MOBILE PHONES: MUST WE AWAIT EVIDENCE?
In this21st Century, everyone is advocating for evidence-based practice in all fields or areas. While this is right in most cases, I think that sometimes we should adopt/ promote measures to prevent any exposure to hazardous substances like mobile phone radiation. Traditionally, it is known that prevention is better than cure and not long ago there was this thing called the precautionary principle, all these seem to be on the shelf when we discuss mobile phones and their radiations. I argue that agents or substances or products suspected of being hazardous and there is no clear evidence should be subjected to control measures on the "prudence principle of public health". In this principle, inconvenience consequent to making an error on the safety side is preferred than allowing for possible harm to occur. I think that this is what our grand fathers had in mind when they said that there is no smoke without fire.
Dear health promotion activists, I appreciate the importance of evaluation of scientific data. But we should not forget the importance of community concerns as has been portrayed in the media in the recent past. We should appreciate that news in the media give little value to data and more often pay attention to suffering individuals who beyond any logic believe that they are suffering preventable harm. My understanding is that using mobile phones is an individual choice and certainly has economic advantages, what do we lose when mobile phone manufacturers are asked to put labels of the amount of radiation in each phone? What harm do we do by advising users to limit talk time on their mobile phones? Cancer morbidity and mortality continues to cause suffering to our loved ones, relatives, friends and in-laws yet the various methods used to prevent it have reached their diminishing returns. My conviction is that action to limit carcinogenic hazards thought to be! associated with use of mobile phones is worth a mention to the public. Unfortunately, I see a world marred with moves and activities intended to cause confusion and misunderstandings in whatever is being done to establish the extent of hazards associated with mobile phone use and overshadowing initiation of measures to reduce the risk. I hope this does not last.
William B. Mbabazi