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Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Are you limiting kids’ cell phone use?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Theresa is on vacation this week. Keith Still will be filling in today and tomorrow.
Not long ago, my seven-year-old daughter and some friends were coloring together. What were they drawing…unicorns? rainbows? family portraits? No, no and no. With a few snips of the scissors and a couple of magic marker lines, they each fashioned their own “cell phones” and walked off to chat with each other. The cell phone has become a kid’s most-coveted accessory, but the potential risk it poses to children is still unknown.
Last week, the director of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute warned 3,000 members of his faculty and staff to limit cell phone use - especially among children — because of possible cancer risks. No studies to date have shown a link between the phones and cancerous tumors, but Dr. Ronald B. Herberman says it takes too long to get answers from science. Children, he says, are at an increased risk because their brains are still developing.
“Really at the heart of my concern is that we shouldn’t wait for a definitive study to come out, but err on the side of being safe rather than sorry later,” Herberman said.
Herberman bases his concerns on early unpublished data looking at how electromagnetic radiation emitted by mobile phones may affect human cells in the brain and central nervous system. Most radiowaves are emitted from a cell phone’s antenna in the handset, and the electromagnetic radiation is strongest at your head when you hold the phone to your ear. Groups in the UK, France and India have also called for limiting children’s cell phone use out of similar concerns.
I’m not a big alarmist, and I’m not sure I believe a link between cell phones and cancer will ultimately be proven. However, I am a parent. And no parent wants to do anything that could put their child’s health or life at risk.
My kids have known for years that the closest thing they’re getting to a mobile phone is that yellow construction paper model - mainly because I don’t see why they would possibly need one any time soon. In fact, I told my rising fifth grader she could make a phone of her own (in any color) the last time she reminded me how many of her 10-year-old friends had real cell phones.
But a lot of kids do have them these days. Even my 7-year-old can list a growing number of friends who carry one. For some families, it’s a status thing. Others have real reasons for giving their young children some way to communicate with Mom or Dad throughout the day.
So what’s a parent to do with warnings like Dr. Herberman’s? Does your child already have a cell phone? Do you make them use hands-free kits (which can reduce the radiation their heads absorb)? Are you going to limit their use? Do they use the phone mostly for talking or texting (which I would think would pose a lesser threat)? At what point does a possible unknown health risk outweigh any real benefit to your child or teen using a mobile?
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