brain cancer, glioma, meningioma, or acoustic
neuroma, tumors of the brain or salivary gland, leukemia, or
other cancers. None of the studies demonstrated the existence
of any harmful health effects from wireless phone RF
exposures. However, none of the studies can answer questions
about long-term exposures, since the average period of phone
use in these studies was around three years.