You Coulda Told Us

Hey! Guess what?! You could be slowly killing yourself! No, not with all that crap that you eat. No, not with your extreme lack of exercise. And I'm guessing that your drinking isn't really a problem, per se. And I'll be honest, the smoking really isn't helping anything, but that's not what I'm going at here. Yeah, I'm talking about an article I read over at ABC which informed me that "An international panel of experts says cellphones are possibly carcinogenic to humans after reviewing details from dozens of published studies." Oh, you have GOT to be kidding me!

Now?? They're just getting around to figuring this stuff out NOW?! Let me get this straight. Practically every man, woman and child in the civilized parts of the globe (ie, damn near everyone, as the article say that "According to a survey last year, the number of cellphone subscribers worldwide has hit 5 billion, or nearly three-quarters of the global population." ), has a freaking cellphone and NOW you're telling us that they MAY be carcinogenic?! Great! I'm trying to think of when this information could have been more useful. Oh, I know! BEFORE we all got in the habit of holding a damn cell phone up to our noggin all the live long day.

Maybe I shouldn't panic. Let's see...what other things are they comparing the cell phone usage to? Um...oh, here it is. "The group classified cellphones in category 2B, meaning they are possibly carcinogenic to humans. Other substances in that category include the pesticide DDT and gasoline engine exhaust." Hmmm. We've been told for quite some time that DDT and vehicle emissions are bad for us. We seem to have accepted that. I mean, DDT is not in use anymore because of how bad it's supposed to be. And now we have cell phones in that same category. All right then. We're all going to die.

What they're concerned about are people developing brain tumors. While they say that it's hard to pinpoint if the cellphones cause the cancer, a lot of people with these tumors use cell phones. Then again, since 75% of the world uses cell phones, that isn't exactly a damning factor. But there is a group called Cancer Research U.K. and they recommend that "...children under 16 only use cellphones for essential calls because their brains and nervous systems are still developing." I see. Soooo, if they can alter a brain that is still developing, I'm going to guess that they can alter a brain, period.

While I'm not exactly surprised by this finding, I am a little annoyed that it's taken this long to get to this point. Seriously, why can't this sort of stuff be thought about when things are being developed? Hey, you're going to make a little device that people will hold up to their head for elongated periods of time? What say you find out if all of that electromagnetic radiation is going to turn my melon into a cauliflower BEFORE sell it to us? Just a thought. I don't get it. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go figure out where the speakerphone is on my super awesome EVO 4G. After that, I'm going to hope that someone calls me so that I can save myself.

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