Cell phone radiation is still safer than viral science stories

[Wireless News]

http://l1.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/mQvTp7v7qMcuKgOABTCRbA--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3NfbGVnbztmaT1maWxsO2g9ODY7cT03NTt3PT EzMA--/http://media.zenfs.com/en-US/homerun/science.mashable/9b18ccd98bd9cfd661bc8f7f43aa7afa (http://news.yahoo.com/cell-phone-radiation-still-safer-220142566.html)You are almost definitely slowly killing yourself. Eating poorly, smoking, riding motorcycles, watching "The Bachelor" — they're all statistically proven to shorten the average life span (except maybe that last one). As for using your cellphone? Not so much. The World Health Organization has said that cellphone radiation is "possibly carcinogenic to humans," putting it in the same category as drinking coffee.-In other words, we have no proof of an established causal link, but we can't rule it out either. That kind delineation is quickly trampled when it comes to new studies, one of which came out Friday, resulting in the usual freak out. Here's the study's title: "Report of Partial findings from the National Toxicology Program Carcinogenesis Studies of Cell Phone Radiofrequency Radiation in Hsd: Sprague Dawley® SD rats (Whole Body Exposure)" And here's a summary from Mashable -science editor Andrew Freedman:-“The partial results show that exposing large doses of radiation over about two years to male rats can cause unusually high rates of two specific kinds of tumors. But the comparison to humans is a question mark and comparison even to the control group of rats is problematic because of abnormalities in that group. There are a lot of statistical oddities in the study." And now, a selection of headlines from various outlets that covered the study:- "Cellphone-Cancer Link Found in Government Study" (Link) "Cellphone Radiation Linked to Cancer in Major Rat Study" (Link) "Yes, your cell phone really could give you cancer, major National Institutes of Health study finds"- (Link) "NIH Experts Question Fed Study Linking Cellphones to Tumors"- (Link) "A Possible Cellphone Link to Cancer? A Rat Study Launches New Debate"- (Link) "Study ties cellphone radiation to brain, heart tumors in male rats"- (Link) "'Game-Changing' Study Links Cellphone Radiation to Cancer"- (Link) "Major Cell Phone Radiation Study Reignites Cancer Questions"- (Link) These headlines clearly run the gamut from terrible ( Mother Jones -and NBC News have been roundly criticized, second from the bottom on this list) to reasonable but still titillating ( Scientific American , the last one on the list). For posterity's sake, Mashable 's is third from the bottom.- If media is on one end of the nuance spectrum, science is on the polar opposite. One of the responsibilities of a journalist is to distill (sometimes complex) information into a form that is easy to consume by just about everybody. Journalists tend to write at a reading level somewhere near late middle school or early high school. That's fine when talking about everyday topics, but it can become problematic when dealing with areas of scientific analysis that delve into advanced mathematics and almost limitless levels of nuance.- It's easy to understand why the scientific community may become frustrated. Aaron Carroll a doctor and writer of The Incidental Economist- didn't mince words in going after the media writ large. He pointed out a variety of reasons that the study did not produce much in the way of concrete results.- "At the end of the study, survival was lower in the control group of males than in all the exposed males. Survival was lower in the control group of females for two of the three exposed groups. Yet no headlines blared that cell phones extend life. Nor will mine. No statistics are presented on whether this is significant," Carroll wrote. "And why does the media keep doing this?"- The notion that cellphones can cause cancer might be the perfect collision of science and journalism in the worst way. As John Oliver noted on his show Last Week Tonight , the media isn't terribly good at covering that intersection. It might be easy to chalk this up to the usual media shenanigans, but there's some unfortunate correlation here.- As the stories started to roll in Friday morning, the audience clearly began to respond. Here's Google's search data for "cellphones cancer" in the past week: It's worth noting that searches for this topics are weirdly consistent over the past 12 months. This is clearly something on people's minds. Things are getting a little better.-A few outlets have published articles pushing back against the coverage.-Vox's Brad Plumer admonished that "reporters need to do a much better job of putting this incrementalism in context — rather than preying on people's fears for clicks."- The Washington Post -even went as far as putting "Don't Believe the Hype" in the headline for their story about the piece. Sadly, the damage was done. Some in the media have even gone as far as covering the study from the stance of its shortcomings. Seth Borenstein, science writer for the Associated Press, led with the fact that reviewers were finding flaws in the study. That helps, but it's also something of a drop in the ocean of broader coverage.- So what's a reader to do? Well, Today 's Al Roker put it best in a clip featured in Oliver's segment: "I think the way to live your life is you find the study that sounds best to you, and you go with that." Found it.



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