Results of the GSM and UMTS Study

Results of the TETRA Study

Synopsis of results from the paper ‘Do TETRA (Airwave) base station signals have a short-term impact on health and well-being? A randomized double-blind provocation study’ by Denise Wallace, Stacy Eltiti, Anna Ridgewell, Kelly Garner, Riccardo Russo, Francisco Sepulveda, Stuart Walker, Terence Quinlan, Sandra Dudley, Sithu Maung, Roger Deeble, Elaine Fox

Main aims

Our main aims were to establish whether short-term exposure to a TETRA base-station signal affects:

a)    physiological responses
b)    subjective well-being
c)     total number of symptoms experienced

In addition to this we wanted to answer the simple question as to whether people can actually detect the presence of electromagnetic fields.

Design of Study

The study involved one open provocation session (when both researcher and participant knew when the base station was on or off) and two double- blind sessions (when neither researcher nor participant knew when the base station was on or off).

There were two exposure conditions:

TETRA
Sham (meaning the base station was turned off)

Session 1: Each participant completed an open provocation test. During this time participants' heart rate and skin conductance (amount of sweat they were producing) were monitored constantly. Participants recorded any symptoms that they were experiencing and rated their current levels of subjective well-being. At the end they completed a quick double-blind test comprising four 5-minute trials. At the end of each trial they made a judgement as to whether they believed the base station was on or off.

Sessions 2 and 3: These sessions were all double-blind, but this time participants only received one exposure condition per session. Again, during this time participants' heart rate and skin conductance were monitored constantly, they recorded any symptoms that they were experiencing and rated their current levels of subjective well-being. At the end they made a judgement as to whether they believed the base station was on or off.

Summary of results

We found that:

1) The open provocation tests demonstrated that the laboratory conditions did not prevent sensitive individuals from responding to the TETRA signal. For example, during the open provocation test, sensitive participants reported more symptoms with greater severity during TETRA compared to Sham, and they reported feeling worse.

2) Under double-blind conditions, when participants did not know the order of exposure, there was no increase in physiological response or number of symptoms experienced and no decrease in subjective well-being, during TETRA exposure (base station ON) compared to Sham (base station OFF).

3) Neither the sensitive nor the control group could detect the presence of electromagnetic fields at above a chance level. Out of 48 sensitive individuals, two people were correct on all six trials, and out of 132 controls, 3 were correct on all six. This is broadly what is expected by chance.

Do TETRA base-station signals affect physiological responses?

Sensitive individuals consistently had a higher heart rate across sessions compared
to controls. However, this was not affected by whether the base station was on or off.

Do TETRA base-station signals affect number of symptoms reported?

Sensitive individuals consistently recorded experiencing a higher number of symptoms across sessions

compared to controls. However, under double-blind conditions this was not affected by whether the base station was on or off.

These results are consistent with our previous study and existing research (see Rubin et al., 2009 for review).

Please note that this is only a very brief synopsis of the results. For full details please see the published paper.