IARC, the organization that produced this mess is doing science communication a massive disservice and it should be reformed. They call category 2B "possibly carcinogenic" when in reality the evidence required for category 2B is basically anything that is as flimsy and hypothetical as possible. No one would refer to anything in category 2B as "possibly carcinogenic" in daily life. At best you might say this category is "worthy of potential future study".
Their poor communication creates hype and hysteria while discrediting scientists everywhere.
A few years ago they said "Radiofrequency electromagnetic fields are
possibly carcinogenic to humans (Group 2B)." https://publications.iarc.fr/126
The reasoning for this is on page 419. They classified radio as possibly carcinogenic because prior studies weren't as well controlled as they wanted, some analyses they wanted weren't done, and because one very small study that saw a minor correlation that isn't at all consistent with the population level data that we have (which says there's no association).
That's it. All of this hype for absolutely nothing.
Any electromagnetic radiation of considerable power and penetrability causes oxidative stress, which in turn causes cellular damage, which in turn increases probability of getting cancer.
So they are kind of right when they say that radiofrequency electromagnetic fields are possibly carcinogenic to humans. They are, but to a small degree for the most part.
The statement "radio can possibly cause cancer" is irrelevant if it takes a signal so powerful no human would ever encounter it, let alone produce it. The question is whether radio signals used in telecommunications can cause cancer, especially compared to the waves already present in nature.
The people most at risk would (one would think) be people that have a cellphone glued to their ear all day. But these people would (or: do) also end up with damage to their hearing, so maybe that tempers behavior ?
2B requires evidence of carcinogenicity in animals as well as "strong mechanistic evidence, showing that the agent exhibits key characteristics of human
carcinogens."
Their poor communication creates hype and hysteria while discrediting scientists everywhere.
A few years ago they said "Radiofrequency electromagnetic fields are possibly carcinogenic to humans (Group 2B)." https://publications.iarc.fr/126
The reasoning for this is on page 419. They classified radio as possibly carcinogenic because prior studies weren't as well controlled as they wanted, some analyses they wanted weren't done, and because one very small study that saw a minor correlation that isn't at all consistent with the population level data that we have (which says there's no association).
That's it. All of this hype for absolutely nothing.
IARC needs to be fixed.