What Scientists Are Saying
Scientists have published over 1,000 studies on animals and plants exposed to wireless radiation and other non ionizing electromagnetic fields (EMFs). They have repeatedly found harmful effects in animals and plants.
“The 5G expansion is leading to a significant increase in EMF emissions…
Based on an assessment of the overall study situation on insects, we must warn against a careless deployment of further mobile telephony infrastructure, as harmful effects on insect populations would be likely…”
—Alain Thill, Marie-Claire Cammaerts and Alfonso Balmori
Biological effects of electromagnetic fields on insects: a systematic review and meta-analysis
2023 3
— Quote Source
“Numerous studies across all frequencies and taxa indicate that current low-level anthropogenic EMF can have myriad adverse and synergistic effects, including on orientation and migration, food finding, reproduction, mating, nest and den building, territorial maintenance and defense, and on vitality, longevity and survivorship itself. Effects have been observed in mammals such as bats, cervids, cetaceans, and pinnipeds among others, and on birds, insects, amphibians, reptiles, microbes and many species of flora.”
—Blake Levitt, Henry Lai and Albert Manville
Reviews on Environmental Health, 2022
“Measures are needed to protect public health and the environment. Plants and animals, in fact, are affected by the chronic exposure to radiofrequency, with significant damages mostly to birds and bees populations.”
—Appeal of Scientists for Electromagnetic Safety sent to the Italian Parliament signed by 50 eminent EMF scientists, researchers and scholars
2023
…we strongly recommend the implementation of complementary measures aimed at reducing wildlife exposure to RF-EMF, particularly for species of major conservation concern.”
Jérémy S. P. Froidevaux, Laura Recuero Virto, Marek Czerwiński, Arno Thielens, and Kirsty J. Park Addressing Wildlife Exposure to Radiofrequency Electromagnetic Fields: Time for Action Environmental Science & Technology Letters
2023
"We recommend a full environmental impact review to evaluate 5G and the rapid proliferation of 4G wireless antennas in the USA.
A three part review published in Reviews in Environmental Health found the scientific evidence showing adverse effects is sufficient to trigger new regulatory action to protect wildlife, yet the US does not have regulations that were ever designed to protect flora and fauna...U.S. safety limits for cell phones and cell towers must rest on sound science to ensure the public and wildlife are protected.”
—Letter from Expert Scientists to the FCC
Signatories include the former Director of the National Institute of Environmental Sciences Linda S. Birnbaum, PhD; Jerome A. Paulson, MD, FAAP, retired chair of environmental health for American Academy of Pediatrics; and other experts: Lennart Hardell MD, PhD, Devra Davis, PhD, MPH; Ronald M. Powell, PhD; David O. Carpenter, MD; Anthony Miller, MD; Kent Chamberlin, PhD; Fiorella Belpoggi PhD; Livio Giuliani, PhD; Morando Soffritti, MD; Rodolfo E. Touzet, PhD; Theodora Scarato, MSW; Colin L. Soskolne, PhD; Paul Héroux, PhD; Paul Ben-Ishai, PhD; Meg Sears PhD; Claudio Fernández Rodríguez; Igor Belyaev, PhD; Marc Arazi MD; Frank Clegg; John Frank MD; David Gee; Suleyman Dasdag PhD; Christos D. Georgiou, PhD; Prof. Dominique Belpomme, MD; Philippe Irigaray, PhD; Dr. Pierre Madl; Stella Canna Michaelidou, PhD; Alvaro Augusto de Salles, PhD; and Adejoke Olukayode Obajuluwa PhD.
2021
“EMF exposure exerted strong physiological stress on honeybees as shown by the enhanced expression of heat-shock proteins and genes involved in antioxidant activity and affected the expression levels of behavior-related genes…Our study provides conclusive evidence of detrimental impacts of EMF on honeybee’s pollination behavior, leading to negative effects on plant community.”
—Molina-Montenegro MA, Acuña-Rodríguez IS, Ballesteros GI, Baldelomar M, Torres-Díaz C, Broitman BR, Vázquez DP.
—Electromagnetic fields disrupt the pollination service by honeybees
Scientific Advances
2023
“Statistical analyses demonstrated that the electromagnetic radiation from cellphone towers is harmful to trees…This constitutes a danger for trees worldwide.”
—Waldmann-Selsam, C., Balmori-de la Puente, A., Breunig, H., & Balmori, A.
Radiofrequency radiation injures trees around mobile phone base stations
Science of The Total Environment
2016
“RF-EMF had a significant effect on birds, insects, other vertebrates, other organisms and plants in 70% of the studies. Development and reproduction of birds and insects are the most strongly affected endpoints…”
“Amongst the more recent laboratory studies, evidence of an effect of RF-EMF on mortality and development of embryos was in all cases found at both high and low dosages. In all the five field studies found a significant effect of RF-EMF on breeding density, reproduction or species composition. Field observations give a closer representation of real-life exposure thus RF-EMF, especially in the 900 MHz GSM band could be a certain factor influencing the ecology of birds.”
—Cucurachi S, Tamis WL, Vijver MG, Peijnenburg WJ, Bolte JF, de Snoo GR.
A review of the ecological effects of radiofrequency electromagnetic fields (RF-EMF)
Environment International
2013
“The effects on DNA and reproduction reported by different labs on a variety of animals demonstrate a remarkable similarity. For example, Sharma and Kumar [47] found a large decrease in reproduction (egg laying) of bees after exposure to mobile phone radiation, which was identically observed before in fruit flies [15,16,41,42] and birds [49, 50, 51]. The recorded decreased reproduction is strongly corroborated by very similar effects in amphibians [54, 55], rats [17, 46], and human sperm [44]. This unique similarity of effects in different organisms found by different research groups can be explained by the observed cell death induction in reproductive cells due to DNA damage found for Drosophila ovarian cells [15,16], human sperm cells [22], mice and rat sperm cells [10,17], and chick embryos [36]. It is evident that such a similarity of findings is not a coincidence.”
Dimitris Panagopoulos
—Comparing DNA damage induced by mobile telephony and other types of man-made electromagnetic fields.
Mutation Research Reviews in Mutation Research
2019
“The wildlife diversity significantly reduced with increasing EMR strengths, especially in areas (<12 km from phone mast) with greater than 250 ± 20 μA/m EMR levels. We suggest that deployment of wireless telecommunication infrastructure should take into account EMR levels, safe zones and avoid or minimize biological loss in hotspots.”
—Vincent Raphael Nyirenda, Ngawo Namukonde, Esther Buumba Lungu, Sande Mulwanda, Kenneth Kalezu, Matamyo Simwanda, Darius Phiri, Chansa Chomba, Josephat Kalezhi & Chisala Abbie Lwali
2022
“The available literature on the effect of RF-EMFs on plants to date observed the significant trend of radiofrequency radiation influence on plants.”
”Our analysis demonstrates that the data from a substantial amount of the studies on RF-EMFs from mobile phones show physiological and/or morphological effects (89.9%, p < 0.001). Additionally, our analysis of the results from these reported studies demonstrates that the maize, roselle, pea, fenugreek, duckweeds, tomato, onions and mungbean plants seem to be very sensitive to RF-EMFs.”
—Malka N. Halgamuge
Review: Weak radiofrequency radiation exposure from mobile phone radiation on plants
Electromagnetic Biology and Medicine
2017
“The audiograms and spectrograms revealed that active mobile phone handsets have a dramatic impact on the behavior of the bees, namely by inducing the worker piping signal.
In natural conditions, worker piping either announces the swarming process of the bee colony or is a signal of a disturbed bee colony.”
—Daniel Favre
Mobile phone-induced honeybee worker piping
Apidologie
2011
“The current study demonstrated that mobile phone radiation is harmful to honey bee stomach cells, and we recommend limiting the use of mobile phones near hives.”
—Mahmoud EA and Gabarty A
African Entomology
2021
“Our results of field trials suggest that prolonged RF-EMF exposure has a negative impact on plant photosynthesis and development.”
—Tran, N. T., Jokic, L., Keller, J., Geier, J. U., & Kaldenhoff, R.
2023
“Radiation from the cell phone influences honey bees’ behavior and physiology. There was reduced motor activity of the worker bees on the comb initially, followed by en masse migration and movement toward “talk mode” cell phone. The initial quiet period was characterized by rise in concentration of biomolecules including proteins, carbohydrates and lipids, perhaps due to stimulation of body mechanism to fight the stressful condition created by the radiations.”
—Neelima R. Kumar, Sonika Sangwan, and Pooja Badotra
Exposure to cell phone radiations produces biochemical changes in worker honey bees
Toxicology International
2011
“These results indicate that radiation emitted by phone masts in a real situation may affect the development and may cause an increase in mortality of exposed tadpoles. This research may have huge implications for the natural world, which is now exposed to high microwave radiation levels from a multitude of phone masts.”
—Alfonso Balmori
Electromagnetic Biology and Medicine
2010
“Our results revealed a noticeable suppression (approximately 45%) of inflammatory responses in EMR-exposed lizards compared to sham-exposed animals.”
“Conclusion Daily radiofrequency EMR exposure seems to affect, at least partially, the immunocompetence of the Aegean wall lizard.”
—Mina, D., Sagonas, K., Fragopoulou, A. F., Pafilis, P., Skouroliakou, A., Margaritis, L. H., Tsitsilonis, O. E., & Valakos, E. D.
Immune responses of a wall lizard to whole-body exposure to radiofrequency electromagnetic radiation
International Journal of Radiation Biology,
2016
“The findings suggest that electromagnetic radiations induced oxidative stress in T. foenum-graecum L. and increased activity of antioxidant enzymes as a protective mechanism against cellular damage. The study highlights the potential risks associated with EMF radiations on plant systems and underscores the importance of further research in this field.”
—Surbhi Sharma, Priyanka Sharma, Shalini Bahel, Joat Singh & Jatinder Kaur Katnoria
Toxicology and Environmental Health Sciences
2023
