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Court rules that mobile-phone usage caused cancer

Posted on Thursday May 27 5:45:00 UTC 2010

For the first time the Court of Appeal of Brescia in Italy has recognised that excessive use of mobile phone can cause cancer.
In a revolutionary judgement, the Court of Appeal of Brescia has recognised that physical harm is cause by the electromagnetic waves and the mobile phone.

The cases concerned Innocente Marcolini, who was head finance of a very important company in Brescia and who in 2002 started getting excruciating pains in the part of his face where he uses the mobile phone. In effect Marcolini used the mobile phone for five hours a day negotiating and concluding contracts with the company’s clients. After being operated for the tumor, his face is now semi-paralysed, he has lost his sense of touch and half his tongue and has great problems with his left eye, as well as difficulties in chewing and in speaking. He now suffers from 80% disability, and has to undergo extensive therapy and physiotherapy.

In his case, the Court of Appeal recognised that the cause of his condition was s the excessive use of mobile phones, and concluded that his use for business purposes constitutes injury on duty.

Of course it was not easy for Marcolini to convince the industrial tribunal that the cause of his disability was the use of the mobile phone and he was lucky to find the support of a neurosurgeon from Brescia, Dr Giuseppe Grasso, and two neurologists, Angelo Gino Levis and Paolo Liberini. In effect, Marcolini lost his case before the industrial tribunal, but then won it on appeal. In this landmark judgement – not only for Italy but also for us and for many EU member states – the Court has for the first time recognised that there are electromagnetic waves caused by the use of mobile phones do cause harm.

Although many countries like Malta are awaiting instructions from the World Health Organisation, there are other countries which argue that it is better safe than sorry, and which have legislated a lower rate of emission from these electromagnetic waves than that of 45 established by the WHO.

The final results of an international study by WHO, intended to produce definitive evidence on whether cell phones cause cancer, could be released any day now. Nine years ago the World Health Organisation launched ‘interphone’ to determine whether brain tumors can be linked to electromagnetic radiation from cell phone. The researchers analysed cell phone use by 14,000 people in 13 countries. Half of the participants had brain tumors; half did not. Fieldwork for the study ended in 2006 but a final paper has yet to be published.