In early October, Steven Milloy wrote an excellent story about a federal judge’s dismissal of an $800 million lawsuit that claimed cell phone use had cause a man’s brain tumor.
Judge Catherine Blake dismissed the lawsuit citing the plaintiff’s failure to provide any valid scientific evidence for this claim.
Milloy notes that the plaintiff’s main body of evidence were studies by Dr. Lennart Hardell, who has published two studies on cell phone use and brain cancer. A 1999 study by Hardell found no “overall increased risk for brain tumors associated with exposure to cellular phones.” A 2001 study claimed to find such a link, but was criticized for being a flawed rehash of the 1999 study. Finally, Dr. Hardell has conducted as-yet-unpublished research that, again, found no link between cellular phone use and brain tumors. Despite this, according to Milloy,
. . . Dr. Hardell nonetheless maintained the overall findings didn’t matter because the cancer was only associated with ipsilateral phone use, in which the cancer develops on the same side of the head as the phone is held — as in [the plaintiff, Christopher] Newman’s case.
Judge Blake dismissed this claim since Hardell also reported a statistical association between ipsilateral use of cordless phones and cancer, “even though there is otherwise no scientific claim that cordless phones cause brain cancer.” A defense expert attributed Hardell’s results concerning ipsilateral use to “recall bias” — study subjects’ inability to accurately recall which side of their heads phones were used.
At one point, Milloy notes, the plaintiffs lawyers actually called a meteorologist to give testimony about radiofrequency radiation! That tactic didn’t work, but it did give Milloy an opportunity for a great one-liner which pretty much sums up the “cell phones cause cancer” claims,
It’s comforting to know that while cell phone reception has improved, reception of cell phone junks science hasn’t.
In fact it’s a very good sign to see the cell phone nonsense rejected by court so soundly and relatively quickly rather than seeing a repeat of what happened with breast implants and other similar unfounded health claims.
Source:
Cell Phone Suit Gets Bad Reception. Steven Milloy, FoxNews.Com, October 4, 2002.
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