Netherlands EHS conference

Hi all,

Someone sent this to me, and I'm forwarding it to the group.

Marc

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Symposium proceedings

Internationaal symposium

Understanding electrohypersensitivity -EHS

December 8, 2006
Utrecht – the Netherlands


Working group on electrical hypersensitivity
Platform health and environment


Opening address

Ladies and gentleman,

I have the privilege of organizing the first symposium that focuses
on the problem of electrical hypersensitivity -or EHS as it is called
nowadays. There have been several meetings in Europe before on the
topic of EHS but the emphasis has usually been on the question whether
the problem really exists. And on whether people can really suffer
from exposure to electromagnetic fields (EMF) to which they have
developed a curious and disabling hypersensitivity.

Today, our starting point is that such people exist, that
they deserve attention and respect and that measures should
be taken to make a normal life at home and at work possible
for them. We hope to exchange knowledge and expertise from
the speakers as well as from those participating in discussions.
We have here an assembly of some 65 participants, all with
keen interest in this matter, without doubt. But we hoped
for a larger representation of health authorities and press.
Some are here anyway, but we keep trying to stimulate
interest and public debate even better. With the ever-increasing
impact of EMFs from digital electronics and cordless or mobile
communication systems problems are bound to increase rapidly.
Let’s hope that our insights lead to a better understanding
and general acceptance of the EHS problems and do something about it.
I wish you a meaningful meeting!

Dr. Hugo Schooneveld
Chairman of the Dutch working group on EHS, the WEO

Parade of authentic electrohypersensitive persons

Three adult persons report on the EMF factors causing their disabling
sensitivity, the health
problems that emerged as a consequence of the inflicted stress
reactions, the measures taken to
eliminate the most annoying EMFs and the way in which they rearranged
their lives in order to
keep fit for family relations and work and enjoy life.
Names and addresses of these persons are available on demand.

Symposium papers

Overview of the EHS problem
by Hugo Schooneveld

-Working group on Electrical hypersensitivity –EHS
-Foundation of EHS

www.electroallergie.org


See the connection!

Some people develop electrical hypersensitivity to certain types of EMF
and develop certain of
the health problems related to conflicting fight/flight syndromes
EHS may occur in all ages, social classes and professions. Jobs with
high or long exposure
to low-frequency and pulsed high-frequency EMFs present relatively high
health risks. These
conclusions were drawn from questionnaires completed by 200 EHS people
in the Netherlands.


Proposed scheme showing the strict individual
relationship between physical character of
disturbing EMF and specific type of stress
response.

Follow the red line

‘Electrosmog’ contains EMF from several
sources. Person 2 is sensitised only for source
C and suffers from headache as his primary
stress symptom.

Progression of EHS

Electrosensitivity usually increases and broadens over the years:
thresholds are lowered, the
range of disturbing EMFs widens. EMF field strengths causing discomfort
may be several orders
of magnitude lower than those accepted as safe by several health
authorities. Complaints
disappear after the removal of ambient magnetic and electric fields.

Perception of EMF

Most EMF types do not bother most of the people. Pulsed high-frequency
fields from most types
of wireless communication systems, some of the low or intermediate
frequencies (up till some
ten-thousand Hertz), and extremely-low frequencies (ELF) present a major
hazard. Especially
when the pulse shape is not sinusoidal or when pulses have steep flanks
and occur non-
continuously, such fields are to be feared. Fields radiating from
electronic equipment are
frequently disturbing, even when field intensities are well below
1nanoTesla (magnetic
alternating fields) or below 1V/m (electrical fields). It is desirable
that appropriate measuring
equipment is developed to monitor such specific fields.

Recognition of EHS

Health authorities have so far failed to accept the existence of EHS and
organizations like the
European Commission and World Health Organization openly criticize
research directed to solve
basis questions and also discourage such research. This attitude is
clearly unfair to those
suffering from EHS and is jeopardizing attempts to comprehend the
growing incidence of
environmental diseases. Social and economic welfare is even put at risk.

Why are certain EMFs disturbing?

Many electronic parts wire networks emitting high or low frequencies may
be disturbing and we
want to know what the physical nature is of the disturbing parameter (if
there is such a
discriminator). EHS people are usually advised to limit the use minimal
electric equipment and
not to live under GSM/UMTS masts, to abandon their mobile phone and
digital home phone of
the DECT type. Further, all equipment equipped with digital power supply
and LCD screen is to
be kept at a distance as well as electric motor and generators of all
types are potentially harmful.
We are currently working on determining the relevant field parameters so
that people may be
given better advice as which fields to be feared and which are
acceptable.

Delayed effects

Most EHS people report that harmful magnetic field effects take place a
few to several hours
after exposure to a certain field . This delay in response is the reason
why the relation between
exposure and effects is usually not seen and medical help is always
inadequate. Information
should be made public to prevent that too many people are invalidated by
unknown exposures to
EMF.

Diagnosis

To date, no biological marker is available to assess the state of
electrosensitivity. Research
should focus on the discovery of such markers for use in medical
practices and field sanitation. It
is vitally important for scientific experiments that volunteers are
selected on the basis of sound
biomedical diagnosis or on psychological and cognitive test results, or
both.

Scientific experiments

Research on EHS needs a multidisciplinary cooperation for optimizing
chances for success.
Factors to be taken into consideration are, for instance:

• Selection of useful and well-screened volunteers for experimental and
control groups
• Selection of provocation conditions relevant to personal and
individual sensitivity reports
• Selection of the appropriate evaluation method, based on the
individual’s report.
Experiments not paying attention to individual differences in field
sensitivity and effect are not
to be taken seriously. There is a need for combined efforts in
biomedical and psychological
disciplines to work out the best way of assessing individual EHF
problems.
Monitoring EMF-related Health Problems in the
Netherlands

Miep Verheuvel, biologist MNGM

www.gezondmilieu.nl

The Dutch Monitoring Network Health and Environment (MNGM) is a
non-profit, nongovernmental
organisation, which registers environmentally related health complaints
since
1994. Health complaints as well as environmental factors are encoded and
recorded in a
nationwide database. Researchers and research institutes can make use of
the data, founded
exclusively on perception, to build hypotheses and ideas. The database
is not of epidemiological
or geographical significance. The system is comparable to the
registration of adverse side effects
of pharmaceuticals, after they have been released on the market. For
this occasion we selected
the physical environmental factors, according to EMF and present them as
functionality of time.
We discuss the numbers of individual complainers and the health
complaints and compare the
patterns of health complaints with the outcome of the inquiry on
electrohypersensitive persons.
It is shown that health complaints expressed by people affected either
by HF EMF of base
stations or by LF EMF radiating household electronics and electric
appliances have much
overlap. Fatigue, headache and insomnia are reported most frequently.
Further, several of these
persons reporting to the MGM appear to have a medical history of
immunological derangements,
multisystem diseases such as MCS, CFS, fibromyalgie, and damaged nervous
system by organopsychosyndrome, multiple sclerosis, Lyme disease and by
medical treatments, hospitalization
and narcoses. It is noteworthy that several of the health symptoms
registered were already seen
much earlier in East-European countries as described by Gordon in 1966.

Much remains to be investigated to reveal the biological mechanism
leading to EHS. A plea is
made for the establishment of a Centre for Environmental Health
Research, with sections for
home sanitation and a training facility for environmental physicians.

Sources of hazardous electromagnetic fields

Michiel Haas
Instituut voor Bouwbiologie en ecologie (NIBE)

www.nibe.org

Dr. Haas elaborated on all hazardous sources of EMFs outside, in the
office and at home. Based
on measured emissions of field strength and duration of exposure, he
presented the following
Top-10 sources of electrosmog: DECT phones -waterbed -electric alarm
clock-wireless
network -hand piece of mobile phone for kids -microwave oven -electric
installations electronic
blanket -induction heater and TV. Haas' company -the NIBE-is using this
and other
information for designing 'healthy' housing and offices.
Further EMF sources are electronics in car, buses and trains, GSM
handset, nearby base stations,
overhead power lines, railway traction power lines, fluorescent
advertizing in shopping malls,
and overhead high-voltage power lines.

Conclusion: Electrosmog is an important reason for chronic tiredness,
stress, aggression,
depression, and other civilization illnesses, even cancer. In the past
100 years is the chance to get
one of illnesses increased from 1:4000 to 1:2!

Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity: A still open question

Professor Dr. Norbert Leitgeb

Institute of Clinical Engineering, Graz University of Technology,
Austria

There is no doubt, that an increasing number of persons suffer from
non-specific health
symptoms and, in case of missing medical explanation, attribute them to
environmental
electromagnetic fields. However, the term electromagnetic
hypersensitivity is ill-defined. It is
used in different context:

a) as a medical term attributed to afflicted patients irrespective of
any causal relationship
with EMF;
b) to describe the ability of individuals to perceive EMF at significant
lower levels than
most people;
c) to describe a yet hypothetical adverse interaction of environmental
EMF with people of
increased sensitivity.

By now, in spite of many attempts, no causal role of environmental
electromagnetic fields in the
development of adverse reactions could be proven nor was it possible to
identify a specific
symptom cluster to associate it with a clinical EMF syndrome. However,
the awareness of the
problem is high. An inquiry among Austrian physicians showed that an
overwhelming
percentage of them beliefs that environmental EMF could be associated
with the initiation and/
or progression of non-specific health symptoms. It could be shown that
the results of studies on
EHS people critically depend on the strategy of selecting volunteers.
This makes it difficult to
draw a final conclusion from existing literature. In the meanwhile
enough data from the general
population could be collected to allow identification of persons with
significantly increased
electromagnetic sensitivity. This is done by repetitive measuring their
perception ability for
electric currents directly applied at their forearms. The threshold
value and its variance have
proven to be a valuable tool for such a differentiation.

People claiming to be electrohypersensitive show a higher than average
sensitivity in this assay
than an 'average' citizen. There is a clear difference among EHS people
as to the time of the day
when highest sensibility for electric stimulation of skin of underarm is
reported. Therefore, daily
fluctuations should always be taken into account.

In another experiment, people claiming electrosensitivity towards HF
EMFs from mobile phone
base stations were subjected to experimentation in their own bedroom.
The question was if
shielding the bed from such EMFs with HF reflecting cloth would allow
these volunteers to sleep
better. Experiments are still underway, but the first impression is that
there is no clear-cut
evidence that the presence or absence of such protective cloth could be
truly noted.

Need of epidemiological studies on EHS effects.

Professor Dr. Lucas Reijnders,
Institute of biodiversity and ecosystem dynamics


There are as yet very few good epidemiological studies dealing with the
potential risks of
radiofrequency electromagnetic fields used for cordless communication.
The few exceptions
include the studies of Hutter and others (et al.) (concerning GSM base
stations) and of Lönn et
al. (dealing with handy’s). This is partly a reflection of a more
general imbalance between
money spent on the development of new cordless technologies and money
spent on preventing or
limiting adverse unintentional effects thereof. This is in sharp
contrast to the longstanding
practice of preventing and limiting unintended effects of new chemicals.
It may also be a
reflection of the communication industries’ unwillingness to face the
possibility that unintended
effects may occur.

At the present rate, it will take us probably a further 10-20 years
before we have a reliable
picture of unintended effects. In view of the general use of cordless
technologies this would
seem unacceptable. A crash program of epidemiological research (as a
part of a more general
crash program of empirical research) is needed. Obvious matters of
interest for further
epidemiological studies are potential effects on the central nervous
system, tumour risk and
within-population variability of sensitivity.

Lönn, S. et al. Mobile phone use and the risk of acoustic neuroma.
Epidemiology 15 (2004) 653

Hutter, H.P et al. Subjective symptoms, sleeping problems, and cognitive
performance in
subjects living near mobile phone base stations. Occupational and
Environmental Medicine 63
(2006) 307-313

Funds for the program “EMF effects on health
research”

Julia van Os
Zorgonderzoek Nederland / Medische wetenschappen (ZonMW)


Internet: www.zonmw.nl


Summary

The ZonMw organisation

The mission of ZonMw, the Netherlands Organisation for Health Research
and Development, is
to improve prevention, cure and care in the Netherlands by supporting
and financing research,
development and implementation. ZonMw is a national health council
appointed by both the
Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport (VWS) and the Netherlands
Organisation for Scientific
Research (NWO). With an annual budget of €100 million we invest in
fundamental and applied
research of the highest quality. Where possible, we make sure the
outcomes lead to effective
practical innovations in health care and prevention.

Aim of the programme Electromagnetic Fields and Health

Scientific research into the health effects of exposure to
electromagnetic fields and the impact of
new technology on well-being have not kept pace with the technological
developments.
Scientists are therefore unable to respond adequately to the public’s
questions. More and better
targeted research is therefore needed in the Netherlands.

For this purpose ZonMW has developed the programme Electromagnetic
Fields and Health. Aim
of the programme is to substantially enhance the Dutch knowledge
infrastructure in the field of
electromagnetic fields (0-300 GHz) and health, giving the Netherlands
its ‘own’ scientific
authority in this area. The infrastructure will be set up in such a way
that it makes a substantial
contribution to the international research effort in this field. The aim
will be to keep track of new
electromagnetic field applications and to clarify some of the effects of
electromagnetic fields.
ZonMW takes great care in guarding the relevance, reliability, quality
and independence of the
research funded under the programme, irrespective of the results or the
source of funding.
The Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment (VROM) has
made this
programme possible. The programme was launched in August of this year,
has a duration of
eight years and a budget of € 16.6 million. At this moment six different
calls for grant
applications are open. The deadline for application is December 15th
2006.

General conclusions

It was for the first time that a symposium was organized to study the
problem of EHS from
inside the group of electrosensitive people. EHS is a complex
phenomenon: Some people suffer
from certain electromagnetic fields (EMF) in their environment and
produce some of the health
complaints associated with activated stress syndromes. It concerns
approximately 1,5% of
citizens who develop chronic fatigue, concentration problems, insomnia,
skin problems, tinnitus,
pain in muscles and joints and some other inconveniences. EHS will never
subside and the only
practical remedy is to eliminate equipment and installations emitting
the specifically disturbing
EMFs.

Physicians and medical authorities don't usually recognize the real
cause of health problems
mentioned because each EHS person develops his or her own specific
repertoire of disturbing
EMF parameters and show individually programmed electrostress symptoms.
When looking at
these people as a group, there is no obvious relation between average
field strengths of EMFs
and general stress symptoms. But on an individual basis there is a very
strict relation, each
person reveals his specific choice of disturbing EMF parameters and
health effects. Given this
complexity, it requires a different approach while experimenting with
human volunteers. Unless
clear data become available from such indispensable person-oriented
experiments, a general
acceptance of the EHS problem will proceed only slowly.

In experiments cited by some of the speakers (Leitgeb, Reijnders) it
became clear that volunteers
usually were not able to judge whether high-frequency EMFs were either
or not present in
experimental double-blind provocation studies in experimental settings.
This lack of proper
response can be taken by critics as evidence indicating that such people
are not electrosensitive
after all. On the contrary, it may as well be that no relevant stimuli
were offered to the volunteers
or that no relevant choice of answers was offered to choose from. It is
rather the lack of basic
knowledge that prevents us from designing the proper experiments.

Apart from the fact that much remains to be desired in designing
experimental questions and
approaches, the influence of human emotions is rarely taken into
consideration. The sleeping
experiments of Leitgeb, carried out at the people’s own bedroom,
represents a breakthrough in
experimental approach. However, even under these conditions people who
report decreased wellbeing
caused by high-frequency EMS from GSM base stations cannot reproducibly
state whether
EMF-shielding curtains have -or have not-been wrapped around their beds.

One of the questions from the audience referred to the minimal group
size of persons subjected
to provocation experiments. Leitgeb’s answer was: just one person. A
single individual should
allow experimentation under conditions defined by his personal
preferences and reaction
repertoire. To date, no such person has offered his services for the
simple reason that frequently
repeated exposures would make him very sick.

Present-day attention is focussed mainly on effects of high-frequency
fields from GSM/UMTS
base stations. Several speakers (Schooneveld, Haas, and Verheuvel)
expressed the view that
attention should be focussed also on fields in the homes such as those
emitted by
DECT telephones, WLAN and other wireless communication systems. Also low
frequency fields
should be considered. According to data from questionnaires, people
suffering from EHS report
that ordinary electrical or electronic appliances such as TV, PC, vacuum
cleaners, electric (bed)
heaters and blankets, alarm clocks may be disturbing. These items all
emit low-frequency EMFs.
People don't usually realize this due to the long incubation time
between stimulus and effect. A
delay of minutes to several hours or days is not unusual.

One of the requirements for work with volunteers is to ascertain that
volunteers are fit for this
purpose. Self-reported claims on electrosensitivity should be checked
carefully and the criteria
for such a check are rather 'soft', at the moment. There is presently no
specific marker for EMF
vulnerability. Besides, there are several other biotic and abiotic
environmental factors that cause
discomfort, such as allergens, odours, noise, UV light etc. All give the
same array of 'vague
health complaints'. Research should be directed towards elucidating
key-identifiers for EHS. But
first of all, test procedures must be developed to assess the 'quality'
of volunteers as to
responding reproducibly to applied EMFs in provocation studies.

On behalf of the Netherlands organization for health research and
development. Julia van Os
communicated on the fact that a budget of €16,6 million has been made
available for research on
possible effects of EMF on health. By December 15, research plans had to
be proposed for
funding. We all hope that good research projects bring some more light
into questions as to
which EMFs do affect what processes in the body such that so many health
problems do emerge.
All speakers were of the opinion that more research is needed to prevent
that unnecessary harm
is afflicted to people for the simple reason that signs of deleterious
effects are ignored or
overseen.

The audience responded with enthusiasm on the suggestion that meetings
like this should be
organized again in future. One of the objectives could then be to open
communication with
health authorities. Exchange of thoughts and experiences should help
finding a common basis for
support and advice for EHS victims. These seek recognition of their
problems and cooperation in
attempts to improve working conditions in home or office. There is a
good example in the
municipality of Stockholm and some Swedish provinces. Authorities are
all too eager to assist
electrosensitives in making the necessary changes in accommodation which
help to keep workers
in good shape, regardless the exact diagnostic label of health
complaints. Such a strategy should
be adopted by every nation with a feeling for the needs of sensitised
people.
This symposium has been made possible by a generous gift by the Dutch
foundation for health
and environment (PGM).

Hugo Schooneveld
E-mail: [hidden email]

Postscriptum: The Powerpoint presentations of Schooneveld, Verheuvel,
Haas, Reijnders and
van Os van be viewed on website www.electroallergie.org of
www.stichtingehs.nl.

File: Symposium proceedings

> Hi all,
>
> Someone sent this to me, and I'm forwarding it to the group.
>
> Marc

Actually, I guess I should have just mentioned the following
website, which contains all of that information and more:

http://www.electroallergie.org/

Marc