The controversy surrounding EMFs never seems to end, and with good reason. The technology is changing quickly with the rise of 5G and wireless technology being in everything from your car to your fridge. The truth is, we don’t know the health effects of this technology and won’t fully know for years.
We’ve tackled this topic a few times on the podcast and the blog, but today we’ll get an update from EMF expert Daniel DeBaun of DefenderShield on new developments, especially those surrounding 5G.
Episode Highlights: The Advent of 5G
- what non-ionizing radiation is and why we need to be cautious of it
- what’s coming with 5G and why it is a big deal
- the surprising difference between 3G, 4G, and 5G
- why 5G represents a much bigger jump than previous generations
- how the EMF controversy can be related to trans fats
- how our current safety standards for cell phones was set 35 years ago (and needs an update)
- why kids are more vulnerable to the effects of EMFs than adults
- why women are more electrosensitive than men
- the effect of blue light from screens on circadian rhythm and sleep
- what studies show about EMFs, laptops, and sperm
- practical modifications you can make to your home and devices to make them safer
- and more!
Resources We Mention
- DefenderShield.com
- For the research and studies Daniel mentions see https://www.defendershield.com/learn/studies
- Radiation Nation: The Fallout of Modern Technology by Daniel DeBaun
- The Non-Tinfoil Guide to EMFs by Nicolas Pineault
- The Body Electric: Electromagnetism and the Body of Life by Robert Becker and Gary Selden
- Little Women by Louisa M. Alcott
- DefenderShield for laptops
- Shields for tablets
- EMF shielding phone cases
- Programmable outlet timer
- Blue light blocking glasses
More From Wellness Mama
- 462: EMFs, Quantum Healing Technology and Inner Power With Philipp of Leela Q
- 193: How to Protect Your Family From the Rise of 5G & Other EMFs
- 73: The Truth About EMFs, WiFi, and Radiation (+ How to Avoid Them!)
- 120: A Real-Life Approach to Reducing EMFs with Dr. Libby Darnell
- 154: Understanding and Mitigating EMFs in the Home With Peter Sierck From EMFRF
- 178: A Pediatrician Explains How EMFs Are Dramatically Affecting Our Children With EMF Kill Switch
- Is EMF Exposure Really a Big Deal?
- Why I Wear Blue Light Blocking Glasses (at Night)
- Why You Should Never Eat Vegetable Oil or Margarine
Are you concerned about EMFs? What do you do in your home?Also, please take two minutes to leave a review on iTunes. I value knowing what you think and this helps other moms find the podcast as well!
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Katie: Hello, and welcome to “The Wellness Mama Podcast,” I’m Katie from wellnessmama.com. And I’m getting an increasing number of questions about EMFs and what to do about them. And in this episode, we’re going to delve into that and what to do about it, and all of those answers. Because I am here with Daniel DeBaun, who is an internationally recognized and influential expert in shielding electronic emissions and electromagnetic radiation or EMFs. And he has a particular focus on the effect of exposure from mobile devices such as laptops, tablets, and cell phones, i.e. those things that our kids are touching all the time.
And his concern regarding the health impact of the EMFs grew from over 30 years of engineering experience in the telecommunications industry. He was on the front lines, he held a variety of leadership and executive positions in several large companies that were kind of advancing their technology here. And he’s the Co-author of the recent bestseller “Radiation Nation: The Fallout of Modern Technology.” So I cannot wait to jump in, he’s a wealth of knowledge, Daniel, welcome and thanks for being here.
Daniel: Katie, thanks so much for inviting me, I appreciate it, and I’m excited about chatting with you today about this subject.
Katie: Oh my gosh, me too. And I get so many questions and I’m sure you must as well, and I want to start with the big one which is 5G. There’s been a lot of buzz about this, this is a new thing. It’s becoming very widespread. So let’s start with the big one, the elephant in the room, can you explain what 5G is and why it’s such a big deal?
Daniel: Yeah. So by definition it’s the fifth G, well it’s the fifth generation is what it is. There’s actually been four before that, when cell phones became available, you know, 20, 30 years ago, or even further than that, it was all analog, and then all of a sudden it shifted to a digital signal. As an analog signal, it was always a constant load to your body as it traveled. With a digital signal, it’s a pulsing data content that travels within the signal. So with G1, we started to code digital signals and we got better at it at G2, we got even better at it three and four.
And at four, for example, it’s about two gigahertz that is it’s fairly fast, and it has one data stream within the signal. And you can pass maybe 10 megabits easily as a content load, so you can watch TV. You can watch media content and it’s not jittery, it looks clean. Well, 5G, is not two gigahertz. It can be up to 90 gigahertz, that means it can be 45 times faster. That’s one of the ways they’re putting more information, of course, the airwaves is by going that much faster in the speed.
They also are adding what they call MIMO, multiple in multiple out, that means there’s not just one data signal, there are multiple data signals within it. And so, where we knew there was potential concerns about up to 4G with digital signals, there’s all of a sudden becoming lots and lots of interest, on 5G. Because now you can go that much faster, and you can have multiple data stream joining inside, and that potentially can be harmful in some thinking, and others in the service providers community, think it’s the best thing since sliced bread.
Katie: That makes sense, and I get that it’s a tough issue because, obviously, there are many positives to technology that many of us enjoy, and that are convenient. And we don’t want to give up our laptops, or our phones, or the ability to watch video on either of those devices. So I feel like this is going to be a big thing that we do need to address during this current generation, because like you said, it’s getting exponentially faster. It’s not just that like 2G or a 3G was two gigahertz, and 3G is three gigahertz, this is increasing at exponential rate as technology does. And there’s not a likelihood that it’s going to slow down or go away.
So I feel like this is something important. I’m I’d love for you to expound on… before I know we touched on this a little bit in your first episode that we did together. But can you explain a little more in-depth what EMFs are and how they might impact the body? Because I know there’s a lot of doubters out there who say, oh, it’s non-ionizing radiation therefore it’s safe. And I know that you also have a background in research and have some really valuable insight on this, so can you delve into that?
Daniel: I sure, can. So you are correct, we’re taking a signal that’s been around two gigahertz and we’re multiplying it by 45 up to potentially 90 gigahertz. Well, you just mentioned to me ionized radiation that’s like X-rays, gamma rays, things like that. They start becoming ionized that is you can get hit by this signal, it takes the electron and knocks it out of its orbit, and charges that electron. And it’s now a charged element that’s why they call it ionized. Well, X-rays under those circumstances, exposures that are a long, or too long cause cancer. They cause very, very serious problems to the body when exposed at long durations of time.
So why is that important? Because 90 G is one-third of the starting point to ionized radiation, even though it’s non-ionized, it’s now increasing its power to knock and destruct the cells. And so, all of a sudden, where we were getting pretty clear with science and research, talking about the dangers of the body from these exposures, now there’s a real concern. Because, well, what happens as you start approaching the ionized space, is it’s worse.
And as you remember, Katie, you know, this is a stress, this isn’t… and in terms of a cell to your body, it’s an oxidative stress. That is it really bothers the membrane to the extent where it stresses the body’s cell, and then there’s penetration of that cell under worst circumstances which causes mutated cells and DNA damage. So what do you think, 45 more times faster, what is that impact? Honestly, we actually don’t know. There’s no research in that space that says is it dangerous or not. And so, from a user point, you are right, we’re not throwing our cell phones away anytime soon. You’re not getting rid of your Wi-Fi that you use to communicate within your home. And so, they’re going to be more and more prevalent, and we are going into a space where we know less and less about it.
Katie: Yeah, exactly. And I think that’s the important distinction, is like you said, there’s not research on this, and there certainly not enough research on this. It’s so new. It’s something our grandparents didn’t face much less our parents at our ages or certainly at our children’s ages. So that’s always been my caution, when I hear people say like, “Oh, it’s not ionizing radiation to it’s completely safe.” No, that just means we know that ionizing radiation has an immediate and potential danger that we can document. That does not mean that non-ionizing radiation is safe. It just means we haven’t studied it, and we don’t have long-term data to know what the effects are.
I think that’s a really important distinction because it’s easy to fall into that trap of just thinking we can’t see it, it’s safe, it’s fine. And just think back, those of us listening, how many of us had an iPhone, or an iPad, or a tablet at the ages that our children are? None of us. They didn’t exist. I didn’t get a cell phone until almost college. And so, in a very short period of time, less than one generation we have seen a complete change in the electrical environment that we’re exposed to on a daily basis, and we don’t know what that’s going to do to our DNA over the long term, to ourselves you mentioned oxidation to our mitochondria.
There are so many levels here and there’s books like “The Body Electric” and others that really delve into the body being an electrical organism. And if we understand that, it’s only logical to understand that electrical impulses outside of us can affect the internal environment of our body. But would you agree with that, am I getting that synapsis right?
Daniel: That’s an accurate summary of events, in other words, it’s only been recently introduced in our environment as a toxin. So what does that really mean to us? Katie, you remember recently there was oil that was banned in the U.S. I forget the name of it.
Katie: Was it the trans fats?
Daniel: Yes, the trans fats. So here’s the story about trans fats. Over 45 years ago, there was this lonely biochemist who said, “It’s not the eggs that’s killing you. It’s not the steaks you’re eating. It’s the trans fats that are helping to preserve the food making it easier to spread the butter, the stuff we cook in. That stuff is what is killing us. And it took that whole 45 years or so for it to be banned. And so, here we had an environmental problem that was known embryonically some 45 years ago, and all of a sudden it’s been banned.
Well, that’s what happens when we introduce stuff in our environment we really don’t… the lady who created X-rays died of X-ray poisoning. You know, it’s so even the inventors of the technologies don’t fully understand the impact of the technologies they offer us. So yes, you are correct. We only know more and more with time, but I gotta tell you there’s been lots of recent study work at the U.S. government, and in Europe about reinforcing on non-ionizing emission, that is an X-ray… excuse me a radio frequency ray, an EMF. There’s no question whatsoever, it impacts the cell. We know about the oxidative stress to the cell, but we also know that it goes far beyond that, and it does and will create DNA damage and mutated cells.
So we are getting sufficient… in my opinion more than sufficient evidence that says this stuff we should be worried about. We should be careful about how we deal with it in our environment. Not that you can’t use your cell phone, but you gotta know that your router may be too close to you when you’re working on your workbench. Your cell phone should be put away when you’re not using it. So these kinds of things we need to be more and more aware of. And we’re learning for sure there’s enough evidence now in my opinion that says we really do need to be cautious about this stuff.
Katie: I agree. I’m 100% there with you, and I think that the unhealthy fats analogy is a really applicable one here, because we now at least have banned trans fats we know those were bad. But in that same time, there was you know, the vegetable oils and the low fat craze, and that we need to avoid like you said eggs, and steak, and saturated fats. And now, we have leading health experts saying that low-fat vegetable oil thing was one of the most dangerous health experiments of our time, and that we’re gonna pay the price of this for generations. But we’re just now starting to understand that half of a century later.
And so, now we look at the EMF issue and we’ve got people like that, that one man back then who are saying EMFs are gonna be the smoking of our generation, this is a big deal. We don’t understand what it’s doing to the body, and by the time we figure it out, it may be too late. Because if it’s affecting our cells, if it’s affecting reproduction, then it causes obviously long-term side effects especially for our children. So I’m curious, are children more susceptible than adults to EMFs, and if so, why?
Daniel: Yeah. There is a federal standard that defines the maximum power level of a cell phone. It was created 35 years ago, and the model that they used to create that standard was a six-foot male. And in that model, they looked at the thermal impact to the skull from a cell phone radiating into the skull. And what I mean by thermal is that the standard had to make sure that the area around the cell phone couldn’t increase by two degrees, and it couldn’t penetrate the male by one inch. So that’s how they created the strength of a signal for a cell phone.
But as you just pointed out, our children at six years old using a cell phone that signal goes completely through their head. And it’s a thermal transmission. In other words, it heats all the elements it hits as it passes through the head. The body of a child is very immature, and so it doesn’t have the same response. It almost can absorb the signal more so than let penetration only be one inch. So that kind of exposure at a very, very early age, we really don’t know the impact of that. We’ll know 20 years from now what the impact is. And unfortunately, all indications are we know that that kind of exposure and if it’s long-term exposure can be very dangerous to the body.
Katie: Exactly. So what other forms of EMF are we exposed to on a daily basis? So we talked about 5G and cell phones and tablets that’s definitely a major source, and one that I would say as a parent, kids don’t need. Unless your child is driving, they do not need to be on a cell phone, they just actually don’t. But what are some of the other places in a daily life that we might be encountering EMFs and maybe not even realize it?
Daniel: Katie, if you don’t mind, I’d like to go back to 5G just a little bit to help you better understand why there’s as much concern in the science community as there is. And then maybe then we can chat about the daily exposures?
Katie: Absolutely, let’s do it.
Daniel: Okay, good. So remember I mentioned how those now two digital signals data in 5G signal?
Katie: Yeah.
Daniel: Think of it this way, if I take a 10,000 pounds piece of steel, and I put it against a piece of concrete, and I keep it there constantly it won’t break the concrete. And so, that is an analogy of what was the analog signal to a cell. When we go to 5G, we’re going to have two streams of data content. So we’re gonna have two on off on off. So should we be worried? Well, we began seeing all the problems with the impacts to the body from cell phones and all the other devices that produced this, because they went from analog to digital. When they went to digital, it became an analog signal to a cell. What does that mean? It’s a jackhammer that’s hitting the cell which can fracture the cell membrane easier than a constant load as an analog signal would do. Now, we’re gonna have double jackhammers hitting the cell.
So that’s why the science community is really getting more and more concerned that in fact, the new technology brings so many more benefits to us, in communications amongst all of us and the content we want to live with, but it also does have a much more different characteristic. Now, I mentioned thermal, but most of the stuff I’ve talked about is not thermal, it’s biological. When I talk about a mutated cell that’s a biological impact it’s not a thermal impact, it could be but more often than not it’s a biological impact.
So if you have a child using a cell phone, six years old, and they are doing perfectly fine at six years old, that would mean that it seems that everything’s okay. But with biological impacts, it takes years, 10 years,15 years for the impact to be felt on those kinds of exposures. So it’s a biological concern we have more so even than the thermal issue concern. And remember, Katie, when you use a microwave oven, it’s around 2.3 gigahertz, and I talked about cell phones at about two gigahertz.
Well, in other words, the RF signal, the electromagnetic radiation we’re talking about is virtually the same frequency range as a microwave. And in a microwave, when you turn it on, it heats up the water between the cells, cells oscillate and they cook the meat. Well, in a microcosm of that to your head with a cell phone, it’s just a mini microwave just with much, much less power. But make sure you understand there’s a biological impact to the exposure.
Katie: That makes sense, and I think it’s also important to highlight that this for many people is constant exposure, whereas microwaves can be certainly very problematic, but most of us aren’t running them 24 hours a day. They’re used very infrequently for only small amounts of time, whereas especially when we’re talking about kids, they’re exposed to Wi-Fi signals, and cell signals and cell phone, and iPads almost 24 hours a day, if not 24 hours a day.
And so, this is a constant exposure so it’s one of those things that you have to look at differently. So if the body… like we can handle small amounts of stress or small amounts of toxicity, because our bodies are adaptable, we’re made to be able to handle that. We can’t handle it all day every day. It’s like if you ingest tiny amounts of arsenic from chicken or rice, you’re gonna be fine because your body can deal with it, if it’s a one-time thing. If you’re doing that all day every day, eventually you’re going to see a problem and it may not be that day, it may not be that week, but eventually, your body is going to have a problem.
And so, I feel like that’s an important distinction like you said to look at with EMFs is it’s a constant exposure we don’t fully understand, but it does have a biological impact. And essentially, we’re studying that by default on our children right now because we don’t have long-term data and our kids are constantly exposed.
Daniel: Right. And in fact, I think that point is very, very important you just made. These are toxins. The body reacts to a toxin, and believe it or not, exposed to arsenic for one second, will not kill you. If you eat arsenic over a year, you will die. So it really depends on the level of exposure, and the duration of exposure, so you really have to think about it as a toxin. And I don’t recall if you and I chatted about this last time Katie, but when I think about that toxin in the room, I actually think of bees in the room. One bee won’t bother you, 1,000 bees will.
And think of the all the transmitters in your room that could be potentially equivalent to a bee. In your cell phone alone, you have potentially a Bluetooth transmitter, a Wi-Fi transmitter, and a cell phone transmitter, three transmitters in that one cell phone and is sitting right next to you. And you could have the router a foot away from you on the other side of you, and all of a sudden you’re getting more and more and more bees. And the more and more concentration of bees there are in that room, the more and more likely it is that that constant load becomes more and more problematic to you. So you always want to think about how do I reduce the bees in the room.
Katie: That’s another good analogy, and I know that… I hear from people all the time that say, “You know, it’s anti-science to question this and say that EMFs are harmful.” And I think there’s actually a lot of compelling evidence that they not only can be but are harmful, but I would say this is my challenge to anyone coming from that perspective. Because I do think that conversation helps all of us to move this topic forward, I think it’s important to hear disagreement from both sides of the issue. I’m not trying to exclude that at all, but my challenge would be look at the actual data, look at the data from the last 50 years, from how much health outcomes are changing, and the upward curve of everything from cardiovascular disease, to autoimmune disease, to cancers. And try to explain it in any other way besides I think EMFs are not the answer, but one of the many answers.
Explain it to me statistically or mathematically without being able to look at these things, because it doesn’t make sense. Statistically, it does not make sense that within one generation we are seeing such a rapid rise of all of these problems across the board. Because food alone can’t explain that, one lifestyle factor alone can’t explain that, and one thing that has drastically changed during that time, is our exposure to these EMFs. And I would say like let’s shift the burden of proof, if they’re supposed to be safe show me the studies that show that they’re actually safe over the long term, because I’ve looked and they don’t exist.
Daniel: No, actually, really good point. We highlighted a moment ago recent studies, the National Toxicity Program did a $25-million study in the federal government, and they concluded in the epidemiology study a huge study with significant analysis of the details to ensure the study accuracy. That, there is no question whatsoever that under certain exposure levels, there was frontal lobe cancer and heart cancer that was associated with those exposures. That was reinforced by an Italian study last year. And it actually went one step further and was actually larger than the one in the U.S. and they confirmed their findings.
So you can argue that there’s a debate going on, but there is clearly more and more evidence, and the metadata evidence is overwhelmingly proving that is something that you really should consider very importantly in your life to avoid if you can. These are stresses that didn’t exist when I grew up, no question whatsoever. Your children will grow up with it in their lives every day. I talked about bees in the room a moment ago, and now I’ll give you another correlated sort of example of what it actually could look like. When I talk about 4G technologies, those are the common bees in the room. When I talk about 5G, that’s the killer bee coming from Mexico coming into your room. So it’s more dangerous than the current set of bees that you have in your environment.
Katie: That’s a good point, so I think at our first episode, which I’ll make sure we link in the show notes, people can start with that one, we talked about shielding and some things you can do in your home to help reduce exposure. But we weren’t really talking about 5G at that point because this is something that’s new on the scene. So I’m really curious, before we move on from 5G, is it possible to shield from 5G and are there any special considerations we need to know about for that?
Daniel: There are certain characteristics of 5G that differ from everything previous. When you and I had a chance to talk a while ago, we talked about a cell phone having the capacity to go close to five miles and connect to a cell tower, and that’s a fairly long distance. But when you start increasing the speeds of the signal, to get all the content in that signal, that they’re intending to have, those towers now are blocks away. Every other block, there will be a transmitter and receivers for this 5G. So all of a sudden, they’re gonna be so many more of those in our environment.
And essentially, it’s providing services that we already have, so you wanna think about that. You know, you were talking about caution, if you have a service provider that says, hey, I’m gonna give you a 5G router, so we can connect to all your devices and have high broadband service, you actually don’t need it you know. I don’t know I watch TV on my cell phone and it’s fine. There’s enough bandwidth to give me the things I need. So yes, you have to start thinking about how do you want to manage the technologies in your environment.
Katie: Will the things that shield like 4G and 3G, do those same materials also shield 5G effectively if that could?
Daniel: Actually, sort of a technical thing, they refer to the shielding of that stuff with permeability in mind. So permeability says how much can I absorb? And there are some materials that can absorb a little bit, and then others that do it a lot. So yes, there are some technologies that actually can be used as shielding for these next-generation technologies, fortunately, for those who wanna choose to use something.
Katie: Good to know. So let’s go back to the previous topic we were about to circle into which is just kind of give us a roundup of other ways that were potentially exposed to EMFs on a daily basis and we may not even realize it?
Daniel: Let’s talk about some rules because we’ve danced around several rules up to this point, and time, time of exposure, and the distance of that exposure are pretty important components. In other words, if you are exposed to a cell phone for five seconds and you hang up on your mother because you don’t wanna talk to her anymore, virtually, there is no concern whatsoever from that exposure. If you call her back and you talk for five hours and making your apologies for hanging up on her, all of a sudden, that time duration is now much, much longer. And that’s when there’s more and more concern of potential harm.
So the distance from that, if you were to take that same phone call and you put it in your hand, in your speakerphone and you use it for five hours, there’s much less danger to your body than there was when you had it to your head. So you can make choices about where you put technology. Here’s a good example, your Wi-Fi, never have your Wi-Fi near your bedroom right you know that. But why do you have the router on at night if you don’t need it? So you should have timers on your router. So you turn that bee off when you’re not using it and it minimizes the EMF exposures within your environment. If you’re not using the Wi-Fi and the Bluetooth components of your cell phone, why do you have them on? Turn them off, you don’t need them.
If you have a PC or a laptop… I don’t use anything other than my Ethernet, in other words, I use a wire, a physical wire that goes to all the devices I can, and I eliminate those devices from transmitting into the room. So time and duration are very important to manage and of course, the third thing is if you are going to use stuff very close to yourself, you may wanna consider finding ways of preventing those signals from touching you, shielding those signals.
By the way, I needed to mention that I forgot before. Katie, do you know only like four or five years ago, 15% of the population was electric hypersensitive. In other words, if you would pick up your cell phone, your hand would tingle. You would put it to your head, your eyes would hurt, maybe you got a headache. 15% were known to be electromagnetically hypersensitive, of that, 80% were women. So we know for sure that for some reason, women get more affected than men do, and we still don’t know why. There’s some neurological potential reasons why, but we ultimately don’t have enough science to understand it fully.
Well, today, it’s over 20%, so we know it’s increasing. Is it because of the exposures in the environment? We can’t speculate what we can definitely state that there’s a clear increase in that hypersensitivity. And I don’t know if you know people who have that. Some have it pretty severe, and they can’t even go out their front door, it’s so bad. So we know that the electromagnetic component of that environment we live in is actually influencing the hardship of that environment through hypersensitivity to those technologies.
Katie: Yeah, exactly. I actually had the opportunity last year to study at a biological medicine clinic in Switzerland, and like get some continuing education. And some of the patients, the long-term patients there are sensitive to what they call in Europe “Electrosmog” which is essentially EMF. And these patients can’t leave because even exposure from ground wires or electrical wires, or certainly Wi-Fi and cell phone, a couple of them have grand mal seizures from exposure.
Daniel: Yeah, it’s very serious. Actually, I’m working with a team within the medical community trying to help understand this phenomena better. Because we really have to find a way of not just avoiding it, but can you recover from exposures and live normal lives. Because some of these… there was a TV show something about soul. He was an attorney. I can’t remember from where it was from. But he used to put aluminum over his head when he went outside, it was because of the EHS, he really was very, very sensitive.
And I’ve known actually many people who have that same kind of extreme case. And as you get older by the way, if it’s very little now, it gets worse and worse over time. So managing that exposure time now is pretty important before it gets any worse for you. By the way, you would be interested in this statistic, like 99.9% of anybody who’s electric hypersensitive are multiply chemically sensitive too. It’s interesting because we were talking about toxins, toxins, and toxins in our environment, so the body is reacting in the same way.
Katie: So what do you see as some of the most important steps that we can take? Like you said if it’s a minor problem now it’s only going to get worse. So especially as parents, what are some of the most important steps we can take especially regarding our children in this?
Daniel: Make sure that their environment, particularly their sleeping environment, do not have any transmitting sources within it. Like for example, if you have a router on the outside of your bedroom of the child, move the router to some far distant placed in the house not even remotely close to where your child sleeps, because those are constant exposures. There are these devices that allow you to monitor children. If you’re gonna choose to use them, do not have them close to the kids. Put them at the very far into the room, as far away as you can in that environment. Minimize the amount of electronics, because you mentioned something before about ground electromagnetic radiation.
Your wires in your house generate extremely low-frequency stuff. That actually bothers people and can really bother people a lot. So if you’re gonna have a child on a wall, make sure there’s no clocks plugged into the wall creating current in the room that’s creating that emission. So minimize the number of bees in that room and those things are really important.
Other things are you want to make sure that if your children are gonna be using devices, minimize the time in which they use it. You know, time in duration as I spoke before and the distance are really sort of important. So by minimizing it to some extent, not preventing them from using them, but by minimizing it, you actually improve the likelihood of less impact to the child. And so, you wanna be always thinking about it. If you’re gonna give it to a child for a long time, really think about shielding.
Like many people do, they wanna use their technology and they wanna use it next to them. So there are ways you can shield yourself to minimize that exposure. You can’t do enough to minimize that exposure to children. They’re just too susceptible more so than adults are. And believe it or not, if you were calling me and saying I’m electrical hypersensitive, what should I do every time I have to use a computer? I would say, well, take your laptop, push it back at least two feet away from you, and get a large screen that you can see from a distance, and put distance between you and cell…and have at it. You’ve minimized the exposure.
In fact, let’s talk a little bit what that means. When you have a cell phone directly to your head, or you have a laptop directly on your lap, 100% of that signal is hitting you. That’s the worst exposure you can have. When you move it one foot, 80% of that danger to the cell is gone. By four foot, 98%. So if you have devices in your house that you have to have, keep them away from you, keep them away from children. Simple little mechanics like that actually goes a long way to minimize the potential dangers.
If you have, as I said, a router and you have it and you want the whole family to use it, there’s no reason it can’t be in the garage that penetrates walls. And by the time it gets into the house, it’s a minimal danger to the family, as opposed to putting it in the middle of the living room when everyone’s sitting around the router. So simple kind of changes within your environment really can go a long way to minimize those potential dangers to your body.
Katie: And I think that helps us keep it in perspective too that even… you said a little bit of distance can make a big difference. It’s not that we have to go hide in a cave. It’s that we need to be smart about these things. And I know that for the naysayers I will say as well, just consider things in a logical sense. If we make a conscious effort to avoid these EMFs and then later find out they’re totally safe, which I don’t think is gonna happen, then you haven’t lost anything. Whereas, if we don’t make a conscious effort to avoid them and then we find out in 20 years that there are causing cancers or other problems, you’ve lost a lot.
So I feel like this is one of those things that, even if you don’t think there’re solid research there which I actually do, but if someone is listening and doesn’t, it’s still worth potentially looking into and shielding because it doesn’t take that much effort necessarily, and it can make a big difference. And I know there’s things like a study that came out a couple years ago that showed that seven days of camping completely resets circadian rhythm and reduced inflammation in the body, and there’s a lot of theories as to why. But one thing is we don’t have typically when we go camping routers and Wi-Fi and TVs in the tent.
So these people were having a break from exposure to EMF that even in just one week, they saw a drastic difference. So my perspective as a mom is I want… we know there’s positive benefits, we know nature has positive benefits so, A, we wanna spend time out in nature whenever possible. But, B, we want to create a home environment that to the most degree that we’re able is reducing inflammation and mimicking that natural environment to whatever degree we can. So in our house, that means things like we put devices in airplane mode unless they need to be on for some reason. And if my kids are on a device, it is in airplane mode period unless they’re talking to a relative on a phone, and then it’s them on speakerphone or far away from them.
And same thing with… you mentioned the Wi-Fi router, ours is not near anyone’s bedroom, it’s not near anyone’s workspace, and it is on a timer that goes off at night. Because you’re not using it when you’re sleeping anyway, so why have it on. That doesn’t take really any extra effort and it’s a $10-timer from Amazon, is on it’s not that difficult. Another cool thing I recently found at a conference is called an EMF kill switch because you mentioned the current in the walls, so this thing actually can be added on to your circuit breaker box for your house, and it has switches. Because those breaker switches are not meant to go on and off all the time, they’re not like a light switch. And it has add-on switches that let you turn off power to non-essential parts of your house at night.
So you can actually take a break from all of that exposure. So you can keep your air conditioning and refrigerator on, but turn off the Wi-Fi and the non-essential wiring in the walls. So that’s been a cool way that we can use technology in a smart way and kind of reduce our exposure while we’re sleeping. And I’m curious if you have any other tips that you’d recommend that I’ve missed?
Daniel: No, actually, as you were just pointing out, anywhere this current flow, there is an exposure and emissions in the wall, when you have a light on, when you have your radio playing. Any time there’s current flow. So the kinds of suggestions you just had are really sort of simple things, doesn’t cost as much, even if you don’t believe in it take cautionary measures. It doesn’t cost much, and for a little bit of effort, there’s a lot of benefit potentially. Certainly, for those of us in the research side of the business, there’s not much debate. It’s the service providers’ side that there’s debate.
There was another thing you mentioned actually that triggered circadian rhythm. When you look at a screen of an electronic device, there’s a spectrum of electromagnetic radiation in the light spectrum. And believe it or not, most of that spectrum is fine. But at night, when you’re looking at a screen, it’s not just potentially being hitting your retina, but it’s screwing around with the circadian rhythm of your body. And so, the other thing you may want to think about shielding is the loop component of that electromagnetic radiation. And there are available kinds of technologies around that does shield the blue, and it’s more and more growing in its importance.
I’m working with an ophthalmologist and other experts in the field on these subjects, and we’re finding that it’s not just the one simple thing you worry about impacting, like circadian rhythm. As you know, it’s a bunch of stuff that’s related to circadian rhythm that you’re worried about. And so, taking up a precautionary measure about the exposures you have from the blue light is something you really should also consider by shielding as well.
Katie: Exactly, and that’s another point on the camping study, people were also not exposed to artificial lighting for seven days and within seven days they had lab measurable drastic differences in their circadian rhythm, and their hormones. Because from, like my side in the health and nutrition background, melatonin is the hormone that signals sleep. It also is connected to everything from cortisol, to vitamin D, to proper estrogen, testosterone, progesterone production, all of that. When your melatonin is messed up, you are gonna be potentially at risk for a lot of health struggles.
And I’ve seen data showing that even, like you said, a little bit of exposure to blue light at night, not even just on the retina, but even on the body at night, can cause sleep problems, and then this cascade of insulin issues and hormone issues, and hormone imbalances. It’s just everything is so connected, so I think that’s another really important point as well. And another thing that’s easy enough to avoid in my opinion, call me old fashioned, I know I am, but kids don’t need to be looking at screens, and they certainly don’t need to be looking at screens after dark. To me, that’s a great time to have family time and turn down the lights and spend time in community versus just watching TV all the time.
Daniel: Yeah, not only that, I don’t know if I mentioned this to you the last time we had a chance to chat, but I have a colleague, Dr. Ali Johansen in Sweden. We talked a little bit, not much of course, about oxidative stress to the cell. I was not worried about as much as the oxidative stress as the systems impact to the body. Why can’t you sleep at night when you have a clock one foot away from you, or a cell phone one foot away from your head? It’s because it’s screwing around with your melatonin process, the creation of the melatonin for you to fall asleep. So it’s not just a cell you’re worried about as you are just pointing out, it’s so many, many other things that are impacting in the body.
And Dr. Ali recently in his research found, it’s not only an oxidative stress, and that it impacts other parts of the body, but the way they do it is it suppresses the immune system. So when you are exposed to an RF signal, this is oppression of the immune system, thus the potential argument about why is there an increase in electro hypersensitivity. It’s because our bodies are reacting to this our immune system is becoming less and less capable of withstanding the exposures. So as you pointed out, the better you minimize exposure, the most likely the better off you are long term.
Katie: Yeah, exactly good to know.
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Katie: And I wanna make sure that we don’t neglect to talk about shielding devices because I get asked this especially by parents a lot, and I personally use a shielding case on my phone and on my laptop. And I know that you saw this as a big problem and created products to fill that need, because you realized the trajectory of what we are seeing. But I’d love if you could speak a little bit to how we can responsibly use shielding technology on things like our phones, at our tablets, and our laptops, and how that technology works.
Daniel: Yeah, actually maybe you read the story. Seven years ago or so my sons were using their laptops on their laps and my wife turns around says, “I want grandchildren.” And she had this intuition that the exposure to the emissions from a laptop were dangerous to the sperm of the male. And I said, “Ah, that can’t be true,” well I did some research and of course, immediately found out it was true. In fact, 25% of the male sperm is immobile after three, four hours of exposure. So it became clear to me that there was evidence that suggested that there may be a need for shielding. So I looked around and I couldn’t find anything that really was as effective as it should be across the spectrum of shielding that was required.
So there were technologies that actually I developed and took advantage of in a series of products that actually prevents the signal from touching your body. So you can you should devices but you’re not exposing yourself to any greater risk because of the use of that device. And there are ways that you can shield the signals at the ELF level, for example, this sort of one set of specifications you’ve gotta meet. And when you’re RF, it’s another set of specifications, but there are devices that actually can shield, and those devices are available in the marketplace.
Katie: Yeah, exactly. And I’ll make sure some of those are linked in the show notes especially the ones that I use. Those will be at wellnessmama.fm, for anybody listening who wants to check those out. I know we’ve touched on it a little bit, but I’m really curious what your response is to people who say that people who are worried about EMFs are being alarmist and that this concern is not backed by science?
Daniel: They’re not informed, period. There’s no question whatsoever. There is a sufficient amount of evidence that I’ve had… I wasn’t a believer necessarily. I was a neophyte seven years ago. But I also ran technical laboratories for many, many years in the Bell System, so I was used to looking at data. So I began looking at the data, and it was clear to me that if you paid any attention to the research that was being done, that there was reason to be concerned. I don’t think you should throw your phone away, I don’t think you should not use technology, but I think you should be concerned about it because there was clear evidence that there was impact to the cell.
We’ve learned a lot over the past five years, we know it’s a danger in their use. Most of us are gonna be probably okay, but some of us will not be, it will be impacted without proper management of that technology around their environment. So that’s what I would say, in fact, Dr. Ali had a conference in Europe, and he said, “All right already enough is enough, we know enough, in the research community to say this is a problem.” And I truly believe his point, is that we know enough. The problem has been research didn’t link to practice. It wasn’t general common knowledge what was going on in the research space.
And there’s a preponderance of evidence that talks about it clearly, and there’s clear evidence. In fact, I don’t know if you remember “Radiation Nation” was a book we put together for that very reason. We didn’t think research was getting to the science community, the practitioners that were helping the public, nor the public itself. So we released a book “Radiation Nation,” to help people be informed about what we know and what we don’t know. You decide if it’s a problem or not, but clearly, there’s enough evidence in the marketplace, in the science community talking about the problems, and I would take precaution if I were you.
Katie: Great response. I had a couple other questions I can’t believe we’re already at end of our time already. But I love to ask and I want to get your answers to, first and foremost would be is there a book besides your own which of course will be linked in the show notes, that has really had an impact on your life or that you would highly recommend?
Daniel: Actually, it’s funny you ask me that question, believe it or not, when I was quite young, I read a book and you’ll know it, “Little Women.” It was not a science book. It was a book as you may know that was starting at the Civil War level, and it is about the lives of women, their charitable contributions, as well as more importantly, the relationships of their family over their lifespan. So to me, that was sort of like pretty insightful, and I guess at that point before I read the book wasn’t quite as aware of that kind of impact, understanding relationships was. So a surprise answer, I’m sure.
Katie: That is a new one for that question, and a surprising random fact about me, I was actually Jo in “Little Women” in a play back in high school.
Daniel: You’re kidding me.
Katie: I’m really familiar with it, probably could still recite some lines if I thought about it for a minute. So another question I’d love to ask and I think you’re gonna have a really insightful answer to, is if there was a piece of advice that you could spread far and wide, what would it be and why? Because there’s a couple hundred thousand people who will at least hear this, so I can help you get it that many at least.
Daniel: Recognize what’s important in your life. And the way I like to think about it is on your deathbed, Katie, you won’t be thinking about your podcast, you won’t be thinking about the pretty shoes you bought, the nice new car you have. What you’ll be thinking about is your close friends and your family. So recognize the most important things in your life are the family around you, so my advice is to pay attention to your friends and family.
Katie: That is great advice and I think probably at the end of the day, some of the most important health advice we can get. I think family, and community and time together is by far one of the biggest health factors, and I love that you brought that up. Well, Daniel, I know that, as a Researcher, a business owner, everything that you do, you’re very busy and I really appreciate you taking the time to be here again, and to educate and to share. I think, like I said at the beginning, this is an increasingly important issue, and I love that it’s such a passion for you to help educate us about it.
Daniel: Well, thanks so much for inviting me. I really do enjoy the opportunity to talk about these things, just to help people understand the environment. They make choices on what they wanna do based on knowledge, that’s the best way to make good choices. And with your work, sharing to your listening audience the importance of maintaining health and understanding all aspects of health is very, very important. And I appreciate an opportunity to share my aspect of that health to your community.
Katie: And thanks to all of you for listening. And I hope to see you again next time on “The Wellness Mama Podcast.”
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