[tell-me-why] Health fears lead schools to dismantle wireless networks

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http://www.worldhealth.net/p/health-fears-lead-schools-to-dismantle-wireless-net\

works-2006-11-22.html

Health fears lead schools to dismantle wireless networks

Parents and teachers are forcing some schools to dismantle wireless computer

networks amid fears that they could damage children’s health.

More schools are putting transmitters in classrooms to give pupils wireless

access from laptops to the school computer network and the internet.

 

But many parents and some scientists fear that low levels of microwave

radiation emitted by the transmitters could be harmful, causing loss of

concentration, headaches, fatigue, memory and behavioural problems and possibly

cancer in the long term. Scientific evidence is inconclusive, but some

researchers think that children are vulnerable because of their thinner skulls

and developing nervous systems.

 

At the Prebendal School, a prestigious preparatory in Chichester, West Sussex,

a group of parents lobbied the headteacher, Tim Cannell, to remove the wireless

network last month. Mr Cannell told The Times: “We listened to the parents’

views and they were obviously very concerned. We also did a lot of research. The

authorities say it’s safe, but there have been no long-term studies to prove

this.

 

“We had been having problems with the reliability of it anyway, so we decided

to exchange it for a conventional cabled system.”

 

Vivienne Baron, who is bringing up Sebastian, her ten-year-old grandson, said:

“I did not want Sebastian exposed to a wireless computer network at school. No

real evidence has been produced to prove that this new technology is safe in the

long term. Until it is, I think we should take a precautionary approach and use

cabled systems.”

 

At Ysgol Pantycelyn, a comprehensive in Carmarthenshire, parents aired their

concerns to the governors, who agreed to switch off its wireless network. Hywel

Pugh, the head teacher, told The Times: “The county council and central

government told us that wireless networks are perfectly safe, but as there were

concerns we listened to them and decided that the concerns of the parents were

of greater importance than our need to have a wireless network.”

 

Judith Davies, who has a daughter at the school, said: “Many people campaign

against mobile phone masts near schools, but there is a great deal of ignorance

about wireless computer networks. Yet they are like having a phone mast in the

classroom and the transmitters are placed very close to the children.”

 

Stowe School, the Buckinghamshire public school, also removed part of its

wireless network after a teacher became ill. Michael Bevington, a classics

teacher for 28 years at the school, said that he had such a violent reaction to

the network that he was too ill to teach.

 

“I felt a steadily widening range of unpleasant effects whenever I was in the

classroom,” he said. “First came a thick headache, then pains throughout the

body, sudden flushes, pressure behind the eyes, sudden skin pains and burning

sensations, along with bouts of nausea. Over the weekend, away from the

classroom, I felt completely normal.”

 

Anthony Wallersteiner, the head teacher of Stowe School, said that he was

planning to put cabled networks in all new classrooms and boarding houses.

 

Professor Sir William Stewart, chairman of the Health Protection Agency, said

that evidence of potentially harmful effects of microwave radiation had become

more persuasive over the past five years. His report said that while there was a

lack of hard information of damage to health, the approach should be

precautionary.

 

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Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired

signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are

not fed, those who are cold and not clothed.

- Dwight D. Eisenhower

 

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