Run awareness campaigns on mobile radiation: Report

Government should step up efforts to spread awareness about mobile radiations for allaying fears of possible ill effects on health, a DoT committee has said.
"Concerned departments of government like Department of Telecom, Health, Environment etc, shall step up efforts to spread public awareness regarding mobile phones to allay undue apprehensions in regard to possible health effects.. Largely cause due to misinformation being peddled by certain sections in public," the committee said in its report.
The committee was set up following direction of the Allahabad High Court to work on the radiation issue.
The report also said that a research shall be conducted to determine sensitivity of mobile radiation and possible health hazard from it "which at present is not proven".

The Department of Science and Technology with Indian Council of Medical Research shall carry out or facilitate extensive studies on Indian conditions with special focus on prolonged use of mobile phones, it said.
The telecom industry has brought various instances before the DoT and the Trai about residents in colonies and societies protesting over installation of mobile towers due to fear that it may cause cancer.

A World Health Organisation expert, Michael Repacholi, has also said that mobile radiation are less harmful than sun rays and the radiation emitted from mobile tower have negligible impact on health but more research needs to be done in this area to find health hazard from it.

According to guidelines issued by DoT, specific absorption rate - measure of radiation, on mobile phone sold in India should not be more than 1.6 watt/ kg averaged over a mass of 1 gram of human tissue. Most countries however allow SAR of 2 watt from mobile phones.
Mobile tower radiation in India is also one-tenth compared to the level that most of the countries follow.