BenQ Mobile GmbH & Co. OHG A70 Manuel D’Utilisation

 of A70 Dorado, 140mm, us-en A31008-H2770-A1-4-7619 (05.10.2005, 12:27)

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FDA has been receiving inquiries about 

the safety of mobile phones, including 

cellular phones and PCS phones. The fol-

lowing summarizes what is know – and 

what remains unknown – about whether 

these products can pose a hazard to 

health, and what can be done to mini-

mize any potential risk. This information 

may be used to respond 

to questions.
Why the concern?

Mobile phones emit low levels of radio 

frequency energy (i.e., radio frequency 

radiation) in the microwave range while 

being used. They also emit very low levels 

of radio frequency energy (RF), consid-

ered non-significant, when in the stand-

by mode. It is well known that high levels 

of RF can produce biological damage 

through heating effects (this is how your 

microwave oven is able to cook food). 

However, it is not known whether, to 

what extent, or through what mecha-

nism, lower levels of RF might cause ad-

verse health effects as well. Although 

some research has been done to address 

these questions, no clear picture of the bi-

ological effects of this type of radiation 

has emerged to date. Thus, the available 

science does not allow us to conclude 

that mobile phones are absolutely safe, or 

that they are unsafe. However, the availa-

ble scientific evidence does not demon-

strate adverse health effects associated 

with the use of mobile phones.

Questions have been raised about hand-

held mobile phones, the kind that have a 

built-in antenna that is positioned close 

to the user's head during normal tele-

phone conversation. These types of mo-

bile phones are of concern because of the 

short distance between the phone's an-

tenna – the primary source of the RF – 

and the person's head. The exposure to 

RF from mobile phones in which the an-

tenna is located at greater distances from 

the user (on the outside of a car, for ex-

ample) is drastically lower than that from 

hand-held phones, because a person's RF 

exposure decreases rapidly with distance 

from the source. The safety of so-called 

“cordless phones,” which have a base unit 

connected to the telephone wiring in a 

house and which operate at far lower 

power levels and frequencies, has not 

been questioned.
How much evidence is there that hand-held 

Briefly, there is not enough evidence to 

know for sure, either way; however, re-

search efforts are on-going. The existing 

scientific evidence is conflicting and 

many of the studies that have been done 

to date have suffered from flaws in their 

research methods. Animal experiments 

investigating the effects of RF exposures 

characteristic of mobile phones have 

yielded conflicting results. A few animal 

studies, however, have suggested that 

low levels of RF could accelerate the de-

velopment of cancer in laboratory ani-

mals. In one study, mice genetically al-

tered to be predisposed to developing 

one type of cancer developed more than 

twice as many such cancers when they 

were exposed to RF energy compared to 

controls. There is much uncertainty 

among scientists about whether results 

obtained from animal studies apply to the 

use of mobile phones. First, it is uncertain 

how to apply the results obtained in rats 

and mice to humans. Second, many of 

the studies showed increased tumor